Versions of “Speed Trials”: looking at lyrics, learning about smiles. by Yohei
by Yohei
I recently re-listened to Elliott Smith‘s earlier, demo version of his song “Speed Trials.” Though the demo is poorly recorded, it has some noteworthy lyric moments that are, I think, more interesting than the later version’s.
Placing the original, demo lyrics in the margins in bold, the chrous of finished version of “Speed Trials” (as it appears on Either/Or) is,
It’s just a brief smile [crossing your face,] got stuck on your face,
running speed trials [still standing in place.] all over the place.
To the ear, it seems as if the earlier lyrics have been improved. “Crossing your face” is softer than the harsher and germanic “ got stuck on your face.” Yet, there is a subtle indeterminacy in the original line that isn’t preserved in the song’s final form. “It’s just a brief smile got stuck on your face,” immediately branches into two possibilities that are, wonderfully, left open. Is it “It’s just a brief smile, [that] got stuck on your face,” or “It’s just a brief smile, [I] got stuck on your face”? Both potential lines flicker in the empty space between “smile” and “got”. Even better, while the images are alternating (one a frozen smile, the other that first moment of attraction), they are at the same time forging — from that flickering — a combined image: an unstable, moving one that is both the stuck smile and getting stuck on it.
I prefer the earlier chorus then, but there is something rewarding in juxtaposing the two versions. As editors of manuscripts or theorists of textuality or bibliography remind us, texts are unstable, but examining that instability uncovers what would be lost in any single version. It’s a banal premise now, reflected in how common the practice is: Wordsworth’s Prelude comes in an edition including the 1799, 1805, and 1850 forms. Norton Anthologies of poetry reproduce (in appendices) canonical poems in various versions, with crossings-out and revision marks intact.
Thus, only from seeing both versions of “Speed Trials,” does it become clear that the smile is — to complicate matters — from the start, somewhat fragile and always on the verge of tumbling downward into its less joyous version, a frown. In version 2, the brief smile negates itself with “crossing,” a cross look. Just as it’s counterintuitive to think that a smile can cross (or dampen) a face, version 1 similarly undermines the smile in it’s own way, by grabbing its brevity and fleetingness by the collar to make it stick around — turning it into a forced smile (the kind one pastes on in job inteviews). Still, none of this to simply say that smiling is unhappy. Smith sings in another song,
“You see me smiling you think it’s a frown / turned upside down,” (“St. Ides Heaven”)
and there as here, the point seems to be that smiling is all the more valuable precisely because it can become a cross look in the short time it takes cross the face, or its honest spontaneity can get stuck into an insincere, meaningless smile — that smiling can turn upside down in an instant or else be virtually the same thing.
The whole song is below and there is more to unconvered.
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Speed Trials
He’s pleased to meet you underneath the horse,
in the cathedral with the glass stained black,
singing sweet high notes that echo back,
to destroy their master.
May be a long time till you get the call-up,
but it’s sure as fate and hard as your luck.
No one’ll know where you are.
It’s just a brief smile [crossing your face,] got stuck on your face,
running speed trials [still standing in place.] all over the place.
When the socket’s not a shock enough,
[you little child what makes] you think you’re tough, You’re a child because
[when all the people you think you're above,] You can’t remember what you were thinking of.
[they all know what's the matter.] Don’t ask what’s the matter.
[You're such] a pinball yeah you know it’s true. ‘Cuz he’s
[there's always something you come back running to,] He’s gonna keep on running back to you,
to follow the path of no resistance.
It’s just a brief smile crossing your face,
running speed trials standing in place.
It’s just a brief smile crossing your face,
running speed trials all over the place
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