Music = Memories

[4X4]

Just moved and I'm connecting through someone's unsecured network. It's been on and off all weekend, so I've had plenty of time to listen to music.
It really strikes me that certain songs bring back such vivid memories. I've been replaying songs over and over because they remind me of certain times and places.
Piano Man - Rome, summer of '06. Billy Joel played a free concert in front of the Colosseum. God damn, what a night. At the time, I estimated at least 50,000 people. Wikipedia has it up around 500,000.
Imagine a street the width of Mcleod Tr, packed shoulder to shoulder for about 2 km. That was Via Foro Imperiali in Rome that night.
I took the whole hostel down there, bought beer from gypsies with coolers on wheels, had a blast. Piano Man will forever remind me of that night.

Let It Be - Again, Rome. Staring out my bedroom window, listening to my mp3 player and drinking wine and smoking... Looking down at people doing their thing. The funny way people parallel park in Rome. Just back up until you hit the car behind you, then drive forward until you hit that car, then back up..... The unbelievable women... The way the language sounds like song, even when they're yelling.

Sweet Home Alabama - Driving down the highway in BC, a few summers ago. Hot, hot day. Windows wide open. Music cranked. Doing a beer run for the group, as we were camping a few clicks outside of Ainsworth.


I could go on and on. Seems like every other song puts me in a time or a place. There are songs that remind me of girls, places, eras... I think music does more to jog my memory than pictures... Of course, if this internet connection cuts out again tonight, I'll start looking through pictures and I'll probably disagree with myself.

[Canada 02]

I don't like Bryan Adams, but back in the early/mid 90's, I think it was a Molson Canadian Rocks concert with a bunch of Canadian bands/artists at COP's ski jump bowl. It was a huge crowd for Calgary (guessing 35000+, but could have been more). It went into the wee hours, and near the end, when Adams was playing, the sky lit up with lightning, and there was thunder crashing! It was an awesome setting for Adams playing 'Kids Wanna Rock'

[Robbob]

I'm not a big music person but whenever I here time of or life or I will remember you I get a flashback or gretzky circling MSG. When I here Tone Loc (sp?) I get a flash back to 89 during the Flames run playing street hockey. Can't really explain it.

[troutman]

You might be interested in this book:

This Is Your Brain On Music (Paperback)
by Daniel Levitin (Author)


http://www.amazon.ca/This-Brain-Musi...4511520&sr=8-1

You are an expert in music, whether you know it or not. You can identify hundreds, possibly thousands of songs from just fractions of a second of audio; you can anticipate and identify minute changes tempo and rhythm; you have a built-in framework for identifying standard popular music chord structures, and you know when a song returns to the root (which you find pleasing, even if you don’t know what “root” means); you can recognise a familiar tune-even, say, a Led Zeppelin classic sung as opera, or as an Australian outback ditty. You are attuned to slight changes in pitch, timbre, volume, and location. In fact, when it comes to many of the finer details of music, your mind is far more powerful than any existing computer. It’s all because you have honed your skills with thousands and thousands of hours of training-by listening to music.

Unless you’ve studied music theory, or possibly cognitive neuroscience, you probably had no idea just what an expert you are. This Is Your Brain on Music explains exactly why you are such an expert, appealing to the latest brain imaging research, evolutionary biology, behavioural psychology, and cognitive neuroscience. It’s a primer on music theory, and a fascinating study in the evolving field of brain science.

[Locke]

I always knew you were a softie you big lug!


Please dont kill me. I'm too handsome to die so young.


Although you're absolutely right. People really identify memories and emotions to music. For instance, I cant listen to a Metallica song without remembering hours and hours studying for a grade 11 math final.

Then there are great driving tunes. Albums, artists or songs that I remember from taking long road trips with friends.

This same phenomena is why couples have "that song" that they define their relationship by.

Its interesting, I'm not sure if its a manner of memory storage or just a by-product of circumstancial repetition.

[Shnabdabber]

Originally Posted by troutman

You might be interested in this book:

This Is Your Brain On Music (Paperback)
by Daniel Levitin (Author)


http://www.amazon.ca/This-Brain-Musi...4511520&sr=8-1

You are an expert in music, whether you know it or not. You can identify hundreds, possibly thousands of songs from just fractions of a second of audio; you can anticipate and identify minute changes tempo and rhythm; you have a built-in framework for identifying standard popular music chord structures, and you know when a song returns to the root (which you find pleasing, even if you don’t know what “root” means); you can recognise a familiar tune-even, say, a Led Zeppelin classic sung as opera, or as an Australian outback ditty. You are attuned to slight changes in pitch, timbre, volume, and location. In fact, when it comes to many of the finer details of music, your mind is far more powerful than any existing computer. It’s all because you have honed your skills with thousands and thousands of hours of training-by listening to music.

Unless you’ve studied music theory, or possibly cognitive neuroscience, you probably had no idea just what an expert you are. This Is Your Brain on Music explains exactly why you are such an expert, appealing to the latest brain imaging research, evolutionary biology, behavioural psychology, and cognitive neuroscience. It’s a primer on music theory, and a fascinating study in the evolving field of brain science.

This is an interesting read....

On name that tune night at the local watering hole, I cant be beat... usually all I need to identify a song is a single note, guitar tone, snare drum tuning, cymbal sounds... and here I was thinking I was just a freak.

[Wookie]

Yeah, music can be pretty amazing.

What I love and hate is that song that you start listening too and just love, you can play it over and over and over and over again, it's incredible. But soon, not far enough into the future, it just doesn't do it anymore. But for that short time, there's nothing better!

Some songs can be pretty painful for bringing back memories. Actually, nostalgia is pretty depressing at times.

Jerk.. now I'm sad..

Actually I've thought about that (the book mentioned above) how I can't remember so many things, but songs, I can sing (granted only along too) soo many songs. So many lyrics, so many beats. It's amazing. And how one can pick up a song from that very first note. Often it almost seems like you knew what song it was, when it was still the silent part before it started. Weird..

Songs and girls (mostly x girls) is the worst though...

Damn you again!

[Displaced Flames fan]

Originally Posted by Shnabdabber

This is an interesting read....

On name that tune night at the local watering hole, I cant be beat... usually all I need to identify a song is a single note, guitar tone, snare drum tuning, cymbal sounds... and here I was thinking I was just a freak.

I'm with you.

Del's Bar in Somers, MT I was the freaking King for an entire summer. Good times.

[Berger_4_]

That's wierd, I was just thinking about this a couple days ago. Song came on the radio or something (I can't remember exactly what it was...might have been Weezer or The Weakerthans) and I instantly remembered a good portion of last summer. Hell, I remembered exactly what the truck I was driving in smelt like...strange.

The Weezer song, and one by Sublime, I remember last summer, getting loaded with people who were twice my age who I'd only met that night.

It's really annoying me right now that I can't remember the other one that made me flash back to work this summer. But it was strange how I was just instantly transported back to there, driving home with the sun in my eyes...good times.

And every time a song by Montgomery Gentry comes on, I remember sneaking up to the front rows of BVJ with 15 other people in the rain, singing along to Gone...ah now I've gone and got all emotional-like.

[icarus]

I can associate just about every song with a particular moment in my life, I too have the gift of song recognition and identification. Just picking out songs mentioned above in this thread for example and what they remind me of:

"Piano Man": Partying with my exchange student friends in Kingston at Tir Nan Og pub.
"Let It Be": Nothing specific, but that era as a young teenager when I discovered the Beatles.
"Sweet Home Alabama": Alabama! It actually does because they played that song on the radio A LOT when I spent two weeks there in 1999.
"Kids Wanna Rock": My first concert, Bryan Adams, at the Saddledome circa 1991.
"Time of Your Life": High school grad, that was our 'official' class song.

Some of them are pretty random, for example Dis mentioning Montana makes me think of how David Bowie's "TVC 15" makes me think of the hot, dry landscape of MT because I was listening to tons of Bowie in August 1997 when I was roadtripping through the state.

And speaking of roadtripping, I can't listen to Cat Stevens without thinking of the Australian outback because when my ex-gf and I went on a three-week roadtrip in December 2006 all our campervan had was a cassette player and after about a week of listening to ABC radio she bought a Cat Stevens cassette at a roadhouse in the middle of freaking nowhere. So guess what we listened to incessantly for the next two weeks. She ruined him for me!

[Jayems]

I get flashbacks of working at a grocery store in Bragg Creek whenever i hear certain early 90's songs...

[4X4]

Originally Posted by troutman

You might be interested in this book:

This Is Your Brain On Music (Paperback)
by Daniel Levitin (Author)


http://www.amazon.ca/This-Brain-Musi...4511520&sr=8-1

You are an expert in music, whether you know it or not. You can identify hundreds, possibly thousands of songs from just fractions of a second of audio; you can anticipate and identify minute changes tempo and rhythm; you have a built-in framework for identifying standard popular music chord structures, and you know when a song returns to the root (which you find pleasing, even if you don’t know what “root” means); you can recognise a familiar tune-even, say, a Led Zeppelin classic sung as opera, or as an Australian outback ditty. You are attuned to slight changes in pitch, timbre, volume, and location. In fact, when it comes to many of the finer details of music, your mind is far more powerful than any existing computer. It’s all because you have honed your skills with thousands and thousands of hours of training-by listening to music.

Unless you’ve studied music theory, or possibly cognitive neuroscience, you probably had no idea just what an expert you are. This Is Your Brain on Music explains exactly why you are such an expert, appealing to the latest brain imaging research, evolutionary biology, behavioural psychology, and cognitive neuroscience. It’s a primer on music theory, and a fascinating study in the evolving field of brain science.

I'm going to have to read that book...

But as for the bolded part, my dog can identify a certain song that way.
A few years ago, I had the music on, and one of the songs in the playlist was 'Been Caught Stealing' by Janes Addiction. The song opens with two notes, then some dogs barking.
I had the music just cranked that day, and when she heard those dogs, she started barking like crazy and running back and forth from the front window to the back door, just going nuts.
It was so funny, that I started showing it to my friends and family, whoever was over.
After doing it a few times, the very first note would set her off. Didn't even need to hear the dogs. I could just play the first note and pause it, and she'd still go nuts.
God I love that dog.

[4X4]

The more I think about this, the more I realize that most of my memories have sound associated with them. Or that most sounds have memories associated with them.

For example, TV theme songs do it as well. Old tv themes remind me of eras. The theme to MASH makes me picture my mom sitting on the couch watching the show. Of course, it takes place in the house we lived in about 20 years ago.

I still love reruns of Star Trek TNG. The opening theme reminds me of my old apartment at 12th & 12th. That is where I lived when I worked every day until 11pm, and TNG was on at midnight.

The theme to HNIC does two things, it gives me shivers (apparently, I love hockey THAT much), plus it gives me some kind of areal view of myself lying belly down on the carpet, chin in my palms, wearing pjs and begging my mom to let me stay up until the games were over.

[Jing]

Whenever i go on trips, i usually find a new album and just listen to that. Bob marley reminds me of san fran and Jack Johnson reminds me of hong kong. Awkward associations no?

[chid]

Hands Up (not sure who by) used to be on a Club Med tape my parents used to play in the car repeatedly. However, as soon as I hear the song I am immediately back in the blue Windstar staring out the window..

[rockstar]

Ahh...the magic of music...

So much more effective than simple language. And it's universal.

Thanks for that book suggestion troutman, I'm going to buy it today I think.