Life’s Soundtrack

Journey

Longer ago than I care to remember, I co-habited with a guy who was a sales rep by day and drummer by night (and weekend).  Of course, he played up the latter occupation as it sounded so much cooler – a bit like he played up the fact that he was Italian when, in reality, he was only about one-eighth Italian and actually had more Welsh blood although he mentioned that rather less.  Can you sense a whiff of  disillusionment and a hint of bitterness?  I call them ‘the lost years’.

Anyway, whilst I was still enamoured, and obviously against my better judgement, I joined in his admiration for the 80s American  rock band, Journey.  Of course, when the relationship ended, all the poignancy in the lead singer’s voice oiled the tear ducts and the ‘meaningful’ lyrics seemed to be so relevant to me and my situation. 

When I saw the ‘greatest hits’ CD advertised recently, I thought, ‘yeah, I can cope with that now, all these years later’ so I bought a copy as, back in the day, I had it on vinyl (yes, I’m that old). 

What a difference the years make.   Driving along in the car singing at the top of my voice  thinking, ‘my God, how can I ever have thought that these sentimental lyrics were deep and meaningful and how did they manage to make me cry instead of laugh my head off?’  Don’t get me wrong, I still like Steve Perry’s voice and quite a few of the songs  are brilliant to sing along to but it’s not really my own musical taste – it was sort of a feature of that relationship and that time in my life.

When I was younger,   whoever I was with influenced  my musical taste – I suppose that happens with everyone.  Sometimes it was a good thing, sometimes bad.   Now, I’ve just got to get Genesis out of my system.