"You will always like best the music you listened to when you were nineteen."
That's what my sister says, and she should know. For myself, I turned nineteen in 1968, that awful year. In fact, Senator Kennedy was mortally wounded on my birthday. Also, that year included the murder of America's great moral conscience, the Tet offensive, riots at the Democratic convention in Chicago, and Richard Nixon was elected to his first term as president.
So, a bad year for the most part, but musically it was one of the best of the twentieth century.
I had been a folkie during my high school days, preferring Peter Paul and Mary to the various rock groups that adorned the early sixties. Surely we'd all agree in retrospect that their covers of "Blowin' in the Wind," and "Leavin' on a Jet Plane" have left a greater mark on us than "Duke of Earl" or "Soldier Boy." Those years popularized songs across a spectrum from "Ballad of the Green Berets" to "Eve of Destruction" and "Universal Soldier."
I remember the Doors, of course. "Light my Fire" really didn't have much of a lyric aside from the veiled drug reference, but it had that long instrumental passage in the middle (if you heard the six-minute version) with a pounding drum accompaniment and repetitive guitar licks. It broke the mold of the "three verses, two choruses and a coda" songs we were used to. "Somebody to Love" by Jefferson Airplane was in much the same style, driving beat, Grace Slick's powerful voice, and the beginnings at least of what came to be called psychedelic rock.
It was the year the Beatles turned out the White Album. The introspective "While My Guitar Gently Weeps," and the homage/satire of Bob Dylan, "Rocky Raccoon" are the songs I recall. The White Album falls between "Sergeant Pepper" and "Let it Be," so it might not get the attention it deserves.
But I was more interested in Simon and Garfunkel, at least at the start of the year. It was the year of "Mrs Robinson" and many of my friends and I had a definite sense that we wanted no part of the materialistic world our parents were making for us. Still, some of Simon's lyrics that year and subsequently didn't quite satisfy our expectations for profundity.
"Wish I was a Kellogg's corn flake,
Floating in my bowl taking movies,"
It's whimsical, but silly.
That summer I worked for the post office, delivering mail. I was assigned to a car with left hand drive, but had to deliver from the right side window, which required a lot of stretching. I tried driving on the wrong side of the road, but figured I'd be fired if they caught me doing it, so abandoned the idea. I bring all that up because the car had a radio and the hit song during the summer was a number called "The Letter," appropriately enough. Again, there wasn't much of a lyric. What I remember is the chorus.
"I'm gonna take a jet plane,
Ain't got time for a fast train.
I'm a-going home,
My lonely days are done,
My baby wrote me a letter."
The song didn't wear very well as I perspired through a Miami summer, cooped up in a car without air conditioning.
By fall, we were so benumbed by the torrent of news, most of it bad, that we were more than ready for Paul Simon's "Bridge Over Troubled Water." It seemed the best way to see out the year. Simon still thinks of that song as his best melody, but not his best lyric, but I always think of it as a solace when things go badly.
Those are my memories of the year I was nineteen. What are yours?
I went back and checked the top 100 songs of 1993, and of those 100 there are two which I really remember listening to much (at least by choice) - Runaway Train by Soul Asylum and Two Princes by Spin Doctors. I could still listen to the Spin Doctors once in a blue moon, but the other I could leave and not miss. So I'm not sure my 19th year is the year of the music I'd love best.
ReplyDeleteI graduated High School on the wave of Nirvana's grunge revolution, which certainly has shaped modern rock a little bit. I never pull out my Nirvana album and listen to it.
I'd have to say that the music that stuck with me from the High School and Post - High School years were bands that hadn't hit the radar yet or which had built a strong underground following and never really reached a full blown mainstream audience; Jane's Addiction, Dave Matthews Band (subsequently superstars, but not until 1995), Widespread Panic, & Phish were all bands that were attracting followings that would eventually make them media darlings but who at the time did not enjoy a radio presence.
Mostly, though, I always liked the music of younger days, either the songs I heard on the record player or radio growing up. And the music I listen to now is mostly a mix of those two groups and all the new fun stuff I dig up or are shared with me by friends. There's still some good music being made out there, but it takes some digging.
I couldn't remember the songs form the year I turned 19, so, like Joe, I looked them up. There is a reason I couldn't remember - 1978 - Disco. Of the top 10 songs, 5 were Andy Gibbs or the BeeGees songs, and not the good BeeGees.
ReplyDeleteOf course, as the youngest of an older family, I had always listened to "oldies". Though I am about a decade younger, Pete's music is the music I identify with, Peter, Paul and Mary, Simon and Garfunkel in particular.
Of course, Disco, did open up my music tastes considerable, I spent the Disco years listening to Country when I couldn't find an Oldies Station. This lead me to Celtic and World Folk. As long as the lyrics are in English, I'm ok.
I was 19 in late 1973 and early 1974. The pop music of that era is mostly nowhere near as good as that of the 1960s. There IS Elton John's "Yellow Brick Road" from that era. There is some of the early Abba stuff (I know, I know, but I actually like Abba). There are "classics" such as "Billy Don't Be a Hero". There is stuff like "Rock Your Baby" (I don't know who did that one). Incidentally, when I read the title, I thought you were going to write about JESUS CHRIST,the original "Rock of Ages"!
ReplyDelete