Amanda's meme. Allison: The Album.
I've probably gone about this entirely the wrong way, but alas, it is what it is! midtownmandy told me a while ago that she was thinking about starting a meme akin to the Guest DJ project on KCRW (89.9 Santa Monica. KCRI, Indio/Palm Springs; KCRU, Oxnard/Ventura; KCRY, Mojave/Antelope Valley. KCRW is hand-picked music and NPR news, streaming and podcasting at KCRW.com. We are a community service of Santa Monica College.) and I've been thinking about which song I'd pick since then...but couldn't exactly figure out how I'd make the music available.
As it is now, I'm including full-length clips of my selected songs under the cut, courtesy of imeem. I also have all of them in m4a format...but since I'm on my work computer, I don't have them at hand to upload right now. I may just amend the post later with yousendit links should anyone want to DL the clips.
Confusing enough? Yeah? Great! Let's start the meme:
Your mission, should you choose to accept it - and you should - is to post the songs that have “stamped” your life. It can be as few or as many as you need it to be. Tell the story that goes along with each song and then title your blog/Facebook note/LiveJournal post/WHATEVER “[YOUR NAME]: The Album.”
Here’s mine...
1. "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" - Elton John & Kiki Dee
Don't Go Breaking My Heart - Elton John & Kiki Dee
This is one of the earliest songs I ever remember hearing, and - along with "Teddy Bear" by Elvis Presley and "I Just Called to Say I Love You" by Stevie Wonder - it was part of some Disney cartoon special for Valentine's Day that we taped off of TV and I watched over and over and over again. Of course, I eventually tired of it, and so didn't hear the song again for a number of years, but when I did, it immediately transported me back to the carpet in front of the TV at my family's first house, watching Robin Hood and Maid Marian get married again.
2. "Walk Like an Egyptian" - The Bangles
Walk Like An Egyptian - The Bangles
Yes, I am a child of the '80s. How did you guess? This one comes from my dance classes when I was about 4 or 5. At the end of every dance recital, all of my teacher's classes would come out on stage, one group at a time, and take a bow before scooting to the back of the stage and making room for the next class. One year, we did this song as our finale song, and each class came out on stage doing the Egyptian move. You know, one hand palm upward in front, other downward in back. This is another one of those songs that I don't consciously remember as "Oh, I liked the Bangles when I was a kid," it's just this fun tune that I always associate with wearing too much makeup and my mom smearing it off with Vaseline and watching for the red light of my dad's video camera in the audience.
3. "Main Street Electrical Parade" - Disney
01 Main Street Electrical Parade From Disneyland.mp3 -
Second Disney reference; I am aware. And thankfully, the version on imeem says, "Disneyland's Main Street Electrical Parade" instead of "Disney's Electrical Parade," like it does on my CD. BECAUSE THAT'S WHERE IT BELONGS. I went to Disneyland for the first time when I was about 5, then again in the second grade, then again for my 10th birthday. It's what you do when you grow up in California. And this parade has always been my favorite, no matter how dated it looks now. My mom says that when I saw it the first time and the lion from "Robin Hood" swung out of his organ float, I squealed. And when we were there when I was in high school to see the parade in Disneyland for the last time, I had the strangest experience: I stood behind this little girl with wavy brown hair cut fairly short and wearing a purple raincoat with a purple-and-white striped lining. It was like my 10-year-old self had been transported right there for the occasion. Now, the parade is at California Adventure, and I still go to see it, but it's not quite the same.
4. "This Used to Be My Playground" - Madonna
This Used To Be My Playground (LP Version) - Madonna
I did my best NOT to pick any songs from movies or TV shows, but I think this one could be an exception. "A League of Their Own" came out during the summer I went to visit my family in Cincinnati alone for the first time. I got on a plane by myself, the whole shebang. And my aunt and I hit up SO many movies, including that one, which is still one of my all-time favorites. And the use of this song at the end - it still kinda baffles me, because it's so sad. But I get actively angry if I'm watching the movie on TV these days and they cut it off at the end. It still brings me to tears. I think it just reminds me of that summer and how much fun I had, and maybe how it started a more involved relationship with those grandparents that I'm so glad now that I had.
5. "Save the Best for Last" - Vanessa Williams
15 - Save The Best For Last - Vanessa Williams
Sixth grade. Katharine Allen and I could not get enough of this song. We taped it off the radio, and I clearly remember hanging in her bedroom at her parents' old house near the Sikh temple, probably there on a sleepover, doing makeovers and playing Barbies and listening to this song. (HELL YEAH, WE STILL PLAYED WITH BARBIES IN THE SIXTH GRADE. WE'D MOVED ON TO BARBIE SOAP OPERAS AND LIFETIME MOVIES.)
6. "No Rain" - Blind Melon
No Rain - Blind Melon
Junior high dances in the old Centerville gym. Even now, when I hear this song, I still bellow the "Oh-oh-OH-OH!" like an entire room of seventh and eighth graders did back then.
7. "Great Balls of Fire" - Jerry Lee Lewis
Great Balls Of Fire - Jerry Lee Lewis
Touching back on the dance thing - I ended up enrolled in the dance program with the City of Fremont for about 15 years. It started with 3-year-olds in tap class and ended up evolving into my participation in a more elite, competitive dance troupe. I'd been wanting it for several years, and finally got admitted around the eighth grade. The routine to this song is one of the first I learned once I joined, and I can still do it today...if you ask me nicely. It has a baseball theme.
8. "As I Lay Me Down" - Sophie B. Hawkins
As I Lay Me Down - Sophie Hawkins
This one's actually kind of difficult to listen to. It was popular right around the time my grandfather died, when I was a freshman in high school. It was the first time I'd lost a grandparent, and it really shook up my mom. We flew back to NC, and a blizzard hit while we were there. One of the first times I truly experienced snow.
9. "Theme from 'Shaft'" - Isaac Hayes
Theme From "Shaft" - Isaac Hayes
Ahhh, senior calculus. This was "my joke" with a group of boys in my class...including Tim Snelson, my crush. My first failed attempt. The song is still badass, though.
10. "Build Me Up Buttercup" - The Goops
Build Me Up Buttercup - The Goops
My freshman year of college, I ended up in this suite in the furthest possible dorm. Ten stories of cement block, no air conditioning...and some pretty cool suitemates. We became fast friends, and while it didn't necessarily last (a long story), we had a good time that year - especially with movies. We watched all the Tarantino and Kevin Smith flicks, which led to this song. Jay and Silent Bob do a pretty hilarious dance to it in "Mallrats," and we taught ourselves the choreography. (We didn't have YouTube then, so how did we do it? Someone may have had a pirated copy on the campus network. *g*) I can probably still do this dance too...
11. "Take on Me" - The Marching Tar Heels
Apologies to the former Marching Tar Heels on my f-list, because this is obviously not the Marching Tar Heels. But this version of "Take on Me" is not on imeem, and this was the best I could do. I could of course put any number of fight songs, or the opening sequence from football games, up here, but those are all still relevant to me. Hearing this, because I don't get to hear it on TV or anywhere these days, takes me back to crisp September/October Saturdays with my dorm keys stuffed in my pocket, hot dogs and fresh-squeezed lemonade that I'd always spill all over my face, and nearly empty stands in the waning moments of the fourth quarter as we lost yet another game. Hee!
12. "Closer to Fine" - Indigo Girls
Closer to Fine -
Weird story on this one: I think this is the song I associate with my maternal grandmother's death on Jan. 1, 2000. (She wasn't Y2K compliant.) I say "think" because after her funeral in China Grove, we went out for dinner at the local country club, where all of my aunts, uncles, cousins - basically, my mother and her entire side of the family save for me and my dad got completely trashed. We went back to my uncle Bob's house and put on music. And I believe that this was one of the songs, because I have this memory of my cousin Paul drunkenly putting his arm around me and telling me that I needed to listen to the lyrics now that I was in college and etc. etc. etc. The reason I'm not sure about the song? I have no idea why an Indigo Girls album would be at my uncle's house. He's a former Marine, for God's sake. Unless my cousins were staying there for the funeral and it was theirs...
In any case, I took his words to heart and picked up on this song. When I started to have a troublesome relationship with my university as the years went on, this became one of my anthems.
13. "Blurry" - Puddle of Mudd
Blurry - Puddle Of Mudd
DON'T JUDGE ME. The summer I lived and worked in Cincinnati, I had just started driving my dear, departed Squeaky, and all she had was a tape deck. And the only options I had for radio there were top 40, really hard rock, rap or country. So I think it was on the top 40 station when this song came on, and I have this distinct memory of sailing over the bridge connecting I-71 north to I-275 west on my way home from my internship to it. That summer was one of the best decisions I've ever made, so I therefore have a soft spot for this song because of it.
13. "Motherland" - Natalie Merchant
Motherland - Natalie Merchant
I actually had to review this CD as part of my duties as an arts desk writer for The Daily Tar Heel, and I didn't particularly like the album. But this track spoke to me, especially because I was a senior and - due to a combination of factors - ready to get the hell out of dodge. My fabulous internship convinced me that I was ready to join the workforce, I was getting dicked around at the DTH and Phi Beta Kappa, and after so many years of just knowing that I'd live in North Carolina, I'd come to the conclusion that I'd been wrong. Of course, I love NC and always will, but I'd realized that I'd been born and raised in California and had to go back. My "Motherland" was calling me home, and I was ready to go.
15. "Bring Me to Life" - Evanescence
Bring Me To Life - Evanescence
This song is one of my favorites of all time, which is against type for me, but it represents a particular era as well as a moment. The era: My final semester in college, but also, a time when I got involved in this new community and met a bunch of new people, including the lady whose meme I'm doing right now. The moment: Sitting in my car on the overpass on Columbia St./15-501 over the 54 bypass in Chapel Hill, heading toward campus late at night. Don't remember why (maybe playing DD?), but I do remember sitting at that intersection and hearing the song come on the radio and thinking, "Wow, I like this."
16. "Somebody Told Me" - The Killers
Somebody Told Me - The Killers
Amanda also picked this one, but I'm not just copying her, I swear! This song was on the radio so much in 2004 that every time I was driving from Cupertino (one of the cities I covered) back to downtown San Jose (where I worked) it came on. I remember getting on the ramp from southbound 280 to northbound 880 with the little "bomp-bomp" in the song right before the chorus, and bopping my pigtails in time to the music. Yeah, I famously wore my hair in pigtailed buns a lot that year.
17. "Rich Girl" - Gwen Stefani & Eve
Rich Girl - Gwen Stefani
One word: Rome. Oh, wait, another: Cairo. Every where Meredith and I went on our grand trip, we heard this song. A cafe across from the Colosseum. On the BBC while we were watching TV in Katharine's Cairo apartment. Out at a Cairo nightclub. It was ridiculous.
17. "Welcome to the North" - The Music
Welcome To The North - The Music
When I first moved to L.A. and was temping, this is the song I set as my alarm on my iPod. It works well for that purpose; it starts out with about 20 seconds of quiet guitar before plunging into the full-out rock. Even now, when I hear it, I think of sunlit wood floors and air mattresses that had to be deflated each day and calling Apple One and ironing clothes in the dining room.
19. "Get Ur Freak On" - Missy Elliott
Get Ur Freak On - Missy Elliott
Scene: Casa de Crackerbox, Gardena. Amanda and I are bored with the selection of CNN, ESPN and broadcast networks on our hotel-room TV. So we turn to PBS and find a production of "Swan Lake" on. As I'd had this song in my head for several weeks due to a promo on KROQ, we muted the TV and turned on Missy Elliott. It fit almost perfectly with the choreography of the ballet, and we nearly died of laughter. Apparently, someone's ringtone for me is still this song because of this moment.
20. "Le Disko" - Shiny Toy Guns
Le Disko - Shiny Toy Guns
Oh, this was a fun day. In June 2006, my purse was stolen AND my car was totaled. I'd just picked up a rental car at the Burbank Airport, probably an hour or so after discovering what had happened to my poor Squeaky. I was sitting in traffic on the 5 south, trying to go home and figure out what the hell to do next, and this song came on. I enjoyed the song and still do, but it was such a surreal moment that I just started laughing.
Wow, 2006 is the most recent? Well, I guess the songs since then are still too new to be added to a soundtrack quite yet. Don't exactly know how significant they'll be in the grand scheme of thing.
It probably goes without saying that it was really difficult to pick a finite number of songs. There are so many that could be on here that represent, like, summers in North Carolina (Beatles, Roy Orbison), my relationship with my dad ("American Pie," CCR), etc. And I purposefully chose to stay away from songs from TV shows. :-D Instead, each of these, for the most part, represent an exact moment or age or era in my life.
OK, that took a long time. Must work now. :-D
As it is now, I'm including full-length clips of my selected songs under the cut, courtesy of imeem. I also have all of them in m4a format...but since I'm on my work computer, I don't have them at hand to upload right now. I may just amend the post later with yousendit links should anyone want to DL the clips.
Confusing enough? Yeah? Great! Let's start the meme:
Your mission, should you choose to accept it - and you should - is to post the songs that have “stamped” your life. It can be as few or as many as you need it to be. Tell the story that goes along with each song and then title your blog/Facebook note/LiveJournal post/WHATEVER “[YOUR NAME]: The Album.”
Here’s mine...
1. "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" - Elton John & Kiki Dee
Don't Go Breaking My Heart - Elton John & Kiki Dee
This is one of the earliest songs I ever remember hearing, and - along with "Teddy Bear" by Elvis Presley and "I Just Called to Say I Love You" by Stevie Wonder - it was part of some Disney cartoon special for Valentine's Day that we taped off of TV and I watched over and over and over again. Of course, I eventually tired of it, and so didn't hear the song again for a number of years, but when I did, it immediately transported me back to the carpet in front of the TV at my family's first house, watching Robin Hood and Maid Marian get married again.
2. "Walk Like an Egyptian" - The Bangles
Walk Like An Egyptian - The Bangles
Yes, I am a child of the '80s. How did you guess? This one comes from my dance classes when I was about 4 or 5. At the end of every dance recital, all of my teacher's classes would come out on stage, one group at a time, and take a bow before scooting to the back of the stage and making room for the next class. One year, we did this song as our finale song, and each class came out on stage doing the Egyptian move. You know, one hand palm upward in front, other downward in back. This is another one of those songs that I don't consciously remember as "Oh, I liked the Bangles when I was a kid," it's just this fun tune that I always associate with wearing too much makeup and my mom smearing it off with Vaseline and watching for the red light of my dad's video camera in the audience.
3. "Main Street Electrical Parade" - Disney
01 Main Street Electrical Parade From Disneyland.mp3 -
Second Disney reference; I am aware. And thankfully, the version on imeem says, "Disneyland's Main Street Electrical Parade" instead of "Disney's Electrical Parade," like it does on my CD. BECAUSE THAT'S WHERE IT BELONGS. I went to Disneyland for the first time when I was about 5, then again in the second grade, then again for my 10th birthday. It's what you do when you grow up in California. And this parade has always been my favorite, no matter how dated it looks now. My mom says that when I saw it the first time and the lion from "Robin Hood" swung out of his organ float, I squealed. And when we were there when I was in high school to see the parade in Disneyland for the last time, I had the strangest experience: I stood behind this little girl with wavy brown hair cut fairly short and wearing a purple raincoat with a purple-and-white striped lining. It was like my 10-year-old self had been transported right there for the occasion. Now, the parade is at California Adventure, and I still go to see it, but it's not quite the same.
4. "This Used to Be My Playground" - Madonna
This Used To Be My Playground (LP Version) - Madonna
I did my best NOT to pick any songs from movies or TV shows, but I think this one could be an exception. "A League of Their Own" came out during the summer I went to visit my family in Cincinnati alone for the first time. I got on a plane by myself, the whole shebang. And my aunt and I hit up SO many movies, including that one, which is still one of my all-time favorites. And the use of this song at the end - it still kinda baffles me, because it's so sad. But I get actively angry if I'm watching the movie on TV these days and they cut it off at the end. It still brings me to tears. I think it just reminds me of that summer and how much fun I had, and maybe how it started a more involved relationship with those grandparents that I'm so glad now that I had.
5. "Save the Best for Last" - Vanessa Williams
15 - Save The Best For Last - Vanessa Williams
Sixth grade. Katharine Allen and I could not get enough of this song. We taped it off the radio, and I clearly remember hanging in her bedroom at her parents' old house near the Sikh temple, probably there on a sleepover, doing makeovers and playing Barbies and listening to this song. (HELL YEAH, WE STILL PLAYED WITH BARBIES IN THE SIXTH GRADE. WE'D MOVED ON TO BARBIE SOAP OPERAS AND LIFETIME MOVIES.)
6. "No Rain" - Blind Melon
No Rain - Blind Melon
Junior high dances in the old Centerville gym. Even now, when I hear this song, I still bellow the "Oh-oh-OH-OH!" like an entire room of seventh and eighth graders did back then.
7. "Great Balls of Fire" - Jerry Lee Lewis
Great Balls Of Fire - Jerry Lee Lewis
Touching back on the dance thing - I ended up enrolled in the dance program with the City of Fremont for about 15 years. It started with 3-year-olds in tap class and ended up evolving into my participation in a more elite, competitive dance troupe. I'd been wanting it for several years, and finally got admitted around the eighth grade. The routine to this song is one of the first I learned once I joined, and I can still do it today...if you ask me nicely. It has a baseball theme.
8. "As I Lay Me Down" - Sophie B. Hawkins
As I Lay Me Down - Sophie Hawkins
This one's actually kind of difficult to listen to. It was popular right around the time my grandfather died, when I was a freshman in high school. It was the first time I'd lost a grandparent, and it really shook up my mom. We flew back to NC, and a blizzard hit while we were there. One of the first times I truly experienced snow.
9. "Theme from 'Shaft'" - Isaac Hayes
Theme From "Shaft" - Isaac Hayes
Ahhh, senior calculus. This was "my joke" with a group of boys in my class...including Tim Snelson, my crush. My first failed attempt. The song is still badass, though.
10. "Build Me Up Buttercup" - The Goops
Build Me Up Buttercup - The Goops
My freshman year of college, I ended up in this suite in the furthest possible dorm. Ten stories of cement block, no air conditioning...and some pretty cool suitemates. We became fast friends, and while it didn't necessarily last (a long story), we had a good time that year - especially with movies. We watched all the Tarantino and Kevin Smith flicks, which led to this song. Jay and Silent Bob do a pretty hilarious dance to it in "Mallrats," and we taught ourselves the choreography. (We didn't have YouTube then, so how did we do it? Someone may have had a pirated copy on the campus network. *g*) I can probably still do this dance too...
11. "Take on Me" - The Marching Tar Heels
Click to viewApologies to the former Marching Tar Heels on my f-list, because this is obviously not the Marching Tar Heels. But this version of "Take on Me" is not on imeem, and this was the best I could do. I could of course put any number of fight songs, or the opening sequence from football games, up here, but those are all still relevant to me. Hearing this, because I don't get to hear it on TV or anywhere these days, takes me back to crisp September/October Saturdays with my dorm keys stuffed in my pocket, hot dogs and fresh-squeezed lemonade that I'd always spill all over my face, and nearly empty stands in the waning moments of the fourth quarter as we lost yet another game. Hee!
12. "Closer to Fine" - Indigo Girls
Closer to Fine -
Weird story on this one: I think this is the song I associate with my maternal grandmother's death on Jan. 1, 2000. (She wasn't Y2K compliant.) I say "think" because after her funeral in China Grove, we went out for dinner at the local country club, where all of my aunts, uncles, cousins - basically, my mother and her entire side of the family save for me and my dad got completely trashed. We went back to my uncle Bob's house and put on music. And I believe that this was one of the songs, because I have this memory of my cousin Paul drunkenly putting his arm around me and telling me that I needed to listen to the lyrics now that I was in college and etc. etc. etc. The reason I'm not sure about the song? I have no idea why an Indigo Girls album would be at my uncle's house. He's a former Marine, for God's sake. Unless my cousins were staying there for the funeral and it was theirs...
In any case, I took his words to heart and picked up on this song. When I started to have a troublesome relationship with my university as the years went on, this became one of my anthems.
13. "Blurry" - Puddle of Mudd
Blurry - Puddle Of Mudd
DON'T JUDGE ME. The summer I lived and worked in Cincinnati, I had just started driving my dear, departed Squeaky, and all she had was a tape deck. And the only options I had for radio there were top 40, really hard rock, rap or country. So I think it was on the top 40 station when this song came on, and I have this distinct memory of sailing over the bridge connecting I-71 north to I-275 west on my way home from my internship to it. That summer was one of the best decisions I've ever made, so I therefore have a soft spot for this song because of it.
13. "Motherland" - Natalie Merchant
Motherland - Natalie Merchant
I actually had to review this CD as part of my duties as an arts desk writer for The Daily Tar Heel, and I didn't particularly like the album. But this track spoke to me, especially because I was a senior and - due to a combination of factors - ready to get the hell out of dodge. My fabulous internship convinced me that I was ready to join the workforce, I was getting dicked around at the DTH and Phi Beta Kappa, and after so many years of just knowing that I'd live in North Carolina, I'd come to the conclusion that I'd been wrong. Of course, I love NC and always will, but I'd realized that I'd been born and raised in California and had to go back. My "Motherland" was calling me home, and I was ready to go.
15. "Bring Me to Life" - Evanescence
Bring Me To Life - Evanescence
This song is one of my favorites of all time, which is against type for me, but it represents a particular era as well as a moment. The era: My final semester in college, but also, a time when I got involved in this new community and met a bunch of new people, including the lady whose meme I'm doing right now. The moment: Sitting in my car on the overpass on Columbia St./15-501 over the 54 bypass in Chapel Hill, heading toward campus late at night. Don't remember why (maybe playing DD?), but I do remember sitting at that intersection and hearing the song come on the radio and thinking, "Wow, I like this."
16. "Somebody Told Me" - The Killers
Somebody Told Me - The Killers
Amanda also picked this one, but I'm not just copying her, I swear! This song was on the radio so much in 2004 that every time I was driving from Cupertino (one of the cities I covered) back to downtown San Jose (where I worked) it came on. I remember getting on the ramp from southbound 280 to northbound 880 with the little "bomp-bomp" in the song right before the chorus, and bopping my pigtails in time to the music. Yeah, I famously wore my hair in pigtailed buns a lot that year.
17. "Rich Girl" - Gwen Stefani & Eve
Rich Girl - Gwen Stefani
One word: Rome. Oh, wait, another: Cairo. Every where Meredith and I went on our grand trip, we heard this song. A cafe across from the Colosseum. On the BBC while we were watching TV in Katharine's Cairo apartment. Out at a Cairo nightclub. It was ridiculous.
17. "Welcome to the North" - The Music
Welcome To The North - The Music
When I first moved to L.A. and was temping, this is the song I set as my alarm on my iPod. It works well for that purpose; it starts out with about 20 seconds of quiet guitar before plunging into the full-out rock. Even now, when I hear it, I think of sunlit wood floors and air mattresses that had to be deflated each day and calling Apple One and ironing clothes in the dining room.
19. "Get Ur Freak On" - Missy Elliott
Get Ur Freak On - Missy Elliott
Scene: Casa de Crackerbox, Gardena. Amanda and I are bored with the selection of CNN, ESPN and broadcast networks on our hotel-room TV. So we turn to PBS and find a production of "Swan Lake" on. As I'd had this song in my head for several weeks due to a promo on KROQ, we muted the TV and turned on Missy Elliott. It fit almost perfectly with the choreography of the ballet, and we nearly died of laughter. Apparently, someone's ringtone for me is still this song because of this moment.
20. "Le Disko" - Shiny Toy Guns
Le Disko - Shiny Toy Guns
Oh, this was a fun day. In June 2006, my purse was stolen AND my car was totaled. I'd just picked up a rental car at the Burbank Airport, probably an hour or so after discovering what had happened to my poor Squeaky. I was sitting in traffic on the 5 south, trying to go home and figure out what the hell to do next, and this song came on. I enjoyed the song and still do, but it was such a surreal moment that I just started laughing.
Wow, 2006 is the most recent? Well, I guess the songs since then are still too new to be added to a soundtrack quite yet. Don't exactly know how significant they'll be in the grand scheme of thing.
It probably goes without saying that it was really difficult to pick a finite number of songs. There are so many that could be on here that represent, like, summers in North Carolina (Beatles, Roy Orbison), my relationship with my dad ("American Pie," CCR), etc. And I purposefully chose to stay away from songs from TV shows. :-D Instead, each of these, for the most part, represent an exact moment or age or era in my life.
OK, that took a long time. Must work now. :-D