The mid-century Jazz stylings of Cousteau’s signature song “Last Good Day of the Year” were already considered severely dated when it debuted in 2000, a relic from a distant era, positively antediluvian by Pop-cultural standards. But then, this was the same turn-of-the-millennium milieu when seemingly all the detritus of the 20th century was allowed one last brief revival before the end came: it was when Blue Grass momentarily returned to the mainstream charts thanks to the “O Brother, Where Art Thou” soundtrack; when Big Band Swing (the bane of many a YSA youth dance of the period) enjoyed an equally-brief resurgence thanks to the likes of Squirrel Nut Zippers and Brian Seltzer; and when throwback Jazz crooners like Norah Jones and Michael Bublé (also mainstays of many a millennial BYU student’s CD collection) released their debut albums. In that regard, Cousteau fit right in with the moment.

Albeit with this subtle difference: Cousteau’s first and most famous single appeared to at least be self-consciously aware that it was an anachronism–that in fact it’s time-out-of-joint feel was the whole point. Folks like Norah Jones and Michael Bublé by contrast seemed to be sincerely trying to bring Jazz back in vogue; Cousteau however seemed well aware that they were already out of time—in every meaning of the phrase.

The lyrics themselves, after all, are about mourning the inevitable end of summer (“When the summer’s so forgiving”)—which in turn is an obvious metaphor for mourning the inevitable end of youth (“you’re burning/For nothing to change”)—when you see the leaves start to turn (“All the leaves are turning/Autumn’s fingers burnished”) and the air chills (“with the the north wind breathing down my neck”), when you realize not just your youth but your life entire is as fleeting as the summer, that everything must change, that “all things must fail,” that nothing young can last. It’s a sentiment that could only be expressed in a long-outmoded musical genre; in fact, if mid-century Jazz crooning ever did enjoy a full-scale mainstream revival, it would fatally undercut the feeling of the song entirely.

The video itself affirms this reading, as the singer sports a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it memento mori skull ring as he runs around an English beach with his lover before it becomes too cold to do so, uncaring if he ruins his suit in the ocean because he’s keenly aware of how little time they may have left anyways, so doesn’t waste any of it changing into something different. The video also both begins and ends with a brush fire, eventually revealed in the finale to be caused by a car bursting into flames—implicitly both of them were almost caught in it. He opens the song by crooning to his lover “Don’t tell me/That you get sick of living…” because it seems like such a horrid thing to throw away life, when we get so little of it to begin with. The phrase “Carpe Diem” comes from the ancient Roman poet Horace, whose complete line translated reads as, “Seize the Day, and trust as little as possible in the future”; such is also the ethos of “Last Good Day of the Year.”

And of our religion. One of the many paradoxes of our faith is that we are all so persistently and consistently counseled to save prudently and invest wisely for the future (such is the sole defense and justification for the Church’s staggering hedge fund at present, is it not?); yet we are also endlessly reminded that there is always less time than you think, that “As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth” (Psalms 103:15), that “what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away” (James 4:14), that the rich man who gathered his abundance into barns to enjoy his retirement (such sound investment advice!) was a “fool,” for “this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?” (Luke 12:20), and so to “not procrastinate the day of your repentance” (Alma 34:33).

These are not necessarily contradictions: just as the first shall be last, and we must be abased to be exalted, and we are less than the dust of the earth yet also “The worth of souls is great,” so also are we to prepare for the future yet also live in the moment. Short life is no more guaranteed to us than long life is. Only eternal life is guaranteed, and paradoxically the only way to properly prepare for it is to behave as though it will only last a day. We are to live eternally as though it really were the last good day of the year.