![]() “P.Y.T.” and “Billie Jean” fall into the same category aptly named “auditory cocaine.” It’s like if 200 milligrams of caffeine were captured in a six-minute song, which never failed to get me up and moving, whether it was around the house or at a birthday party. Michael’s over-the-top energy, the fast-paced funk beat ripe for dancing, the angelic chorus of background voices devolving into a joyous collection of scatting at the end hit all the marks for four-year-old Ritchie. It’s the perfect song for a child to get introduced to an artist. The pure, unbridled joy of the first time that I remember experiencing “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” is unmatched. I’d continually drift off to sleep as Jackson’s prime crooning would seep into my brain, nestling comfortably in my memory banks with ease.Įach track holds a special place in my head, representing a different emotion and the warm feeling of a familiar, loving memory. Whether it was driving home from another Baltimore Orioles’ loss or to my grandmother’s house for church and lunch in my Sunday best, it was always playing. The sheer number of times I listened to it should be a world record. The other works I named only register with individual tracks like “In Da Club” and “Hypnotize,” but the entire tracklist of Jackson’s most famous work has been permanently tattooed on my brain. It is the first album that I can remember listening to from start to finish. It’s hard to encapsulate how important Thriller is to both my happiness and my memories. But the crown jewel, the album that never seemed to be taken out of rotation, was Michael Jackson’s Thriller. From my first foray into rap music through 50 Cent’s Get Rich or Die Tryin’ and Biggie’s Life After Death to an inexplicable amount of Mary J. And honestly, shoutout to him for having an amazing taste in music. Strapped into a car seat that I never dreamed of escaping, my dad would drive me around the neighborhood when I got antsy, plopping in the CD of his choice. This practice of bonding music and happy memories together probably started in the backseat of my dad’s Dodge Neon between the years of 19. Intimate nights with close friends are often soundtracked by our favorite songs at that time, granting power to the likes of Snoh Aalegra and Durand Jones & The Indications. The best family reunion memories never arise without the sounds of McFadden and Whitehead’s “Ain’t No Stoppin’ Us Now” to accompany them. Every positive memory becomes tied to a musical moment.ĭriving to and from middle school basketball games will forever be associated with Drake’s only classic Nothing Was the Same. Given the amount of time that I’ve spent listening to music, I’m unable to think of a single moment when melodies aren’t flowing through my ears. All songs and albums, good and bad, stand the test of time because we can always access them. But we can’t depend on those central memories all of the time.ĭue to the seemingly endless catalog of music available through streaming services, music, unlike memories, is permanent. Any memory that we are lucky enough to capture and lock into our minds is either a powerful event that becomes a cornerstone of who we are or is tied to another sensation that grounds it. It is in their nature to be brief, as our brain attempts to hold onto them like sand slipping through our fingers. This is because memories, like feelings or people, are fleeting. In the bustling interchange of memory encoding and storage, many of the positive memories I have are attached to some sound or song. That number exists in the 90 to 95% range. If I adjust the question to ask, “What percentage of my happy memories are tied to music?”, it becomes easier to figure out a precise number. In fact, it might be necessary to add a qualifier in order to get closer to a more concrete answer. ![]() It’s impossible to nail down the exact percentage of memories I have that are explicitly tied to music.
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