Sometimes when I sit down to write, I open my Web browser intending to find the source of a quote or factoid I think I remember. Sometimes I am successful. Sometimes I fail. And sometimes I get completely taken away and end up watching old music videos on YouTube. My brain turns off and I let the nostalgia wash over me.
I don’t know why it happens or how I choose the songs I do. I don’t know why they come to mind after so much time. I suppose sometimes its because I hear the song in passing – on the radio, on the street on someone else’s radio, on TV, a street performer doing a cover.
Most times its something I am composing in my head that disturbs a memory and I feel sure that if I dig it out, dust it off, and play it an “answer” will be revealed – some subtle truth that has eluded me – a question I had forgotten I asked.
You can safely assume writing this post has taken longer than it should have because I’ve been surfing YouTube for old 80s music videos.
Alphaville’s Forever Young was my senior prom song.
How telling of the sentiment of the time:
Heaven can wait we’re only watching the skies
Hoping for the best but expecting the worst
Are you going to drop the bomb or not?
Let us die young or let us live forever
We don’t have the power but we never say never
The Smiths’ The Queen is Dead tour was the last time I saw the group of friends I had become close with in high school. In the title song, Morrissey asks: “Has the world changed or have I changed?”
And Soft Cell’s Wave Hello, Say Goodbye was my being dumped song until Last Night I Dreamt Somebody Loved Me.
How about you? Does this happen to you too? Do certain songs get stuck in your head and bring up memories that leave you feeling a little emotionally “exposed”? Is music an important part of your day-to-day? How essential is it to your mental health?
Vincent Young 
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