When I was in 9th grade creative writing, we had to write an essay that was very descriptive and mood-setting, based on something we’d experienced recently in real life.
I wrote a story about my friends from band and me meeting up at a local pizza place after we had done a quick “introduction to band” thing at the middle school. It was really nice because it was the first time in a while that we’d gotten to be “the older kids” in a school setting. You know, when you’re freshmen you’re always the youngest kids. And even though we were all in high school band together, we were mixed in with kids from other grades so we never got to be “together alone” anymore. Plus, the pizza place was next to the middle school, very far from the high school, so since none of us could drive we couldn’t be there much anymore.
Anyway, Black Hole Sun was on the jukebox a bunch of times while we were there. Plus, that song was on the radio all the friggen time that year. I wrote about it in my expository piece for creative writing, which sort of sealed the song and the memory for me. Now every time I hear that song I think of that night. Or my essay. Or both. heh.
In the clearing stands a boxer
And a fighter by his trade
And he carries the reminders
Of ev’ry glove that layed him down
Or cut him till he cried out
In his anger and his shame
“I am leaving, I am leaving”
But the fighter still remains.
One of two songs I could relate to before I discovered Prozac, the other being the Eagles “Take it to the limit, one more time.” Not the best inspiration to get you out of bed, but realizing I wasn’t alone helped.
looked for it for the full imagined drive, since fully imagining it is not possible since the Blue Highways in Illinois connect one cornfield to another perpendicularly. Which is good, considering my condition when the song came on.
I was 16, and involved with an summer program for students. They sent us to live in a dorm in downtown NYC (Pace). No parents, one 23 yo RA who was in it for a quick buck. There were 26 female students and 4 male students. It was an amazing time, the first time a lot of us were treated like adults. That song was all over the radio, and in my head the whole time. Every time I hear I think of that summer.
The entire track list of Actual Miles, Don Henley’s compilation CD. I played it constantly for a while, when I was running with a certain crowd and deeply in love with a certain person. The associations have begun to fade now, but it used to and still can catch me up in a huge wave of nostalgia, especially The Boys of Summer and The End of the Innocence. (Finding those songs on Youtube just…wow. The ability to call up memories like that is powerful stuff.)
Less pleasantly nostalgic is Natalie Imbruglia’s Torn. I used to spend many long hours in a movie theater standing at a little booth and tearing tickets and listening to this song and others looped constantly through the PA system. Other than a Sting song, most of the music has faded from my mind except Torn, and it still viscerally brings those memories back to me…at least, as viscerally as the memories of working in a movie theater can be, anyway. It took me a long time to admit that it really is a good song; I just know that for years I couldn’t bear to hear it outside of work.
“Step Inside This House” (the Lyle Lovett version). On my second date with my now fiance, he played his guitar for me. This was the first song he played and it was so sweet. I feel so hard for him.
There were a couple of years when I was about 19 to 20 when I kind of did what I wanted and who cares what anyone thinks. I had a car that had a sun roof and I would open that sucker as wide as it went and put all the windows down and drive as fast as I could.
At night, when the stars were bright and wheeling around me, and the wind howled, and I drove as fast as a bird over Indiana hills that smelled like woods and lakes, and I felt so free that I was flying, I would put that CD in the player and it would be that one perfect moment.
“What’s New Pussycat” by Tom Jones and “Down in the Boondocks” by Billy Joe Royal. Same situation for me, except it was 1965. My family had rented a beach cottage for two weeks in August on the outer banks of North Carolina. This place was remote - so remote that you could only pick up one AM radio station, and it seemed those two songs played constantly (certainly every hour or two). Apparently the #1 song during the two weeks we were there was either “I Got You, Babe” by Sonny & Cher or “I’m Henry The VIII, I Am” by Herman’s Hermits. But those songs don’t stand out in my memory like the ones by Tom Jones and Billy Joe Royal! Great memories!
I’ve got three that trigger strong emotional memories for me.
John Denver’s I’m Sorry. I used to perform publicly and did a lot of Denver’s stuff. I closed a set with this song and caused a young lady in the front row to break down sobbing. Seems she had just broken up with her boyfriend and was trying to get over it. This song apparently pushed her button badly, and for some reason, the show and the time I spent talking to her afterwards has really stuck in my mind.
Al Stewart’s Flying Sorcery. When I was younger, I spent a lovely weekend with a young lady, most of it in the sack, with Al’s Year of the Cat album playing over and over on the stereo in the next room. As much as I like YOTC, this is the song that stuck in my mind from that weekend.
Back to John Denver. His song This Old Guitar, IMNSHO, tells the reason anyone plays guitar. In addition (and you will see a comment to that effect on the YouTube site), it’s the song that
I’ve been in three car accidents (never at fault). Robert Palmer’s “Doctor, Doctor,” was playing when two of them happened. You’ll never see anyone move as fast to change a channel when that song comes on while I’m driving.
The first week of June, 1967…I graduated from 8th grade (big ceremony, caps & gowns) and at the reception in the church hall immediately afterward, a hot 6th grader kissed me. Completely unexpectedly and most welcome.
The #1 record that week was The Doors, Light My Fire. 42 years later whenever I hear it I think of that girl.
The Indigo Girls’ “Closer to Fine” will always remind me of a week at the beach in Avalon, NJ, with a friend who became much more that week.
I was away from home working at a new job before our new house was ready. Our sweet 5-year-old beagle had suddenly gotten ill and was at the vet’s for a couple nights while they tried to figure out what as wrong. My wife was coming up that day with the kids as we were taking possession of the new house. I thought “I’ll call quickly to get a status update on the dog” and found out he died. I was so sad.
When I got in the car to drive over to the house and get the keys, “Time of your Life” by Green Day was playing on the radio. I still get tears thinking about that moment, and whenever I hear that song I sing it for our beagle.
On a happier note, “Copacabana” always reminds me of our driving trip from Pennsylvania to Ganonoque, Ontario, the summer I was 7 years old. Riding in the front of the 1976 Ford Granada, that song came on the AM radio a lot during that trip. A nice, goofy song to commemorate that trip.
Oh yeah, Something to Talk About by Bonnie Raitt. Hubby and I met at work, and when we started getting cozy, we kept it mostly to ourselves. Still, a few people knew (we told them, knowing they’d keep it under their hats), and one caught us walking hand in hand at the mall. This song came out around the same time, and it just seemed so apt.
Checkin’ In by A. J. Croce (Jim’s son, and quite talented in his own right) was playing in my car’s CD player when some yutz pulled out in front of me and totaled my new car. We had to go to the junkyard to pull the CD out.
