Peter Bjorn & John - Young Folks

Appreciating the whistling song, when you are unable to whistle yourself

Photo by ChurchArt Online: https://www.pexels.com/photo/boy-in-red-knit-cap-and-gray-crew-neck-shirt-13181038/

Throughout my life, there have been two everyday, ordinary things I’ve never been able to do that has led to endless hours of self-conscious fretting.

Snapping my fingers and whistling. 

You were expecting something more traumatic?

SNAPPING

Snapping my fingers, I could fake pretty easily, as it was rare that I would be required to perform solo snapping. Finger snapping, in my experience, was always something done in a group setting — an act of camaraderie by the Jets gang in the musical West Side Story. A form of voicing approval during a speech when clapping would be too loud and disruptive.

I could always mime the finger movements. I knew what my digits were supposed to do; they simply refused to emit a sound through said action. I figured my stubby sausages were too fat, too oily, too nervous to create a sharp snap.

When I was in 6th grade, I admitted my finger-snapping disability to Carrie Hamburg, my next-door neighbor, who was in the 8th grade. She was my closest connection to feeling slightly cool. She looked like Farrah Fawcett’s younger sister and never treated me like the geeky middle-schooler that I was — the way I assumed all the older kids saw me.

“What do you mean you can’t snap?” 

Carrie’s shocked expression surprised me. It was as if I had told her I couldn’t clap my hands. I may have had stubby sausage fingers, but I was an excellent clapper. From my cupped palms, I could emit deep, resonant claps. As the famous Nancy Sinatra song says, These hands were made for clapping. 

“I just can’t snap!” I snapped, pouting. “I don’t know how else to put it.”

“All you do is….” And then Carrie snapped her fingers, her thumbs and middle fingers sliding off each other in one swift motion, then her thumb and pointer finger landed together in a gentle embrace. “Here, give me your hand.”

Carrie reached over and grabbed the fingers of my right hand and formed them into the shape she thought would make a fool-proof snapping position. As if my fingers weren’t sweaty enough, having young Farrah touching them sent my twitching digits into moisture overdrive. 

I prayed that my fingers would finally obey and make that sweet, sharp, magical snap. Even if just this once. But alas, nothing. Carrie tried again with my left hand and even dried off my sweat with a towel. Whether wet or dry, my fingers refused to sing. 

Ferris Bueller snapping and whistling simultaneously. The friggin’ showoff.

Another reason I regret not being able to snap is because it’s a useful way to get someone’s attention. Instead of calling out, “Listen up!” you could snap your fingers and, if done right, get the response desired.

Super-skilled snappers can send a sharp finger signal to their intended recipient and have it cut through the roar of a crowd. It’s a useful alternative to yelling. 

So is whistling. Whistling is like snapping on steroids. 

WHISTLING

I get the need to whistle when you desperately need to grab someone’s attention. But for the most part, this type of whistling, the non-musical form, is simply annoying, bordering on oppressive.

Have you ever been to a concert or a sporting event and someone (usually some drunk guy with a non-ironic mullet) won’t stop blasting out brain-rattling whistles at a pitch that could shatter glass? The sort of person who seems to believe that all the other patrons came to the game/show/venue just to listen to his 5-octave whistling skills? This type of douchebag jackass couldn’t care less that his eardrum-piercing whistles have obliterated (hopefully temporarily) your hearing’s upper register. It’s this sort of sonic violence that can lead a peace-loving lefty to question their opposition to open-carry laws.

Thankfully, most whistling is pleasant to listen to and provides an aural signal that a person in a good mood is nearby.   

Whistle while you work. Put on that grin and start right in to whistle loud and long.

Yeah, never been able to do that. Whistling, that is. And if you ask a few of my old bosses, the working part too.

I’ve tried. I’ve puckered my lips in a hundred different ways. Like Carrie Hamburg, I’ve had well-meaning friends and girlfriends try and teach me how to whistle. The best I could do was add a little tonality to my heavy breathing. Perhaps my sausage lips (like my sausage fingers) were too fat and coated with Chapstick.

I always wanted to be able to whistle, to carry a tune in whistle form (or even in voice form), as it seemed like people who could whistle tended to be happier. They tended to be better equipped at entertaining themselves.

Lauren Bacall — you cannot shame me!

But unlike snapping, it’s common knowledge that a fair percentage of the population can’t whistle. According to my hasty research on the internet, the best guess is 70-80% of the population can whistle.

So, I’m not alone in my whistling ineptitude. And my shame at being a silent whistler has lessened as I’ve gotten older. I’ve evolved from seeing whistling less as a natural ability and more as a nice-to-have.

I’ve come to view whistling from the proper perspective of an appreciator. Similar to how I can appreciate talented guitarists and pianists even though I can’t play either instrument. Or any melodic instrument. Except for the kazoo. I’m a beast on the kazoo.

YOUNG FOLKS

I was reminded of this appreciation the other day when my latest earworm, Peter Bjorn and John’s “Young Folks,” appeared.

Appeared from where I am unsure. Maybe I walked past a stranger that was whistling and it triggered the song. Maybe it played unobtrusively from a car driving past. Maybe the barista at Peet’s was named Bjorn. However it came to me, my first reaction was joy.

I’ve always loved this song.

It’s imminently catchy and features not just whistling but bongos and maracas. And it includes the classic male-female lyrical trade-off, immortalized by Sonny and Cher. (As well as a thousand other duets before them.)

Guest vocalist Victoria Bergsman (of indie pop band The Concretes) joins Peter in lead vocal duties. Their voices blend perfectly together, conveying the song’s meet-cute new-love vibe with just the right blend of innocence and wariness.

The first verse, below, has Peter voicing his worry that Victoria, his potential love interest, would not want to be with him if she knew his past history. In the second verse, sung by Victoria, she tells him, in essence, let’s just see this night through and not try and make a bit to-do about it.

If I told you things I did before, told you how I used to be
Would you go along with someone like me?
If you knew my story word for word, had all of my history
Would you go along with someone like me?

I did before and had my share, it didn't lead nowhere
I would go along with someone like you
It doesn't matter what you did, who you were hanging with
We could stick around and see this night through

The message of the song, captured so wonderfully in the chorus, is: let’s just accept each other as we are now. Not who we used to be, not who we might become in the future.

And we don't care about the young folks
Talking 'bout the young style
And we don't care about the old folks
Talking 'bout the old style too

I’ve been a big fan of Peter Bjorn and John since their self-titled debut album in 2002. It blows my mind that they’ve been around for more than 20 years. Could it really be more than 16 years since this song and the album it is from, Writer’s Block—was released? How can that be? I remember when “Young Folks” was omnipresent on alternative music radio and streaming sites. Wasn’t that only a handful of years ago?

The video (above), like the song, is adorable incarnate. The simple, low-tech animation is a perfect match for the spare, colorful, infectious tune.

It starts off with animated Peter showing animated Victoria how to whistle as they sit on a park bench. She quickly picks it up (as she doesn’t have sausage lips like me), and soon they are whistling together. Then, a speech bubble appears above Peter’s head that says, “My place?” And instead of it being creepy, it comes off as sweet as when they get to his place, the other guys in the band are there, ready to rock out!

Yeah, probably not the best move for a first date. But maybe in Sweden, first-date jam sessions are all the rage. Or were, back in 2006. But Victoria’s invited to sing, which she readily accepts, and seems to be okay with having to deal with Bjorn and John.

When I watch this music video, it brings me back to that time when Carrie Hamburg tried to teach me how to snap and the times that other girls tried to teach me to whistle. Maybe what I needed was a genteel Swedish pop singer to show me how it was done. But since that never happened and likely never will, I’ll have to be content watching this video and listening to this song, air-whistling (and air-snapping) along to my heart’s content.

“Young Folks” was not the first song to feature whistling, and it won’t be the last. I can certainly think of a few classic tunes with whistling as a main ingredient.

Snapping songs, though less common than whistling tunes, also have an important place in modern music. A couple that come to mind are Lorde’s 2013 hit single “Royals” and Queen's (with David Bowie) “Under Pressure.”

• What songs that feature whistling are your favorites?

• What songs that feature snapping are your favorites?

• Are you as challenged as I am when it comes to whistling and snapping?

• Are there any actions or behaviors that seem natural or innate that you simply can’t accomplish no matter how hard you try? Don’t be shy, get ‘em off your chest!

• As always, thanks for reading! - Steve