The audio effects of our visual memories
It seems that some of the music that I love best is the music that I have a visual memory of something when I listen to it. For example:
When I pop in Weezer’s first album, blue (titled by their fans not the band itself) I vividly remember the night that Jason Fry drove Josh Furnal, Levi Dolan, and I to Kansas City from Joplin to see Waterdeep.
The show went till about 12:30 when we set out to drive back home. Jason stopped for some food, and we were on the road to go back to Joplin. After about an hour of driving Jason was pooped, and pulled over in an attempt to sleep for a few hours before we went on. Jason drove a stick-shift, and the only one who knew how to drive a stick in the car was Josh, but his contacts had been in for way too long and he needed to have his eyes shut, so he was asleep. Levi had dozed off as well. I told Jason that we shouldn’t sleep on the side of the road and we should keep moving because we needed to get back to school.
Jason was reluctant, but then decided that if he could listen to a CD that would be exciting enough to keep him awake then he would march on into the darkness! As I’ve told you – we chose Weezer, Blue. We listened to the album TWICE over and sang along to every part as Josh and Levi tried to sleep. I still remember rolling onto the Ozark campus with the windows down, and the last song on the CD blaring! (by the way, “Only in Dreams” is one of the rest rock songs produced in the 90s).
Sometimes I wonder about some of the songs that plague us. I mean that in the temporal sense - that we can’t fit it into any visual memory. Can you understand me? For example:
Two weeks ago I took my friend to see his fiancé graduate from Basic Training. We drove from Moberly to Fort Leonard Wood. The main route there is on highway 17 (about 15 minutes south of Jefferson City off Hwy 54). Highway 17 is the self-proclaimed greatest highway EVER. It’s like a roller-coaster ride for your car. TONS of ups and downs, sharp turns and silly curves. This road has so many frequent bends and hills that there isn’t a posted speed limit sign – that is, outside of the yellow warning signs that have the suggested speed for the next turn coming up.
We’re cruising down this road, on a bright Thursday morning, and I put in Tool’s CD from their Salival box set. The first track on that CD had yet to be acquainted with a specific visual memory. So, now that I listened to that track while experiencing that ride I get this awesome memory of that beautiful morning, with that fun road, and a great friend by my side.