Soundtrack of Your Life

An occasional feature in which we mark the songs of our relative youth as played over public muzak systems.  Today, a three-pack scoring low on the irony matrix, but satisfying as a group effort:

Date: 13 April 2014, 4:00 p.m.
Place: Midtown Sports and Wellness 
Song:  "Love and Happiness" (1991)
Artist: John Mellencamp
Irony Matrix: 3 out of 10
Comment: The gym was in a classic rock mood, apparently, burning through the '70s and '80s with a few tired classics. Then they sneaked into the '90s, when they were still earnest about videos, for this guilty pleasure chock full of chunky riffs.



Date: 13 April 2014, 4:15 p.m.
Place: Midtown Sports and Wellness 
Song: "20th Century Boy" (1973)
Artist: T-Rex
Irony Matrix: 3 out of 10
Comment: "Bang a Gong" at the gym, sure, but this one? Props. For indie cred, we present the Replacements version from the "Let It Be" sessions in the mid-'80s. Guitar swagger here is courtesy of the late, great Bob Stinson.




Date: 13 April 2014, 6:45 p.m. 
Place: Car, radio, Big Oldies 98.5 FM 
Song: "Jump Into the Fire" (1971)
Artist: Harry Nilsson
Irony Matrix: 2 out of 10
Comment: It's certainly not ironic at all to hear an oldie from a car stereo. This one blew me away as if it were recorded last year. (Of course, it was a track from the epic "Nilsson Schmilsson.") It sounds like proto-new-wave, totally Joe Jackson (Graham Maby bass lines and all). Doesn't it? This song played as part of a replay of the April 8, 1972, "American Top 40" countdown with Casey Kasem (airing at 6 o'clock Sundays). Nilsson came in at No. 32 that week, just two notches above T-Rex's "Bang a Gong," one behind "Precious and Few" and six behind Walter White's swan song, "Baby Blue" by Badfinger. It was chasing Nilsson's own grammy-winning "Without You," which was falling from No. 1, on its way to "dedication" purgatory. Dig the drum solo! Around 1974 and 1975, I was a dedicated 12-year-old listener of the AT40, faithfully transcribing the Top Ten each week; in the archives, I still have scraps of paper with the handwritten lists. Now, of course, they are all artfully codified online. This is a great "record," as they used to say. I probably had never heard it until last night. Everything old is new again.