October 29th, 2004
I had a lot of friends ten or fifteen years ago that grew up in the 1960s. I used to go drink beer or coffee with them and talk a lot about the Sixties and what it was like. A lot of times we would get onto the subject of music, and what it was like listening for the first time to the songs that have now become "classic" rock.
For example, one of my friends told me how, as a child growing up in a small farming community, he accidentally set fire to a field of wheat. The fire spread to other fields, and threatened to devastate the town. He could do nothing but lie in bed all weekend, sick from guilt and horror, as all the adults were out fighting the fires in the fields. This also happened to be the first weekend that The Doors' "Light My Fire" was released. As he lay in great morbid fear and revulsion at what he had done, the strains of, "Come on baby, light my fire ... Try to set the night on fire ..." rang out through the house. He said he could not listen to the song ever again ... it was too painful.
Then there's Alan W. Pollack (not a friend, though I really like his writing) who talked about an experience listening to The Beatles' "She Came in through the Bathroom Window" where he was accelerating out of a toll booth and into the crest of the bridge just as the medley broke into that song. He said it was an exhilirating experience--the radio coinciding with the car on the bridge.
I know what he means, of course. I love that album and that song (and the little bridge leading up to it that he writes about). But I was sure I would never be able to experience that freshness of a new song. By the time I was old enough to think of such things as important in my life, it was the late Seventies or early Eighties. And who wants to wax poetic about A Flock of Seagulls or Falco?
I mean, I have a vague memory of "Joy to the World" at a church picnic when I was very young, but that doesn't count, since the only association I can make is the discovery of my utter enchantment with Tahiti Treat soda pop. (Have you tried it? It's perfect for three-year-old tastebuds.)
But then, in 1995, the three Beatles still alive at the time got together and overdubbed their performances to a couple of unfinished John Lennon songs. The first of those was "Free as a Bird" and it played on the radio around the time that I got my first job in the computer software biz. I went from shopping with a calculator and renting grungy little apartments to being able to eventually Get On With My Life. OK, so I only became a salaryman, big deal; I finally was on my way. Believe you me, I spent two years teaching at an impoverishment salary (you just can't make a buck as a teacher, and everyone hates you anyway) and I figured that my life was over; I wouldn't ever make it anywhere anyhow. Then an opportunity out of the blue and although I will never be wealthy, I was headed in the right direction.
And at the same time "Free as a Bird" was on the radio. A new Beatles song with an association of a big step up in my life. I felt free as a bird, and a fresh new Beatles song captured my feelings.
My own little echo of the Sixties.