Music in Place and Time

For the past few days, I've had an earworm - but not one I've ever had before, and I can't figure out the trigger. The best way to cure an earworm is to actually listen to a performance of the piece from start to finish a few times. This wasn't a problem, since my earworm is an Oysterband song - one of my favorites - "Blood Red Roses", from Shouting End of Life. I loved this CD so much I played it constantly in my car and scratched the disc so badly I needed to repurchase it.



Although I've been on a Baroque kick for the past few months, I didn't mind revisiting this album, not just to cure the earworm, but to enjoy it for it's own sake, and I put it on to play last night on the ride home.

Listening to it this morning, I was struck with an odd sense of deja vu - how many times had I listened to this particular track on this exact stretch of road? Then I started to really think about my experience with the album. When I bought it, what I felt when I listened to it for the first time, and how I would describe the album to friends.

I remember finding this in the Bohemia Borders, back in the day when the store had a huge music section. It came out in October 1995, and I got it in late December that year. A co-worker had given me a Borders gift certificate for Christmas, and I used it then. I remember being blown away the first time I listen to the album - particularly by the lyrics of "Jam Tomorrow". I wasn't sure if they were "Hey hey, the donkeys say" or "Hey hey, the darkies say". I nearly had an accident when I heard the next line in the song - "Jam tomorrow, shit today". No trouble understanding that one.

A few weeks later, at a dinner with Fran and Steve Kuperschmid and his wife - the night before the Blizzard of '96 - I recommended the album to Steve - describing it as (if I recall) soul-stirring, fiercely political, English rock. Or English folk. Steve thought my tastes were very cool.

The next day, the snow started - I remember sitting in my bedroom (still living in Jericho), listening to the album play over and over and over. In my head, I was pulling out the lyrics, and decided that it was "donkeys" not "darkies".

Back to the present day - I can't believe that "Shouting End of Life" has been out for 14 years (and I wonder what has happened in those 14 years of my life). But the music is as fresh and as shocking as it was when I first heard it. People the generation before me talk about the first time they listened to Sgt. Pepper, how earthshattering it was. I think I feel the same way about this album - every time I listen to it, I can go back to a very specific time and place. It may be 14 years, but I don't feel any older.