What was your first album? Not the first one you listened to, but the first one you wanted and, therefore, received? Purchased or got as a gift?
When I was in sixth grade, my music teacher, Mr. Harvey, introduced us to a new album that he was enjoying called Return to Pooh Corner. It was by a guy named Kenny Loggins (whom I didn't know and hadn't heard of but, since my dad was a musician, I figured--in that 11-year old logic that a sixth grader possesses--that the two men likely worked together). That Christmas, I asked for my first album.
Today, my Spotify "Discovery Weekly" playlist pulled up "The Last Unicorn" from the Return to Pooh Corner album and I decided to listen to it.
Wow.
It sounds like a theme song that belongs on a late eighties' animated film, which is good, because that's exactly what it's covering.
I didn't like the cartoon (it scandalized me when it said "damn", as if I were back in 1939 when Gone with the Wind was first released), and I don't think I much cared for this particular song when I was 11, but seeing it hit my orbit again was a major surprise.
I bring this up, in part, because my youngest is three days from his fourth birthday (which, yes, is right before the Fourth of July, and, yes, we do try to convince him that the fireworks are to celebrate his birth) and I purchased a CD boombox for him. Why? So he can listen to the first album he will ever receive: the original soundtrack to Moana. We decided this would be a nice way for him to enjoy the music (which he loves) without plunking him in front of the TV or computer to watch the film (which he also loves).
I don't know if my son will enjoy the music (knowing my luck, all the effort* and cost for the items will be in vain because he'll lose interest thirty seconds in when there isn't any visual stimulus) or if it'll embed itself as a memory, but I think it's important for the power of crafting music as a subset of personal identity.
While Kenny Loggins' Return to Pooh Corner (which could also be the name of a punishment for an unhousebroken dog) remains unlistened to and uncherished in my own life, there are other albums and artists who haven't left me. These are the artists and soundtracks of my youth, when I was buying or asking for albums to music that was different than my older brother's (you know how younger siblings follow trends), or sometimes appreciating ones that my brother listened to and then abandoned. Active choices in my music consumption led me into third-wave ska**, which also gave me another aspect of my identity that I clung to fairly tightly as I grew into teenagedom and young adulthood.
Since it's summer and I was driving through the more familiar avenues of my home town, I decided to put on a disc from 1997 called Our Newest Album Ever! by Five Iron Frenzy as I cruised about. It was a desperate attempt to reclaim some of the optimism and vitality that I felt during those crucial, formative summers, back when I spent a lot of time with friends and still managed to make good grades and enjoy myself with that idyllic innocence of both a pre-9/11 world and the enthusiasm of youth. Because I was listening to them in my car, when my children piled in--an image I hadn't known how to imagine when I was 16--I forced my children to listen to the album (which wasn't Hamilton, so they were a little miffed). They didn't much care for what they heard, though I suppose third-wave ska may be a bit of an acquired taste.
The songs weren't as good as I remembered them, but neither were they dross (as sometimes happens when you return to something you've long abandoned). It's made me both want to return to the old discs, but also avoid them, in part because they can't mean as much to me now as they did then. That they trigger memories of the storied hallways of my high school, or the endless summer sunsets turning purple over the western mountains by which I now live doesn't make them unpleasant, though. I liked my childhood and early young adult years a lot, so being reminded of that past isn't uncomfortable to me. But it's also irretrievably beyond my grasp (that's the nature of time), and there is a lot more to learn, hear, and experience than a disc I've revolved so many times that, not only do I know all the words, but I remembered how long to fast forward to get to the "secret track" at the end of the last song.***
As I said before, I think music gives a pathway into a person's identity--which is why teenagers in particular tend to be so militantly musical, regardless of their musicality. The memories we forge in our youth, when layered with a soundtrack, become sharper, even after twenty years (or more). I know there's a lot of research on this, but I'm not talking about the scientific effects of music, but rather the philosophical undercurrents. It also makes me wonder what kind of person I might have become if I hadn't had the exposure to the kinds of music I ended up consuming in the past.
What if, for example, because of the first album I ever received, I ended up becoming a Kenny Loggins fan?
I shudder to think.
----
* Do you know how hard it is to find a cheap CD boombox? When was the last time you went out to look for one of those? While they're available, a lot of them have USB charging or WiFi, but if you're looking for something for a four-year-old, you don't want to be spending more than a Jackson for that thing.
** Over half of the examples they included in that Wikipedia article were in my collection, and only a couple are unfamiliar to me.
***If you're not familiar with the concept, I'm sure this will sound pointless, but here goes: You take the last cut of the album, then slap on a good five to eight minutes of silence (that the listener either sits or fast-forwards through) and then, as an Easter egg, drop another song there. It was a trendy thing to do in the mid- to late-nineties.
When I was in sixth grade, my music teacher, Mr. Harvey, introduced us to a new album that he was enjoying called Return to Pooh Corner. It was by a guy named Kenny Loggins (whom I didn't know and hadn't heard of but, since my dad was a musician, I figured--in that 11-year old logic that a sixth grader possesses--that the two men likely worked together). That Christmas, I asked for my first album.
Today, my Spotify "Discovery Weekly" playlist pulled up "The Last Unicorn" from the Return to Pooh Corner album and I decided to listen to it.
Wow.
It sounds like a theme song that belongs on a late eighties' animated film, which is good, because that's exactly what it's covering.
I didn't like the cartoon (it scandalized me when it said "damn", as if I were back in 1939 when Gone with the Wind was first released), and I don't think I much cared for this particular song when I was 11, but seeing it hit my orbit again was a major surprise.
I bring this up, in part, because my youngest is three days from his fourth birthday (which, yes, is right before the Fourth of July, and, yes, we do try to convince him that the fireworks are to celebrate his birth) and I purchased a CD boombox for him. Why? So he can listen to the first album he will ever receive: the original soundtrack to Moana. We decided this would be a nice way for him to enjoy the music (which he loves) without plunking him in front of the TV or computer to watch the film (which he also loves).
I don't know if my son will enjoy the music (knowing my luck, all the effort* and cost for the items will be in vain because he'll lose interest thirty seconds in when there isn't any visual stimulus) or if it'll embed itself as a memory, but I think it's important for the power of crafting music as a subset of personal identity.
While Kenny Loggins' Return to Pooh Corner (which could also be the name of a punishment for an unhousebroken dog) remains unlistened to and uncherished in my own life, there are other albums and artists who haven't left me. These are the artists and soundtracks of my youth, when I was buying or asking for albums to music that was different than my older brother's (you know how younger siblings follow trends), or sometimes appreciating ones that my brother listened to and then abandoned. Active choices in my music consumption led me into third-wave ska**, which also gave me another aspect of my identity that I clung to fairly tightly as I grew into teenagedom and young adulthood.
Since it's summer and I was driving through the more familiar avenues of my home town, I decided to put on a disc from 1997 called Our Newest Album Ever! by Five Iron Frenzy as I cruised about. It was a desperate attempt to reclaim some of the optimism and vitality that I felt during those crucial, formative summers, back when I spent a lot of time with friends and still managed to make good grades and enjoy myself with that idyllic innocence of both a pre-9/11 world and the enthusiasm of youth. Because I was listening to them in my car, when my children piled in--an image I hadn't known how to imagine when I was 16--I forced my children to listen to the album (which wasn't Hamilton, so they were a little miffed). They didn't much care for what they heard, though I suppose third-wave ska may be a bit of an acquired taste.
The songs weren't as good as I remembered them, but neither were they dross (as sometimes happens when you return to something you've long abandoned). It's made me both want to return to the old discs, but also avoid them, in part because they can't mean as much to me now as they did then. That they trigger memories of the storied hallways of my high school, or the endless summer sunsets turning purple over the western mountains by which I now live doesn't make them unpleasant, though. I liked my childhood and early young adult years a lot, so being reminded of that past isn't uncomfortable to me. But it's also irretrievably beyond my grasp (that's the nature of time), and there is a lot more to learn, hear, and experience than a disc I've revolved so many times that, not only do I know all the words, but I remembered how long to fast forward to get to the "secret track" at the end of the last song.***
As I said before, I think music gives a pathway into a person's identity--which is why teenagers in particular tend to be so militantly musical, regardless of their musicality. The memories we forge in our youth, when layered with a soundtrack, become sharper, even after twenty years (or more). I know there's a lot of research on this, but I'm not talking about the scientific effects of music, but rather the philosophical undercurrents. It also makes me wonder what kind of person I might have become if I hadn't had the exposure to the kinds of music I ended up consuming in the past.
What if, for example, because of the first album I ever received, I ended up becoming a Kenny Loggins fan?
I shudder to think.
----
* Do you know how hard it is to find a cheap CD boombox? When was the last time you went out to look for one of those? While they're available, a lot of them have USB charging or WiFi, but if you're looking for something for a four-year-old, you don't want to be spending more than a Jackson for that thing.
** Over half of the examples they included in that Wikipedia article were in my collection, and only a couple are unfamiliar to me.
***If you're not familiar with the concept, I'm sure this will sound pointless, but here goes: You take the last cut of the album, then slap on a good five to eight minutes of silence (that the listener either sits or fast-forwards through) and then, as an Easter egg, drop another song there. It was a trendy thing to do in the mid- to late-nineties.