Music to live by.

I grew up surrounded by musicians.

And really good music.

I took it for granted, especially when I became a sullen little tween and thought that it was all just so blase and why couldn't we listen to top forty? (Okay, so I was fortunate to find some friends who had excellent taste and I avoided lots of top forty musical pitfalls with an intense middle-school Beatles obsession - with a dash of Weezer, Green Day, Bush, No Doubt, and Garbage for good measure).

My mom was and has been in bands for as long as I can remember, playing all over at some pretty sweet places like Kirby's, The Artichoke, Watermark Books, Stage 5 at the Walnut Valley Bluegrass Festival, C Major's, and countless backyard parties and impromptu jam sessions at home. I fell asleep to the sounds of people singing at the top of their lungs and playing all sorts of instruments.

Hillary's Sister
(mom's third from the left... and she painted all of those boots... you should see 'em in color)

My step-dad Bryan is also a musician, of course. He writes and sings and plays and takes graphic design seriously. I think the importance of the perfect font choice and graphic placement rubbed off on me, but I didn't get the musical inclination from Bryan or from mom. It skipped me somehow. I mean, I still love music, and I have a guitar somewhere... But you know, it gives my fingertips callouses and I can't just pick it up and play it and I am highly suspicious of my singing skills... so I've always pretty much left it at that.

But sometimes, like today, I realize how lucky I am that my ears were trained from birth to appreciate good music. Good is subjective, but to me it's honest music, played by artists who feel what they play and sing - even if they didn't write it. But most of the time they did.

So here's my childhood flashback playlist. They go as far back as I can remember, and they still take me to that safe, happy, carefree place that I was when they were etched into my aural brain:

• Elvis Costello - Watching the Detectives
• Talking Heads - Burning Down the House and Stay Up Late
  
• The Rolling Stones - You Can't Always Get What You Want
• David and David - Welcome to the Boomtown
• The Beatles - Michelle
• Lou Reed - Take a Walk on the Wild Side
• Violent Femmes - Blister in the Sun
• 10,000 Maniacs - Peace Train
• Paul Simon - Boy in the Bubble
• The B-52s - Love Shack

"Stay up late" was definitely in the top three. My brother and I also loved "Michelle" because we made up lyrics for the French parts - I know we sang "Michelle, my bell. Some say monkeys don't play piano well, my Michelle."

What songs do you remember from your youth? I hope they're good ones! I'll have to be mindful when I have kids to avoid my (rare) tendencies toward junk music and play the good stuff.