If we've learned anything from turning George Lucas franchises into Lego-based video games, it's that Harrison Ford looks all sorts of hot as a little blockman. I mean, watching the cutscenes, seeing Lego Indy tipping his hat back, smiling that rakish smile, giving the girl his best "I'm so going to block you later" look, it's almost better than the movie.
I'm also a geek.
Today, my iPod decided to regurgitate some songs that aren't its usual fare. There was more from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers than I'm used to hearing, and a good deal of Islands, really old Beck, and one or two Coldplay songs I don't believe I've ever heard before. It was enough to break me from my reverie each time it happened, to press the back button, to listen again to make sure I heard right. I really ought to reformat my iPod; it was starting to guess at what I liked, which is kind of not the point, in my opinion. I'd rather hear a song I like, remember how much I liked that song, listen to it on purpose a couple of times over the next few days, and then move on. To have my iPod preempt me by playing the songs I've played manually more often than other songs is kind of bothersome.
Either that, or I'm crazy and totally made up a function that my iPod does not in fact possess. That would work, too.
Alright. So far this week, I've pretty much exclusively listed albums that I still listen to on a regular basis, or at least don't skip over when songs from the album come up when I shuffle my music collection. The albums for this evening fall into another queer category altogether, which is albums that have shaped me, but I don't hear much of now that I'm older. You'll probably understand why. The next two are as follows:
Rebel Rock by Various ArtistsIn fourth grade, I was really getting to know what it meant not to be an only child any longer. Margo had been born a couple of years before, and Marielle was nearly brand new, and it became obvious with each passing day that life was no longer going to revolve around me. My Father was working extra to support his growing family, my Mother was constantly busy with baby things, and any assorted relatives that may have come over before, pinched at my cheeks, asked me how school was... well they were too preoccupied with the girl children to bother with an increasingly awkward boy-child with large teeth and a proclivity towards speaking softly.
Not that I wasn't adorable, 'cause I was. I was a blond little runt until the age of twelve, at which point I shot up a couple of feet and darkened perceptively. My towheaded features betrayed their part-Scottish origins like a sleeper agent gone rogue, and suddenly I had brows full of spiky hair and a jutting chin.
But at ten, I was still fair, still a little chubby, still a soft-spoken germanic boy. And more and more each day, I was discovering that I would never be an only child again.
My Father had a case, large and hard, built specifically to hold some thirty-odd cassette tapes in. Never much a man for music, his case was filled with self-help tapes, some free Garth Brooks albums he'd scored off of Ty England (who he had a sort of awkward friendship with. It mostly involved name-dropping in my father's case), and some of my Mother's tapes she'd made when they were still a young, enthused couple. These last tapes were mostly songs recorded off of the radio (as mixtapes used to be), with a couple tracks of poetry or bad jokes. I don't think my Mom ever knew that I found them, although they did disappear as I got older. I wish I knew where they were now.
But no - the real gem of my Father's collection was a gray and blue tape in a clear case on which someone (not my Dad) had written 'ReBeL RoCk' in magic marker. It was so cool. I'd sit on my bed with my half-brother Chad's old Walkman and groove out to what can only be described as, well, rebel rock. Children of the south writing music that wasn't quite country, wasn't quite rock & roll, wasn't quite poppy enough to just be... and I loved it.
I have a very vivid memory of being in the back of our monstrous old minivan (Ford Aerostar, I think), driving down the side of Pike's Peak after half a day spent at Santa's Workshop. I loved that place, loved feeding the reindeer, flying the little clapboard biplane ride, loved the giant slide and the place where you made candles. And even though I now had to share one of my favorite places on earth with two sisters (one of which wasn't even old enough to get it! Jeez!), I'd still had an awesome time. Feeling the afterglow, I slipped the big fuzzy headphones of my Walkman over my ears, rewound the tape, and listened to Rebel Rock for a few minutes until the joy was just too much to hold in and a ridiculous, pre-pubescent laugh bubbled up and escaped. I can't remember another time I've felt that sort of pure glee to be alive.
Tracks to listen to:
Gregg Allman Band - I'm No Angel
The Fabulous Thunderbirds - Tuff Enuff
Where in the World is Carmen Sandiegoby Rockapella and Various Artists
I was a PBS baby. My Mom would set me down in front of the television while she sewed or read or whatever it is she used to do way back when she still believed in free time and having an attention span. Sometimes we'd watch soaps, and sometimes we'd watch reruns of Star Trek or the Outer Limits, but more often than not there'd be a pledge drive on PBS, featuring some Operetta or another, or an eighteen-tape set of Beethoven symphonies recorded live at the Philadelphia Philharmonic. And I ate it up. I sat straight and hunched at the same time (like only babies can do), rapt as large women in yards of silk and furs sang. I emulated with sounds at first, then with words as I got older and understood that they weren't just singing gibberish (which I thought would have been kind of cool, to be honest), but simply expressing themselves in another language.
I never stopped watching PBS as I got older, but simply changed time slots. After I started school, the daytime operas were no longer on when I could watch them, and so I was forced to adapt to the likes of Wishbone, Ghost Writer, and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? And when I say forced, I don't mean I watched them unwillingly. I loved my demographically targeted children's programming like a fat kid loves insulin. But I didn't love it quite enough to be overjoyed when my mom bought me the freaking soundtrack to a quiz show for my birthday, however much I may have liked singing along to the theme song.
But over time, that little tape grew on me, especially the tracks that weren't really the headliners. I found that I had intense desire to visit New York and Indiana, and I didn't really mind being called Jim Boy. And so it was that I was devastated beyond consoling when the car's tape player made that telltale sickening 'schlurp' sound, and ate my Carmen Sandiego album. I think I was fifteen or so at the time, and although I hesitantly asked my Mom if we could replace it maybe, I knew that the end of an era had come, and that I was one step closer to growing up.
Tracks to listen to:
Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? (with end credits!)
Capital
More to come, if I can find them...
That's all for tonight, folks. Leave me love, cookies, small children. I don't discriminate.
-James.
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