I’m taking a class, “Using Pop Culture and Media to Bring Your Memoir to Life”, through StoryStudio Chicago. Tonight’s class was about music.
It’s no secret that music plays a significant role in my life. Depending on your perspective, there is an argument to be made it has played an outsized role in my life. When experimenting with form and structure for my memoir, I tried structuring it like a play, or a symphony, complete with an intermission. The intermission became an experiment on breaking the fourth wall, talking directly to the reader, presenting a lesson on the meaning of music in my manuscript.
There was a specific playlist, a specific order of songs I always listened to on a specific walk.
Lyrics were always running through my head. I kept a notebook of every lyric that ran through my head every day for a few months, and then went and tallied the total number of lyrics, and then the number of times a lyric repeated itself. It was eye-opening.
I was reminded of all this tonight during class, and I found myself trying to think of time when there wasn’t music in my life. Even as a kid, there was music, be it music class in school, church, piano lessons, a brother practicing guitar, the music they listened to, the music their friends listened to, the music on the radio in the cars of friends, the music played during family road trips when we weren’t taking turns reading out loud from a book. Until I adopted my dog, there has always been music.
Taking what I learned about how music has been code for my brain as an adult, a way for my better angel to communicate with me, and thinking back to the earliest memories as a kid, the music I either heard or played or practiced, I realized that music has been code for my brain, and how my better angel was able to communicate. The songs I listened to when I was being intensely bullied as a kid. The playlist as an adult. And all the music in between.
Elton John’s “Sad Songs (Say So Much)” is running through my head as I write this. The irony of the lyrics set to an upbeat tune. But there is truth in those lyrics, too. There is truth in the lyrics that most often ran through my head for a period of time. There are some songs that will always elicit a vivid memory, or feeling.
Sometimes the meaning associated to that song changes. “Somebody that I Used to Know” by Gotye was always on the radio whenever I got into a vehicle when I lived in Canada. It became a running joke among my friends. Now, the title itself is truth. There is part of me that is somebody that I used to know.
I use to listen to “We Used to be Friends” by the Dandy Warhols and wonder if that would ever be the case, if I could ever say to part of me that we used to be friends. “A long time ago, we used to be friends, but I haven’t thought of you lately at all” has become a true statement. I didn’t think that would be possible. It seemed more like a dream, a wish, something always just out of reach. Apparently my better angel knew more than I did.
Technology has advanced considerably over the years, and services like Spotify send you a “wrapped” at the end of the year, listing the songs you listened to most. It’s fascinating to look back at those. For 3 consecutive years, the top song was “A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You” by The Monkees. And then it “She Sells Sanctuary” by The Cult replace “A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You.” I wonder what happened during that year. I remember when I first heard “She Sells Sanctuary,” just as I remember the first time I heard “Burn it to the Ground.” But it isn’t clear to me the significance of “She Sells Sanctuary,” at least not yet. Unless it is talking about me.
Hrm…that is curious…
For another post, perhaps.