The Soundtracks of our Lives
I have been doing some thinking lately, brej, and some talking, with various people, about how music fans tend to have a sort of running soundtrack to their lives. Like, there are records, songs, bands, whatever, that define a certain period in your life, and whenever you hear them, they take you back. There are certain songs you remember clearly as being connected to a certain moment in your life... or is it just me?
When I was a kid, I had an amazing Fisher-Price record player (which still works, btw - astormyhaze knows the lore of of Old Tab's great Fisher-Price record player) and a fairly extensive record collection. The earliest record I can remember playing over and over again is Raffi's Singable Songs for the Very Young, and I also had some really classy Care Bears records, on which the various bears sang about caring, and the soundtrack to Strawberry Shortcake in Big Apple City, which I can still sing from memory (skarily enough).
When I graduated to tapes, I had a lot of disdain for my older cousins' love of "stupid rock music" (although I do remember having a thing for Madonna's "Papa Don't Preach" when I was, like, seven). What I loved was soundtracks. I started out with The Sound of Music and Disney soundtracks (Sleeping Beauty was my favourite until The Little Mermaid came out), and later graduated to Les Miz and The Phantom of the Opera, which I listened to obsessively until I could sing every word of both straight through.
When I moved to Toronto, I started waking up to the world of politics around the time of the 1992 Charlottetown Accord referendum, and then even more so once Mulroney retired in disgrace in 1993. With my growing interest in socialist politics, my love of Moxy Fruvous was born. I first heard them at a CBC Town Hall on the Charlottetown Accord in 1992 and promptly found a copy of their six-song indie tape at the library. When Bargainville was released the next year, I was instantly hooked, and my first "real" (i.e., non-Raffi, non-musical theatre) concert was when I went to see them play at the Danforth Music Hall the same year. That was the height of FruMania, and coincidentally, the opening artist at that show was a recently-signed young woman by the name of Jann Arden. Interesting, eh?
I discovered BNL around the same time as Fruvous, but as I've said before, Fruvous really was the band of my youth. They were quirky and unabashedly weird and fiercely political, and it was always just plain fun to watch them live. They had the earnestness and idealism my teenaged self craved and spoke to the issues of the moment, and being part of the FruWorld was the right kind of La Vie Boheme existence I needed then. I think one of the key signs of the band of one's youth should be whether they are quoted in your graduating yearbook, and voila, look me up and you will see my grad quote begins with "If you can't see dreams, your eyes are blind. - MF"
Fruvous were starting to fade and go their own ways when I started university, and that was around the same time BNL came back with a vengeance and suddenly became cool again after years of being the dork band that sang "If I Had a Million Dollars". I didn't care that they were cool, but I did go to my first big BNL gig around that time and realized that the band kicked 390483048 different kinds of ass live. My love for them was cemented, and much of my early university time was soundtracked by BNL.
Somewhere between high school and university, I started getting more into the Toronto indie scene aside from BNL and Fruvous, and for some reason, this seemed to consist mostly of female singer-songwriters who played acoustic guitar and piano. I discovered Emm Gryner and Sarah Slean and soon became brej-y with them, thanks to Old Tab, and quickly got into Weeping Tile, Feist, and other music of the Lilith Fair ilk. I was a pretty hardcore Lilith Fairy the three years the festival existed, and while I'm not so much into that kind of music anymore, I will say those were some good times. I'll even admit to loving Jewel back when she was playing a residency at C'est What and no one knew who the hell she was.
We all know what happened with my taste from there - from indie female singer-songwriters, I expanded further into the indie scene, and my love of hobos blossomed with time. It took some time to really click, hardcore - Old Tab told me about BSS when they were just a jam band playing at Ted's Wrecking Yard, and I heard Stars' Nightsongs before it was even released, but all I remember is that when I heard Heart, I fell in love, and I haven't looked back.
Did you have a song associated with your first big crush? I remember mine, pretty clearly - it was "Summerlong" by Emm Gryner, because it was summer, and I was 19, and the lines "Nineteen years I didn't know you/I still loved you for them all" seemed written for us. And your first breakup song? Mine was "Stay", by Lisa Loeb, because it was more a truncated relationship than a breakup, and "I thought, 'Hey, I can leave, I can leave'/But now I know that I was wrong" seemed painfully apt.
Your summer fling song? Mine was set to "Symphonic", another one of Emm's tunes, because he had blue eyes, and "There were no lies in your blue eyes/Only a summer day" seemed to work, as did the plaintive "How could I forget you?" of the chorus. A song for a bad day? "Wonder" by Natalie Merchant was mine, with its "She'll make her way" message of hope.
Your first real love song? "My Invitation" by Sarah Slean, and the line "Love me for stupid reasons, I like those most" stuck with me, but in truth, I think my heart was a swirl of music at the time, some of which I'll always remember and some of which I've already forgotten.
And for those of you who are old like me, is there a song that made you realize you were an adult and couldn't be a kid or even a teenager ever again? Mine was Stars' "Life Effect", and after the moment I listened to it and had that flash of realization, it took me a year to be able to listen to it without having an intense visceral reaction again.
I've said before that I think Stars are the band of my first foray into real adulthood, because they personify, to me, a lot of what this time of life is about - figuring out what love and hate really mean to you, dealing with new relationships and old ones and trying to sort them out and make sense of them and their place in your world, trying to believe in something and fight the good fight before you're overwhelmed by everything else the world can throw at you. Heart took me into this stage of my life and Set Yourself on Fire has grounded me here, and I've told a few people this, but I honestly think (and hope) that whenever my favourite hobos come out with a new record, it will be there to usher me gracefully into my old age (as in, my late 20s/early 30s *snikkerz*).
Okay, now that I've rambled on without making a lot of sense, I'm going to let you guys tell me if you have songs that soundtracked your lives, with a little poll, behind the next cut.
Poll The Soundtrack of Your Life
When I was a kid, I had an amazing Fisher-Price record player (which still works, btw - astormyhaze knows the lore of of Old Tab's great Fisher-Price record player) and a fairly extensive record collection. The earliest record I can remember playing over and over again is Raffi's Singable Songs for the Very Young, and I also had some really classy Care Bears records, on which the various bears sang about caring, and the soundtrack to Strawberry Shortcake in Big Apple City, which I can still sing from memory (skarily enough).
When I graduated to tapes, I had a lot of disdain for my older cousins' love of "stupid rock music" (although I do remember having a thing for Madonna's "Papa Don't Preach" when I was, like, seven). What I loved was soundtracks. I started out with The Sound of Music and Disney soundtracks (Sleeping Beauty was my favourite until The Little Mermaid came out), and later graduated to Les Miz and The Phantom of the Opera, which I listened to obsessively until I could sing every word of both straight through.
When I moved to Toronto, I started waking up to the world of politics around the time of the 1992 Charlottetown Accord referendum, and then even more so once Mulroney retired in disgrace in 1993. With my growing interest in socialist politics, my love of Moxy Fruvous was born. I first heard them at a CBC Town Hall on the Charlottetown Accord in 1992 and promptly found a copy of their six-song indie tape at the library. When Bargainville was released the next year, I was instantly hooked, and my first "real" (i.e., non-Raffi, non-musical theatre) concert was when I went to see them play at the Danforth Music Hall the same year. That was the height of FruMania, and coincidentally, the opening artist at that show was a recently-signed young woman by the name of Jann Arden. Interesting, eh?
I discovered BNL around the same time as Fruvous, but as I've said before, Fruvous really was the band of my youth. They were quirky and unabashedly weird and fiercely political, and it was always just plain fun to watch them live. They had the earnestness and idealism my teenaged self craved and spoke to the issues of the moment, and being part of the FruWorld was the right kind of La Vie Boheme existence I needed then. I think one of the key signs of the band of one's youth should be whether they are quoted in your graduating yearbook, and voila, look me up and you will see my grad quote begins with "If you can't see dreams, your eyes are blind. - MF"
Fruvous were starting to fade and go their own ways when I started university, and that was around the same time BNL came back with a vengeance and suddenly became cool again after years of being the dork band that sang "If I Had a Million Dollars". I didn't care that they were cool, but I did go to my first big BNL gig around that time and realized that the band kicked 390483048 different kinds of ass live. My love for them was cemented, and much of my early university time was soundtracked by BNL.
Somewhere between high school and university, I started getting more into the Toronto indie scene aside from BNL and Fruvous, and for some reason, this seemed to consist mostly of female singer-songwriters who played acoustic guitar and piano. I discovered Emm Gryner and Sarah Slean and soon became brej-y with them, thanks to Old Tab, and quickly got into Weeping Tile, Feist, and other music of the Lilith Fair ilk. I was a pretty hardcore Lilith Fairy the three years the festival existed, and while I'm not so much into that kind of music anymore, I will say those were some good times. I'll even admit to loving Jewel back when she was playing a residency at C'est What and no one knew who the hell she was.
We all know what happened with my taste from there - from indie female singer-songwriters, I expanded further into the indie scene, and my love of hobos blossomed with time. It took some time to really click, hardcore - Old Tab told me about BSS when they were just a jam band playing at Ted's Wrecking Yard, and I heard Stars' Nightsongs before it was even released, but all I remember is that when I heard Heart, I fell in love, and I haven't looked back.
Did you have a song associated with your first big crush? I remember mine, pretty clearly - it was "Summerlong" by Emm Gryner, because it was summer, and I was 19, and the lines "Nineteen years I didn't know you/I still loved you for them all" seemed written for us. And your first breakup song? Mine was "Stay", by Lisa Loeb, because it was more a truncated relationship than a breakup, and "I thought, 'Hey, I can leave, I can leave'/But now I know that I was wrong" seemed painfully apt.
Your summer fling song? Mine was set to "Symphonic", another one of Emm's tunes, because he had blue eyes, and "There were no lies in your blue eyes/Only a summer day" seemed to work, as did the plaintive "How could I forget you?" of the chorus. A song for a bad day? "Wonder" by Natalie Merchant was mine, with its "She'll make her way" message of hope.
Your first real love song? "My Invitation" by Sarah Slean, and the line "Love me for stupid reasons, I like those most" stuck with me, but in truth, I think my heart was a swirl of music at the time, some of which I'll always remember and some of which I've already forgotten.
And for those of you who are old like me, is there a song that made you realize you were an adult and couldn't be a kid or even a teenager ever again? Mine was Stars' "Life Effect", and after the moment I listened to it and had that flash of realization, it took me a year to be able to listen to it without having an intense visceral reaction again.
I've said before that I think Stars are the band of my first foray into real adulthood, because they personify, to me, a lot of what this time of life is about - figuring out what love and hate really mean to you, dealing with new relationships and old ones and trying to sort them out and make sense of them and their place in your world, trying to believe in something and fight the good fight before you're overwhelmed by everything else the world can throw at you. Heart took me into this stage of my life and Set Yourself on Fire has grounded me here, and I've told a few people this, but I honestly think (and hope) that whenever my favourite hobos come out with a new record, it will be there to usher me gracefully into my old age (as in, my late 20s/early 30s *snikkerz*).
Okay, now that I've rambled on without making a lot of sense, I'm going to let you guys tell me if you have songs that soundtracked your lives, with a little poll, behind the next cut.
Poll The Soundtrack of Your Life