Songs from 1988-93

I'm working on a series of essays that focus on my life from 1988-93, which are my undergraduate years (though the essays are not really about college).  I've been thinking for a while of creating a playlist of songs from the time because music was always in the background, whether from my car radio, my CD player when I was riding the bus, or the background in bars and clubs.  Thanks to Wikipedia, I am able to find out when the songs were released and put them in order.  But that's not just my Virgo mentality at work.  I can look at the list and see a kind of progression, my transition from boyhood to manhood.  I just set my timer for twenty minutes today and got the list started.  It'll be fun to listen to on the treadmill, though I better have a notebook handy for the memories that arise.

If anyone can think of any songs from that time period, feel free to let me know in the comments.  My only rules for including them on the playlist are 1) only one song from an artist or I'll end up putting all of Depeche Mode's Violator and R.E.M.'s Out of Time on the list and 2) they have to be something that played a role, however minor, in my own life.  Perhaps your memories might trigger some of my own.  You can click on the image to enlarge it.

Fever Ray and La Roux

After reading this interview with The Gossip's Beth Ditto, I was inspired to check out some of the acts she mentions, and I've fallen in love with Fever Ray and La Roux. In particular, I have been listening to Fever Ray's "When I Grow Up" and La Roux's "In for the Kill" interchangeably in the car on my commute. It's an odd combination, to be sure, but it also fits the general directions my mind takes throughout the day, from deep and brooding to light and airy. Hell, I'm often going both ways at the same time.

La Roux's official video for "In for the Kill" does not allow embedding, but you can see it here. And here's Fever Ray:

"I'm Taking a Ride with My Best Friend..."

For Christmas 1987, my family gave me several gift certificates to the mall thrity miles from the town where I lived. They knew I loved the chance to spend all afternoon going in and out of various stores picking up random shirts or books or whatever caught my eye. At the record store, I picked up a few cassettes, including The Smiths' "Strangeways, Here We Come" and Depeche Mode's "Music for the Masses." Over the next few months, I wore those things out in my car and on my Walkman.

I remember listening to Depeche Mode on bus trips to area speech and drama tournaments and Biology II field trips. On a Saturday ride to the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, I badgered the art teacher (best friend of the biology teacher) into listening to "Sacred," telling her how much I loved it. On rides alone around the town's outskirts, I would listen to "Never Let Me Down Again" over and over, singing loudly and nearly bursting my car's speakers. The darkness of the album's images and the heaviness of its tones fit easily with the fears that were welling inside me with increasing intensity.

It was my senior year of high school. Before long, it would be over, and I would be off to college. I craved the chance to go out into the world, but it terrified me, too. I tried to imagine my future, but getting there started feeling more and more impossible. Who was I, some country bumpkin, thinking I was going to make it in college? And how could someone like me survive in the fourth largest city in the nation? The emotion that ruled my life more than any other that year was fear, and my music choices fit along with that.

Last night, I had a seat in the last row of the top mezzanine at Madison Square Garden to see Depeche Mode in concert. It was a sold out show, and it looked like every seat was filled. I was far, far away from the stage, but I could see it all clearly. I was surrounded by fans, screaming and dancing and cheering for a band most of us have been listening to for decades.

By the time they started playing "A Question of Time" and "Precious," I was standing in the aisle behind my seat where I could bounce around easily, signing at the top of my lungs. Through "Walking in My Shoes" and "I Feel You," I moved my hips, feet, shoulders, and lips. I screamed the chorus to those songs as loud as possible every time Dave Gahan held the microphone to the crowd, wanting us to show him that we knew these songs almost as well as he does.

As they made the segue from "Enjoy the Silence" to "Never Let Me Down Again," I started to cry, truly to cry. I well up and shed a tear or two at just about anything, but the strength of these tears surprised even me. I clasped my hands together and held them up to my face, closing my eyes and squeezing out more tears.

At that moment, I sent a message to my adolescent self, living somewhere back in my mind or my heart or my memory or my soul. Pressing my eyes shut even tighter, I thought, You did it, kid. You got out. You grew up. You did everything you wanted to do. And more. Dave Gahan started singing the opening lines, and I quickly joined in, drenched in sweat and tears on face. You did it, kid, just like I knew you could.

That kid and I danced together until the whole show was over, at which point we walked from the Garden to Times Square, the words and images of those songs still chanting in my head well into this morning.

Did You Want to Be an Icon?

As mentioned on Facebook and Twitter, I spent Wednesday night at Radio City Music Hall at a concert with British band Keane. It was a freakin' blast! I haven't done a concert in years. I guess that last one was Suzanne Vega in August 2003 right after I moved here to Hartford. I'm trying to think if I've been to anymore in the last six years, and I don't think I have. And that's a shame because this was so much fun.

It was a sold out show, and the place was packed by the time Keane came on stage. I had a great seat almost right in the center of the first mezzanine. I arrived before the first opening act, The Heilo Sequence. I'd never heard of them, but I really liked the Oregon duo. Reading about them online, I see that they are put in the electronica category, which probably explains why I felt drawn to them. The second opening act was Matt Kearney, who was also cool, a bit too folky for my personal taste, but a good fit for the tour and a good show nonetheless.

Keane just came right out with lights flashing and the video screens going and the music loud, loud, loud. People were cheering and standing. I've read in other places that some people were asked to sit down, which strikes me as insane for a rock conert. No one in the two rows in front of me stood up until the very end, so I stayed seated, but I certainly wasn't sitting still. When I knew the words, I would sing at the top of my lungs, but I could barely hear myself. Still, when thousands of people started singing together, you could hear and feel it.

Their second album, Under the Iron Sea, is one of my favorites, and after a few listenings, I started getting into their most recent, Perfect Symmetry. Or at least I've been getting into the first half, which contains the songs that they've released as singles. I will fully admit that I had tears running down my face after they broke out into their biggest US hit, "Somwhere Only We Know," which is an emotional song that has always hit me a certain way. And then they slid right into "Crystal Ball," which is probably my favorite song on the second album. The crowd got louder and more energetic and just went crazy. But nowhere near as crazy as we all got when they came out for the second encore.

See, by the end of the first encore, they have played all the songs everyone expected them to play. So when the lights stayed down after the first encore, I could see people looking at each other. And one of the girls next to me asked her friend what they could do next. I wondered if they were going to repeat something. But Keane came out an started the familiar bassline to "Under Pressure," and that got everyone standing and cheering and singing along.

I'd gotten there about 6:40 and didn't leave until after 11:00, and it was a blast. I loved it so much that I bought a ticket to Depeche Mode at Madison Square Garden this coming August. I got a ticket at the very, very top of the place, so I'll be miles away from them, but it wasn't that expensive, but it'll still be loud enough to hear and join in the fun.

I've just got to start doing things like this more often.