the love of music - part 1

i need to talk about music.
i mean, i really,
really
do.

and i didn't realize it until my friend tessa sent me a link to a blog, written by tori. so i hope you can indulge my need here.

tessa, and her sweet baby, ella, picutred here.

we went to school with her. tori. she was a little younger than us and i felt a connection with her at the time though knew close to nilch about her. outside of school, she dressed in clothes that looked like mine. a porcelain dolled girl dressed in clothes i could understand. and at that point in my life... in my world of private, christian collared shirts and belted pants...it meant pretty much everything. it meant that she, though we rarely spoke, got me. i just knew that if we had been friends she would have understood that i rose above that school. that i was going places, that i was thinking thoughts, that i was more than met the jock's eye. you know, all the things that you hope are seen in you at that age.

my love for music dates back to second grade when somehow i caught wind of george michael's video for faith. oh yeah! sunglasses, black leather jacket, worn out denim, boots tapping on a juke box. puh-lease! i woke up while watching this video. i knew who my imaginary boyfriend looked like finally. his name was johnny and he looked just like george michael and he made me feel like that song made me feel. and there, at 8, began my love for music that won't let up.

for me. music is the most powerful thing God put in our hands. it's the only way that i understand the word - holy. everytime i hear that word i think of the way that music makes me feel. lost, weepy, caught up, momentous, inspired, clarified, understood, ....holy. when i think about eternity, i immediately imagine the sounds of music. and how God will be like the most beautiful song that i won't ever want to stop hearing. that i won't ever want to stop singing. music is the closest i can get to bliss. music is the way that i start my quiet time with God. it gets me right there in that sweet spot of emotion where i need to be. it sluffs the edge off that creeps on me throughout the day.

anyhoo...tori expanded on a facebook note craze and spoke on her favorite songs. and i feel the need to do this too.

kids, you are the bees knees. really. i was born to mother you. but sometimes i do fantasize about something entirely different. it's not at all thought or planned out. i have no idea what it would look like. but when i hear a song i love, it's there looming and waiting. i'm somewhere other than with you and i feel this sense of another life that i almost entered. a sense of my life had it taken some weird turn, if God's will for me had slighted to the left a little. and i have no choice but just to get lost in it. to just go with it and let it intoxicate me like it does. and then the song ends and i'm back in my minivan on I-40, driving you home from your doctor's appt. i'm mom. i promise. and i'm privileged. down right, blessed, to get to be.

but mommy's got her jams.

and i want you to know about them. this will certainly not be summed up in this blog entry. consider this installment 1 of many of the love of music.

here we go yo. and in no particular order. because i could just never, ever rank. (aside from ranking jacksonville city nights the best album ever. ) but nevermind.

1) mellow mood, by bob marley.

"i'll play your favorite song, darling" - he's definitely trying to romance his lady here. and who could resist a "darling" ? it's southern. it's gentlemanly. it's aparently, jamaican. it's just plain old universal.

"open up your heart
open up your heart
let love coming running...IN, darling
cause i've got your love, darling,
love, sweet, love
darling"

raspy, sincere voice. you just can't not love, bob. everyone has their bob song. this is mine.

2) you don't know my name, by alicia keys.

this song has mood from the first beat. from the first note. descending piano notes in the chorus. soul throw back from the oldies. and it doesn't try too hard. she's just feeling it.

"and i swear on my mother and father it feels like ooh"

it definitely does feel like ooh.

3) bouncing around the room, phish

one of my first phish songs. gotta love a live one.

"and in a sweet sound bouncing 'round"

can you help but dance? and wonder what your high school boyfriends are up to now?

4) for the widows in paradise, for the fatherless in ypsilanti, sufjan stevens

"if you have a father or if you haven't one
i'll do anything for you.
i Did everything for you.
i Did everything for You. "

"if you ever make a mess
i'll do anything for you"

this guy gets it. he understands how much we're loved. how much was done. and it can't go unnoticed that he's playing a banjo, singing about Jesus, and managed to be unlabeled as a gospel artist.

5) karma police, radiohead

it's never quite the words with this band. for me, it's very cure-esque in this way. the music is transcendent and speaks over the words. it's very rare and special. you look at thom yorke and know that whether or not he had the words, he absolutely has caught a moment of your life in music.

6) sweet illusions, ryan adams.

"let me go
i'm only letting you down
i've got nothing to say to you now"

you knew i had to go there. this music is a complete package of the senses. it's in the words. it's in the music. it's ambiatic. he knows what you're trying to get at. he's singing what you were. he's singing where you're at. he's singing the would have been. it's best alone with your thoughts and with wine.

"you and i used to shine like a jewel
but times been nothing to us but cruel"

when cold roses came out, this song was a stand out. it haunted me.

"we were nothing
we were only the best"

it comes off very easy, vulnerable, no second guessed lyrics.

"i ain't got nothing but love for you
love, i can't use"

ugh! head in your hands, down on your knees kind of music.

more on music to come. it may just go on and on and on, so bear with me.