Monster Ballads of the Seventies

I grew up in a little town on Lake Superior.  In the fall of the year, it was time for getting older, advancing a grade in school, new shoes, old friends and homework.  The fall was the beginning of the school year, one step closer to our adult lives and one step farther from home each year.

I didn’t mind the growing up part, it’s the getting older part that really makes me mad.

It all started just a few years ago.  It was September of 2000.  There I was 40 years old, just returning from a trip to South Dakota with our friends.  We had driven out there in our old cars.  Along the way we had a lot of fun.  Paul (the painter, everyone has a nickname in this town) provided mile by mile commentary, John and Arlene, Kim and Toni, Bonnie and Till,  Guy and Judy. 

The trip was great, we had a lot of fun, saw some beautiful landscapes, Mt. Rushmore, etc.

We returned and there in our mailbox with our stack of bills, was a magazine.  I remember pulling it out of the mailbox and thinking who is that good looking guy on the cover.  I kept admiring the picture, walked in the house (I had a broken foot by the way) and sorted through the mail.

Then I looked at the magazine again, geez he was cute.  And then horror,  I looked at the magazine and realized I was looking at the cover of AARP magazine.   I swear I wanted to cry.  What does it mean when you think the guy on the cover of AARP is hot???

A few months later my suspicions about getting older were confirmed.  I was watching one of the music awards shows.  I sat and watched for over an hour hoping I would at least know one of the songs nominated, but I didn’t.  In fact, I kept thinking to myself, when are they going to get to the “good” music.  And that’s when it happened, they presented a lifetime achievement award to Rod Stewart, he accepted and sang Maggie May.

I’ve never really liked Rod Steward, but that night, I started clapping and singing along like he was a long lost friend.  I was so desperate to hear any familiar song I instantly became a Rod Stewart groupie!  How desperate was I to suddenly like Rod Stewart, just because I had heard of him before?

And then it happened again this week.  I watch a lot of TV, what else can I do when it hurts (yup, I still have that back problem, the weather is turning colder and cold makes it hurt a lot more).  I also admit that I watch a lot of infomercials and there are 2 that I really like.  First, the one selling DVDs of The Midnight Special.  What a great TV show.  Wolfman Jack and live performances by great singers and comedians and the Lockers (dance group) every week.  I lived for that show.  The Midnight Special was to music fans what Saturday Night Live was to fans of comedy.  It was like American Bandstand, only good.  Face it, Bandstand had outgrown it’s newness by the 70’s.  All that lip synching and hairspray just looked so rehearsed.

But the Midnight Special was different.  There were several live performances every week.  The bands almost always sang 2 or 3 songs.  It was like being at a concert.   Since groups did not tour like they do now, it was all we could hope for living at the top of Wisconsin.

But it’s the other infomercial that really has me chomping at the bit.  The one for the CD set of Monster Rock Ballads.  Keep in mind,  these are all songs I heard in the 70’s and 80's and for the most part, I didn’t like any of them. 

I do not own an album or CD of REO Speedwagon, Jefferson Starship, Foreigner, Warrant, Poison, etc.  I was never a fan of the “hair bands”.  You know, heavy eyeliner and about 2 cans of Aqua Net and of course, they wore skin tight clothes, nothing left to the imagination.  Those of you who have seen Tommy Lee know exactly what I’m referring to.

Anyway, I’ve watched the infomercial about the rock ballads 6 or 7 times now and I’m seriously considering buying it.  I watch it with such fondness for the old music, you would swear that I loved that era of music and I didn’t.  Even Steve Perry, he sings the opening line from “Oh, Sherrie” and there I am wishing I was 23 years old and named Sherrie.

What is it about getting older that makes anything old seem so great?  I swear, I’ve never sat through a song by Journey in my life without protesting and now my You Tube Playlist has several videos by Journey and I listen and watch  them over and over.  Is that familiarity really all that binds us to the old songs?  or is it something more?

I think that we are bound to the old songs and old tv shows and movies by something more than just familiarity.  It’s the same way that a certain fragrance can evoke a powerful memory.  It’s not the songs, or the singers, or the movies or the TV shows.  It’s us.

It’s remembering how we felt and what we were like when we first heard or saw a particular performer.  I remember clearly that when Clare and I got stuck listening to an entire Journey concert while we moved home from college in Madison to Ashland for summer vacation.  The pick-up truck had an AM radio and it was night and the only station that came in clearly was WLS.  WLS was broadcasting 2 hours of Journey songs because there was a Journey concert in Chicago that night.  It was either Journey or the farm report.

We laughed and talked the whole way home.  We were so glad final exams were over so we could go home and sleep and eat normal food for a few months.

It’s the way you feel when you see a picture of yourself as a child and are reminded of the swing set in your back yard, playing in a mud puddle and making mud pies or smelling the bread baking in the oven.every Saturday morning like clockwork.

It’s the way your Gramma smelled sweet like vanilla when she hugged you and told you to behave and the way you got all choked up when Simon and Garfunkel’s “Homeward Bound” played on the radio in the Greyhound bus as you traveled home for the holidays.

It was only 30 short years ago this week, I was starting my 3rd week of college.  Living away from home, going to football games and being a grownup, sort of.  I had my first real date, we went to dinner and a movie and he asked me to go steady.  We necked on Bascom Hill, sitting on the bench by the statue of Abe Lincoln.  We dated for over 2 years.

Every September is a time for change and growth and age and wisdom, or stupidity, I’ve had both happen to me in September.  But every September is the same.  I get all misty eyed when I hear the UW Band play “Varsity” and we sway back and forth to honor my Alma Mater. 

Remember that song from Finnegan’s Rainbow:

Do you remember
the kind of September
when life was young
and oh so mellow.....

Well, maybe not that old how about Earth, Wind and Fire.....:

Do you remember the 21st night of september?
Love was changing the minds of pretenders
While chasing the clouds away

Our hearts were ringing
In the key that our souls were singing.
As we danced in the night,
Remember how the stars stole the night away

Ba de ya - say do you remember
Ba de ya - dancing in september
Ba de ya - never was a cloudy day

Sing along now, sway back and forth and do your best disco moves.....

Just like I remember.

Thanks for listening.

Anne

Comments

[Val]

I think I recently visited that little town... It's across from Duluth and about an hour east... :D Beautiful place. I'm just glad I was there in July and not December.
Glad you're hanging in there but sorry you're still in pain. Stay strong.
Valri- the Crazy Truck Driver (shame on me, I haven't called Colin in two months)