Geek Love and Finding the Perfect Wedding Song

Slate's Double X has a post up on the challenges of finding the perfect wedding song. I do fear to blog about my upcoming nuptials, lest To My Parents, Ayn Rand and God devolve into an abyss of pastels and questionable grammar à la theknot.com. But it is is something I've struggled with myself, as so many of the songs that I love most are ill-suited for weddings.

I've thrown out several suggestions to my fiance. Sadly, we cannot use the closest song that we have to *actually* having a song, which is Vampire Weekend's "Mansard Roof. The song came to be ours because he was going to teach a course in Argentina, and I'd hoped to come with him. I confessed once that I thought of this upcoming trip every time I heard the line in "Mansard Roof" about the Argentines collapsing in defeat. The trip then fell through because of budget cuts, so I suppose the Argentines really did collapse in defeat. Still, there is nothing that is romantic whatsoever about "Mansard Roof" or indeed about Argentines collapsing in defeat.

So, to the actual suggestions. First was Bob Dylan's "You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go, which is one of the few love songs I find non-sappy enough to be bearable. "Situations have ended sad/Relationships have ended bad/Mine have been like Verlaine's and Rimbaud's" may also be my favorite lyric ever.

Second, Buddy Holly's "Dearest." It is sweet, melodious, and lovely.

Third was the Velvet Underground's "I'll Be Your Mirror." This is a tougher question. It is one of the most beautiful songs I know, and it is actually rather perfect as a first dance for a wedding. On the other hand, it is not actually my fiance's and my song. Rather, it's an "our song" to a friend from undergrad and me. This would not be so bad -- "I'll Be Your Mirror" functions beautifully as either a song about two super-close friends or as a love song -- except that the platonic friendbecame a Catholic priest and once confessed that he had romantic thoughts about me, but had, um, decided to stay in the priesthood anyway. Further details of this situation probably properly belong off-blog, but one can understand the dilemma I face. Is it worth it to try to re-purpose the song, or just stick with the less emotionally fraught "Dearest?"

Although I must say I've never cared for "The Last Days of Disco," I suspect the Double X columnist might understand.