Your Permanent Record

First impressions and the lasting legacy of the music that shapes us

BFFs: Jessi and I at 12

My 15 year old nephew is a SONGWRITER - no cap…all caps? Whatever. The point is, it is a delight and privilege to be offering any kind of guidance as he discovers his voice as a writer and musician.

One of the best parts of our time together is giving him a ride home afterwards, when I force him to listen to good music where I give him an opportunity to hear music that might expand his songwriting vocabulary.

He had shared a song during our lesson called 6 Pills, by Rosendale. Basically the narrator of the song meets a guy with an oaken staff in the woods and then gets addicted to the pills the staffed man gives him. It’s a really interesting and earnest tune, and nothing I would have probably heard if he hadn’t shared it with me. It’s got an interesting arrangement, cool melodies and vocals, and tells a tale as old as time about addiction (and like who hasn’t gotten drugs from a weird guy in the woods?). The chorus is especially catchy and relatable, and was the part my nephew really wanted me to hear.

One to numb the hurt, two to ease the pain

Three to clear your mind, forget all the hate

“That’s clever, using ‘forget’ for the fourth pill. There’s a few other songs I can think of that use this same device, and there’s one in particular I think you’ll really like.”

Obviously we were going to listen to Kiss Off, by Violent Femmes, one of the best fuck off songs of all time, but first we finished listening to U2’s Sunday Bloody Sunday, which started blaring when I turned the key. I prescriptively scream/sing this in my car 2-10 times a day. It does help.

My nephew was one hundred percent not impressed, other than the word ‘bloody’ being in the title, and his phone was winning the battle for his attention by a freaking mile. But then I put on a different song.

I need someone, a person to talk to

Someone who’d care to love

Could it be you?

Could it be you?

Situation gets rough I start to panic

It’s not enough, it’s just a habit

Hey, kid you’re sick

Well, darling, this is it

Violent Femmes kick ass. Don’t trust anyone who says otherwise. I have biased credentials in that I have seen them live more than any other band, but that’s only because my stepdad was their road manager for many years, and at around 12, I started going to their shows whenever I could, because why wouldn’t you go see the Violent Femmes whenever you could?? I was almost always with my best friend, Jessi, who had cool older siblings who had given her a tape of their first album.

With our all-access passes we had free range to hang out on the bus and explore backstage, where one time we did almost die from a teenage hormonal surge as we caught a glimpse of a shirtless Damon Albarn, lead singer of Blur, through the flap of a makeshift festival dressing room as he chugged a handle of vodka.

The Femmes, as my stepdad would say, were always so sweet and very tolerant of us. We literally always had the best time, and by some miracle, nothing weird or bad ever happened to us, which is insane because it was 1994 and we were criminally unsupervised. We saw them more times than I can remember, and they killed it every time. Over the years I have repeatedly returned to their music for inspiration and catharsis because, as my nephew was about to discover: Violent Femmes kick ass.

This time he looked up from his phone with genuine interest and curiosity at the first few bars of Kiss Off.

Not only did I feel very cool, which is almost impossible to do when you are in proximity to a teenager, but more importantly I was able to get a real time temperature read on what kind of music makes him stop in his tracks and go, woah.

“So, what do you like about it?”

“I like the beat. And the lyrics.”

“Hold on, this is the best part…”

I took one, one, one ‘cause you left me…

I turned it up and watched him from the corner of my eye. He was hooked. Of course we listened to Blister in the Sun next, which equally held his attention.

I encourage all the songwriters I work with to take a minute to sit down and make a playlist of the music that made them fall in love with music and want to write their own songs. It can be a fun little trip down memory lane, but more importantly it gives us the opportunity to see what music from those early days of discovery grabbed our attention and made us go, woah.

In making my own playlist of my favorite songs and artists, I have rediscovered a treasure trove of music that I now listen to again regularly, but with a new perspective from now having written songs for the past 25 years.

Understanding and naming the elements of our favorite songs is a magically practical activity that can get us back into our creative curiosity and our overall enjoyment of music. I love to listen to these songs like a detective, trying to identify which elements of the song impact me the most and why, then use those markers as prompts in my own writing.

As we pulled into the parking lot of my daughter’s school, the teacher with the sign out sheet looked down at my dash and exclaimed, “Oh yeah! I love this band! I think I saw them on Warped Tour.”

“Awesome,” I motioned to my nephew, “It’s his first time hearing them.”

She smiled and then proceeded to rattle off a bunch of bands that he should check out, Korn, System of a Down, and mostly other bands that had been on Warped Tour.

As my eight year old climbed in the car, smiling ear to ear at the surprise of seeing her older cousin, I skipped the rest of Add It Up, as her fascination with the ‘F’ word is already piqued enough, and put on The Beatles. I glanced to my right and my nephew looked back down at his phone. Noted.

-Katie

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