So, I’ve been thinking a lot about love and romance lately. And I’ve been chatting a lot about music with this new guy that I really like. (He’s really great, but this blog is not about him… not about the romantic escapades that you might have gotten used to over the past few blog entries. I will say he is someone new, it’s going great, and that’s all for now).
Today, I am thinking about music in relation to my life, my progression as a human, and less about the romance of knowing and liking the same obscure 90s and 00s indie rock bands, although that’s pretty awesome. Nick Hornby taught us this in High Fidelity.
My discovery of music started when I was quite young with top 40 pop music. I sang Madonna’s “like a virgin” when I was about nine, no idea what the lyrics meant, and was truly unaffected by them. A few years later, I was “out of the blue” with Debbie Gibson and I even won a Billy Idol cassette from a radio station in Calgary in grade seven. I liked what I was told to like by the radio, by my friends, etc. I even liked Milli Vanilli, girl you know it’s true. Go ahead and judge. I can take it.
The thing is that as I got older and discovered more music via my Mum’s records (Harry Chapin and Joni Mitchell, specifically) and started seeking out better music, I figured out that music could do more than just entertain, it would become the soundtrack to my life. Thinking back now about the music I was listening to at the time big moments occurred in my life, shows the importance of it and how it developed me in a real way throughout my life. The songs that could be the background to montages of experience in the film about my life, and how music has instructed me in life… that is what I want to write about today.
So, Mum’s records, in high school… I remember playing “both sides now” whilst laying on the floor of our dining room, reflecting on the emotion and depth that Joni sang about… the angst which life can carry with it. Harry Chapin, and how he articulated love and relationships, still give me goosebumps today. I remember listening to The Chili Peppers’ “Under the Bridge” while laying on the warm hood of my mum’s car in the garage because I was banished there for listening to music too loudly. I remember going to the park and swinging with my little brother the night before I went away to university, singing The Rugburns’ “Me and Eddie Vedder” at the top of our lungs. I remember being in Amherst Massachusetts for a youth conference and falling upon a record store that was a museum to Fugazi. I remember playing NOFX and Pennywise and hearing the depth in the “happy punk” lyrics. So, yeah… my musical appreciation tour started in high school.
Then I got my first car, had a tape deck installed, and blasted Nirvana, Meat Puppets, Pearl Jam, The Offspring, Green Day, James, and sometimes Erasure, Depeche Mode, and even the random musical. I loved nothing more than driving around listening to music and feeling the freedom of the road. I was liberated by that tape deck in that aqua blue Toyota Tercel.
Then, in university (because of a roommate that loved music as much as me) I was introduced to a whole new thing – more good old music – cheesy and campy, but good. Neil Diamond and The Carpenters in playful karoake in our living room, Van Morrison on repeat, and dancing frivolously – because we could – to whatever songs inspired us. We sought out local bands where we lived and revelled in going to our favourite coffee houses to hear them play. The layers of my appreciation for music were deepening. I suddenly was mixing my punk with folk with classical with quirky rock…
Then I discovered mix tapes.
The amazing gift that you could give a friend (or often someone more than a friend, in a way of expressing how you felt through music and lyrics) that was inexpensive, but revealed a bit of your soul. I received mix tapes with glee and played them on repeat twenty times a day, or more. The mix of genre, the lyrics being written on my heart and engraved on my mind, yes… I think that the era of the mixtape was when music really came alive to me.
So, today I really miss mixtapes. I miss going to stores looking for odd postcards to use as the background image for the liner notes. I miss the hours I sat next to my stereo choosing songs that I thought might speak to the person I was making a mix for. I miss the days in Japan when I had no money, but would make “The Christmas Blend” mixtape for gifts to send off in orange envelopes to my people back home.
Today I have Apple music on my phone and I can get playlists and albums of the music I love, all for a great price and stuff… but I am missing the surprise of what songs might end up on the next mixtape I might receive. And mix CDs were just not the same, right? (After publication update: previously mentioned guy, after reading this very blog entry has promised a twelve track playlist that can somehow be delivered in person).
This morning as I listened to Yo La Tengo and Kristen Hersh and reminisced about those days of the mix tape, I also reflected on the music of the day and the state of my mind and heart. Music has saved me from heartache more times that I’d like to admit. Music has inspired me to think and feel more fully. Music has defined road trips and late night hang out sessions… Now I realize that music defines how I see the world, how I feel the world. I just had to share.
That’s all (for now).
karlamarlablog 