Tuesday, March 9, 2010

The Soundtrack of Your Life

What are your favorite songs of all time? Seriously, what are they? Don’t gimme that whole spiel about “Oh, I couldn’t possibly pick one or even five!” – you have your favorites, just check your iTunes play counts! And if you change your mind all the time, what are the five songs that really pull at your heartstrings – and not just in a sad way?

When you hear those songs, do they take you back to a specific time period and place? Can you feel the same emotions now that you did then? I’d honestly be surprised if you answered “no” to those questions.

Music is such an integral and powerful part of our lives. All of our senses are unique in their own right, and all of them have a distinct impact on our memory, but our auditory sense has an especially acute ability to bring us back to particular moments in our lives.

Hell, whenever I hear “Achy-Breaky Heart” I’m instantly taken back to when I was four years old, dancing in a white t-shirt and tighty-whities around the living room while singing into the TV remote.

And then there’s Mariah, of course. As most of you already know, I have a slight obsession with Mimi – she’s my favorite musical artist. It only takes a short, two-second clip of any of her songs and I’m immediately feelin’ emotions higher than I ever dreamed of – pun intended.

My favorite song of all time is probably “Honey” by Mariah. Every time I listen to it, I get butterflies in the best way possible – and I become giddy and optimistic. Why? Who knows! Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I’ve been dancing around to that song for over a decade. Or maybe it’s because I imagine myself back on the beach in Miami whenever I hear it. Whatever the reason, that song will forever have strange powers over me.

I’m a music freak. Some people grow out of it – my Dad sure as hell did – but I don’t think I ever will. I follow music blogs like Musicboxmix (shout out to Louie!), constantly download new music and never turn off my iPod. I’d rather have it this way.

So what are your favorite songs? Tell me in the comments! If I don’t already have the song, I’ll download it. Nothin’ like sharin’ a lil’ musical love, right? Mhm.

5 comments:

  1. Interesting story and I agree with you that when you listen to certain songs, they remind you of stuff. I would have to say that the songs that strike home to me are the following:

    *"Bend and Not Break" by Dashboard Confessional since that was the song that my ex gave me when we were dating and I fell in love with the band's music.

    *"No One" by Cold and "Lithium" by Evanescene since I went through a bad breakup with Bruce and felt really low here and almost wanted to kill myself.

    That's all I can think of for now here.

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  2. I love Dashboard. I was really into them at the beginning of high school, circa 2001-2002.

    The other two songs I haven't heard. I'll have to look those up! Thanks for sharing :)

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  3. I thought about this all day in my cubicle (or really, for the 20 minutes that I was not running around stalking the hot IBM guy), but here you go:

    -Fight by Ben Kweller
    -Swept Away by The Avett Brothers
    -Hold On by Neko Case
    -At the Bottom of Everything by Bright Eyes
    -I Don't Feel Like Dancing by Scissor Sisters-I dare you not to shake it when you listen to Scissor Sisters

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  4. I LOVE that last song! The other four I must download. Immediately. xoxo

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  5. Hey boy hey! Thanks for the shot out to the music blog. I appreciate it. And since I'm in the business of providing the music that makes soundtracks, I'll give a glimpse into what the soundtrack to my life looks like:

    1. Yolanda Adams - Open Your Heart
    2. Kina - Me
    3. Anastacia - Defeated
    4. Groove Theory - Tell Me
    5. Corine Bailey Rae - Like A Star
    6. Diana Krall - Case Of You
    7. 3 Doors Down - Here Without You
    8. Veronica - Someone To Hold (Johnny Vicious Hard Mix)
    9. Andrea Martin - Share The Love (Hani Hyperkickass Mix)
    10. Plumb - In My Arms (Kaskade Mix)
    11. Sam Sparro - Black and Gold (Phones as Hard as Diamonds Mix)
    12. Mary Mary - Shackles (Victor Calderone Big Room Mix)
    13. Britney Spears - Unusual You (Geo Iezzi Remix)

    And here I pause; my impulse is to keep going, but I'll tell ya this. I'm in the process of preparing the concept for a new blog I'm launching and this entry was inspiring in context to that. Thanks for the shot out and for the muse.

    XOXO

    Louie

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