What Are the Five Songs That Define Who You Are?
OK, here's the challenge. Think of five songs that cumulatively address the various multitudes you contain. What five songs are the soundtrack to your existence? Not desert island songs, but songs that vocalize the very essence of your being.
Here are mine:
1. "Deacon Blues" by Steely Dan. This is the easiest for me to pick. This is so much of my inner workings. Geeky adolescent (or post-adolescent) narrator, with a love for jazz music, who longs to transcend the prosaic limits of his daily life by re-emerging as a scotch-drinking, romantic tenor sax virtuoso, only to die behind the wheel.
2. "Blackbird" by The Beatles. This is the vulnerable me of my long-ago salad days. A ballad about that moment when you became what you are. Fittingly, I heard it one August 1996 afternoon, on the radio in a rental truck, when I was driving away from my hometown for grad school, the dog by my side. Naturally, I cried.
3. "'Round Midnight" by Thelonious Monk. Hard to say how an instrumental song sums up the core of one's inner being, but this one does. Haunting, and angular, and a tribute to nocturnal beings the world over.
4. "Swanee River Rock" by Ray Charles. I like to substitute "Detroit" for "Swanee," but otherwise the bluesy, "All the world's so sad and lonely" observation that Brother Ray makes in summarizing his travels seems apt. And yet there's such hopefulness in his voice too!
5. "Love's In Need of Love Today" by Stevie Wonder. On the hopeful note, this one gets at my idealism, my big pseudo-Buddhist hug for people, no matter how often they disappoint me. Stevie is one of the great prophets of goodwill and this one represents that small flicker of people-are-inherently-good that I always aspire to maintain.
Now tell me yours!
01 July 2006
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4 comments:
Uhmm...you are right.
Damn...I'll have to think about that....it's too late at night - and I have to get up for work tomorrow - to think properly...
Okay.....
There are songs that others associate with me and then there are the songs that I associate with myself.
For instance, my roommate and her girlfriend said that The Pixies "Here Comes Your Man" is a Charlie song - my nickname during college. I'll tell you later. My husband, for reasons known to him, associates Crowded House's "Don't Dream it's Over."
But what songs would I identify myself with?
Let's see...
Strawberry Fields Forever - The Beatles: I "discovered" the Beatles when I was a sophomore in high school. I thought I had hit a musical goldmine and why wasn't everyone else listening to them? Then I realized, I was late. But this song struck a chord in me - if you will. The first thing that my friends - even now - say about me (musically speaking) is that "she likes the Beatles."
Elvis Costello - Beyond Belief: Another one that I discovered late. His vocals on this song are...unreal. His lyrics are wonderful - word play? Oh, yes please.
Andrew Bird - Skin is, My: No, I don't understand what this song means. That's okay. It's the music that draws a picture of me. Can't explain it. Download and listen to it.
The Indigo Girls - Fugitive: Another high school discovery. It spoke to that angry part of me that hasn't yet been mollifed.
Dave Brubeck Quartet - Take Five: What can I say? Underneath it, I'm still a musician who doesn't have her instrument with her. Classy, yet willing to take risks and explore other avenues.
I could go on, but I'll save your eyes.:)
me, how am I right? I mean, I think I am, but how did you mean?
PW, good list. I love ECostello and almost included "Everyday I Write the Book" in my five. Brubeck? Really? I like to play "Take 5" on the piano sometimes.
But only sometimes. :)
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