The Fuel of Life 5.0: The Soundtrack of Our Lives

We all remember the soundtracks to our favorite movies. Some are so well done, that you can't shake the memories of certain songs from being attached to certain scenes. Think about Pulp Fiction, Requiem for a Dream, Kill Bill, Trainspotting, or Easy Rider. We all know those songs now, and mostly, because of the scenes they starred in. The mood was set, and there was a chemistry between the things going on in the scene, and the song playing with the scene. It's a really crazy feeling, and I know those of us around me who appreciate music as much as I do, have had some of those feelings in our lives, and probably have them once or twice a day. So here's mine...

So I set out this afternoon on my Vespa to grab lunch. I know this'll come with some controversy, but I like to ride with my iPod playing in my ears at a reasonable volume (cue Milton voice). So today, I set out to run some errands and grab some lunch. I roll out, and cue up "Siamese Dream" by the Smashing Pumpkins. If you know me at all, you know that I think this is one of the top ten best albums of the last 20 years without a doubt.

So it's a beautiful day out. The sky is clear and the temperature is hovering around 80, and it's Saturday, so there are people everywhere. As I'm cruising up to the place I originally wanted to grab lunch, "Rocket" begins playing, and I get kicked in the gut with a nostalgic feeling. It was like being reunited with an old friend you haven't seen in a long time. I hadn't done one of these head clearing Vespa rides in a really long time, so I decided, to hell with lunch. We eat to live, we shouldn't live to eat. These are those moments I'm always running my mouth about, so I'm gonna take this one and go with it.

It's been over a month since I last blogged on here. Times have been crazy as hell... I'm moving to Chicago in less than two months. There's so much stuff running through my head these days I can barely keep up. It's been a trying time to say the least. I haven't been able to get a grip on my thoughts and the tasks at hand, let alone, have a cathartic experience I feel is worth writing a Fuel of Life for. That was of course until this afternoon...

When I was riding around listening to "Siamese Dream" and "Carnavas" by Silversun Pickups, I felt untouchable and fearless. I felt like there was nothing I couldn't conquer. It felt the same way that it feels when a really good friend gives you advice and it is exactly what you need to hear. You feel at ease with your thoughts, like everything is lined up in front of you and you can see it all so much more clearly. Like feng shui in your head; your thoughts are organized and presented to you in a peaceful manner, so the rest of your mind and body feels good.

Now I know that somewhere, Billy Corgan is taking his approach to his day, without even the slightest consideration of what the hell I'm up to or whether or not the song he wrote back in the mid 90s is still having an effect on people, but isn't that the beauty of it? I'm cruising around San Diego, struggling to get a handle on what's taking place in my head, and a song he wrote when he had a feeling, which could have been a completely different feeling than I'm having, a song a band performed for the first time probably 15 years ago, is waking me back up and helping things make more sense.

It's almost like it's a time machine. They say that the sense of smell is our strongest human sense when it comes to memory, and I don't know many people that'd argue that one. I still get shivers about my grandpa when I smell cheap cigars, and when I catch a whif of mothballs, I immediately picture my grandmother who died when I was 6 years old. It's the creepiest surprise feeling you can ever have, it's like it comes out of nowhere.

But I feel like the same things happen to me with music. Siamese Dream signifies a very important time in my life. It was a time I was growing out of being a child and trying to figure out who I was and what the hell was going on with me (sounds familiar eh?). Things were changing so fast at such a strange age. The poster was hanging on my angled ceiling in my parent's house and I had to buy the album 3 times because I scratched the hell out of it (I was negligent with my stuff as a kid). Compared to the decisions I face as an adult, the decisions I had back then were something to laugh at. It was a time of innocence, a time when the world felt like it was so huge and something you couldn't even get your hands on. At that age, you were just content to sit back and let it take you where it was going. Today, it was like that was the feeling I got when I listened to the album. The lyrics, the emotions, the fuzzy guitar, the spacy feeling the album has, it all took me back to those days.

It reminded me that everything was going to be alright. I'm at an age now where I feel confident that the decisions I make do have a tremendous affect on things big and small. This world in front of us, is here for us to make something out of, and that can be a pretty overwhelming feeling and at times, can consume you if you try to do too much to fast. Today reminded me that every once in a while, you gotta just let things happen the way they're gonna happen and enjoy the ride. Put on the soundtrack to your life, and let the music remind you that everything is alright and you aren't the only one trying to figure this thing out.

Cheers everyone! Have a great rest of the weekend.

For fun, here's the soundtrack to my life right now. I'd love to see some other people's too.

1. Hummer - Smashing Pumpkins
2. Lazy Eye - Silversun Pickups
3. Golden Path - The Chemical Brothers
4. In and Out of Love - Armin Van Buuren
5. Let it Take You - Goldfrapp
6. Let Forever Be - The Chemical Brothers
7. Soma - Smashing Pumpkins
8. The Time We Lost Our Way - Thievery Corporation
9. Destiny - Zero 7
10. Chicago - Sufjan Stevens
11. Paper Planes - M.I.A
12. Fear Not of Man - Mos Def
13. The Golden Age - Beck
14. In the Garage - Weezer
15. Hollywood Nights - Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band
16. Indian Ocean - West Indian Girl