Musical memories take you back in time

 

It’s funny how a certain song can suddenly teleport you back in time and overwhelm you with emotion and indelible memories.

We were talking about musical memories the other day in the newsroom and immediately certain songs came to mind. Every time I hear “La Bamba” by Los Lobos I instantly return to a Pizza Hut in Rochester, Minnesota, in the fall of 1987. I was an assistant manager there and it was by far the most popular song on the jukebox. It played over and over and over. I got sick of it – almost as sick as I was of the job.

Most songs, however, take me to a happy place. Whenever I hear “Roseanna” by Toto I’m suddenly at the Ben Delatour Scout Ranch in Red Feather Lakes, Colorado, where I was on camp staff in 1982. That song is one of my all-time favorites, probably because of the incredible memories of my time at camp while the song was popular.

Similarly, whenever I hear Survivor’s “Eye of the Tiger” I’m back in the locker room at Everly-Montgomery Field in Longmont, Colorado, dressed in my football gear and getting psyched up for a big game. I rarely got to play, but the emotional attachment was strong. On a side note, that song was a shoo-in to be our senior class song at Niwot High School until some goofballs nominated “Wasted On The Way” by Crosby, Stills and Nash. They did it as a joke and I was livid when it won.

If you go through the playlists on my iPhone, you will see it’s mostly music from the 1970s and 1980s. Although I don’t sing and can’t play an instrument, music had a profound impact on me in my junior high, high school and college years. There are very few rock and roll songs that I like after the 1980s and even fewer country songs after the 1990s.

I think that’s the norm for most generations to latch onto the music they grew up with. It explains our ability to sing along with songs that we haven’t heard in years, while at the same time we can’t remember why we walked into the room.

As a boy I listened to classic country and hated rock music. Waylon and Willie, Glen Campbell, Ronnie Milsap, John Denver, Merle Haggard, Dolly Parton, Loretta Lynn, Barbara Mandrell – ah, that is good music!

My Baptist upbringing taught me that rock was the devil’s music. I had no need for it, that is, until I got into high school and started listening to it with my buddies. I became a hardcore ’80s rock fan. Helping to ease that transition was the Oak Ridge Boys when they came out with crossover hits “Elvira” and “Bobby Sue.”

I started going to concerts in high school and College and saw .38 Special, Journey, Night Ranger, the Beach Boys, and many more. Over those years my interest in rock music from the ’60s and ’70s took off. In college, my musical taste took a twist when MTV started playing old “The Monkees” TV shows. I was instantly hooked and became obsessed with Pre-Fab Four. My friends and I saw them in concert at Red Rocks Amphitheater. Weird Al Yankovic opened for them. I bought all of their cassette tapes and reveled in their new music. Years later I even tracked Micky Dolenz down while on a solo tour and did a pre-show interview with him.

Depending on which Monkees song comes on, it takes me back to Adams State College or to Red Rocks. I have a tendency to become musically obsessed at times. In the 1990s I went through my Garth Brooks phase. I got to cover one of his concerts and even asked him a question at a press conference. Other obsessions have ranged from Donna Fargo to ABBA to, more recently, Neil Diamond. The movie “Song Sung Blue” triggered me emotionally and I have Diamond earworms most days.

When it comes to music, the one thing that lights me up more than anything else is hearing the “Star Wars” theme. The 11-year-old kid in me pushes to the surface and does his Jedi mind tricks on me. I’m awestruck and inspired each time I hear that iconic music by John Williams. I love a lot of movie soundtracks, but nothing comes close to the original “Star Wars.” That music takes me to a place a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. Sometimes it keeps me there.

How about you? What songs send you to your happy place?