Miscellaneous - Travel and Music

  by Adrian Huggins

published: 28 / 9 / 2007

intro

In the latest in our 'Soundtrack of Our Lives' series, in which our writers write about the personal impact of music on them, seasoned traveller Adrian Huggins tells of some of the songs that have stuck with him as he has travelled around the world

This is very much being like at school/college/university again when you have been given a completely open subject to write about. Great, you think. This is why I love writing. This is my piece of the world's wall to scrawl on for the whole world to see. I can talk about the things I love, the things I hate, personal things, things that really grind my gears and so on. This is freedom. The reality, however, is more like this: Soundtrack to our Lives - what the hell am I going to write about ? I am 25 years old. That may not seem old to some. To others it may seem practically retirement age (Those that fall into the latter can quite frankly stick their head in an oven. I look, act and dress like I’m about 21, but for the sake of honesty and authenticity I’ll use my real age. Thanks for your time.). This is a big open thing to write. I am so blessed as to have had a wonderful and fulfilled life so far so this is not an easy task. I decided to write about a few different songs which meant a lot to me rather than one particular song or album, and it seems like I have been over at least 930 albums and 659 different collections of songs in my head and in my note-book before whittling things down. It was not easy to pick out those few songs as there really are so many I could have chosen. As a music lover, a song is one tool that can unlock memories as clearly as looking through a photo album or a diary. I always forget to bring a camera and the idea of keeping a diary if I’m honest doesn't appeal to me, (plus I tend to ramble so it would never make sense when reading back years later, other than to confirm that I should have been seeking professional help then as well.). So there I am stuck with my walkman/disc-man and now in the heady days of this 21st century or whatever year we’re in now, (I’m still convinced it is about 2005), my ipod. Whichever was the preferred source of mobile music went and still goes everywhere with me: On my travels, on my holidays, on the way to school, on the way back from school/college/university and occasionally to work and back, and of course at home. I tend to surround myself with music and the older I get the more I realise that, while it seems like passing the time, it gets in your subconsciousness and serves as that virtual photo album that sometimes only you have access to. Here, therefore is a glimpse through my final selection of songs that stick out like a massive sore thumb when trawling through the countless good and bad tunes that have come and gone with me throughout my life so far. Buddy Holly – ‘Rave On’: I kid you not. I sit here in baggy skater shorts, unshaven, with tattoos up my arm and play in a rock and dance fusion band (They're called Deltasound and are great-Ed) and the first song that I tell you about is Buddy Holly. Well, in all fairness, I blame my parents.... Back, sometime in the very early 90’s, I was lucky enough to go to Denmark with my family. By boat and car. This would be fine if we had taken more than 'The Classical Music of the Planets' and 'Buddy Holly’s Greatest Hits'. The first tape did not stand out as well as the other, but the Buddy Holly tape I swear was on repeat for about 14 hours during that car journey. It’s weird as looking back this isn’t a song that first stuck out in my mind until about a month ago. While in a restaurant, this very song came on and somehow the words were locked in my brain, despite my being unable to count the years since I’d heard it. And right there, I was about 8 years old again in the back of the smallest Citreon 2CV in the world hassling my parents with “Are we there yet ?” as kids do. I chose to mention this song for that reason. It is not an obvious choice for me as will be revealed if you continue to read on, but upon hearing it again it really took me back to that time in a second. Guns 'n' Roses – 'Welcome to the Jungle': This may have be one of the most important songs of my entire life. This song was the song that I heard and first thought “Yes, this is what I like, I’m a rocker” I would first hear this while going to watch ice hockey games around the tender age of 9 or 10. Now Guns 'n' Roses aren’t usually the obvious choice for a child of that age, but I remember so, so clearly hearing this and discovering what real music was, as up to that point most of the stuff I had heard was either forgettable radio garbage, my parents' music or school choir music. This was a true awakening. From that moment on I knew where I stood. I looked up from that stage to guys who were a bit dangerous, long haired, and messy looking with tattoos who made loud, in-your-face music. This was the total opposite of the shy, quiet child I am and law abiding citizen I have become, but that’s why I love it. It was like a benchmark for all other music from then on in, and while I have listened to my fair share of rubbish over the years, including several novelty hits by various puppets and so on, it was always and is still there. ‘Appetite for Destruction’ from which the song is taken was the very first CD I went out and bought when I finally upgraded from a tape deck, and it still gets played to this day. R.E.M. – ‘Crush with Eyeliner’: This is on R.E.M.’s 1994 album , ‘Monster’. I would not class it as one of their better known albums, but this album and this song were the first things I had heard from R.E.M. after ‘Shiny Happy People’ and ‘Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight’. I had heard the previous single from that album, ‘What’s the Frequency Kenneth?’, which is the best known song from that album. ‘Crush with Eyeliner’, however, is the one song that stands out when I think of that album. I only actually bought the CD about 3 years ago, but for years had a copy on tape which my friend Jimbo copied me from his dad's collection. This song typifies this album with its layers of distorted electric guitar and solid beats and is a bit of step up from a lot of R.E.M.’s other work both before and since then. This is another album that has lived with me from that day onwards and still has an influence on the kind of sounds I really like to hear from rock music. For me it was an album that I was listening to when I was becoming both a teenager and someone who was a music lover rather than just someone who would listen to music as background music. Oasis – ‘What's the Story Morning Glory’/ ‘Champagne Supernova’: When I think about these two songs, I think of them in album order carrying on from each other with the crashing waves and sound bites separating the songs. Aged 14 I was lucky enough to make my first trip to the United States with my family and a friend's family. At that age in 1996, there were pretty much two bands you would be listening to, either Blur or Oasis. And being the good old Northerners that we were, myself and my friend were firmly in the Oasis camp and therefore subjected our collective families to this album on the endless car journeys that become a part of any good trip to the States where at least a bit of travelling is involved. There was also a lot of Alanis Morisette as well, of which I am not at all ashamed, but these two Oasis songs stick out. They fitted perfectly with seeing the fast city scapes and roads of America for the first time which really was like being in a film for us. Smashing Pumpkins – ‘Tonight, Tonight’: This is also a song I heard and became aware of during that same holiday but I have added it to my list for a different reason. This is the song that I first heard by the Pumpkins, and it led me to buy, (or rather ask for Christmas) the album ‘Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness’. This is one of my favourite albums. I think it is an amazing body of work, and never gets the credit it deserves. ‘Tonight, Tonight’ was the only song I had heard by the band and, so when I sat down and listened to the whole album, my entire idea of what a band could and should be was completely blown away. This song led me to an album which was packed full of different moods and sounds, starting with a piano piece followed by the song in question, before launching into some heavy metal riffs which totally blew my mind. I had no idea that this is what the Smashing Pumpkins were like and also no idea that a band could create so many different sounds in the space of one album. It opened my eyes and ears to music on a completely different level that I had never experienced before. Kerbdog – ‘End of Green’: In 1997 I was playing on a roller hockey team and made some friends who also had some similar tastes in music in terms of liking things which were loud and in-your-face. They however were far more “into it” than I was and therefore introduced me to a whole new world of music. I borrowed a tape of Rage Against the Machine and the Offspring, but they also added a few other songs on there, including Irish band Kerbdog's early song ‘End of Green’. Kerbdog hailed from Kilkenny in Ireland and had a cult following throughout the 90’s and some of the members have since been involved in the band Wilt. I have never found a copy of this song on CD, but did manage to get a hold of their other album which was released later that year. It was my first taste of music that was actually alternative, not the sort of thing you would hear on the radio or see on television. It was my first taste of finding music that I and a few friends loved without having everyone around you knowing about it. Through this band and this song I discovered other bands such as Machine Head, Deftones, Silverchair and Symposium. Again this was another step on my journey into really loving music and seeking things out rather than just listening to what was fed to me as a casual listener. Ian Brown – ‘F.E.A.R.’: This was not initially a particularly significant song in my life as it came out while I was working as a temp in a dull office in Sheffield. The only real impact it had on me at the time was to convince me that Ian Brown was indeed a very talented guy and the Stone Roses were actually quite good, a fact which had eluded me for years before this. I, however, now believe this is one of the greatest songs ever written. It has an amazing string section that leads the song and grabs your attention, but Brown also somehow managed to work the lyrics so the first letter of each word spells out ‘FEAR’: “For Everything A Reason”, which I think is a great achievement in that it is not merely a bunch of random words spelled out for the sake of it, but they all correlate and are relevant to the meaning of the song. ThisGirl – ‘Three Minute Spanish Film’ I spent a few weeks helping out at a Rotherham recording studio which houses practice rooms and helped organise local gigs. ThisGirl were a local band who at the time, in late 2001, were doing really well for themselves and had gained a lot of interest and a large following. They were the first band that I had actually met, who were just normal guys who came from similar backgrounds as I did. We have mutual friends and they hung out in the same places I did and it was a massive influence to see lads the same age who were actually making something for themselves. While ThisGirl have now split, their members are still around today in various reincarnations including the New 1920 and Salvation and the Skeletons. Other than being a fantastic band who were tight live and exciting to watch, they made me realise that I could also just go out there and join a band. Six years later I am in a band.I do believe ThisGirl had effect on making me take that step. New Found Glory – ‘Failure’s Fot Flattering’: This is another song which takes me back to a fond vocational memory from travelling across Canada with my girlfriend. I have been a fan of New Found Glory since 2001 when I heard their self-titled debut album. Since then I have seen them countless times live. They are a band that gives 100% every time they hit the stage and it is always a great night. This song is on their 2004 album ‘Catalyst’ and is by far one of their most poppier moments with a hook line and chorus that is instantly recognisable and uplifting. While we were in Vancouver my girlfriend and I planned to go and see them on their infamous Warped tour. For some reason two nights before I could not for the life of my get to sleep and ended up listening to this album to qualm my mild insomnia. It didn’t really help, but nevertheless made me happy to be there. The next day on the way to buy tickets for the Warped Tour we walked past Jordan Pundik, the lead singer of New Found Glory. As we were both such big fans we decided to do the whole fan thing and go and say hi, which stands out as a great memory. The next day we saw them play an amazing set and the highlight for me was this song as it really was the anthem for my time there and still is. So there it is, a list of my whittled down significant songs. There really are countless songs from between before and since these songs that I could write equally as much about, but this is a snapshot of some of the songs that have stuck out above the rest for me. The beauty of retrospect is that I’ve sifted through my entire musical collection and glossed over all the bad parts and well and truly added rose tinting. I chose the songs that have made me smile and feel good. I, and many others could just as easily, but maybe not as pleasurably have written a similar piece entitled 'Soundtrack to My Life That Reminds Me How Rubbish Life Can Be Sometimes'. But that would be no fun at all. I’m clearly a glass half full kind of guy and my choice firmly represents that.

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