I’m at a crossroads in my life. Or at least I was until I began university, so now it feels like I’ve just crossed the crossroads. In other ways, I haven’t; I’m still standing in the middle of several paths, each leading in a different direction, each route I want to take dependent on my mood. And being a hormonal teenage girl, this means I often end up beginning to take one route before backtracking and starting again. In other words, the last year of my life (give or take) has been incredibly emotional, but primarily, pretty terrifying. I left school last summer, uprooted my entire life, and plonked it halfway across the country, in Manchester, on my own, knowing nobody, and leaving behind every shred of the identity I had constructed for myself over the past 18 years. Needless to say, I was bricking it. I started thinking a while ago as I walked to and from campus about the songs that had shaped my life up until this point. Everyone has songs that they remember hearing as a kid, or loving for years, and I am not excluded in that – but having a particular set of songs which you specifically remember having some sort of influence in your life, or sticking in your memory for a particular reason, those are different. And so, with the crossroads comes the music, and I shall here talk about the songs which have shaped my life up until now.
Magic – Pilot
This is possibly the very first song I remember hearing. It probably isn’t the first song I heard, but it was the first song that I remember consciously concentrating on listening to. There isn’t much backstory to it, I was sat in the car with my Dad and the song came on the radio, and I just remember listening to it and liking the hook. Whenever I’ve heard it since, I think of that time, as I said, probably because it was the first song I recall consciously listening to.
Beach Baby – First Class
An epitome of summer and nostalgia, a childhood memory of a song that was just…there. I originally got confused with the song name, thinking the artist was the Beach Boys, also because the song could easily be mistaken for a Beach Boys track. Nevertheless, it’s up there with one of my childhood classics.
There She Goes – The La’s
One of my favourite sounds in the entire world is the sound of my father playing acoustic guitar. I could listen to it forever; I find it relaxing, calming and altogether just a beautiful sound. My earliest memory of this is that of my dad sat at our table playing There She Goes on an acoustic. This is a more concrete memory of mine, and as a result, it’s cemented the song in the mental folder of songs which cannot be anything other than happy. The song reminds me of summer, and the general feeling of being relaxed – which, as a uni student, is a godsend. Whenever I hear the intro, it takes me back to the first time I heard it.
My Sharona – The Knack
Another childhood oldie. There isn’t really much of a memory attached to it, just another one that was always there, floating around in a cloud of gig setlists and tabs. I’ve also discovered that it a pain the arse to play on bass.
Boys of Summer – Don Henley
Another one to add to the summer playlist; I heard this song constantly growing up, played either by my dad or brother, and as a result, I could pick out the chorus because of its distinctive melody, but I couldn’t name the song.
Now, my brother and I are much closer than we were when we were teenagers still living under the same roof. When this was the case, it was not as fluffy a relationship as it is now. Therefore, whenever I liked a song he was listening to, and asked for its name, he would not tell me. God forbid I’d listen to a song that he liked, because obviously, the second I listened to a song ‘of his’, it would automatically ruin it for him, and I would be forever burdened with the sin of corrupting a song that he enjoyed listening to. Not that I don’t have a habit of playing a song that I like repeatedly for 3 days straight, but he was still being unreasonable in my 13(ish)-year-old head. This very thing happened with Boys of Summer. Upon requesting the title, I received the usual reply, and so, after a small side of swearing, I decided enough was enough. I’d known this song for years, loved it, and was apparently not allowed to listen to it. Fuck that. Marching outside to my dad’s office, I explained the sitch, and hummed/sang the chorus as best I could to him. I can’t remember if I knew that it was by Don Henley, but either way, I eventually found out the title and immediately ran back indoors with the smuggest attitude I reckon I’ve ever had, and knocked on my brother’s door.
“Boys of Summer”
“Fuck sake”
Slam.
Nowadays, I often get messages from my brother which go something like this:
“Listen from 1:35-2:00, the bass is SO GOOD”.
Papa Don’t Preach – Madonna
Yes I know, but it was the very first single I bought on vinyl, so I kind of have to include it. Plus, not going to lie, I kind of really like it.
Waiting For a Star to Fall – Boy Meets Girl
I feel like many of the songs I’ve chosen to write about from my childhood all come under a certain emotional umbrella; they all seem to have that late 80’s/90’s summery nostalgia attached to them – the musical equivalent of battered, faded Levis, sunshine, bias cut dresses and oversized printed shirts, giant plants in living rooms and dandelions, all seen through a sepia filter. So, not much different from the music video of Waiting For a Star to Fall. I heard this song many, many years ago, and never really heard it again. Many, many years later, re-enter brother. Same formula applied, however, this time, he actually told me what it was. We sat listening to it and came to the mutual conclusion that it was possibly the happiest song EVER. Seriously, I defy all 2 of you reading this to listen to that song (watching the video is optional but would strongly recommend) and try to deny happiness. You will not succeed.
As well as the sentimental value of the song, the actual music itself is spectacular. The introductory bars are good enough, but then the burst of saxophone at the start, and the solo in the middle is the metaphorical explosion of summer, of sunshine, dancing on the beach and laughter. That is what this song is to me. It is the musical representation of happiness as an emotion. And I don’t think music gets better than that.
Photograph – Def Leppard
Oh, Def Leppard. One of the earliest bands I remember hearing, there are many to choose from, but Photograph was the first song by Def Leppard that I remember hearing (apart from Unbelievable, but I initially thought that was by McFly so let’s skate over that). Once again, I can’t pinpoint exactly where or when I heard the song, it was just kind of there, but it’s always been there, a popular Def Leppard favourite in my house. As I gradually became more interested in music, I began to analyse the guitars more, and I love the chords and the intricacy of the different parts. My favourite part of the song is the crescendo (yes I have a thing about crescendos), both for the live performances of the outro, by Steve Clark in 1988, and Phil Collen now. Also, I’d kill to be able to sing that long note.
Much like St Elmo’s Fire (see below), the ending of the song gives off the same sort of emotion for me, and I think the ability to create that kind of emotion in music whilst maintaining the flow of the song and keep its focus as a rock song is another reason for my unconditional love and adoration for Steve Clark. When I saw Def Leppard live, the song didn’t disappoint.
Livin’ On a Prayer – Bon Jovi
This was my favourite song for nearly 10 years. I don’t remember how exactly it was that I became obsessed with this song, but I’ve told the story in a previous post about how I discovered Bon Jovi as a band. However, Livin’ On a Prayer was the catalyst for this subsequent musical (obsession) discovery. I think my memory of this song is sitting on the sofa with the rest of my family and the song and music video coming on the TV, and my Mum singing along to it, and me just absolutely bloody loving it. It was the song that I aired guitared to in my room with a scarf tied around my head; it was the start of my idolisation of Jon Bon Jovi, and it was the song that stayed with me through the years, and became ‘my song’ at school, whenever it came on at parties, I’d be the one that people turned to. It stayed with me as an anthem of happiness, shit key change and all, and I loved the power and euphoria of both the vocal and the chord progressions. It remained my favourite song until I heard another, which I shall talk about later…
Bohemian Rhapsody – Queen
I’m going to voice possibly one of the most unpopular opinions to have as a rock fan – I’ve grown to not like this song. Here’s why…
When my brother and I were at school, our schools put on a joint musical, as they do every other year. The year that we did it, the musical was We Will Rock You. So obviously, I was in the cast and my brother was the guitarist. However, this did mean endless (enjoyable) rehearsals, and constant performances of BoRap. I can now never hear it and not think of the musical. Not that this is a bad thing, it’s just that it’s kind of been done to death for me. Nevertheless, the song has shaped my life in that way, because it reminds me of that period of school, as well as the fun I had putting on the production. And it was a bloody good production, not going to lie. To prove that, we got sent a signed photo by Brian May.
As well as this, the beginning of Innuendo nearly makes me wet myself because that was the start of the first act.
Faithfully – Journey
I’m not really trying to list these songs in chronological order, because I can’t remember which order I heard them all in. But Faithfully stuck out for me among the songs I thought about. I was raised listening to bands like Journey and Def Leppard, and Faithfully was one of those early songs I heard – that and Don’t Stop Believing. I remember falling in love with the way it sounded, but having no idea what the song was actually about. Mainly because I was about 9 or 10, and so long-distance relationships with touring musicians wasn’t really a topic about which I knew a great deal. Nevertheless, the first concert I went to was Journey when I was around this age. I remember little else apart from hearing the lead in to final chorus, sang primarily by the audience. That, and two drunk women really, really going for it dancing-wise about 5 rows behind us. I saw Journey again a few years later, supported by Styx and Foreigner, and again, I heard Faithfully, and the melody, the crescendo, the guitar, the piano, the vocals, everything about it elevates me when I hear it. That hasn’t gone away, for it was the song I talked about in my very presentation at university, when, in a seminar focussed on the history of popular music (best module EVER), I had to talk about a song I associated with a particular childhood memory, or one which meant a lot to me. I did feel sorry for my classmates, as I did get a bit animated talking about the song, but either way, this is another song which has shaped my musical taste.
Uptown Girl – Billy Joel
Similarly to some of the other songs I’ve mentioned, Uptown Girl was one of those which I’d always heard and loved growing up, but I couldn’t really name the artist – the Billy Joel obsession was to come many years later. Either way, I always loved the melody and the music video, and I guess in a way, the song was a gateway to the discovery of the album An Innocent Man, its title track, and a few others on that album which stand out for me – This Night and Christie Lee. The former I loved for its melody, the backing vocals, and most importantly, the saxophone solo and crescendo. The latter I listened to, expecting it to more like This Night or The Longest Time, but no. The moment that rock ‘n’ roll piano kicked in, I stared at my turntable, thought “bloody hell, I was not expecting that.” Whilst it isn’t really that much of a shocker in reality, bear in mind that the most upbeat Billy Joel song I’d heard was Uptown Girl, so Christie Lee was a massive change – another song which influenced my love of saxophone. But more on that later.
During the summer of 2016, I went to see Billy Joel at Wembley Stadium. I took along a friend who hadn’t been to a concert with me before…she did get elbowed, but I did warn her. Anyway, the concert was magnificent, and everyone knew what the encore would be. Surprise surprise, the stage was bathed in pink lighting as the drumbeat kicked in and 90,000 people started singing Uptown Girl.
Love Theme to St Elmo’s Fire – David Foster
Now, I mentioned earlier about my love of saxophone. This song is what tipped me over the edge, from “I love listening to saxophone” to “I must play this because if I don’t I will never be happy with myself.” The film for which this song was written is a bit too relatable in many ways for me, and I reckon that the emotional attachment to my favourite film has influenced my outlook on its soundtrack.
I mentioned at the start of this piece that I am at a crossroads in my life. I am teetering on the brink of something strange called ‘real life’, which I have come to realise, far fewer people know how to navigate than I originally thought. I’m at a crucial point at the start of university. It’s the time where I can start to make choices in terms of what career path I’d like to take, choose the people with whom I want to spend time, develop my hobbies, and ultimately, start carving a life for myself. It is the time where you have to take all of these things into account, and make a choice: sink or swim. Make the most of it, because, if you don’t, what else? It’s terrifying, so terrifying, I’ve never been so scared about anything in my life. The choices I’ve learned that people have to make when they’re this young have more of an impact than one would think. On one hand, the new start is a great thing, people can reinvent themselves, develop as a person, and generally take to it like a duck to water. Others hate it immediately, realise it isn’t for them, and decide to do other things. St Elmo’s Fire epitomises that emotion. The film follows 7 friends who try to navigate life as college graduates in their early 20s. Some can do it, others take a little longer. Most have no clue what they’re doing. But, as the film develops and ends, it leaves a sense of “yes, it’s hard. Yes, you may not always know what you’re doing, and it’s scary having to go into the real world by yourself and work out your own life. But whatever happens, things will always work out” And I believe that if the Love Theme to St Elmo’s Fire could speak, this is the thing it would say. It’s an empowering song with an utterly euphoric crescendo, and when I heard it, I will just say that it affected me. I’m not entirely sure how, but it did, and that is all I feel I can say about it.
Alone – Heart
Ann Wilson. What a voice. She’s up there with the best female vocalists of all time for me. It’s a song that I could never name, but upon hearing the introduction, I’d go “oh, this…” I found Heart when I was quite a bit older than when I discovered a lot of the songs I’ve mentioned. I only found them when I was well into my teens. But whatever song I listened to, I could not get over her voice. When I saw Heart at the Albert Hall in 2016, Ann Wilson still had a phenomenal voice. I was very emotionally conflicted, trying to watch both Ann and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
Ann Wilson is my singing idol (along with Steve Perry) and Alone is a spectacularly well written song. It was another one that I spent far too long singing into a hairbrush, but you listen to it and tell me that you didn’t go a little bit 80s power ballad too.
Tangled
As I’ve grown up, the latest path I’d like to carve into the music industry has been through songwriting. I’m hardly fantastic at it (understatement) and it’s not like I have any particular ability when it comes to putting what’s in my head into music (even bigger understatement). However, it’s been something I’d like to be able to do for a very long time. There was a process to this development in ambition, and it started with Diane Warren.
Diane Warren has written so many songs that I lose track, but she’s mastered the art of a simple song. Case in point: Steve Lukather’s Lonely Beat of My Heart, or Cher’s Turn Back Time. This was my goal – write a simple song like Diane Warren, and practise that skill, and it would get easier. However, this intersected with my discovery of David Foster, and so it all went out of the window because I discovered something which grabbed at me and wouldn’t let go – film music.
As I said, David Foster composed the music to St Elmo’s Fire, among many, many other films. It was this which first got me into the idea of film music in a contemporary, pop-song sense. Enter Alan Menken’s soundtrack for Tangled.
I watched Tangled the first time and quite liked it – I liked the story, and on a basic level, I liked the songs. However, upon the next couple of times I watched it, and then the next 39542952082 times I watched it, I came to realise that OH MY GOD THE SCORE. Alan Menken is already a genius, but this just isn’t fair. Listen to the instrumentation of I See the Light, or my personal favourite, the reprise of Mother Knows Best. Or just the background music in the scenes. It is truly, truly incredible. The film score for Tangled is one of the reasons that I decided I wanted to teach myself more about composing music for film. But this was more in the sense of writing actual songs which were performed as part of the film, not traditional, old-school Hollywood film music. This came later, and there is one person whom I have to thank for setting a fire inside me about the art of film music.
John Barry
I could go on forever about John Barry. To some, I have. If you’re one of the people to whom I haven’t spoken about him, I suggest you possibly don’t mention it around me.
My relationship with the music of John Barry has been a slow burner, but if I come to realise the dream that I currently have of following in his footsteps, I believe I will come to recognise him as possibly one of my greatest musical influences, if he isn’t already. There are several standout pieces which he has composed, and I shall discuss them all, as they mean very different things to me.
The first I’ll choose is Body Heat. This song plays to my love of saxophone, and was another key one which made me want to play; I heard it before St Elmo’s Fire, and the two combined meant that the temptation of learning to play became very hard to resist. I was once discussing Body Heat with a friend, and by that I mean I’d forced them to listen to it and tell me what they thought. I said that I thought the song was the musical equivalent of sex; or rather, how sex should be. They said it was more like seduction, and I found myself agreeing. The piece is beautiful, and the tempo combined with the peaks and troughs of the hook creates such an imaginative, unavoidable atmosphere that results in a piece dripping with seduction.
I read a biography of John Barry over the summer. Whilst sat on the roof listening to his discography, I noticed that there was a term frequently mentioned to describe the work of Barry – soaring. The next piece I chose to discuss embodies this trademark perfectly – Out of Africa. I will be forever grateful to my father for successfully dragging me along to the John Barry memorial concert at the Royal Albert Hall a few years ago. I didn’t want to go, because at the time, I had no interest in his music whatsoever. I’m so, so glad that I went, because not only did I get to see Michael Caine (I love Michael Caine) and Dame Shirley Bassey, I got to sit for a whole evening in the Albert Hall listening to the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra play John Barry’s greatest hits. Even though I didn’t have an interest in film music, or know who John Barry was – I merely knew that he composed the James Bond theme tune – I could still appreciate the sheer power and brilliance of the music. Out of Africa is one of the songs that I associate with that concert, also because it was one of the first pieces by Barry that I ever heard. It’s remained one of my favourites.
Somewhere in Time is my dad’s favourite Barry piece, and one of mine. However, I viewed it differently before seeing the film. I shan’t give away the plot, I shall only say that the ending of the film was followed with about an hour and a half of hardcore weeping. It made the score even more poignant for me, but did not detract from its beauty. It’s not like whenever I hear the music, I burst out crying, but it’s like the musical equivalent of putting a name to a face. I am able to separate the two, but the score itself another soaring piece of magnificence.
I’ll discuss one more of John Barry’s pieces, because this is one of my more recent discoveries. And by recent, I mean within the last week or so. It is also the piece which gave me the lightning bolt moment. Up until now, I’d loved, appreciated and wanted to play John Barry’s music. When I heard the London Theme, I had to learn how to create the music. Taken from the series of songs composed by Barry for Elizabeth Taylor’s visit to London, I listened to the whole lot but kept going back to the London Theme. It’s so classic, it’s so classic Hollywood, it’s beautiful and mesmerising. I listened to it a few more times, and picked up a book about film music. I’m currently 4 chapters in.
Take This Heart – Richard Marx
And now we come to my favourite song. It’s been newly appointed, and it took some emotional effort to yank the crown off Livin’ On a Prayer, but I think it’s more than justified. “You fear every step you make, so sure that your heart will break/It’s not how the story ends, you’ll be back on your feet again.” If you refer back to the first paragraph of this (very long) post, or the paragraph concerning St Elmo’s Fire, you may understand why I listened to this song on a loop for about 16 hours straight. Re: terror of real life and need for musical comfort. My dad showed it to me in his office one summer evening on a whim, saying that he used to play it in a band. I’ve often thought about this; that he wouldn’t have thought about it at the time, but he was playing what would become his daughter’s favourite song. Anyway, I love it. I love it with all my heart, I told Richard Marx how much I loved it (he said thank you), and I love the video. Apart from the sentimentality, I think the song itself is fantastic. Richard Marx has a habit of making the most satisfyingly melodic music ever, and this is no exception; it’s a brilliant piece of music, and once again, because I’m a crescendo whore, I love the ending as well. Everything about the song makes me feel empowered and euphoric, happy and safe. It’s been my go-to throughout my year of transition, and I still continue to love it.
Start Me Up – Rolling Stones
Ok, it’s an unpopular opinion in my house, but I love the Stones. My dad doesn’t mind them, but there’s only so much he can listen to before announcing that it all blends into one. As someone who can rather comfortably listen to good blues music, I do not have this problem. I have many favourable Stones songs, but I’ve chosen Start Me Up, because it’s in my top 3, and quite possibly my favourite. This is primarily because the song always makes me think of when I saw them in Hyde Park in 2013. The band came onstage and Start Me Up just exploded, and the entire festival was enveloped in such a monumental, historical sound, it blew me away. I only have to hear the riff and it takes me right back to the summer; I recently rediscovered the fact that I have that very concert in live form on vinyl, and upon putting it on, the same feeling flooded back to me when I heard the riff. The cheers of the crowd, the sound of the guitars, everything brought me back to the feeling of walking bare foot on short, dusty grass, the faint, echoing sound of Fender guitars wafting around on the breeze, sun and relaxation.
As well as that, Brown Sugar is the other Stones song which I feel shaped my life in other ways; plonking it in the same category as My Sharona, it’s another gig favourite – it was welcomed at the end of every encore. Both of these songs have acted like many of the others, as gateways to the discovery of, often, a band’s entire discography. Or at least, a big part of it. The Rolling Stones hold a special place in my life, because the day that I saw them was one of the greatest days of my life, and their powerful influence in music combined with the era and historical themes they represent cement them as one of the artists who shaped my life.
Wake Me Up Before You Go Go – Wham!
This song has infiltrated my life throughout the years at parties, through my general listening, my brother playing it on bass, among other scenarios. My first memory of it is sitting with my dad in his office, and he showed me this song, and I remember clearly the two of us laughing at the part of the video lit up in neon. The song stayed with me through the years purely because I come from a house of Wham! lovers, and just because the music is incredible. When we heard the news of George Michael’s death, we were all shocked. His talent was undeniable and unavoidable, and quite right too. This song was one which shaped my life by introducing me to that talent.
I realised how long this post was when I hit about 3100 words. However, I didn’t want to stop, because there are so many songs which influenced my life in many different ways – some purely due to sentiment and memory, others due to influence and fascination. I am still at a crossroads in my life. I feel that I will find myself in this position many more times, but so far, this is the musical influence which has accompanied me on this path.
A life in song. A map for a crossroads. A helping hand for a work in progress.
