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Anders Duus: 'Bobby Malone Moves Home' by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
98 Plays5 months ago
We’ve had the pleasure of interviewing lots of friends on this podcast. Why else would you start one? Meet Lydia’s friend, Anders. They regularly share music, stories and thoughts, but this wasn’t the conversation Lydia thought they’d have - It’s a good surprise. He’s also a regular listener to this podcast, which is a lovely thing.
Anders Duus is a playwright, dramaturg and translator, based in Strängnäs, Sweden. These days he splits his time between teaching dramatic writing at Stockholm University of the Arts and freelance writing. (And what brilliant writing he writes…)
Show notes:
Website: https://colombine.se/forfattaren/anders-duus
Instagram: @duusen
Help us a grow a community of survival song listeners by joining us on over on Substack:
https://survivalsongs.substack.com/
'Bobby Malone Moves Home' by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone can be found on our community playlist on Spotify along with our listener’s Survival Songs. Check it out and add your own!
This episode contains small portions of 'Bobby Malone Moves Home' by Casiotone for the Painfully Alone. Survival Songs claims no copyright of this work. This is included as a form of music review and criticism and as a way to celebrate, promote and encourage the listener to seek out the artists work.
Find out more about ARTIST here:
https://open.spotify.com/artist/4FdSsjcX7vzOnN5zNqQWAy?si=QFlGsWSrSNqwkoYbnIfJhg
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Transcript
Introduction and Playlist Concept
00:00:01
Speaker
I'm Lydia. I'm Ed. We're friends with a playlist for everything. And it turns out, we both have one called survival songs. And he got us thinking, what are other people's survival songs? So we thought we'd find out.
Inviting Guests and Listener Engagement
00:00:15
Speaker
Welcome to Survival Songs. A podcast where each episode our guest tells us about a song that gets them through the best and worst of times. Sensitive topics might be discussed. So look after yourself. The show contains portions of copyrighted material. We'd love for you to support and celebrate the artists by streaming, downloading and buying their brilliant music. And go give our guests a follow on social media.
00:00:38
Speaker
Help us grow the community of Survivor Song listeners by joining us over on Substack and add to our public playlist on Spotify. Links are in the show notes.
Guest Introduction: Anders Deuss
00:00:47
Speaker
We hope you enjoy the show. Hello, welcome back to Survival Songs. It's Lydia again this week. And I'm really, really, really delighted to be talking to my friend, Andish, this week. Andish and I met on a course three or four years ago, maybe longer actually. And it was one of those situations where we were flung into a breakout room on Zoom together and had the kind of conversation that we knew was starting a friendship.
00:01:19
Speaker
Since then, we've had regular conversations mostly over the internet, although last year we met in person in Sweden, which was a brilliant, brilliant thing. And I really, really value ah the conversations that we have about art, about writing, and occasionally about music, which is why I invited Anders to be on the podcast.
00:01:41
Speaker
The bio that he sent is very sparse but of himself Anders says that he is a playwright, dramaturg and translator based in Strangnes in Sweden. I hope I got the pronunciation right there Anders.
00:01:57
Speaker
These days, he splits his time between teaching dramatic writing at Stockholm University of the Arts and freelance writing, which he's being very coy about here. His freelance writing is a beautiful, beautiful thing. As is his music choice, it's Bobby Malone Moves Home by Casio Tome for the Painfully Alone.
Song Analysis: 'Bobby Malone Moves Home' Themes
00:02:19
Speaker
Hey, Bobby Malone.
00:02:24
Speaker
It's good to have you home.
00:02:38
Speaker
So that was a little bit of Bobby Malone Moved Home by Cassio Tombs for the Painfully Alone. What a beautiful set of words to say one after another. That was very fun. Yeah, it really is. Thanks. Thanks, Anders. That's the survival song of our guest today, Anders Deuss. Hello. Hello.
00:02:57
Speaker
How many about this song and this I've never heard it. I've been listening to it all afternoon. It's fascinating. I want to hear all about it. But when did when did you first come across it? I think I was down a rabbit hole listening to like bedroom covers of mountain goats songs.
00:03:12
Speaker
um ah as you are occasionally, and I ah came across a young man who was playing a mountain goat song on a really, really dinky small keyboard, and he was really good, and he also had a recording of um of a castor tone for the Painfully Alone song, not this one, but another one, and I just liked the name, so I kind of looked it up, and Bobby Malone Moves Home was the first song that sort of came up as I looked it up in my streaming service and so I i put it on and I'm fairly sure I cried the first time I heard it. Yeah, it's stayed with me since.
00:03:53
Speaker
And we've shared a lot of music in our friendship and so I had sort of inklings of what you might choose or why you might choose it. And we talk a lot about lyrics and um or settings for using music. We've talked about protest songs. we've We um share music in different languages. I'm fascinated to know what made you choose this as a survival song. What what gave it that sort of ah status or title?
00:04:21
Speaker
um I think that, you know, being a fan of the podcast and having heard a lot of people presenting their survival song, I kind of, one one simple answer is I wanted to sort of take my own angle on it a little bit, maybe. But I think also that this song ah really encapsules two really important things.
00:04:43
Speaker
ah regarding survival for me and the first one is the concept of of home and being welcomed home. I think welcome home is my favorite phrase in the whole world. Nothing makes me feel as warm and happy and safe as the phrase welcome home. um So that's one part of it and the other part is that it's a song about accepting failure and and sort of um that failure isn't necessarily be a necessarily a horrible thing, but maybe necessary for growth. um and This is something that I'm struggling a lot with in my life. so I think that those two things combined makes this a song that speaks very um very profoundly to me. In all
Exploring Survival and Home Concepts
00:05:28
Speaker
its in all its simplicity, um it packs a punch for me. Yeah, it really does. really because I ah found listening to it multiple times,
00:05:38
Speaker
I heard something different every time I listened, but it's really useful, isn't it, to have this character of of Bobby Malone because he's talking to him about him the whole time while also are going, oh, that's me. Oh, that's also them. Oh, that's all of us. Are you listening to this song regularly or is it something you reach for a particular time with purpose?
00:05:59
Speaker
I think it it it appears on numerous playlists I have, ah and not necessarily you know a song that I sort of reserved for special occasions, but it tends to bring me into a certain kind of mood when I hear it. so i think that ah that i whenever I hear it, I kind of tend to need it, if that makes sense. um So even though it isn't put in the context um necessarily that deals with, you know, everyday hardship or whatever, it it kind of feels like a little bit of a ah warm hug when i when I come across it.
00:06:36
Speaker
I'm still lingering on the fact that welcome home is your favorite phrase. I didn't know that. that's really Isn't that a beautiful phrase? So beautiful. and and I'm sitting with it in a way that I haven't because you've you've pointed at it for me. it makes me wonder and It makes me want to ask the question about whether there's a bit of this song that you wait for or a bit that you kind of go, oh, there it is. That's that that's my part. That's my line.
00:07:00
Speaker
I mean, the song is basically about you know someone who has sort of left their hometown to go out and and you know try and try their own route. And as the song says, it didn't work out. And and they sort of come home with a tail between the legs a little bit. And the the the the the single line that always makes me sort of draw a ragged breath is is how you have grown.
00:07:33
Speaker
sort of acknowledging that. that um despite the whole project being a failure, acknowledging that you know you're coming home different, you're coming home bigger somehow. So that's that's really one of the parts that's really that really gets me. And also, I think that you know just this sort of this dinky piano that comes in between the verses is, to me, it's spikiness. It's really beautiful. But I think the phrase, how you have grown, there's so much love in that.
00:08:06
Speaker
and You alluded to it earlier ah a little bit, but what what does survival mean for you, particularly in relation to this song? Survival to me can can really be a very literal thing. It's in the way sort of finding purpose to stick around, ah you know as as basic as that.
00:08:28
Speaker
um but also the the foundation of being something more than that, you know ah which is where, you know, coming back to Welcome Home, I think, um having a place, having a context, a place where you can go to sort of lick your vo wounds, but also a place where you can emerge from. And that's where this song takes you to?
00:08:50
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it obviously just sort of, um it just touches on one aspect of that. I mean, it's really, this song is really a station on a journey, isn't it? I mean, we have no idea where Bobby Malone goes from here. And he could be, you know, he makes the same mistake over and over and over again. But there is... To me, there is this is a song that is that at least has the hope of of growth in it, has the hope of of sort of being accepted, and from that acceptance, finding a bravery, I think.
Storytelling and Human Experience
00:09:24
Speaker
Can you talk to me a bit about storytelling? Because you're you a playwright and an educator. You must have come across the best and the worst of storytelling. And then you've chosen a song that is the the you know that is that has images and a a main character and feels very filmic to me in a way that lots of people haven't. So there's there's clearly something important to you in that. what's so why Why is storytelling important to you?
00:09:53
Speaker
and What makes good storytelling, maybe? To me, storytelling is is really one of the things that perhaps makes us interesting as a species, is that we do that and that we use stories to make sense of the world we live in. um and and To me, stories have always been a way of of understanding or of trying new thoughts and trying new ideas and also maybe feeling less alone at times. To me, the story is very connected to the ground. It's very connected to be grounded rather than
00:10:30
Speaker
rather than flying or drifting or up in the air. ah Story to me is trudging through the undergrowth in Wellingtons, maybe. That's a way of moving that makes sense to me. I don't think I understand things without without story. I think it's it's as simple as that.
00:10:49
Speaker
That makes every sense to me. And it also makes sense to me as someone who knows you as a person who responds to the season and and you know you pick mushrooms in the in in particular parts of the year and you spend a lot of time outside with your kids. And I wonder how much that sensibility is impacted by your your culture and your country and and your hometown and and all of these kinds of things.
00:11:14
Speaker
I mean, i and I don't think there's a people on the world that don't consider themselves to be storytellers. I mean, I think i think that's you know that's that's really basic human nature. But I think that there is those things that you describe are also a way of feeling your way in the world, maybe, and also a way of creating memories together. And memories are stories, I think. It's been really gorgeous to have this conversation. and Yeah, it's been lovely
Playwriting and Translation Insights
00:11:41
Speaker
talking to you.
00:11:42
Speaker
Anything that you would like to point our audience towards in terms of work that you've made, ideas you're having, um how would people find out more about what you've done and what you're doing? I have very little work available in English, unfortunately. i mean A few of my plays haven't been translated, ah but mostly into other languages in English. If you are curious about me, I think the best place to go look is perhaps my my publishing month of my publisher, my agency.
00:12:10
Speaker
which is columbin.se. and c o l o m b i n e but c They have all my place. There are about 50 of them. um and ah Yeah, something like that.
00:12:24
Speaker
Have a sit down, Anders, what are you doing? Just out of interest, what are the languages have they been translated into? if um I have been translated into, well, the nor and the Nordic languages, so Norwegian and Finnish, ah Russian, Latvian, German, Spanish,
00:12:47
Speaker
ah Cantonese. No way! Yeah, there so I have a I have a play that is being revived for the third time in Hong Kong. My goodness. That's so exciting. Well, thank you for this and thank you for this.
Closing and Listener Call to Action
00:13:03
Speaker
Thank you so much.
00:13:11
Speaker
We really hope you enjoyed the episode. If you want to support the podcast further, you can choose to upgrade your subscription on Substack. But most of all, we'd just love it if you told your friends about what we're up to. Thanks for listening.