#270 (of 365) "I Don't Like Haunted Houses" Buff Ginger

Back in the summer of 2023, I went to the 18th Ward Brewery in Brooklyn--next door to concert venue Brooklyn Steel--where they'd been having a weekend outdoor "concert" series of local bands playing for free on the sidewalk with outdoor seating and brewery beers. My friend Laura and I went and it was for a "shoe-gaze" themed day of music, which was right up my alley, if not necessarily Laura's. We talked a bunch and didn't really focus on the bands so much, but what I heard I liked enough to investigate afterwards. I don't remember all the bands who played that day, as they were all brand new to me, but two of them--two of the five!--ended up reaching far enough into my listening experience to make this list of my favorite songs of all time. That's pretty damned impressive. And one of the greatest things about living in (or near) the city. To go to a random show on a hot random Saturday and find two bands who would become favorites of all time. 

One of them is Buff Ginger, who I know little about, but this song from their 2021 debut album of the same name (available only on Bandcamp, not Apple Music right now) has been at the top of my playlist lately. The brilliance comes down to one line, for me. After a sputtered stream of consciousness start of the song, with a lot of sentences beginning with "I know" he ends with "I know I don't like haunted houses, and I didn't know you knew too". To me, the obvious ending would be "I didn't know you did too"--as in, hey we both don't like haunted houses. But it's instead, a deeper condemnation of his difficulty in connection with this other person (which starts with "I didn't know you kissed him back, and that's probably because I didn't ask"). He didn't know that (she/he) knew that he didn't like haunted houses. Like they've already had that conversation before, and he'd forgotten. I'm probably reading too much into a toss-off lyric but just the tripping of my expectation made me listen to the song an entirely different way. Anyway, hoping for great things from the band--EP New Jokes came out in 2023--and here's some more great words from the song:

Is losing motivation such a criminal act? Cause everyone tells me I'll get lazy and fat.
You better be a rich man and you better do it fast, cause that money you have is not built to last.
It appears that we're having a domestic. It appears that I can't tell if it's a joke anymore anymore anymore...
If you quit smoking what do you have left to lose, if you quit smoking all that's left is your abuse, there's no more news, there's no more news...

"I Don't Like Haunted Houses" - Buff Ginger // I Don't Like Haunted Houses (2021)