Some of my favorite moments with our girls involve music and, as I’ve written in previous posts, I am all about shared experiences and music can easily create those kinds of experiences. In fact, that is exactly what we enjoyed tonight as I led us down a rabbit hole of music from my teenage years. It started because I tend to sing songs that come into my mind without rhyme or reason and one such song is, Behind Blue Eyes by The Who. Now, I am not much of a fan of The Who but am familiar with many of their most popular songs because when I was growing up, my brother was a pretty big fan. Of all their music, however, it is Behind Blue Eyes that tends to float into my mind from time to time, as it did tonight. Thus began our rabbit hole journey.
As the girls finished their dinner, I hopped on Spotify and played that song for them. That led to playing a few other songs, specifically introducing them to the popular selections from The Who’s rock opera, Tommy. My youngest noticed that though I’m not a fan of the group, I do know the lyrics of several songs; but, then, how can you not know the lyrics to Pinball Wizard and Tommy, Can You Hear Me. They stick with you. But we didn’t just stay with The Who, nor did we end there. Because while my brother loved The Who, I was a huge fan of The Rolling Stones, not only because of their music, but because of their front man, Mick Jagger. How could I not introduce them to that legend? This introduction required us to move from Spotify to YouTube because to appreciate Mick Jagger, you really need to see him dance.
First up was one of my absolute favorite pairings, I’m sure you already know—it was Dancing in the Streets by the duo of Mick Jagger and David Bowie (because what’s not to love about watching these two dancing in the streets together)? Because our oldest is an 80s hair metal/80s rock loving girl, I knew she’d appreciate Mick Jagger for his Steven Tyler-esque moves. She is fully aware, after all, of the influence bands like The Stones had on some of her favorite 80s bands.
And, of course, what rabbit hole music travel would be complete without a good amount of time spent with Queen? This is a band that our whole family simply loves (why else would we have watched the fictionalized biopic, Bohemian Rhapsody several times?). It helped that when the clip of The Beatles on The Ed Sullivan show ended (the girls needed to experience the screaming audience of their debut after we watched The Stones’ clip with a similar screaming-girls performance), there was a suggested clip for a remastered version of, Keep Yourself Alive from 1973. It was an absolute delight. Some of their later videos, based on their 1989 album, The Miracle gave us collective pause (despite their cool idea of shooting one of the videos on a flatcar of a moving train). In order to steep ourselves once again in their legacy, I called up one of my new-favorite Queen songs, Love of My Life (featured on A Night at the Opera, the legendary album my 17 year old just picked up a used copy of at our local indie vinyl store today).
While I’d heard the song on that album years ago, it didn’t stick with me until recently, specifically when Brian May played it during the Taylor Hawkins’ Tribute Concert in London (Love of My Life was Taylor and Alison’s wedding song and Brian sang it to Alison to a hushed crowd). If you’ve never seen concert footage of Freddie Mercury singing this song before a crowd, I urge you to check it out. Not only are his vocals incredible and Brian May’s guitar playing astounding, but the fact that Freddie Mercury can stop singing and the audience sings the song in unity in his vocal absence is nothing less than amazing. Every time I watch a Freddie Mercury performance, my girls will tell you, I cannot stop talking about his talent, musicianship, and the way he could entertain a crowd.
Anyway, to round out our musical exploration, I had to call up one final video mainly because I find it achingly beautiful—it is of Brian May in recent concerts (well past the death of Freddie Mercury) singing, Love of My Life on stage with just his voice and his 12-string guitar. But as the song closes out, Brian is joined on stage by a video hologram of the Queen himself, Freddie Mercury, their voices blending as they once used to and Freddie turned toward Brian. As I said, it is achingly beautiful, especially when Brian reaches a hand out to Freddie’s outstretched hand.
I could easily write volumes of the ways these shared moments with our girls fill my heart and my soul. Any time I get to share beauty with our teenagers, I count myself deeply blessed. Too often, it is easy to get lost in the noise of the world, a world angry and scared and divided and seemingly filled with more ugliness and hate than beauty and love. That’s why I choose to seek out these moments, steeping us in what love and hope look like and how it played out in music and in the performances of people like Brian May, Freddie Mercury, Roger Taylor, and John Deacon. It still plays out in music today, but it’s also in so many other moments, like ones shared with these remarkable young women, and I don’t want to lose sight of that.