The Beatles

The Beatles 'invaded' the U.S. forty years ago. I'm still too young (okay, barely, but too young nevertheless) to remember what all the hoopla was about. The Beatles broke up in 1970 when I was five years old, so I don't remember the impact they had. I remember when John Lennon was murdered in 1980, and even then I wasn't sure why people were making such a big deal about it.

I may not have been influenced by The Beatles, but I know that music has had a big impact on my life. There are certain songs that are touch stones for me (don't judge my musical tastes here ...):

...listening to Casey Kasem's American Top 40 and actually writing down the songs in a notebook to see how things were moving in the charts (this was long before the internet!)
...Laura Branigan's "How Do I Live Without You" brings to mind my first break-up in high school.
...Michael Jackson's "Thriller" album was just huge as I left high school and went to college in the early/mid 1980s.
...I used to listen to George Michael/Wham as I was riding my bike the summer after graduating from college. I can still envision where I was on my customary route as each song played on my walkman (how passe is a walkman in this day and age!). I always smiled when "Last Christmas" came on at the end of the tape - it was summertime and Christmas was months away.
...I was in a complete and total Melissa Etheridge rut in the early nineties as I realized my marriage wasn't turning out to be everything I wanted.

In the last few years I've turned to the internet like so many others out there. I trade songs with Phil, and sometimes I think he's just testing me when he asks me to find certain songs. Sometimes I look to impress like recently when I found a live concert recording of Sister Hazel doing a cover of "Leaving On A Jet Plane."

In fact, I considered (and may still change) giving my blog the subtitle of "The Soundtrack of My Life" I think the media is finally clued in to how important a soundtrack can be. And "Ally McBeal" started it all - sure, there was background music in a lot of television programs, but not until "Ally McBeal" did a television show spawn (I like that word) its own soundtrack. Now, every time you turn around there is a soundtrack. I own the soundtrack to "Remember the Titans" only because it was the movie that John and I watched just before we had sex for the first time.

I actually played a role in the "Ally McBeal" phenomenon. Really. Why do you think the Original Vonda Shepard Web Site is at the top of my links list?