The words to every song you've ever heard, did you know that you absorb them?
At least, that's what my brother told me, years ago, as we listened to the Beatles sing 'Get Back' on his car stereo. You'll hear a song, maybe you won't hear it again for years, and then something will trigger, and you'll be doing something that will make it come pouring out of you. It's like muscle memory, you know, the whole bike riding thing. He laughed.
At least, that's what my brother told me, years ago, as we listened to the Beatles sing 'Get Back' on his car stereo. You'll hear a song, maybe you won't hear it again for years, and then something will trigger, and you'll be doing something that will make it come pouring out of you. It's like muscle memory, you know, the whole bike riding thing. He laughed.
"Songs are like sleeper agents, man! The musical Russians rising in your brain!"
I was young, and I had no idea what the hell he was talking about. I found my brother to be incredibly cool, a guy at the peak of his game. He'd graduated High School, had decided against college for the time being, and was just bumming around. He wasn't a stoner, not really, and not much of a jock. I guess the best way to describe him now is a just a smart kid who happened to be in really good shape. He worked part time at a friend's father's auto repair shop, cared for the neighbors horses, and spent every spare minute listening to music.
"Listen to this," he'd tell me, "isn't it ridiculous?" He'd hand me a Paula Abdul single, and laugh at how awful it was, but then walk down the hallway, humming the lyrics to himself. I'd get up at night to get a glass of water, and walk past his room to hear The Who blasting at nearly inaudible levels.
"The Who man, no matter what volume you play them at? They're blasting."
This past summer, my brother passed away in his sleep. I just finished up college, and I was doing my level best to find a job. I guess my brother had some effect on me, because I decided to be a bit of an idiot and major in music theory. I thought, hey, I can always find a job as a music teacher in some middle school somewhere, but I didn't really take into consideration the piss-poor state of teaching jobs in the country right now. I was sitting in my car, smoking a cigarette after a particularly disastrous interview at a Catholic school in which I'd clearly given the wrong answer to a question regarding my opinion of rock music, when 'Get Back' came on in the radio in my head. It wasn't the album version either, this was the dramatic video version of the song. The one my brother had shown me of The Beatles just rocking out on the Apple HQ rooftop.
"Isn't that brilliant? Isn't that just the best thing you've ever seen?!" he asked.
I was young. "They're like superheroes! They have their own headquarters and can do whatever they want! They're saving the city through music! Look at all the people looking up at them!"
Sitting in my car, listening to the song playing on the inside of my eardrums, I remembered the look on my brother's face when I said that. At first I thought he was going to laugh at me, tell me what an idiot I was, how stupid and silly my thinking The Beatles were superheroes was. But then he smiled and picked me up in a hug.
"Exactly! Fucking exactly little brother!"
I remembered that moment sitting in my car, remembered how it felt for my brother, cool big brother, to get so excited that he swore at his six year old sibling. He later made me promise not to tell mom, and definitely not to use the word, but I could not have felt more interesting than I did right at that moment.
In my head, Ringo finished the song, a trill on his drums, and it was over. My cell phone rang then, and my mom told me that my brother had died in his sleep, heart failure, no one's fault.
I made sure that The Who blasted at the funeral. His wife slapped me, told me I was being disrespectful.
I just hummed 'Fool on the Hill' and walked out the door.
