Music and the way it shapes our lives

Slacka (who no longer has comments or permalinks) had a post on June 13 about music. He referenced this post by Someone I Don’t Know (henceforth SIDK if I ever encounter such again) that got him (Slacka) started.

I have already mentioned my association of Roadside Monument with Germany in springtime. Puller’s Closer Than You Think and Brandtson’s first album (can’t remember the title) fall into this category as well.

When I started thinking about this post I got embarrassed at some of the stuff I used to enjoy. Like DC Talk’s debut album, Heavenbound. I don’t feel bad for being embarrassed about it — I’m sure that DC Talk would like to forget that phase in their musical lives as well. I still have the cassette and I can’t bring myself to get rid of it.

I grew up listening to Cat Stevens, Simon and Garfunkel, the Beach Boys, the Beatles, and various other LP’s that my brother and I found in our basement. I remember staying up late dubbing oldies off the radio for my personal mixes.

I also really liked Sting — actually, I still do — and Tears for Fears. Ten Summoner’s Tales is still one of my favorite albums, or it would be if I hadn’t gotten rid of it. Somewhere in the middle of high school I entered into a personal dark ages stage where I switched to “Christian Music Only.” I’ve never fully recovered from that, although I did have a bit of a renaissance during college. That was due in part to my roommate’s penchant for musicals — I will always associate the Beauty and the Beast and Phantom of the Opera soundtracks with evenings spent working on Diff. Eq. homework (and yes, that is a happy memory) — and Enya, and in part to my own serious exploration of Christian indie music, assisted greatly by Tim Kilbourn and Adrian Troyer. Adrian introduced me to Stavesacre and Mineral, and Tim introduced me to Bloomsday. Tim also got me hooked on SDRE.

That’s more where I’m at now. I don’t buy a lot of CD’s anymore, and almost all the CD’s I own I can sing through by heart. And I sometimes do, much to my wife’s annoyance. I still listen mainly to Christian fare, though I stay far, far away from Christian pop radio tunes.

But every once in a while, I’ll get a wild, lustful urge to listen to MJ — and I pull out my Dangerous cassette and repeatedly listen to the “Jam” track. Ahh, the days of my youth. . .