Music is Memory

Music is my life. So many people say it, and, trust me, only a small fraction mean it like I mean it. 

The timeline of my life is wrought with memories I've forgotten, people whose names escape me, events that carried only enough impact to have titles in my mind. Like State Championship Game or Graduation Day. I still don't remember any of my at-bats in the State Championship Game. I only know we won. And I only remember the walk up the aisle on Graduation Day and little else from that day. Those are only a couple of examples but suffice to say the rest of my memories are just as sordid. 

But the music. The music stays with me forever. The music is my memory. I remember entire portions of my life based on the music I was listening to at the time.  I remember song titles and lyrics and album covers better than the day to day events I shared with my girlfriends, all of whom I loved to some degree.  I am a romantic at heart, so it says a lot to say that my love for music has eclipsed my love for Kerri or Amber or Jen or Leita.  I'm sure it pleases them none to know that I help remember times spent with them by associating them with the bands I loved while with them.  For instance, I can define my entire relationship with Amber in two bands: Chiodos and Brand New.  I can remember looking over at Jen from the driver's side of her 2000 Grand Prix as we sang "And we'll pray that there's no god to punish us", a lyric from "Fury" by Muse. I don't know where we were driving to or from but I remember I started loving Muse while I was dating Jen. I know that other things happened in my relationships with Amber and Jen, but I can only catalogue those things by remembering a song that helped define each particular moment. 

But I digress, because this is not about my relationships, it's about my music. 

I was born into Beatles music and carry a torch for them still.  Beatles was a love forced onto me. I don't resent it or even dislike it. In fact much the opposite. The Beatles are one of most influential and musically gifted bands of all time. I would've found that out eventually, but my parents made me aware of it when I was wee. The Beatles will always be in my heart. I remember my mother and her brothers and sister singing "In My Life" at my cousin's wedding in Florida.  I remember playing the drums while my Uncle Larry and his brothers sang "Twist and Shout" at his wedding reception.  I was prepubescent at the time both those events took place.  I recall only snapshots of either event but I vividly remember the music of each day. I can thank The Beatles for that.

I also became a devoted fan of several bands as a direct result of my love for the works of the Fab Four. The Rolling Stones, The Zombies, David Bowie, The Mamas and Papas, The Moody Blues are just a few.

I was about nine years old when I fell in love for the first time on my own.  Wayne's World had just come out and was very popular, and a very popular song became it's anthem.  It was "Bohemian Rhapsody", and it changed my life forever. From the moment I heard that song - its intricate arrangement, its raw power, its sheer audacity - I knew that Queen would forever have a piece of my heart. The flamboyance of Freddie Mercury was something I'd never seen in rock music to that point. I didn't realize rock and roll could be so theatrical. And Freddie defined the word. Once I plunged deeper into the Queen catalogue I learned that bands could also transcend genres.  Queen paid tribute to all their influences from pop ("Fat Bottomed Girls"), metal ("White Man"), vaudeville ("Seaside Rendezvous"), and even twice paid tribute to Elvis Presley, one of Freddie's biggest influences, with "Man on the Prowl" and the mega-hit "Crazy Little Thing Called Love".  Their ability to explore all aspects of music and seamlessly put each genre into practice (sometimes in the very same song, like "Bohemian Rhapsody" and "The March of The Black Queen") was my main attraction to Queen. I didn't know what talent was at such a young age. As kids we hear a song, we like it, we listen to it. There are no questions asked. Having said that, it hadn't yet dawned on me that the members of Queen were world class musicians. To this day the common opinion is that Freddie Mercury has one of the finest voices in music history (he even released an opera album in the late 1980s) and Brian May is still regarded as a pioneer and one of the greatest soloists on the guitar.

Queen made me hear music differently...it made me feel music.  But moreover Queen still helps me remember.  I would not otherwise remember a church cookout that I attended with Kevin Mihelc and his family, at age ten, if I hadn't sang a karaoke version of "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" in front of the entire congregation.  My early baseball years would be a more murky set of memories if "We Will Rock You" and "We Are The Champions" weren't a constant as our all-star teams were always winning tournaments. Queen were the soundtrack to our victory dances.

My love for Queen's style has lead to my taking interest in myriad other similar groups such as Mott the Hoople, My Chemical Romance, Radiohead, Breaking Benjamin, Outkast and Elton John, to name a few.

When I was thirteen years old I had a summer league basketball game at the Boys and Girls club by the Union-Endicott High School. After the game I was supposed to find a ride home because my mother couldn't pick me up because she'd just put my newborn sister down for a nap.  Unfortunately, in my absent-mindedness I'd forgotten to ask anybody for a ride and by the time I remembered the gymnasium was empty. So I called my mother and pleaded with her to come and get me.  Begrudgingly, she woke my sister, packed her in the car and came to get me.  On the way home, mom was in no mood to talk and made it very clear by turning the radio up loud.  She hadn't known it but she was turning me on to another new love.  When we got home and I let her cool down I asked her what the song was that we'd been listening to in the car.  She told me it was "Comfortably Numb" by Pink Floyd.  I loved it. I listened to that song, in the context of The Wall (the album that featured it) non-stop on my parents record player.  The Wall was mean and gritty and psychedelic and bombastic all at the same time.  After weeks of hearing The Wall being played to death, Mom recommended that I listen to Dark Side of the Moon. That was the album that had initially launched Pink Floyd into stardom.  I listened to it and loved it, despite its vast differences from The Wall. 

Pink Floyd was the first band that I listened to that would've been considered progressive. I'd come to appreciate the lengthy tracks on Animals and the droning repetition of the earlier work like "Careful With That Axe, Eugene" and "Echoes".  There was a distinct difference between the gritty, dark writing of Roger Waters versus the more whimsy style of David Gilmour, but that difference only enhanced the chemical quality of the their music.  I delved into Pink Floyd's music, their story, the legend of Syd Barrett (the genius co-founder of the Floyd who would eventually be replaced by Gilmour when his use of LSD had permanently skewed his mind), their inner-group quarrels (revolving mostly around the power struggle between Waters and Gilmour), biographical books on the band (see A Saucerful Of Secrets: The Pink Floyd Odyssey). I became obsessed with the band.  My love for them also happened to coincide with a trend in my generation that made Pink Floyd even more popular. It was the rebirth of the Flower Power generation and psychedelia of the 1960s. All the girls were wearing tie-dye and bell-bottoms and those sunglasses with odd-colored lenses. It suited me fine as I used the music as a way to try to find common ground with the girls at Jennie F Snapp, my middle school, because as puberty hit me and my face exploded into a greasy, lumpy canvas most of the girls were not attracted to me physically. So I used Pink Floyd as a way to flirt with girls...NO LIE!! Example: I see Lisa Quackenbush in her full-on Flower Power outfit at her locker, which is right next to mine and I have a huge crush on her.  But according to her my name is not "Jaime", it's "Pizza Face" (don't judge her...we were all kids and we were all mean at one time or another) so I know she's not diggin' me as a physical specimen.  Instead, I assume that her attire matches her musical taste, so I get to my locker as I'm singing the last line to "Brain Damage"..."I'll see you on the dark side of the moon..."

Maybe it worked...Lisa and I started going out a short while later. And while "going out" doesn't mean much in middle school, it meant a lot to me.  So, in a way, besides being a talented psychedelic band, Pink Floyd also serves as an aphrodisiac? Well, yes or no I'm just illuminating, yet again, how some small memories would be dead and forgotten if not contained in the lyric and song.

As a result of my love for Pink Floyd, I began to embrace the qualities of the psychedelic/progressive bands both of the era and of the eras that followed.  I'll always be a big fan of King Crimson, Porcupine Tree, Dream Theater, The Mars Volta, and Tool to name only a few.


As my teenage years passed and my musical tastes progressed and became more and more dynamic, I experimented with several different musical stylings. Bands came into and out of my favor. In Sociology class my senior year, Dave Magdich did a presentation on a band called Cradle of Filth. They're a band that is considered "black metal" with a unique melodic touch and a singer who's voice you might mistake for the welcome voice over the intercom at the mouth of Hell. The music video that he showed along with his report displayed a hellish motif with pale women dressed as angels slitting their wrists and bathing in tubs full of blood.  Most of the class was moved to nausea. I was nearly moved to tears. I thought the music (the video was "From the Cradle to Enslave") was beautiful and theatrical and for a short time I became very involved with Cradle of Filth, brushing up on their catalogue and I still, today, find myself longing for the tortured screams of Dani Filth from time to time. I never thanked Dave for that.

It wasn't until I got to college that I found two bands that would become the new stalwarts in my repertoire.  The bands were Tool and System of a Down.  Tool had gained popularity in the early 1990s as a metal band with a progressive appeal and a catalogue wrought with epic ebbs and flows. The music is all brought together within the tremendous vocal stylings of Maynard Keenan.  His ability to write and sing with such beauty (see "Jimmy") and also a genuine ferocity (see "Cold and Ugly") brings a stand-alone quality to an already stellar band. In addition, drummer Danny Carey is still considered one of the finest drummers in rock music. The major appeal with Tool was the ambition and sustained energy in each song.  There is a pronounced angst in each movement on any of Tool's albums.  Each album appears to have a theme, at least musically, yet, lyrically there is little or no similarity from song to song. Tool also made themselves noticed on the performance level with stage shows that affected many of the senses, with intricate lighting and video, lingering smoke and fog, and the erratic contortions made famous by the flamboyant lead singer.  I can remember cramming through the night with my roommate, Ben, while we lost ourselves in "Third Eye" and "Ticks and Leeches".  I don't remember what I scored on the exam that followed, but I was receiving a separate education in those early morning hours in the basement lecture hall of Brubacher Hall. Music Ed X.

System of a Down came to me in a completely different way.  Every day at 2:20pm, when the last afternoon classes let out, a distinct voice could be heard without fail.  The voice of a boy who lived down the hall, screaming with perfect pitch "How do you own the world?/How do you own disorder?/Disorder".  This lyric came and passed every single day at the same time.  It took me awhile to finally ask him what he was singing.  He told me it was "Toxicity" by System of a Down.  The Toxicity album hadn't become popular yet, but was on the verge, with a mega-hit in "Chop Suey" waiting for release. Once released, it would take the world by storm and the boys from System of a Down to the realm of super stardom.  Once I knew the band name and found out that "Toxicity" was actually a really great piece of music, I began to delve into the System of a Down catalogue without haste.  I was impressed with the melodic quality to their music mixed with their energy.  System of a Down is pure energy. They start fast and stop and pick it back up and slow it down and stop and pick it back up. It's non-stop. The operatic style of Serj Tankian, their Frank Zappa-looking lead singer mixed with the higher-registered voice of guitarist Damon Malaykian serves as a perfect vocal concoction.  System of a Down writes as their name implies.  Their lyrics are strewn with protest and sarcastic political messages. The opening line of the highly-political "Cigaro" raves "My cock is much bigger than yours/My cock can walk right through the door".  "Highway Song" laments the end of America's glory days with "The canons of our times, our days are never ever coming back".  "BYOB" asks "Why don't presidents fight the war?/Why do we always send the poor?"  The music and the message come through with equal strength and vigor.  System of a Down is music that doesn't tire.

My love for Tool and System of a Down opened the door to my interest in much of the college music scene, like Deadboy and the Elephantmen, Acid Bath, A Perfect Circle, Alice In Chains, People in Planes, Fair To Midland, The Raconteurs and many many more.

After it all, after the Beatles and Queen, Tool, System of a Down, Pink Floyd, The Mars Volta, after The Dax Riggs bands, after the acoustic poets like Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell, after the college scene past me and I followed from behind The Decembrists and Cold War Kids.  After all that, I felt I needed the band that could quench it all for me.  The band that brought all the sounds together.  I stumbled upon Muse in 2004. The last seven years have been musical bliss in the world of Jaime Renfro.

When I feel the need to get new music in my ears, my go-to site is allmusic.com.  I search Queen and it gives me similar artists.  This maneuver helped me discover both Mott the Hoople and King Crimson among others.  As I scrolled down the page I came across a word that I absolutely love.  It was Muse.  A beautiful word, both in meaning and sound, I decided I had to have a listen to a band with such an inspirational handle.  I then went to youtube and found the first song of theirs that came up, "Our Time is Running Out".  I loved it. It was beautiful.

Then "Apocalypse Please"...loved it!

Then "Sing For Absolution" amazing!
Then "Micro-cuts"
Then "Showbiz"
Then "Butterflies and Hurricanes"
Then "Stockholm Syndrome"

I fell in love.  My heart leaps when I hear the first strains of any Muse song.  I feel music in so many more ways when I hear them.  The sound is so perfectly woven. Muse is still the only band whose entire catalogue I can listen to without wanting to skip over any song.  It was the exact band I'd hoped for.  People called Muse a Radiohead knock-off before they were really given a chance to prove otherwise.  Lead singer-songwriter-guitarist-pianist Matthew Bellamy has a wonderful voice that soars and pitches perfectly and bites and sometimes jumbles words into sounds that don't articulate.  It just so happens that Radiohead leading man Thome York also has such a voice.  For my money, the similarities end their.  Muse is a three piece band that blends every type of music I've ever enjoyed.  You like classical pieces? Listen to any of the "Exogenesis" movements or "Blackout".  You enjoy subtlety and harmony? Listen to "The Soldier's Poem".  Metal music? Try "Assassin" or "In Your World".  Pop? How about "Fillip" or "Supermassive Black Holes".  Their styles blend perfectly. Their musicianship is delicious.  Catchy guitar riffs? "Stockholm Syndrome".  Dazzling bass guitar runs? "Hysteria".  Clever drum fills? "Take a Bow".  Blinding keyboard runs?  "Space Dementia".  Muse has everything I could every dream of to quell the hunger for new catchy, rhythmic, progressive, bombastic sounds all wrapped up into one.  The live show I witnessed at Nassau Coliseum was a spectacle unlike any other.  Three separate stages that rose and fell with each band member on it,  wonderful lasers, impromptu jam sessions, perfect execution of each song.  I've seen over one hundred shows and Muse was the best by leaps and bounds.  Each memory of my twenties can be matched with Muse songs.  The year that Adam Crooks and I spent getting high and listening to Muse in the car while he tweaked into some head trip.  That year I lived off of an assuming girlfriend who loved me and therefore changed her musical tastes once she heard Muse. Muse is my darling and will always be in my Top 3. More darling than any person has ever been to me.

As my late twenties disappear into my early thirties I can feel the itch again.  I thought I'd cured it a couple times.  There was the Arctic Monkeys.  The Mars Volta is almost there.  The Smiths came close.  Don't get me wrong, I love the adventure of finding "the next band that would change my life" as the boys from Bayside said.  But sometimes I just want to have that year or two in my life where i find a band that can do no wrong.  I'm on the cusp, I can taste it, I'm right on the brink...here it comes.