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I am one of those people who is very strongly affected by music. Once I hear a melody, I tend to retain it, and relate it to whatever I saw/felt/smelled/ate the first time I heard it. The emotional impact of a piece of music on poor ole Educait is remarkable. One of the reasons I program my Headbone Radio so vigorously with stuff I like is that it really improves my mood to have a little mental "musical armor." Here's an example: I heard "Bette Davis Eyes" today. Instantly, I'm seventeen again, waiting tables at Jeffrey's pizza, wiping booths with a bleach-scented rag while my boss, "Jeffrey"(actually a Greek named Zafirios) swats my bum and tells me to make the place "Look sexy!" I can even smell the sour-cheese reek of the place. No, I do not like "Bette Davis Eyes." Other songs are happier things, like "Tom Sawyer" by Rush, which reminds me of staying up all night at my friend Johnny's house playing Risk with Johnny and his mom, while eating pizza. (His mom is extremely cool. Lovely person.) Some are bittersweet, like ELP's "Still, You Turn Me On," which reminds me of an early infatuation that ended very badly. The song was one he associated with me, in a vaguely complimentary way, but he told me this during a drunken late-night long-distance phone call in which he also revealed that he was using the phone of the woman he'd just screwed while she slept. Don't think I like that song, either. So, I just bought myself some wonderful Headbone Music: the soundtrack from "Cold Mountain." I still haven't seen the movie yet, but I'd heard Jack White's rendition of "Wayfaring Stranger," and I had to have it. On this album, I found Alison Krauss' "You Will Be My Ain True Love." This song made my whole inner dialogue, usually so noisy, stop breathlessly. *All* of me listened. I was, well, transported. Not a happy place, exactly, but a transcendent one. Someplace I can go if things get nuts. I will need my Headbone serenity this weekend. I'll be spending my first ever weekend in the Big Apple. I'd be apprehensive, being a little seaside tidewater fishie in the vast Yankee hurly-burly, but I'll be with the Samurai and Blackbear. (Headline: "Muggers Attack Ninja Teacher. Nothing Left But Ears. Police Puzzled.") Evja's wedding, following the Preacher's so closely, should provide many points of cultural anthroplogy to discuss. More anon. (That means "later, y'all" for those who don't grok Shakespeare talk.) |
 
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Musical Armor