Life Soundtrack

Every story that I write has a soundtrack or at least one song that plays in my head costantly as I write or while I'm thinking of scenes. I can't listen to anything, let alone music, while I'm writing. I'm sort of like Jack from The Shining, when you hear me clicking on the keyboard leave me the hell alone.

Most of the time, the song that sticks with me while I'm writing embodies the overall theme. Such as for Dark Earth, I kept listening to (and replaying in my mind) the Rolling Stones You Can't Always Get What You Want.In fact, one of my characters references it in the story. My last story had Nine Inch Nails and some Danzig tones. My superheroes one hasn't hit me, yet. However, my alternative time travel story—the one that keeps needling me despite my best efforts to suppress it—has Alanis's You Oughta Know and Psychedelic Furs Pretty in Pink. How these tunes work into a timetravel romance set in the Middle Ages, well, you just have to read it to find out. Hopefully, within the next year I'll have that one done. Ack!

Soundtracks are important to set the scene and mood for stories, especially movies. Tarentino soundtracks are some of the best out there. I have several of them. A friend of mine who writes scripts, creates his own soundtracks for his stories. Sometimes he even composes his own music to set the mood. Whenever I read over his scripts he burns a CD of the music and tells me to listen to it as I read.

This got me thinking about what would be the soundtrack for my life? What songs inspired me or touched me throughout my life somehow? What music resounded with that time in my life so when I listen to it I'm transported to what it felt like to be that age again?

So here's mine:

Elementary School: My mom and grandmother contstantly had the oldies station on, so I grew up listening to sounds from the 40s-60s, especially Motown. Also, lots of Broadway tunes. My early years would play out something like this:

• Respect, Aretha Franklin
• Hit the Road Jack, Ray Charles
• Bernies Tune (I have no idea who sang this but it was old)
  
• Rockin Robin
• Grease soundtrack (my friend Christina had blonde hair so she always got to be Sandy and I had to be everyone else ... no comment)
• Physical, Oliva Newton-John (she was the coolest!)
• Tide is High, Blondie
  

Middle School: Okay, so I didn't have the greatest tastes in Middle School but I was feeling my way around music to see what I liked.

• Thriller, Michael Jackson (I listened to this album over and over and over again.)
• Another One Bites the Dust, Queen
• Micky, Toni Basil
• California Girls and Just a Giggolo, David Lee Roth (My friends and I entered a talent show in 7th grade where we sang California Boys. I changed the lyrics to read "I dig those OP shorts, I'm wide-eyed for ... " Yes, I was a dork.)
• Here We Go Again, White Snake
• Manic Monday and Walk Like an Egyptian, The Bangles
  
• Goodbye to Romance, Ozzy Osbourne (I was cynical at a young age.)
• Stand By Me sountrack (because you never have the same kind of friendships as you did in the 8th grade)
• Cum on Feel the Noize, Quiet Riot
  

High School: I started breaking out of the mold in high school and listening to some different tunes and hanging with a different crowd. I found I liked boys who were more alternative (skaters, sufers, club guys) than the "grits" (metal heads) as my neighborhood friends dated, so I was a bit of an outcast. But I really came into my love of classic rock during this period.

• Strangelove, Depeche Mode
• Bizarre Love Triangle, New Order
• Dreaming, OMD
• People are Strange, The Doors (and Echo and the Bunnymen cover)
• With a Little Help from My Friends, The Beatles
• Brass Monkey, The Beastie Boys
• Dancing with Myself, Billy Idol
• Standing on the Beach, The Cure
• Blister in the Sun, Violent Femmes
• Joy and Pain, Rob Base and DJ Easy Rock
• Paid in Full, Eric B. and Rakim
• Down in It, Nine Inch Nails
• Rock and Roll, Led Zeppelin
• Epic, Faith No More
  

College was pretty much a mix of the Grunge scene for me which started when I was in my last year of high school. Well ... it hit my area around that time, but I know it started way before that. Those years embodied a lot of the above plus Nirvana, STP, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden as well as lots and lots of club music and acid rock like Lords of Acid. That's when I started going to Raves and hitting the club scene. Ahhh ... to be young again.

Did you ever give a thought to what your life's soundtrack would be like?