Contributed by:
Tabitha Dial, YourHub.com
Article Contributed on: 2/16/2007 1:44:40 PM
Blogger's note: This blog is inspired by Ann Himel's mixed tapeand John Zwick's mixed tape.
I'm just going to lay down some of my favorite songs for you. Here goes:
Drive My Car: The first record my mother bought was
Rubber Soul. I only learned this after I bought my first CD:
Rubber Soul. On family trips from the Western Slope to Denver, we'd play our Beatles. Yes. Our Beatles. My family of four nicknamed ourselves the Fab Four to seal our connection to them a few years ago.
Bohemian Rhapsody:
Wayne's World came out when I was in or approaching middle school. My brother and I loved singing this song. I remember singing it (loudly) with a friend outside my school. About a year ago, at The Spot in Denver, I was co-facilitating a youth workshop with
Art from Ashes and one of the youth began to sing this song. Everyone joined in, and we performed the whole song acapella.
Me and My Bobby McGee: I found this song as a teenager when I believed I was born in the wrong time and should've been a teen in the 1960's.I learned to play it on the guitar not long after and think I'll always have the words memorized. It's almost a guarantee that if you start singing to me, "Busted flat in Baton Rouge" I'll have to finish the song and still imagine I'm
Janis Joplin. When I discovered that
Alex, my boyfriend, had this song on his MP3, I knew I'd found someone who I would never have to trade all of my tomorrows for.
I Hear a Symphony: I believe that I learned to sing from the Supremes. When I listen to this song, I remember standing on my padded desk chair in my bedroom, leaning into my turntable as I played my mother's 45 of this song again and again and again.
Jessie's Girl: Because I used to be Jesse's girl. Hard to hate this song. I was also born in 1980, so I've gotta have something from the 1980s on my list.
It's Tricky: Yes, I was very much into rap music for about a year (oh, I was hardcore) in college. It's appropriate that this follows Jessie's Girl because I adored rap thanks to
Justin, another former-boyfriend-turned-friend. (hidden track:
Pushin' Ryhmes Like Weights). I like rap that honors poetry in its own tricky way.
Today Was a Good Day: I love
Ice Cube. This is a perfect car song (not the best for the Fab Four family trips, I reckon!).
Girl I Wanna Lay You Down: Alex found this song and kindly shared it with me about a year ago. It's a favorite to slow dance to with him. It has an accordian part and a sense of humor and if that wasn't enough, it also has great metaphors, like "you're smooth and creamy like peanut butter" and "baby, the postman is about to deliver". Fun.
I WIll Follow You into the Dark: I first heard this song in Alex's car when we were probably driving to Denver Diner, a tradition we have every weekend (we split a chocolate shake and he almost always orders the Lone Star). I believe it was new to him, too. We both decided we liked the song by the second chorus (Alex found this video and asked me to watch it with him -- it's adorable!).
Song 2: Before there was rap in my world, there were Brits. Plenty of Brits, from the Beatles to Blur .... and I will always hate Oasis and always remember that my pen pal from New Zealand introduced me to them with a mixed tape of her own. This is also a nod to the fact that I nearly moved to London after graduating college.
A Foggy Day in London Town: And before I ever visited London, I fell in love with the music of
Billie Holliday -- my favorite track is this one, or
Comes Love, which I can not find. But if I was ever going to audition for a musical in high school, I was going to sing
Comes Love.
Desperado: The Eagles have accompanied Fleetwood Mac and the Beatles on our family road trips (have I mentioned that I've always been in charge of bringing the music?). This is our favorite Eagles song, even though we admit it is such a sad song. I like that "Freedom's just another word" in
Me and My Bobby McGee while freedom is "just some people talking" in this song.
In My Life: This has been played at two funerals in my family. It will be played at mine. I wanted it to be picked as my class song when I graduated in 1998 (this was before it was played at any funeral I knew of), when the Beatles' Anthology was big. But the Beatles hype wasn't big enough among the class of 1998-- mostly all in my mind, as my yearbook attests.
Personal Jesus: I didn't really discover
Johnny Cash until a few years ago.
Cash is one of my favorite albums. I would have thrown
Streets of Laredo on this (my grandmother loves cowboy songs and this is my favorite one) or We'll
Meet Again, but we need to pick up the tempo a bit, wot? This is another song that sits me right down in my Jeep Liberty and finds me driving from point A to point B.
She's a Woman: I don't think there's a single place on earth that I haven't spent more than 50 hours at and have not sung or whistled this song in. Locations include: the carpark in my apartment, the bathrooms at King Soopers in Stroh Ranch and at The Wal-Mart in Parker and the bathroom just down the hall. The Beatles version (surprise, ha ha) was another find I made as a teenager.
Both Sides, Now: This song, by
Joni MItchell, and
I Willby the Beatles were among my favorite songs to play on the piano. I'd give anything to find the sheet music again. I found Joni Mitchell on my own in high school, too ... I remember my parents and I had to go somewhere before I got to listen to her
Hits and Misses album. Before I knew it, I was imitating her music on my guitar. This song also made me cry after I nearly died in a very scary car accident when I was 19. It seemed that all the "clouds" were suddenly gone in my life ... I had a new start.
Somewhere Over the Rainbow: Legends loom large in my life. When I was nine and my great-grandmother was coming to the end of her life, my only request to my mother was that she sing this song (then my favorite) to her. This version was played at one of my best friend's weddings and then it spilled over the speakers on the
catamaran cruise in HawaiiAlex and I took in October (it was his outstanding idea to go on the cruise). I also adore this version because
Israel Kamakawiwo Ole sings
What a Wonderful World in it -- one of my other favorite songs.
Hello, Dolly: Mom brought us up on musicals. This is my favorite version of
Louis Armstrong's song, though I was first introduced to the version that included
Barbara Streisand. I started loving this rendition in my jazz appreciation class at Metro State. It brings back all-over good feelings and nostalgia and sometimes I feel myself driving to Parker as I listen to this, because I have it on a tape in my car and never skip it.
I Will Remember You: This mixed tape has a lot of easy listening tunes on it, doesn't it? Well ... I think I might want this song played at my tribute (I hate the word funeral) ... I don't know ...
Golden Slumbers/Carry that Weight/The End: I think the first time I heard this was on the back porch of my childhood home. I believe I had just bought
Abbey Road and I was supposed to be paying attention to my brother's high school graduation party, but instead I was listening to my musical gods. Whatever I was supposed to be doing, I wasn't really doing it, sneaking the sound of the Beatles while crouching at the stereo that had been wheeled onto the concrete. Four or five years later, I got to see
Paul McCartney in concert -- I believe he performed these songs. Today Alex and I very much love listening to these songs -- I think of them as one song, not three.