I Like Me Better, Lauv
The first time I heard the song, I was in love. I fell in love with the very first beat, which pricked up my ears; the simple lyrics and swaying melody kept me in a trance. I was in love with a girl, the picturesque sort cut out of a feel-good college rom-com. You know the type: charming and effervescent with a flashy smile and a bubbly personality. Suddenly, I was in love with a memory, too: Sitting in the backseat of a beat-up Toyota with my friends, late at night, driving home to our freshman year dorms, carrying sleds and traces of snow, not a worry in the world. It was us and a couple of blinking street lights, a bustling college town grounded to a halt as the clock ticked towards 2 a.m. I wished I could bottle all of it up forever.
The second time I heard the song, I was riddled with angst; if the first time was blissful, the next proved searing. The song was now inextricably intertwined with a memory, a fleeting moment buried by dust and cobwebs in the bowels of my mind. I wrestled with the fact that I’d never be able to recreate that moment. I would never relive the sensation I felt upon hearing the song for the first time, upon gazing towards the front seat and locking eyes, upon closing the car door and whistling back to my dorm, the smile on my face permanent, tickled as I snaked back into my room in the early hours of the morning, trying to decide where to store the sled. That was all gone.
The third time I heard the song, I was at peace. Months had passed since I last listened, and I had buried the memory deep in my brain. But time is a vessel capable of healing all wounds, and this one had just about scabbed over; it was finally time to realize why I appreciated the song in the first place. It boasts a certain magical quality, an ability to teleport you to a certain moment. It’s a moment that you’ve experienced and yet yearn to experience again, as if you haven’t actually experienced it at all. You’ve been here, you just can’t pinpoint when, and so you have to go back — back to an Eden-like paradise alongside someone you care about more than anyone in the world.
To be young and in love in New York City
I think I’m there again. It’s March of 2023, which still feels wrong to type, and I’m on Spring Break — the final Spring Break I’ll ever have, if I graduate as planned. For these few days, everything is a blur: I’m in Vail, Colorado, for a ski trip alongside six of my closest friends. It’s the sort of five-day span that seems unreal, and each day flies by as if it never happened at all.
I told myself that I wouldn’t do any work over Spring Break, but music tends to have an irresistible pull, and, at the moment, so does this song. Sometimes, it’s about timing. For the first time since January of 2020 — when I fortuitously discovered I Like Me Better — it feels right to strap in my headphones and listen again, this time with a clear, open mind.
And so: The fourth time I heard the song…
I don’t know what it is but I got that feeling.
I tried to make sense of the one question that gnawed at me. Why this song? It resonates the same — even if three years and a lifetime have passed since the initial crush. It’s not like it's some unpopular, niche choice; the song debuted on the Top 100 billboard in February of 2018 and spent 41 weeks on the chart, peaking at No. 27 in September of that year. Clearly, others had the same feeling that I did.
At its core — stripped of all its bells and whistles — the song is relatable. The vocalist is anxious, afraid to express his true feelings of love and devotion. He’ll only spill them if spurred on by a third party, in this case alcohol. Been there, right?
After he spills his feelings, he is relentlessly worried that they won’t be reciprocated. What if he’s hung himself out to dry in utterly embarrassing fashion? Needing an answer, he doubles down, no longer afraid. He begs and begs and begs some more.
But the song is also open-ended. Never do we hear the other side; there is no input from the person for whom the artist professes their love. We can only infer what they think, just as we can only imagine what actually happened. This ambivalence allows us to contort the meaning as our heart desires. As the artist urges their crush to “say you’re with me,” we can imagine they oblige and say yes. Or, we can picture the opposite, imagining a world where the artist’s passion lives on, unmatched and alone. It drives the beauty of the song, simultaneously comforting and hollow, both cute and tragic.
Amid these hypotheticals, amid the lack of a definitive answer, it’s impossible to not think about yourself — and grow lost doing so. The interlude, entirely instrumental, gives you just enough time to process the emotions and memories flooding your insides. But you can’ dwell on them, as the interlude ends in a timely fashion. The artist once again begins singing and you’re forced to stop thinking, instead knocked off your feet by the music.
I like me better when I’m with you
What message is the song hinting at, anyways, in regards to self-love and self-care? It’s something that we all struggle with: Beating ourselves up over mundane matters, our minds gone neurotic by things that really don’t mean anything at all. We know what it means to not like ourselves; adolescence, and all of its pains, opened ourselves up to the world of self-harm. It is so easy to define something through the lens of its opposite; we like other people, who have what we don’t, and therefore we don’t like ourselves. That stream of consciousness is equally applicable here. And yet while we know what it means to not like ourselves, what does it look like when we like ourselves?
The vocalist — again, anxious, lonely and desperate — doesn’t seem to know, either. He can’t picture the idea of himself alone. All he knows is that he likes himself better when he’s with someone else, mostly because he doesn’t like to think about who he is when he’s by himself. But when he’s with his crush, well, he’s fulfilling quintessential relationship ideals: Cute and dreamy, parading along in a Big City, bubbly feelings surfacin inside. The song speaks to the way in which we construe ourselves and our relationships, illuminating the bigger picture of self-harm and self-doubt.
Those are the feelings that creep in when listening to the song at certain moments. It’s impossible to avoid them: You want what the artist and his lover have, and you want what they aspire to have. That’s why this song served as a poignant soundtrack in some hollow times in my life. But the song is multi-faceted, like all good songs are, and so when things are going well, it’s easy to picture your own life through that lens, in the vocalist’s shoes. You see the happy ending, the glass half full.
And so the fourth time I heard this song, I felt complete.
Electric Love, Børns
Electric (adj.) — having or producing a sudden sense of thrilling excitement.
“The atmosphere was electric”
Love (noun) — an intense feeling of deep affection.
“Babies fill parents with feelings of love”
At first glance, the song’s title seems redundant. Isn’t love, at least true love, inherently electric? Love is supposed to light a spark. Something is meant to click to let you know that you of all people — yes, you — have managed to fall deeply, emotionally in love. It’s a consuming feeling, and it’s electric, too.
So why does BORNS feel the need to clarify that this sensation isn’t simply electric, and it’s not merely love, but rather a melding of the two — two words combining forces to create this supernova of an emotion. Two words here are vastly more powerful than one, for they are a stimulating duo, that electric love. It’s why, as expressed in the lyrics, BORNS can feel their partner’s energy rushing through them, as if a whooshing current.
And yet for all the good that the fusion connotes, there is a bad part, too. Electricity is as dangerous as it is brilliant; in certain circumstances, it can be harmful. It can be fleeting, too — a ferocious thunderstorm cradles electricity in its palm, capable of snapping power on a whim. It makes for a poignant reminder that electricity relies on external factors to function and produce the tantalizing end product of power and light.
The same characteristics are applicable to love. It is an empowering emotion, but also an excruciating one, should a relationship go awry. The good times — blissfully innocent moments — are almost guaranteed not to last. And that duration is codependent, meaning that fate isn’t bound exclusively to your hands.
Which is to say that, perhaps, electric love isn’t all that it is made out to be on the surface. In its chorus, BORNS talks about wanting to capture lightning in a bottle. That feat is impossible, and sometimes chasing after love feels the same way — at least the electric kind, the true love that conjures a tingling feeling in your extremities and makes you feel all mushy inside. There are signs of this evasiveness woven throughout the lyrics. BORNS is dying for a taste, but we never actually find out if they’re able to attain it; they also speak of drowning underneath their partner’s wave, which carries an obsessive and negative connotation.
But this exploration is carried out through the lens of two commonplace definitions of “electric” and “love.” And yet both words — mainly “love” — have a multitude of additional meanings, too. And while I think that BORNS considered the primary definitions when crafting the title and writing the lyrics, I didn’t want to ignore the other meanings, either. So I set out to twist and construe the additional interpretations of “love” into the song’s context, weaving them into this conception of “electric love.”
***
Love (noun) — (in tennis, squash and some other sports) a score of zero; nil.
Electric is a fairly common descriptor for a sporting event, though not usually in low-scoring matches. On the surface, the two terms again contradict each other. But take the following scenario as an intriguing case study: What about a scrappy, physical soccer game in which every moment is greeted with anticipation, simply because goals are at such a premium? Fans would be glued to a game of that sort, because it’s electric. Or, think about a tennis match entering the fifth set — perhaps even the final game in the fifth set — that begins at love-love. The crowd, while hushed, would hang on every hit, a nervous energy permeating the stadium. That’s electric, too. It would be an electric love.
Love (noun) — a great interest and pleasure in something
“his love for football”
By mere association, this definition of “love” is electric, too. If someone has an ardent passion for something, they consider the subject to be electric — to be captivating and tantalizing. In this sense, the two terms in the song’s title are redundant, but perhaps the redundancy means something, too. Two words here are stronger than one, and so the person’s love (here, a love for football) runs deeper because it carries the connotation of “electric,” too. Again, electric love.
Love (noun) — a personified figure of love, often represented as Cupid
Imagine for the next few moments that this song is about Cupid. As ancient Greek mythology has it, Cupid is subjected to the trials of love. He falls for a girl — Psyche — when he is set up to love somebody else; Psyche then betrays Cupid by looking at his face, causing him to flee in anger. Eventually, after Psyche navigates the Earth to reunite with Cupid, they are wed as immortal equals. Ultimately, then, the tale of Cupid is an electric one. BORNS explains love as both harmful and consuming, and those two attributes are applicable with the story of Cupid, too. Psyche is consumed with Cupid, an obsessive affection that spurs her to look at his face, breaking their trust and causing harm to both. Electric love.
Have You Ever Seen The Rain, CCR
Once the rain began to fall, it refused to stop. This wasn’t a quick summer shower or a pop-up thunderstorm: No, this was a miserable, freezing, late October rain in Michigan, the type that makes your spine shiver and your teeth chatter all at once. Puddles formed a home around my feet and soon migrated to the inside of my shoes, seeping through the soles. The maize poncho that I purchased in haste at Campus Corner a couple hours earlier tried its best to protect me and, well, at least it tried.
Standing in the thick of the student section deep in the bowels of the Big House, I looked around and realized that no one seemed to give a shit. Halftime hit, presenting a formal opportunity for fans to sneak out and cower to the elements, leaving the game in favor of a roof and a pair of dry clothes. Each friend group was surely having the same conversation, and so one of my friends opened our discourse with a proposition: "We could be home by the start of the third quarter. Should we go?"
At once, as if sensing our indecision, the DJ worked his magic and a faint voice sounded.
Someone told me long ago / There’s a calm before the storm.
By this juncture in my freshman year, I had begun to listen to music — inserting my earbuds for a date with my favorite song before I fell asleep or opening a Spotify tab while I made headway on some homework. But my music-listening remained solitary, which is to say: I didn’t yet understand music and what it can do. Not until this night, at least.
The moment carried a magical aura with it: Rain pelting down from the angry skies, nailing a group of college students below. We rejoiced in song, escaping the weather through CCR’s vocals, entering the world of music instead. The song not only brought people together; it kept them together. Even as the DJ shut off the music — with the two teams re-taking the field — we glided forward in harmony, obliging by an unspoken agreement to continue singing. So off we went. Music added a sparkle to a potentially miserable night, etching a memory and turning strangers into friends. And it was all because of a few simple words and one catchy tune.
I wanna know, have you ever seen the rain?
Comin’ down on a sunny day?
John Fogerty posed that question 52 years ago in the midst of an existential crisis. Fogerty’s brother, Tom, doubled as his bandmate. And even while CCR reached the apex of its commercialized fame, Tom decided to leave the group, explicating his talents into his own career as a single singer. CCR’s rollicking success had surpassed even their wildest dreams, but it wasn’t enough. Tom, much like other members of the band, was not happy. His departure set the stage for a total fracture among the group, which underwent a sorely-needed renovation.
On the surface, the song snugly fit the ambiance of that Saturday in October: Michigan romped Notre Dame, and everyone — students, alumni, the general Ann Arbor populace — loves spending their autumn Saturdays inside the Big House, drunk and jubilant. But that unrelenting rain, in both a literal and metaphorical sense, tried its hardest to ruin a sunny day.
Music made sure that didn’t happen. We latched onto CCR and quickly realized that we made the correct decision in waiting out the storm, even if it never actually ended. Music — and the shared experience that it created — instilled hope, conjured smiles and reinvigorated a sleepy atmosphere. Until that night, I had never seen music have such a transformative effect on a collective group of people.
And yet I wondered what about the song, specifically, resonated with everyone in the moment. It had to be more than the mere mention of rain — even though it has, in fact, become my go-to music choice whenever it rains. I kept thinking that something more lurked beneath the surface, something more profound.
At its core, Have You Ever Seen The Rain is a song rooted in nostalgia. John, saddled with a range of emotions in the wake of Tom’s departure from the band, is beginning to reminisce about the band’s good times: CCR’s peak in the commercial world, the group’s burgeoning fame, the extraordinary experience of sharing the stage with his brother. Applying that lens, it’s an apropos song for the Big House setting, too — even putting the rain aside for a second.
College is akin to its own little world, and it’s a feeling that mostly everyone wishes they can bottle up. It’s supposed to be the best four years of your life: Why wouldn’t you want that feeling to persist forever? But that, of course, isn’t how life works. Shit happens. Things change. We adjust and move on.
Tom’s decision to leave the band forced John to reckon with this unnerving yet stubborn reality, which he does throughout the song. Tom knew that the good times wouldn’t last forever, as he reveals in the opening lyrics: “Someone told me long ago.” Now, he’s grappling with the imminent nature of the end; those good times are finally over. And while John’s soothing voice and the melodic beat creates a leisurely backdrop, Have You Ever Seen the Rain embraces its wistful qualities.
Inside the Big House, college students experience a similar awakening. Saturdays in the fall are precious real estate: From your very first one, you can begin to count down how many you have left, spanning four years of football games to the ultimate deathknell, graduation. For me, as a second semester senior, that’s the only Saturday left to spend in Michigan Stadium. It feels akin to rain on a sunny day, like the Fogertys grappling with the imminent breakup of CCR. We all know that these stages in our lives are destined to end and, once they do, we’ll never be able to relive them. This is an inherently uncomfortable feeling, something that squirms around and forms a pit in your stomach, something that stews inside because no one has any desire to talk about it. Leave it to music, then, to breach that divide; leave it to music to articulate a thought that we’re all too afraid to say.
There is a contradiction, too, between the song’s meaning and the way in which hoards of drunk, freezing, soaked students bonded over it on that Saturday night. Tom is writing out of sadness, while we’re singing along to his depressing refrain with glee. And yet Have You Ever Seen the Rain persists not because of its heartbreak, but because of its catchy tune. In some ways, though, the meaning — that neglected meaning — holds a lasting resonance. Sure, no one is thinking about the finality of those Saturdays, but that plays into our decision not to leave during the storm. It’s late October, which means there aren’t many game days left in the season; in turn, there aren’t many game days left while we’re in college. That sense of finality is always lurking, even when things are going well — even when we’re belting CCR in a downpour.
The rain is always going to come. We just don’t want it to come quite yet.
II: MEDIUMS
Music is ubiquitous in my life, even if I took longer than most to reach that point. By allowing me to grapple with that transformation, this project also prodded me to think about music in ways that I previously ignored.
So for one early April day, I decided to pay attention to how I interacted with music; I wanted to know the how, when and where of my listening. I kept a brief journal of each time I listened to music over the course of an entire day.
Turns out, the majority of my listening was confined to background music: listening in the shower, while getting dressed and while studying. A lot of it was by myself: on a walk to class, on a run, in a car. Only once did it occur in a group, when I was at a bar to watch the NCAA Championship Game.
Neither conjured the exact same effect, but also, each proved to be a satisfying experience. There are so many different ways in which music serves, and I wanted to touch on a few in this next section. In Tiny Dancer, I wrote about the role music plays in catharsis and as a stress-reliever. In Dancing in the Dark, I show how the same song can be twisted to fit both our optimistic and pessimistic moods. And in Good Things Fall Apart, I explained how music helps me run, and vice versa.
Tiny Dancer, Elton John
It’s summer, so roll down the windows and let the warm breeze whistle past your face, flowing your overdo-for-a-haircut mane that shrouds your ears. Windows are meant to be rolled down, anyways. Why breathe in some recycled air conditioning and artificial scents when there exists an empowering alternative? Wind makes you feel alive. Roll down the window, put your foot on the pedal, turn up the music and go.
You have a place to be, you know that. And yet, as you’re driving — whisking your way there, snaking around corners going 40 in a 25 — you begin to wonder if you actually have to be there so soon.
Really, you just wanted a way out of the house. You’ve been trapped in the same house for the past few months amid the raging pandemic. Outside isn’t safe, but safety comes at a cost, too. There’s not much room for freedom or personal space these days, not when you’re living indistinguishable lives from your siblings and parents. Slowly, things are getting better: You can see friends at night and you work during the day. But sometimes frustration peaks. Tempers flare. Tensions boil over. There’s not really anything you can do; this is merely what happens amid such close quarters. And this is why you find yourself behind the wheel, with nowhere to go — at least not yet — but suddenly something to do.
You fly by your destination — no one’s there yet, it’s OK — and the fun commences. Quick, grab your phone and search for “Tiny Dancer” on Spotify. You need to let out steam, emit buckets of pent-up energy. Finally, you think, you’re all alone. It’s time to scream into the void. You need to be your true, animalistic self. What better way to do so than to queue Elton John and re-create the bus scene from Almost Famous?
The piano keys hit first, and you feel assuaged. It’s soothing, the beginning. Piano is an inherently comforting instrument, and John’s pace is just right — as are his vocals, which glide in moments later, as if parachuting in from above. Moments ago, you were furious, a fiery fit of rage. Now, you don’t even remember what had you so riled up. You’re lost, really. Totally lost, swallowed by the intimacy of “Tiny Dancer,” which has wrapped its soft, cherub-like arms around your soul, as if holding up its index finger in front of its glossy red lips, directing you: "Shhh. It’s all going to be OK."
Turning back / She just laughs
The boulevard is not that bad
You’re still driving, but you’re actually elevating, leaving the ground behind. At first, you were humming. Tapping your foot. Drumming along by beating the steering wheel with your finger, slapping your hand along the side of the car. But the song is reaching an apex, and so are you. You’re singing along, getting louder, rising in octaves — audaciously, you must admit, as you aim to hit the high notes in falsetto. Who cares if you lost the capability to hit that note in fifth grade? It’s just you, drifting in your own little world, sailing away. Nothing else matters.
Hold me closer tiny dancer
Count the headlights on the highway
Lay me down in sheets of linen
You had a busy day today
Whoosh. The breeze picks up. You can hardly hear yourself think. You’re feeling better, anger and frustration roaring out of your body with each word. This is catharsis. Remember the fight? Remember your friends? The only thing that you can think of is the impending verse. Your only worry is how loud you can sing it.
Then the song resets, John going back to the top to run it all over again. You’re along for the ride with him, for “Tiny Dancer” has captured your heart in the same vein that the protagonist, a “blue-jeaned baby” who doubles as a “seamstress for the band,” has enamored John.
But as you’re looping around in one giant circle — here’s a right, then a left, then another right — your mind starts to drift. Isn’t that the point, that the song dotingly captures you like the protagonist lovingly entangles John? The ballad carries the same qualities that the title suggests: It’s angelic, it’s blithe, it’s graceful. The song is the dancer — she is charming in her beauty and her ignorance, unaware of the words but nonetheless humming the tune, her innocence inducing a smile that stands alone. The dancer, a ballerina, drifts and sways much like the song, buoyed by its piano-heavy melody and brilliant vocals. They are in harmony, in sync.
Finally, after two renditions, it’s time to go. You pull up to your spot, throw the car in park and shut off the engine. You feel better — free and easy. The world around you is suddenly placid, and nothing much seems that important except for the people surrounding you, and that includes your friends that have patiently waited for you up by the basketball courts. You’ve unplugged in a way that you couldn’t before. Now you’re ready to descend, touch grass and re-enter the world.
The car door slam shuts. You stride up the hill, softly humming.
Oh how it feels so real / Lying here with no one near
Only you / And you can hear me
When I say softly / slowly
Dancing in the Dark, Bruce Springsteen
By 1984, Bruce Springsteen was in the midst of an identity crisis: New Jersey’s savored son had reinvented himself, and now he wanted to turn back the clock. Springsteen gained international acclaim with the release of Born to Run in 1975, bursting onto the rock-and-roll scene. But two of Springsteen’s ensuing albums — “The River” and “Nebraska” — represented a stark shift inwards, with his music assuming a more introspective, melancholic tone. He even forewent traditional concert tours in favor of solitary cross-country roadtrips, a decision emblematic of his dramatic change. When Springsteen decided to reopen his arms, again embracing the style of music originally responsible for his stardom, he did so with a more nuanced, cynical perspective on life.
Just look at Springsteen’s newfound passion for weightlifting, a hobby driven out of nihilism. As he asked his biographer in Bruce, Peter Carlin: “What’s more meaningless than lifting a heavy object and then putting it down in the same place that you found it?” This attitude — a viewpoint tainted in skepticism — defines Springsteen’s album “Born in the USA” and its pulsing hit single, Dancing in the Dark. It’s the poster-child for the melding of Springsteen’s split personalities, a blend of catchy rock-and-roll beats with unparalleled vulnerability. The song’s rhythmic beat and irresistible tune drive its relevance; you’ll hear Dancing in the Dark blasting at dive bars and dance floors alike, 39 years after its initial release. But beneath the glitzy surface lies a gloomy secret: Dancing in the Dark is predicated on a poignant, existential dread, posing as an open book into the personal struggles that marred Springsteen’s reinvention.
I check my look in the mirror / Wanna change my clothes, my hair, my face.
Man I ain’t getting nowhere / I’m just living in a dump like this / There’s something happening somewhere / Baby I just know there is.
Merely listening to the song exposes its two-faced nature. You can hear the lingering pain and tinge of desperation emanating from Springsteen’s raspy vocals, punctuated on words like “nowhere” and “dump.” When he insists that there’s “something happening somewhere,” Springsteen is brash and loud. But when he doubles-down, convincing his “baby” that he “knows there is” something happening, he speaks in softer tones, as if less confident, as if he needs to not only convince others of this purported fact but himself, too.
In perfect Springsteen fashion, Dancing in the Dark is eerily relatable. Springsteen — a millionaire seemingly standing on the top of the world — both writes and sings about life in a way that resonates with everyone, even a college student trudging through life nearly four decades after the song’s debut. That is Springsteen’s brilliance on display.
And so, on the night of my 21st birthday, Dancing in the Dark emerged as an appropriate — albeit coincidental — soundtrack. Turning 21 is a strange feeling: The age has become an unofficial American benchmark, simply because of its association with the legal drinking age. It is, then, somewhat of a signifier for a new stage in one’s life. It feels like one of those birthdays that you’re always meant to remember — like escaping single-digits at 10 or reaching a semicentury at 50, your 21st should be special, the night etched into your memory to look back on when life grows dull.
I’ve never really liked birthdays. To me, those seminal moments – like New Year’s or Valentine’s Day — serve as a reminder of how quickly one is aging and how little one has accomplished. But on the night of my 21st, something different happened: I felt oddly fulfilled. A group of friends jumped at the opportunity to go out with me to celebrate, despite it being a Tuesday night. I was grateful for that, especially since my previous two birthdays were marred by the COVID-19 pandemic and resulted in little celebration. This was a welcome development.
Yet, as always, insecurities lurked beneath the surface. My anxieties were partially trivial and partially warranted. As I thought about going to a bar, I stressed over what the “right” drink to order was for a 21-year-old male. Surrounded by my friends, I thought about the school year drawing to a close (my birthday is in April), which meant that I wouldn’t see many of them again until August, while we all went our separate ways for the summer.
As I fought to suppress these worries and focus on the fulfillment that washed over me, I descended the steps into Ricks while Springsteen’s unmistakable voice filled the dingy basement air. Sure enough, Dancing in the Dark beckoned me into the bar — its glamorous rhythm and made-for-dancing beat masquerading the despair and nihilistic tendencies that make the song what it is.
I get up in the evening / And I ain’t got nothing to say / I come home in the morning / I go to bed feeling the same way.
I ain’t nothing but tired / Man I’m just tired and bored with myself / Hey there baby / I could use just a little help.
That night, I danced in the dark, moving in the shadow of Rick’s dim neon lights, spurred on by Springsteen’s vocals and personal problems alike. Seven months later, amid another one of my fondest memories of college, I turned the soundtrack once again.
Six friends and I had packed ourselves into a rented minivan and hit I-80 E to drive from Ann Arbor to New Jersey for a weekend. We had been on the road for upwards of eight hours when a fortuitous sign appeared on the side of the road: “Welcome to New Jersey, the Garden State.” In that moment, I found myself behind the wheel — and, as pertinently, on aux. So as we began to countdown from 10 as we approached my home state, I rolled down the windows to greet the frigid November air and turned up the volume all the way, blasting Dancing in the Dark. Once again, I felt fulfilled and truly happy — happy enough to suppress the anxieties over relationships and school work that lurked beneath that bubbly joy.
But this is Dancing in the Dark in its two-faced beauty, and this is why it has become a staple in my music taste. Contingent on my mood, I can either grow lost in the deeper meaning of Springsteen’s provocative lyrics, or I can instead focus on the surface-level nature of its up-tempo beat and catchy rhythm. I can be myself — a wayward college student searching for a job, for a passion, for a meaning in life — while relating to the plight of a bona fide rock star. Or I can fall in love with the sounds curated by a synth, a guitar and Springsteen’s voice. Thanks to Springsteen, the choice is mine. And that freedom is appealing.
When I think of Dancing in the Dark, it’s these two-faced moments that come to mind. Springsteen carefully crafts a ballad that resonates with you, regardless of your emotion: You could be angry, confused, lonely, desperate, optimistic, blissful. Regardless, you find something that strikes a chord. This only happens because Dancing in the Dark is borne out of such an emotional blend. Springsteen needed a hit single to push “Born in the USA” over the edge, at least in the eyes of his manager. Strong-headed and confident in his own taste, he disagreed.
“I’ve written 70 songs,” Springsteen said. “You want another one, you write it.”
Of course, Springsteen caved. And so he penned Dancing in the Dark while angry at his manager, frustrated at the album, nihilistic about life, desperate to re-enter traditional rock-and-roll and exceedingly vulnerable following “Nebraska” and “The River.” All of these feelings are brought to life most clearly in the song’s title — catchy and confounding in its own right, just like the actual ballad. Does Springsteen wish to live his life void of fear and shame, as if the lights are off and he can do what he wants with no one watching, no one judging? Or is he merely reflecting on his own life, which he feels he is leading vibrantly but aimlessly, with fun but without direction, as if dancing in the dark? These sort of existential questions lie at the heart of what is, on the surface, a simple dance floor soundtrack. But Dancing in the Dark is so much more, and it's that profundity that spurs its lasting resonance, keeping listeners engaged, year after year.
Good Things Fall Apart, John Bellion
Did I say something wrong? Did you hear what I was thinking?
Did I talk way too long when I told you all my feelings that night?
Is it you? Is it me? Did you find somebody better?
Running isn’t an activity that I particularly enjoy, but it’s something that I deem necessary at certain times. A lot of people talk about runner’s high — a temporary, deeply euphoric, incredibly pure emotion provoked by bouts of intense exercise, most commonly running. Runners are said to experience runner’s high in the fleeting moments after they finish, while they’re winding down and finishing their last lap.
My connection to running is a riff off of the typical runner’s high. See, I don’t have much stamina, at least not yet. When I’m running, in order to meet my goals, I have to focus on the rudiments: putting one foot in front of the other, keeping a steady pace, breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth. If I do everything correctly, I can run just a bit further.
That’s why runner’s high actually hits me during the run. I don’t have any time to dwell on anything else. My anxieties are suppressed, simply because if I’m wasting my mental capacity thinking of anything besides my run, I’m not going to make it. It’s just me and my run, and maybe a bit of music, too.
When you said it was real, guess I really did believe you
Did you fake how you feel when we parked down the river that night?
That night?
To me, running is a diversion. It doesn’t cure much, but it does put things in perspective. It shows me that my stressors and anxieties aren’t actually all-consuming, that I’m capable of moving on and getting over whatever existential crisis is bothering me this time. So, I run.
I’ve been running a lot lately: waking up in the morning and just going, persisting through pelting rain and frigid temperatures and an ailing back. It’s becoming habitual, almost second nature.
I haven’t ran this much since my sophomore year. I’d do giant zig-zags up and down the back streets near my apartment complex, over and over again. When everything around me seemed to be crumbling, running allowed me to feel good for 15, 20 minutes at a time. I could feel like I accomplished something. I could feel like I cared about myself, for once. If all else failed at the end of the day, at least I had something to cling to — I ran a mile-and-a-half today, and that made me feel good.
I know I can be dramatic
But everybody said we had it
When I run, I like to listen to music. But the song has to be worthy. I can’t merely run to any song, even if it’s a song that I normally like. It has to be a song that stimulates my psyche. It motivates me to keep chugging along, compelling me to go an extra beat faster. It incites something inside of me, kindling and sustaining a fire over the duration of this grueling, joyless activity.
There are certain non-negotiables. The song ought to have a strong chorus, hopefully with a rousing crescendo. Provocative, relatable lyrics — the type one relishes singing along to, either aloud or in one’s head — are another plus. At the very least, it has a tune that can be hummed.
For me, the perfect song is Good Things Fall Apart, an anthem by Illenium and John Bellion.
Overthinking’s got me drinking
Messing with my head, oh
It’s the perfect song when my primary goal is to out-run my pain — both metaphorically, and also by merely draining it all out of my body, as if performing catharsis. Perhaps it’s the song’s title, which is apropos for the occasion, describing a pain that is certainly worthy of a run. Perhaps it’s the crescendo to the chorus, which feels so cleansing, a pent-up build-up that just explodes at its apex. Perhaps it’s the lyrics, which are raw and emotional and confusing, a cacophony of feelings that are welled up inside of me before I click play, start my legs and go, darting down the sidewalk.
Tell me what you hate about me
Whatever it is, I’m sorry
I woke up on a recent morning, still in a stupor from the bottle of wine I downed the night before, and I felt sad. So I threw on clothes, tied my sneakers and bolted out the door. My route beckoned. Illenium and John Bellion accompanied me.
Sometimes, I doubt whether the formula — running to the music — will actually work, like when I’m feeling especially down. On a morning like this one, I put that speculation to the ultimate test.
It rained hard that morning, increasing as I went along. But it felt refreshing: the rain smacking me in the face, dampening my clothes, causing puddles in my socks. I don’t have AirPods, my PowerBeats broke over the summer and the wired headphones aren’t conducive for a run — the earbuds fall out as soon as I pick up the pace. So I resort to playing the song out loud, on full volume, unbothered by the thought of someone judging me. I just ran to the beat of the song, piercing through the rain, letting everything else that didn’t actually matter just fade away in my wake, buoyed by the music.
I’m coming to terms with a broken heart
I guess that sometimes good things fall apart
III: DEPTH
I think this is the right time to mention that I’ve never been to a concert.
I’ve imagined what a concert is like; I envision it as a provocative and moving experience. I don’t think people go to concerts blindly — they go to watch artists they adore and hear songs they cherish. For that reason, I picture concerts as formative; concertgoers forge a relationship with the song and the musician. The memory of singing alongside 20,000 peers is etched in their minds, for good reason.
There’s a marked difference between experiencing a song at a concert and merely listening to a song with headphones and Spotify. But again, for the most part, the latter is all that I’ve experienced.
I devoted this next portion of my project to re-thinking my relationship with music. In part, I re-imagined my musical experience, searching for a deeper, more profound connection. Through Satellite, I placed myself into the shoes of an all-omniscient concertgoer, flocking to see Harry Styles for the very first time. With Malibu, I envisioned myself as a DJ performing at a nightclub, examining the crowd that can be manipulated on a whim. And for Who’s Loving You I sought to learn about the artist in a way I previously neglected, hoping to immerse myself in their position to better experience the song and understand its meaning.
Satellite, Harry Styles
Twenty-two thousand tortured souls are crammed into a shoebox of an arena on a rip-roaring Friday night, and each soul has come here for warmth. They are not merely here for insulation from the blustery winds and plummeting temperatures outside; instead, they crave an emotional connection. They want to feel something again.
How do you forget how to feel? It’s the backbone of human existence, because to feel is to live: to feel unrelenting love and searing pain, to feel tickled with joy and saddled with despair, to feel thrill and defeat. It’s the emotional roller coaster that keeps us honest and sane. Without it, life would become stale.
None of these souls are quite sure how they lost that sensation. But they have scapegoats. Take the souls occupying the posh leather seats in Section 331, Row 5, for instance. One of them was a victim of budget cuts last month and has not landed on their feet. One is in the throes of a relationship saga and is too afraid to ask for help, instead subjecting themselves to further suffering. One has plunged head-first into their mundane job, the thrill of college officially in the rearview mirror. One is dreading their 65th birthday, and they can’t stop wondering where all the time went.
But for all of the souls — trapped in a lifestyle degraded by existential dread and a series of seemingly imminent threats — Friday nights are the apex of their freedom. Work, for once, is an afterthought. Last week is in the past, and the next week is just far enough away, allowing them to breathe. And so they have come here to heal, however briefly, through live music.
Driven by the allure of a musician, they have all snaked their way to the arena. On their way, the attentive ones catch a glimpse of the building, lit up in dazzling colors and sparkling lights. Just the sight of it is compelling enough to spur them forward. They leap onto and off of subways, side-step their way through hordes of foot traffic and dash across streets to evade vehicles that barrel down the road. There is never time to waste in the city, and that rings especially true on this night.
There’s a line out front, but no one seems to mind, even as a wintry mix begins to cascade down from above, wetting hair and beckoning a sea of hoods. There’s not a visible end to the queue, with droves of souls lined up around the block. But the building is in both eyesight and earshot, and that’s good enough. They wait, ravaged with anticipation: double-checking their Apple wallets for their tickets, triple-checking their seat number, quadruple-checking the time on their watch, as if willing the minutes to go by. Anything to make them feel better while they await the moment.
At last, the doors swing open. People bum-rush in.
The moments leading up to the moment go as follows: sweat drips from the brim of their foreheads as the arena fills up to capacity, teeming with people, wall-to-wall. Everyone settles into their seats, sitting for now. They whisper to their friends, rushed voices and emphasized syllables conveying their excitement. Apprehension fades into the abyss.
Their ears tremble, awaiting the first note that Harry Styles articulates into the microphone. Around them, people seize their phones and open their camera apps, checking that the flash is on. The introspective ones crane their necks and glance upwards, taking in the banners that dangle from the steel beams above and the spectacular array of lights illuminating the main character below.
Someone in the front row shrieks, and everyone looks. There he is. The crowd screams some more. There are high-pitched squeals, the sort that would cause someone to faint; there are tonal roars, ones that originate in the gutter and rumble through the soul; there are care-free primal yells, the likes in which one would close their eyes and throw back their hair before howling. They’re all blended into one rousing ovation, because he’s here, right in front of them, on that stage, and they’re in the same building with him — yes, really, it’s him. It’s all blinding. They can’t think of anything else, and that’s OK, because nothing else matters right now.
He asks a question.
Do you want to talk?
There he goes.
All of this feels so intimate, as if he’s asking the question directly to them: his sweet blue eyes lighting up theirs, peering into their soul. All they want is to show him their devotion. Something tugs at them. The feeling lifts them ever so slightly off the ground, then hoists them all the way into the rafters and onto a magic carpet. Even though they are surrounded by 22,000 strangers, they feel at home. In as strangers, out as close friends.
Everything feels like the chorus. Everyone is belting the lyrics, and suddenly they can’t hear Harry, but they’re surprisingly OK with that. The teenage girl in the aisle is squealing at unnerving decibel levels, and the couple in front couldn’t be more off beat — which trumps the couple in the row behind, which couldn’t be more out of tune. For once in their life, the souls are unafraid of how they sound or look or act.
And so off they go, too.
Am I bothering you?
Everything that follows is a whirling blur. In a bit, the lights will turn on, and they’ll check the time: what felt like a couple of minutes was actually a couple of hours. People filter out of their seats, and the aurora is different. They’re chatty and punch-drunk, gung ho about the spectacle they just witnessed, unafraid of the conditions that await them once they leave this snow globe and swing open the front doors. They file out, one by one, sustained just enough to push forward once again.
Until next time.
Who's Loving You, Sananda Maitreya
Buried in one of those often-useless playlists that Spotify’s algorithm curates, I stumbled across a song I never heard before. Quickly, it also evolved into a song that I couldn’t turn off.
I listened to it endlessly — on walks, at the gym, in the shower and while studying. Something about it latched onto me and refused to let go. The lyrics were so blunt, the vocals so authentic, the chorus so soulful. More than anything, there was just so much pain: searing, raw, fleshy pain. It was the type of pain that jumped through the speaker and tried its best to hurt you, too.
I had listened to the original rendition of Who’s Loving You before. It served as one of several springboards for the Jackson 5, helping spur the group’s stardom in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. I liked the song. But I loved Maitreya’s cover.
As I grew enamored with the song, a question started to gnaw at me: Who in the world was Sananda Maitreya?
Frankly, I had no idea.
I don’t pretend to know much about any artist that I listen to. I’ve never really felt an urge to learn about the artist. I think of it as more of a surface-level, symbiotic relationship: The artist makes a song, I listen to it. No more, no less.
But something about Maitreya became intriguing. The song was so emotional; I had to know the origin of those emotions. On top of that, the song was so good. Why hadn’t I heard of Maitreya before?
***
I think that there’s something inherently egotistical about performing a cover. It’s not necessarily a binary logic of good or bad, but there’s an element of self-esteem at play — at least, that’s how it looks from the outside.
By electing to perform a cover, the artist is in part declaring, “I think I can do this better than the original.” That conviction doesn’t have to carry through the whole song, but it prevails for a portion of it; perhaps that’s the bridge, or the chorus, or merely the first few notes. The artist firmly believes in their ability to modify the original rendition and create a final product that serves the audience in a different — if not better — capacity.
The dynamic between the original artist and the cover artist is layered, too. Think of the discrepancy between the two people. There are varying levels of fame, success and wealth. More often than not, the cover artist yearns to attain the status of the original artist. The cover artist — usually younger — is clawing their way up the ladder, looking to break into a cut-throat industry and reap the rewards of the brightest stars.
Both points are applicable to Maitreya’s spin-off of Who’s Loving You.
Maitreya included the song in his first album, "Introducing the Hardline According to Terence Trent D’Arby." It was, by all accounts, a smashing success. Maitreya won a Grammy in the category of Best R&B Vocal Performance for a male. He invoked comparisons to other R&B stars, namely Prince and Michael Jackson, as a budding artist in the burgeoning R&B sect.
Born to a bishop and a gospel singer as Terence D’Arby, Maitreya began his music career abroad, becoming a band leader while serving in the 3rd Armored Division in West Germany. He fled the army for London, where he caught on with The Bojangles in 1986. A year later, he released his debut solo album, which he declared the most important compilation of music since The Beatles released "Sgt. Pepper."
When it comes to what happened next, Maitreya has his theories. The music industry wasn’t quite ready for another Black R&B artist in the ‘80s, and Maitreya didn’t exactly see a proper space for himself. So he left, maneuvering away as a form of political sacrifice.
That’s the neat and tidy version. It gets a little messier when you realize that Maitreya also took a risk on his second album. Mirroring the great artists of his generation, he sought not to replicate his first hit, but rather wade into a new musical territory, hoping that his fans would follow.
The gamble, however calculated, didn’t pay off. Maitreya’s ensuing albums flopped. They were ahead of his time — everyone from the album’s producer, Martyn Ware, to Bruce Springsteen admitted it. But Maitreya was ahead of his time, too: He was a tortured soul wrought with mental-health issues, and he recognized the perils of the music industry when others kicked his concerns to the curb. Maitreya continued to take risks. His albums continued to flop.
“That’s what makes Prince and Michael Jackson who they are today,” Maitreya’s brother, Darren, told the Orlando Sentinel in 1993, justifying the switch-ups. “They do something different than their hits; they don’t keep the same style.”
As long as Maitreya lingered in the spotlight, those comparisons shadowed him. Jackson and Prince served as ultimate barometers, end-all and be-all measuring sticks to judge Maitreya’s work and appraise his success — or lack thereof.
Maitreya believed that Jackson felt threatened by his aurora. Maitreya says that he merely wanted to work alongside Jackson, pushing him even further, to get even better, to produce songs even more magnificent. He never got a chance to do so. Jackson and Maitreya met once; Jackson refused to acknowledge him.
“I just had the misfortune of being in the shadow of Zeus,” Maitreya said in a wide-ranging interview in 2021. “We didn’t get along and he was shit to me. I paid the price of being in the shadow.”
The tainted history between Maitreya and Jackson adds another layer of profundity — another layer of pain — to Who’s Loving You. In 1987, Maitreya sings from a pain borne of innocence. Listening in 2023, with the benefit of hindsight, the pain is far more onerous. We know that Maitreya’s career flamed out; we are aware of his ill-fated relationship with the since-deceased Jackson; we know the levels of self-hurt and the depths of despair that riddled Maitreya’s life, while he still lived as D’Arby. And so here is Maitreya, singing a song originally performed by Jackson, a man he once idolized but in the years since has come to loathe.
Maitreya is acutely aware of all of the trauma — all the baggage he lugs along in his day-to-day life — while singing. Perspective is important here. In 1987, Maitreya had not yet suffered from the demise of his fame and his psyche. He had yet to rot away for 12 years while leading a broken life in Los Angeles, escaping several near-death encounters before finally changing his name to Sananda Maitreya, citing a dead spirit. In Sanskrit, his new name translates roughly to “rebirth,” “loving” and “possessed of happiness.”
Along those lines, he is a changed man now. Maitreya has found a purpose in life; perhaps he even feels loved again. But back when he was still Terence D’Arby, Maitreya understood his standing in the R&B industry — even if the ramifications had yet to fully materialize.
That truth becomes understood in Maitreya’s rendition of Who’s Loving You. Through a combination of lyrics and vocals, we gather that Maitreya felt incredibly alone. When he asks the question, it’s as if the gears are churning inside his own head, as if he is pondering throughout the duration of the song. Jackson, his idol, isn’t loving him. Fame is isolating. People are uncomfortable with what he represents. He is ahead of his time. He abandoned his country overseas. He is Black. His taste is polarizing. And so, when all of this is true, he’s left to wonder: Who’s Loving You?
Malibu, Miley Cyrus
How do you read a crowd? That’s the question DJs grapple with every night, and it’s also one that they can’t afford to get wrong, for a song and a crowd are inherently symbiotic; they are capable of making one another better or worse.
DJs have to know what the crowd wants without asking them — seldom do they take requests, and hardly ever do they converse with the bargoers. But the songs that DJs queue have to align with the mood of the night. The latter dictates the former, allowing the crowd to drift and sway, sing and dance. When I’m a DJ, I like to gaze into the crowd and watch this process unfold, the music claiming each person, one song at a time.
The effect of some songs — think Dancing Queen — is easier to understand than others. Other songs carry more nuanced reactions; the effect isn’t instant. Instead, the crowd needs to digest the music, perhaps waiting until the chorus kicks in before understanding that yes, this fits the vibe. Here, think Malibu by Miley Cyrus. So when the first wave of guitar strings ripple in, waves crashing to the shore, I cast my eyes into the sea of people bobbing in front of me, eagerly awaiting their reaction.
I never came to the beach or stood by the ocean
I never sat by the shore under the sun with my feet in the sand
But you brought me here and I’m happy that you did
The introverts are hooked first. Going out isn’t for everyone. Sorry, let me rephrase that — going out isn’t really for anyone. Fun comes at a price, for nights out are costly, draining and sweaty. There’s plenty of people who are content with a more low-key activity, like grabbing dinner and merely hanging at home.
But with the right combination — a blend of good friends, short lines, cheap drinks and solid music — things aren’t too bad. Sometimes, all it takes is a little nudge.
There’s a group near the back that belts the lyrics from the opening chord. Clearly, they resonate with the feelings that Cyrus is attempting to evoke. They passed up on opportunities to go out — and still do — because they find comfort in what they know, which soon becomes what they like. You know the type: They need to be prodded to switch things up, to deviate from their routine. But once they’re convinced, well, you can change their mind.
That’s the exact experience that the guy in the corner had tonight. He nearly didn’t make it here, almost succumbing to the allure of video games and a good night’s sleep. I could see it on his face as he sagged down the stairs, entering the depths of the bar. He was here reluctantly; that’s why he went straight to grab a drink. But he made it — with a little assistance from his roommates — and now he’s in the middle of the circle, singing Malibu, with no shame and no regret.
I always thought I would sink so I never swam
I never went boatin’ don’t get how they are floatin’
And sometimes I get so scared of what I can’t understand
The couple sitting at the bar is getting into it now. See, they started dating a few months ago, but had alternating feelings for each other long before then. Each is low on confidence. So on they went, overthinking and procrastinating, dancing around the matter at hand. Friends chipped in with advice, but no one could spur the relationship forward but themselves. After months of charades, they caved to their fears. Now here they are, giggling, smiling and singing.
The sky’s more blue in Malibu
Next to you in Malibu
You would explain the current as I just smile
Hoping that you’ll stay the same and nothing will change
And it’ll be us just for a while
The place is full of couples, and there’s another one standing a few feet away. Their honeymoon phase has elapsed, and while things aren’t breaking, they’re definitely teetering. Pretty and innocent, they each presumed that their newfound love would endure the test of time. They’d make memories together and when things turned south, they’d lean on each other to prevail. It was cute and, unfortunately, blissful. In the end, each of them didn’t realize what they had. They each felt as if their partner was ignoring them. So it goes.
Do they even exist?
That’s when I make the wish
To swim away with the fish
There aren’t many people that come to the bar by themselves, but there are a lot of people that descend the steps alone. It’s a fine distinction. Some feel engulfed by the pressures of the outside world, stranded and left to fend for themselves. Help and comfort couldn’t be further away. So while they may arrive with a group of rollicking friends, their smile is a little dimmer and their head droops just a little lower.
But as Malibu bounced along, something struck a chord. Worries are ditched. Apprehensions are shed. Off into the night they go.
I never would’ve believed you
If three years ago you told me
I’d be here writing this song
But here I am
IV: TIME
As you may have surmised by now — either via the title of this project or by the selection of songs displayed to this point — my music taste isn’t exactly contemporary. There’s a blend of new and old, yes. But it is skewed towards older music; I have an entire playlist in my Spotify library that is simply called “Old.”
“Old” isn’t as binary a term as I first conceived it to be, particularly in reference to music. A song, for example, can be both old and contemporary. Take Dreams, a timeless hit by Fleetwood Mac. Originally released in 1977, Dreams is a wildly popular song with anyone over the age of 55. And yet, it was introduced to a new audience in 2004 with a remastered version; and, in 2020, it underwent another revival, thanks to TikTok. Thus, Dreams falls into the perplexing category of simultaneously old and new.
The rest of Fleetwood Mac’s discography, for the most part, is old, simply by temporal association. That goes for all-time classics — think Landslide and Everywhere — and the songs that aren’t immediately recognizable. Those are songs that only people who grew up with Fleetwood Mac would know. If a song hasn’t been brought back to life or reinvented by a third party, then it stays old.
I think that this distinction is worth pondering before diving into the project’s ultimate trio of songs: Piano Man, Dreams, and Summer of ‘69. Each is certainly old, and yet there is an argument that each is contemporary, too. They are recognizable fixtures of popular culture — Piano Man is an endearing sing-along classic at sporting events and Karaoke, Summer of ‘69 is a mainstream tailgate ballad, and Dreams is intertwined with one of the all-time viral TikToks. And yet, each song has existed for over 38 years.
They are old and new, new and old. Their shelf lives are seemingly eternal. In turn, they blur the lines that dictate what “old” really means in the first place.
Piano Man, Billy Joel
THE OLD MAN
I’m always the first one to arrive. I’m retired, I live alone and I lack any hobbies, so there’s not much else to do. Driven by boredom, I stroll to the bar, shunning the taxi driver that loiters outside my apartment complex. I’d rather walk, anyhow. Easing my way down the bar’s greasy steps, I reach for the door, nudging it ajar. Once inside, I wander towards the first stool on the right. That’s my spot for the night.
I sit down and look up. The bartender is already preparing my order: One tonic and gin, please.
Saturday nights are meant to look like this. Forget about the loneliness. Hide the joint paint. Screw the early bedtimes. Leave that for the other six days of the week. On Saturday, I can resemble the person who I used to be.
With the first sip, memories flood back.
THE MANAGER
A lot of people claim that they know Billy, but they really don’t. It annoys me, because I actually know Billy. I’m the guy who hired Billy off the streets and put him on his feet. So yeah, I know that Billy isn’t the sort of guy to miss something; I know that he runs late, too. It still freaks me out every time. As the sun dips out of sight and the street lamp illuminates our precious side street, I stare at the door, awaiting Billy’s entrance.
Without Billy, Saturday nights wouldn’t be the same. The bar isn’t quite what it used to be. Yes, it’s profitable. But there’s a new bar across town that opened a few years back and stole our thunder. Competition is fierce: We’ve cut our hours and slashed our payroll. To tell you the truth, we can’t really keep up like this for much longer.
But Saturdays are a different story, and that’s all because of Billy. People flock towards Billy; I can’t recall seeing anything like it. The bar is packed and alive, suddenly transformed into a cozy locale with an aurora reminiscent of home. Hoards of tipsy customers are standing — some on the floor, some on chairs, some ill-fatedly on tables — to sing and dance, drinks in hand, arms around each other. They bask in the glory bestowed upon them by Billy’s music. They are no longer their current dreary selves, but their dreamy selves, the ones they miss, the ones they strive to relive on a daily basis.
I’ve got a drink, too, but I’m off to the side, removed from the hoopla. I like to look around and revel in the scene, relishing the moment. It makes me feel full again. Once a night, I’ll make eye contact with Billy, who is lost in his own world at the piano. I don’t need to talk to Billy on Saturdays — he talks to all of us through his songs. I’ll just give him a smile and move on.
JOHN
I’m at the bar more than anyone else. So I’ve seen it at its best, and I’ve also seen it at its worst.
I’m here by necessity. I’ve been a bartender for 12 years, running on 13. See, out of college, the allure of Los Angeles tugged at my heartstrings. My imagination ran wild: Equipped with a film degree, I attacked the LA movie scene, eager to find an opportunity in the Entertainment Capital of the World. But while I searched for the job of my dreams, I needed another role to bring in an income. Being a bartender sounded appealing enough. But six months turned into twelve, one year turned into two and, yeah, you get the picture.
I haven’t given up; I know that I could be a star. I just need someone to find me and give me a chance. Will that part ever happen? I’m honestly not so sure. I spend a lot of time mulling over that question when the bar is empty and I’m staring at the drinks behind the bar and the old photos tethered to the wall, desperate for company.
But on Saturdays, I don’t have any time for that. Man, Saturdays. Saturdays are damn good to me.
I consider Billy a good friend of mine. He’s just a nice guy. He’s a smoker, like me, but he’s never got a lighter. Good thing I always do. While I light, I reach into my archive of jokes, and I try to make him smile. It’s easy. Billy’s a smiley guy, and I’m a funny guy. Perfect match. Billy asks for a drink — whiskey on the rocks. He reaches for his wallet. Now I’m laughing. The drink is always on me.
PAUL
I don’t have a lot going for me in life. I don’t have a wife, a family or much money. I do, though, have two distractions: My novel and Saturday nights at the bar.
I don’t like my day job. I’m a real estate broker, which means that I help people attain the sort of lives that I don’t have. I spend my day helping couples and budding families, touring extravagant houses and luxurious properties in Los Angeles. When the day ends, I sleuth back home to my one bedroom apartment, where I whittle away my time, alone.
Sucks, right?
But Saturdays are something that I can look forward to.
See, I don’t have much of an audience for my novel. But at the bar, people will listen to me. Sometimes, they pepper me with feedback and ideas. Davey is the best at this. I slide up a chair next to him and kickstart a conversation about the novel, and he is invested right away. The best part about it is that we talk about much more than the novel; we regale each other with talks of life’s twists and turns. When we’re a few drinks in, we start to holler at Billy, imploring him to continue singing so we never have to leave. I hate that damn walk back in the wee hours of Sunday morning. I never want to leave Davey, or Billy, or the bar.
DAVEY
I always wanted to be in the marines. From a young age, the thought consumed me. See, my entire family served in the armed forces. Luckily I liked the idea of serving, because I really never had a choice.
But the Navy isn’t all that I fancied it to be. For one, I’ve never actually been out to combat. I’m stationed on the coast of California, about an hour north of Los Angeles. Most of my work is rudimentary — managing inventory, training prospective marines, leading recruiting visits. I have no epics of heroism and bravery to pass down to my grandkids; absent are the sort of stories that hooked me as a kid. Maybe that’ll come one day. Until it does, I’m not really sure if the Navy is right for me. But there’s nowhere else to go, either. The Navy is all I ever wanted, and it’s all I’ve ever known.
The only place to go, then, is the bar on a Saturday night. I take the bus up from my station, an hour each way, and pull up a chair next to Paul. I put up with conversations about his novel because I can tell that, just like me, he’s trapped in a life that he doesn’t enjoy. I think we’ll both escape our lives, some day. My conviction strengthens as the night glides along and Billy’s concert crescendos. I always feel warm and fuzzy at the end of the night, reinvigorated just enough to survive the rest of the week at the port, plowing forward until next Saturday, when I can do it all again.
Dreams, Fleetwood Mac
Dreams.
There’s something about the video that’s so perfect. A man is whistling down the highway on a skateboard — an inherently stress-free activity, being that the road is sloped downwards, momentum propelling him forward — and simultaneously sipping from a jug of cranberry juice. He’s wearing a fluffy hoodie and rocking a thick, bushy mustache, one of those mustaches that is personality-defining. There’s a distinct tattoo on the side of his head, containing the flag of the Northern Arapaho tribe. No car comes near him — it’s only him, his skateboard, his cranberry juice, the open road and the soundtrack: Dreams, by Fleetwood Mac.
Nothing about it really makes any sense. All of the elements are incongruent. Who skateboards on a highway? Who skateboards while sipping from a full-sized jug of cranberry juice? Is this really taking place in Idaho, of all places? And why is he singing Dreams — a legendary song, yes, but also one that came out in 1977?
The thing is, the video doesn’t need to make sense to accomplish its aim. The whole thing just feels right. You watch it, and you’re suddenly living vicariously through the man on the skateboard: gliding along, buoyed by an influx of sugar and the breeze that playfully whistles by your ear. You are wholeheartedly at ease. Life is good.
Dreams.
Except that’s not what actually happened. The man wasn’t skateboarding at first. His car battery died on the highway. He had to get to work — had to make money, even though being a warehouse laborer at a potato factory doesn’t pay all that well. So the man pulled his longboard out of his trunk and sailed down the highway, leaving his broken down car behind. No time to waste. Off to work.
Dreams.
The man on the skateboard is Nathan Apodaca. He lives in Idaho, born and raised in the sleepy, isolated town of Idaho Falls. His father is of Mexican descent and his mother is from the Northern Arapaho tribe in Wyoming. She grew up on a reservation.
A few years ago, Apodaca was homeless, sleeping in a tent sandwiched between a dirt road and Idaho’s fabled Snake River. He managed to buy an RV to live out of while he bounced between odd jobs — not only at the potato factory, but also as a volunteer fighter at a seasonal wildfire fighting camp — to support his wife and three small children. Money is scarce; that’s why he drinks out of a jug, not a bottle. It’s cheaper to buy in bulk.
The TikTok video changed Apodaca’s life. It notched a whopping 72 million views and garnered 12 million likes in the first two months after its release. Apodaca has since partnered with a number of brands — spanning XBox to Idaho Potatoes — and seen his net worth soar to $900,000. He’s even picked up a few acting roles in comedy series. Ocean Spray gifted him a car and a bed full of cranberry juice, citing Apodaca’s ability to provide the world joy in a challenging year. He deserved it.
Apodaca used the money and notoriety to buy a five-bedroom, three-bathroom home for his family in Idaho Falls. The RV didn’t have enough room for his daughters, who instead lived with either his sister, wife or ex-wife. Now, they all have their own rooms, united under one roof again.
Dreams.
Apodaca never would have even downloaded TikTok without his daughters. They used to live with their mom — whom Apodaca divorced — in Montana. On one visit, they showed Apodaca the app. Apodaca — perhaps partially wanting to connect with his daughters, partially actually believing in his own ability — asked them to film him dancing. They did. They came away impressed. And so he created an account. Why not?
Dreams.
In the aftermath, the clip eventually found its way to Fleetwood Mac themselves. They shared the clip on Twitter with a simple yet fitting caption: “We love this!”
Dreams.
But life, and fame — especially newfound fame — is fleeting. In December, Idaho State Police pulled Apodaca over due to an expired license. On the side of the road, Apodaca began rummaging through his car for his registration. While he searched, the police observed packages of THC gummies littered throughout the vehicle.
They ordered him out of the car immediately. He was under arrest for charges of possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia. His bail was posted at $600. He’s since been released.
Dreams.
Apodaca is adamant that he was wronged by the police. He claimed that the cops who arrested him never read him his Miranda rights — fundamental safeguards against custody and interrogation, which law enforcement are obligated to follow.
On top of that, the police wrongfully labeled Apodaca. They claimed he had a prior felony conviction on his record, allegedly for possession of a firearm. They didn’t realize their mistake until Apodaca had already rotted in jail for a few hours.
Dreams.
Apodaca was somewhat of a public figure, which meant that scrutiny accompanied fame. TMZ ran a story on his arrest. Local news channels, once enthralled with his feel-good story, picked up with coverage of his apparent demise. Once an inspiration and a depiction of the American Dream. Now wrongfully branded as a felon and a stoner. What will prevail, the truth or the lie?
Dreams.
Summer of '69, Bryan Adams
Oh, when I look back now
That summer seemed to last forever
And if I had the choice
Yeah, I'd always wanna be there
Those were the best days of my life
All songs remind me of something. For some, it’s a moment in time. Others remind me of a person. A few make me think of a certain place.
This one reminds me of a quote:
“I wish there was a way to know you were in the good old days before you actually left them.”
In Summer of ‘69, Adams sings about nostalgia. He reminisces about the summers that he shared with his band, reliving the long nights and the best days of his life. He mourns for that time — before the band members moved on with their lives, leaving only memories in their wake.
I chuckled when I discovered that Adams was only 26-years-old when he wrote the song. You can argue that Adams didn’t even know what nostalgia was, at that point in his life. Can you even be nostalgic at such a young age? I’ve been thinking about that a bit, and I suppose that you can, because you can be nostalgic for anything that ended, really. But there ought to be a difference between being nostalgic at 26 — when you can still create so many new memories — and being nostalgic at, say, 86.
When is it OK to be nostalgic, and what subjects are OK to be nostalgic about? I’m wrestling with those questions often nowadays. As I sit down to write this, I’m just five hours away from completing my final day of school and less than two weeks away from graduating college. And although I’m still a college student for these next 12 days (I have to finish this project, afterall), I am already a bit nostalgic for my college experience. I have been for the last couple of weeks.
Rather unexpectedly, this project has contributed to those feelings.
Amid the turbulence of this past semester, my capstone work became grounding. As my life chugged along at an unpredictable and unrelenting pace, I used this project as a crutch. I could always open my laptop and begin to write — listening to music in the process — knowing that I’d be at peace in a couple of minutes.
A couple of weeks ago, at the Minor in Writing showcase, a number of my peers told me they were impressed with the sheer amount of writing I carried out for this project. I smiled and shrugged off the compliment.
But after the showcase, I took a step back for the first time and realized that I had, indeed, written a shit ton. I’m not really sure how I decided on 12 songs — something about it just seemed neat and tidy, splitting up the project into four sets of three. And yes, 12 songs is a lot. But it never really felt that way.
As I explained it to my peers at the showcase: There’s always one course each semester that doesn’t actually feel like work, and so you wind up doing work for that course over work for other courses, even when deadlines are less imminent and assignments are less stressful. For me, that was this project.
As capstone draws to a close, I’ll soon move on without it, absent my crutch. This piece is the last thing that I’ll write for this project. That’s an intentional decision — much like Adams, I wanted to write about nostalgia. At 22 years old, I’m not entirely equipped to write about it. But I wanted to, anyway.
I think that I’ll look back fondly on my project — not only in terms of how much I wrote, but the boundaries that I pushed while writing. From the onset, I challenged my creativity, which isn’t exactly a strength of mine. Once I decided to write about each song with a different perspective, I pushed my anxieties to the side. I challenged myself to be introspective and open and vulnerable, and to communicate all of that through my writing. That’s not an easy task either, especially as someone who skews towards introvertive.
Adams also makes a point in Summer of ‘69 that this project helped illuminate. Back in January, I found myself wanting to learn about music curation, wondering why we listened to certain songs, artists and albums the way we so ardently do. My project dovetailed a bit, and so I wound up shifting my curiosity a bit, too. What I learned through my own organic discovery is that music has an unrivaled capability to transcend us to certain moments.
Adams, for instance, makes us feel young again. We are suddenly free-spirited teenagers with reckless ideas and boundless dreams. Adams is back in that moment, back in the band. Listeners can relate, too, because they had a parallel experience as a kid, one that they can teleport back to, too. No matter what else is going on in our lives, we can go back to a moment — just for a couple minutes at a time — via song.
At the start, I wanted to tie each of the 12 songs to a specific memory. Instead, I only wound up doing that with one song, I Like Me Better.
Now, though, all 12 of these songs will be intertwined with my capstone. When I hear the song, that’s what I’ll think of — not what I wrote, but the boundaries I pushed and the limits that I challenged. And when I think of the project and the songs and my college experience, I will also think of this brilliant line by Adams, which I will use to tie a bow on the 12th and final song in my project:
Those were the best days of my life.
Maybe that was true for Adams at 26. But I have a feeling it’s not anymore.