The Vineyards

By request, and because I said "soon" and it has been over three months, I now finish that story about music.

On with it, then. I stopped at age 16, when I ventured outside my imposed boundaries of Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Johnny Mathis, John Lennon (post-Yoko), soap opera music, and anything French or Italian.

It started with a little program called Turtle Beach Midi Karaoke. It was a big pink box with two floppies inside, one for the program and another for the .mid files. My father just bought it one day. No questioning from my part, just installed it and went to check the music. Lots of things one would expect to hear in easy listening FM stations. The heaviest thing in the collection was "We will rock you", which is funny enough and unmusical enough to capture my interest. Seeing, then, "Memories", "Blue Moon", "It Might Be You", "New York New York", I was obviously fated to like it but remain in my little circle. Except there was one I liked more than all others, and I was sure I knew it, even if I had no idea where. "Dust in the Wind", by Kansas.

A few weeks later I was surprised once again when my father came home with a Kansas CD. "Point of Know Return", because it had "Dust in the Wind" in it. A full CD of an American band playing with electric guitars (and violins and other unexpected instuments, but bear with me). The cover was a ship falling off the border of the world - not anywhere near any album cover I had ever seen. The booklet had drawings of the members, all with long hair, some with beard. It was quite shocking, but I gave it a try - if they made "Dust in the Wind", they surely are not very bad.

I paid my fee for innocence when I realized that was the lightest song in the CD; everything else was heavier. And I paid my fee for ignorance when I caught myself listening to the CD over and over. With exception of two songs I considered too heavy and just skipped ("Lightning's Hand" and "Sparks of the Tempest"), there was not one I did not love. I accepted defeat.

The door was open, then, and there was a corridor ahead, that everyone had taken years before. But I had no one to lead the way. So I stood at the door watching, and accepting anything that came along, but never looked for anything, never was given any indication of what I should listen to. The big turning point of my life in terms of music had the single immediate result of making me switch my alarm radio from AM to FM. Nothing more.

So limited I was again, not by my own walls, but by a complete lack of leads to follow. The result of that is that I can sing about twenty songs by Air Supply flawlessly - their CD is right next to Barry Manilow's, Celine Dion is next, then Diana Ross. I keep them in alphabetical order, on top of everything.

Cliché, but Mp3 played a role there. In fact, one Mp3. At the time, internet was something distant, and there were many BBSs. I was a member of one, and someone uploaded Jewel Kilcher's "Who Will Save Your Soul". I downloaded it and liked it, then went out and bought the entire album. Shot in the dark, but it worked better than anyone would ever expect - in that album are two of the three songs that can make me cry.

So, buying albums based on a single music works. So I bought Natalie Imbruglia's "Left of the Middle" - yes, because of "Torn", damnit. And each track makes me remember a level in Duke Nukem 3D, as I always played it whenever I faced Puppy in a match. I only won three times.

(Breech deserves mentioning here, but it had a post of its own some time ago. It has its standalone importance. It did not to much in the big picture, even if I really like it.)

So, it was me and Air Supply, Bee Gees, Celine Dion, Jewel, Barry Manilow, and Kansas remained the only thing remotely "rocky" I had touched. Then finally someone came from the long corridor to the door where I was standing and said "come, I will show you something". It was a bit late.

First was Joanne, known to most as Pashura. She hates Air Supply and Celine Dion with a passion equal to her love for Scorpions. Always insisted she would "corrupt" me. I asked her to, even, but it did not go far. She had an account on a Mp3 streaming service that was going to close down, so she asked me to download all the songs from it because she was on dial-up. Granted, I liked many of them, and still keep them all here, but nothing really sparked me enough to go out and buy a CD, perhaps for lack of emphasis. Alice Cooper, Pink Floyd, Metallica, Aerosmith, there are a couple of songs from each of the big bands in those she had me download, but it stayed at that. Probably because she did not make me listen to them as much as she had me Scorpions. Before I finally gave in and bought two albums by them, I knew at least fifteen songs. Unfortunately, they never meant as much as Kansas. Shame.

In conclusion, Pashura introduced me to (and made me walk five miles into) Scorpions, and had me listen to an assortment of other bands and singers of varying quality (there was one I mocked her often, because I found him so bad and she liked him so). All in all, I am happy for what she did, even if it was overly Scorpionesque.

Next was Donnie, known by more names than I remember. Rather erratic suggestions, and often overwhelming, although he did try hard. Gave me lots of Opeth songs. Opeth is great because it varies unbelieavably - some songs can make a baby sleep, others can wake the dead, but they all sound "full". I liked many songs by them, and by some other artists he told me to try. But, as I said, it was overwhelming, and I quickly lost track of things. I could never download the full pack he prepared for me, for instance - something I regret tremendously. The list of suggestions was just too big, I did not have time to get used to a song before he would throw another Mp3 at me along with three more names of things to look for. We lost contact for a while, as happens very often, and we both gave up. A true shame, I am sure there was a lot to be taken from that, hm, class, if we had sync'ed our paces. I hope he will want to try again sometime.

Well... There was Justin, of course. But only for a day. Not sure why, since we never talked about music, he sent me a link to open with Winamp. "Now I will submit you to music." There was a lot of VNV Nation, if I remember. More dancy than I expected from him. It did not last long, as I lost the link. So he is mentioned here just so he will read it (two weeks from now) and make a witty comment pretending he is hurt by what I said. Justin is great and needs no music to be.

Unfortunately, that was all. No one else tried to make me like what they fondly call "good music", even though most of what I listen is considered "horrid music" and they find it absurd that I touch it at all. All my saviors are gone.

If anything, however, I have some new songs in my list that I would never dare to listen to before these people came along. And after all their attempts, I consider "Lightning's Hand" and "Sparks of the Tempest" quite nice. Maybe if they kept trying consistently for longer periods I could become a fan of something, but no one would invest that much time and effort on my musical taste. Really, if even I will not.

(Perhaps ruby might, but there is no way to tell, as she is yet to try, if ever. But she keeps making me try to guess who sings each song playing on the classic rock radio station. I make wild guesses and get about one right in each twelve after I hear half the music; she recognizes the majority of them on the first few seconds - and for Pink Floyd music she also says in what album it is. But she can sing not one song by Air Supply, hah!)

At the end, after all the attempts, I am still left standing at the door, with a few indications but no real lead to follow. So I listen to what comes along. Lately it has been a lot of anime music, and some things I find very good from that station mentioned. And those classical ones, of course.

Posted by Etienne at August 15, 2004 08:43 PM