The Glory of Love
It must have been the late 80s and I was undergoing a sort of sexual awakening at school. I'd got a headstart in the development stakes and found that a pair of well exhibited tits was pretty much all you needed to have most of the boys transformed into drooling lapdogs. I had my pick of the lot.

Thus it was that I found myself on a date at the cinema to see Karate Kid II with one Gregory Birstall, a guy in my class who had impressed me with the suggestion of a date rather than just sucking him off behind the dentists near my house.

Who can forget the haunting strains of Peter Cetera's ballad The Glory of Love? Certainly not anyone who has witnessed the cinematic landmark of Karate Kid II, in which eternally young Ralph Macchio seals the fate of his movie career by mimicking a cheesy tourist drum knick-knack as a martial arts move. The song was all over the radio during that period and, as teenage girl, I was prone to a bit of romance.

Indeed, it was just as that song was playing that Gregory's hand began the inevitable journey up my leg. I'd like to say that I was appreciative of the gesture, but I had other things on my mind. Specifically, the slimy burger I'd bought from a converted ice-cream van earlier in the day. At that moment, it was coursing through my bowels like black plague and was threatening to erupt into my too small pants any moment in a geyser of liquid ordure.

I clamped my legs closed (almost breaking Gregory's hand) but evidently he took this as a coy gesture of shyness and continued to probe snatchwards.

By now, the formless abomination was quivering at my anus and it was all I could do to hold it in while trying to lever Gregory's hand from betwixt my thighs. I could not do both, and my tightly sheathed tits had rendered Gregory incoherent with seething hormones.

"I am a man who will fight for your honour" warbled Peter. "I'll be the hero you've been dreaming of..."

Sometimes you just have to let go. I sighed and relaxed the inward pressure of my thighs, giving Gregory the go-ahead.

Or rather, allowing about a cupful of reeking shit to bubble noisily from my arse with an accompanying wet raspberry that was heard for about three rows in both directionsd. The stench followed quickly after and we were asked to leave.

For at least the next year my tits did nothing to entice anyone on a date with me. The glory of love my arse.
(JessicaJugs, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 14:30, 13 replies)

Monsters
What's That Coming Over the Hill? Is it a monster.

This was played as we walked in to the Crem for a friends funeral. He'd drank himself to death by 31

I will take the image of his Mother collapsing as she walked roudn the corner to see his coffin sat there with me to the grave. It was one of the saddest things I have ever seen.

The song was playing because he used to sing it to his little sister (8 at the time) when they were playing hide and seek, replacing the monster with her name.

It was the only time he was ever a nice person was when he was playing with his sister. The rest of the time when he was on the sauce he was bloody horrible.

Can't listen to that song now without reminding me of him and that day.

Sorry for lack of lols and punnage.
( ogwen69 has returned from Reddit, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 13:18, Reply)

Soundtrack of my younger life that still brings back bad memories
I hate most music and musicians after a pretty bitter experience that happened to me back in the mid 80’s.

My family had moved to the US 2 years ago and we were living in a poky little flat at the time I was an only child (about 10 years old ). The move to a new country had not been as fruitful as my dad had imagined and the wages were pretty crap. My mum and dad would spend what little earnings they had on booze and come back in the early hours, put on the radio and beat the crap out of each other hoping the music cut out the noise to the people that lived around us, sometimes I would be dragged into it too (Both parents saw me as a reason why they were together and would happily beat the crap out of me). I did not mention this to any of my newfound mates when we played in the courtyard as I didn’t want to draw attention to myself. I felt that I could not really tell anyone about my predicament until I met Sue.

Sue was a resident on the first floor and I would often see her around but not talk to her (she was a grown up ). I had been playing on our balcony with a tennis ball when it fell onto the balcony underneath our own. My parents had spent the early hours beating the crap out of me and each other and therefore didn’t want to explain to my ma and pa that I had lost my ball so therefore wandered down to the first floor flat below ours . Sue answered the door and I introduced myself and where I came from. I was invited into her flat and while she got me my ball back she also brought me a can of pop and some crisps. She sat and talked to me for a while and asked me a few usual questions (how we had seen each other in passing, about what I did in my spare time, was I enjoying the US etc etc, she then got onto the subject of the noise she heard from our flat in the early hours. I will admit that I blanked that question and asked her not to mention it to me again. Sue apologised and gave me my tennis ball back. I was happy to have met a adult so nice and my faith in humanity was restored… for about 6 months. The bitch went and turned my tragedy into a hit song and she made a nice bit of cash with it (true she had already done something about a diner or something but I’m still pissed).

So thanks to you Suzanne Vega I can’t think to any 80’s compilation albums without fearing of hearing my song being played and having flashbacks.

And let’s not get started on the Lemonheads cover that was released a few years later.

Thanks for letting me rant for a while.

Luka
(mon bison powered by magnets, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 12:36, Reply)

OK, here's mine ...
"Who Wants To Live Forever?" by Queen - First time I heard this, I cried. Mind you I was drunk and emotional in that way you get after several pints.

"I Write The Songs" made famous by Barry Manilow, performed by my Dad. We played this as the last song at my Dad's funeral. The old man was a musician in his time and had recorded a few tracks over the years. My bro and I managed to get a few tracks from tape to CD in time for the funeral. Can't listen to either version now without feeling a bit bubbly.

"I Love You Baby" performed by Brak, that weird space pirate kitty from Space Ghost. It will forever be the anthem of my best friend and I. During the days of drunkeness we called our early twenties, we'd skip down Newcastle's Northumberland Street, singing this as loud as we could.
(camomile, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 12:11, Reply)

November 2002.
At Royal Surrey Hospital in Guildford.

In my bed, I had been left parked just outside the Operating Theatre, while the people inside did final prep.

On the floor by where I'd been parked, was a radio / cd player, tuned into a National Radio station.

Flooding from this was Culture Clubs' "Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?"

The irony which filled the air could have been cut with a knife, a knife similar to which I was waiting to be cut with, also.

I'd been booked in for a "Bi-Lateral Mandibular Distraction, which for the sake of those with weak stomachs, details of can be found here:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Distraction_osteogenesis#Maxillofacial_Distraction_Osteogenesis
(caescarna Hell's Roomba, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 11:34, 7 replies)

Yann Tiersen
As a pianist, any songs that involve piano music immediately make me sit up and take notice. It doesn't matter what genre they are or who the artist is; the haunting sound of a piano playing a minor key instantly gives me goosebumps.

So imagine my joy when I watched Amelie for the first time. The film moved me - but I expect that was due to the piano based soundtrack as opposed to the storyline for the most part.

The two songs here make me shiver, make the hairs stand up on my neck, and occasionally reduce me to tears - they are the perfect songs for remembering lost friends, reflecting on hard times or just for when you need a good old bit of emotion. For me, they take me back to my time in France, and remind me that no matter how grown I feel at a certain point in time, I'll always look back on it and realise what a young, foolish girl I can be.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZJDNSp1QJA (ignore the file name on this one - they've got it wrong)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZBqFZ5CNiw

Simple, yet incredibly moving.
(Cheets, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 11:32, 2 replies)

My First Time
I had a week's holiday in Prague and ended up - as is probably common - in a 'gentleman's club'. It was populated by beautiful young women clad in revealing lingerie and an older woman who asked me to pick one of them.

So I selected a beautiful, busty blonde and she escorted me through a door. She told me to have a shower first, which I did, even though I'd already had one directly before leaving my hotel.

I went into the room and she was waiting there - now completely naked. Kissing me all the while, she got me to lay down on the bed and then really started to get down to business.

It's my first time and I'm feeling really nervous. I try some small talk (I genuinely said 'Nice weather today') and she says just to relax. Then she puts on a nearby radio and says to just listen to the music.

At first, I'm pleased. It's a Norah Jones song and I like Norah Jones.

Then Norah starts to sing: "I don't know why I didn't come, yeah, I don't know why I didn't come."

Norah Jones keep singing and it makes me feel more and more anxious.

And, to be perfectly honest, I don't know why I didn't come either.

Length? Let's just say all the young ladies were having a good laugh as I left.
(Ted Cunn, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 11:13, Reply)

An evening of electronica
One Friday afternoon, a bunch of us went for a post-work beer, and a friend said her and her husband were going on to another pub later to an electronica gig.

Fancying ourselves as open-minded types, and having enjoyed boshing pills and dancing at various clubs to various electronic-type music during the late 90s and early 2000s, and since we were getting steadily inebriated, my friend and I decided to join them.

Dear Jesus Christ.

It was a geek at the front with a bloody Apple Mac. Making noise.

Now - don't get me wrong - I remember the days when bands didn't play a tune you could whistle, and you couldn't hear the words.

I've been to drum n' bass nights where there's been mass throwing up because the frequency was so low.

I experimented with LSD, with friends that wrote lyrics about pixies living among the stars.

This was simply just fucking noise. Quite literally. There wasn't even a vague semblance of rhythm, or of beat. VERY ocassionally the operative would bring down a frequency that quickly swooshed through a sound that was vaguely frenetic drum n' bass on speed-sounding. But really - it was just electronic noises.

It was art, I presume.

What interested me was that the populus of bespectacled, bearded geeks wearing t-shirts bearing witty fucking HTML slogans on them* would regularly:

A: try to dance - I don't have a problem with that, but I honestly have no idea what they were dancing to

B: Would nod and clap enthusiastically in unison at certain points

C: Would tell each other that this one coming or that one he just played was absolutely superb.

Afterwards, trying to investigate, someone told me I should investigate Squarepusher.

Dear Christ. I mean - really - what?

*Actually true - I honestly saw a geek walk past another wearing such, and laugh and compliment him on it.
( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 10:46, 8 replies)

Halcyon
Orbital in general, but this song in particular reminds me of some of the best nights out I've had. I've lost count of how many times I've been to see them - always with as big a group of mates as possible. usually about 2/3 of the way through the night, Halcyon enters the breakdown, just the bassline bouncing along. And then... a bit of Bon Jovi and Belinda Carlisle. Never fails to raise a smile and cause much manly, sweaty hugging.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfn-YpP4pjI skip to 4 minutes in for the bit I'm talking about

I think the best time was in 2004 at Somerset House. Sun setting over the courtyard, Sol from Hollyoaks trying to bum a cigarette and the missus and I with a load of mates being very very intoxicated.
(Alphabet Soap boshboshboshbosh, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 10:28, 4 replies)

Kate Bush
specifically babooshka. When I was but a burkychild. Myself, my sister and my mother went to the crematorium to visit my granddad. Now for some reason I stayed in the car with some thing like Kate bush's greatest hits on the stereo.
Needless to say the combination of my surroundings and the music scared me out of my tiny juvenile mind. To this day if I hear that song it makes my whole body tingle with fear!
(burkyman, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 10:28, 2 replies)

Tool - Schism
Reminds me of one of the best festival experiences ever.

Ozzfest , T'was my 18th birthday, i was as pissed and as merry as can be - watching some of my favourite bands and celebrating my plunge into manhood (officially)...

I didn't even go to watch Tool (although they are great), but i remember when Schism hit the crowd, i was so happy and blissed i could cry... and then just to make things even better i stood on a girls foot and somehow pulled her! She was lovely... :)

Aaaah great days..
(mr-lizard Hell's teeth man!, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 4:56, 5 replies)

as gay as could be
I think mine has to be sarah brightman and hot gossip's "I lost my heart to a starship trooper" I used to put it on the jukebox, scream along to it and it would help me pull the ditsy queens. fuck knows why it worked. also worked on drunk marines and sailors.
(TIMBIonline available for any passing drunk sailor, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 2:20, 1 reply)

Also...
On a happy note, I had a really good night out in a late opening pub in Digbeth in Birmingham last autumn. The reason the night was so good was because the DJ (this is an old man's pub btw, the Big Bull's Head if anyone knows it) played nothing but Irish music for about 2 hours! Irish music is the best for just relaxing, getting slowly wasted and dancing like a lunatic!

Good times :-D
(welshyboy, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 2:08, Reply)

Space Oddity
When I was in primary school, my mum used to play tapes of assorted 70s and 80s music. It was mostly Queen, Zeppelin, Jethro Tull, Bowie and Fleetwood Mac. The first time I heard Space Oddity I broke down in tears because at the tender age of under 10 I actually thought there was a real life Major Tom floating to his death in space completely helplessly. I've since grown older and wiser and now love the song.
(welshyboy, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 2:06, 2 replies)

LamRatLazIt1st
No, you've never heard of them.

vimeo.com/2187019

Quite phenomenal.
(rampants, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 0:24, 1 reply)

I just don't get it
Click if you hate music

All that banging and crashing, and the 'woo-woo' singy bits - rubbish, the lot of it. Fiendishly ridiculous, I say.
(Clerk T Hazarde are all the wine, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 0:06, 7 replies)

A happy one! (oooh, look at me being happy!)
Last night in the bar, there were 6 of us regulars sat at the actual bar, and a bunch of other people sat at the various tables and playing pool.

This song came on the jukebox, and a couple people started singing loudly. The rest of us joined in. As did the rest of the bar. We all but pissed ourselves laughing by the end, and it's the first and only time I've seen everyone in the bar having a great time collectively.

You don't even call me by my name

Darling ;)
( Batshitmentalist is sane for once, Tue 2 Feb 2010, 0:04, Reply)

Happy Birthday....
What, not again..? Surely not...
(The Archduke of South London I'm in your Girlfriend eating her organs, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 23:57, Reply)

Under your spell (from the musical episode of Buffy)
I was listening to this on the way home from work tonight. As Tara sang "Now I'm bathed in light" I tripped the sensor on a security light on a house nearby, simultaneously bathing me in light.

This is easily the most amazing thing to happen to me in my short and dull existence.
( GarbageFan didn't know what to have as a board sig on, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 22:42, 4 replies)

A Vagabond has just reminded me...
As per the Chiquitita post, ABBA brings back some memories :s

My parents went nuclear when I was 10, on a family camping trip to France, all of us stuck in a caravan with walls made of paper. The only cassettes I had for my walkman were the Best of ABBA Gold (1 and 2, no less). With that I attempted to drown out the sound of them screaming, accusations of all kinds of improper behaviour (well, mums accusations anyway - grew up quite quickly in those 2 weeks), and basically, the end of my family as I knew it.

For a long time, anything by ABBA turned me into a bawling wreck, which surprised me a great deal (having avoided it like the plague for many years) when I moved into what we fondly termed "The Big Gay House", and the Swedish warblers were regular fare. Happily, new memories were made, and now whenever I hear the opening bars of "Dancing Queen", I only remember some very special friends and some great times.
(Carmen Dyslexia, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 22:06, Reply)

Fuel - sunburn (accoustic version)
When I was at university, I think it's fair to say that I did not use my time incredibly productively; by the time I completed my degree I had a far more thorough knowledge of how to get wasted than my chosen subject.

With one exception.

During my first year - somewhat on a whim - I signed up to do a first jump course with the skydive club. Notingham university is 12 miles away from the busiest dropzone in the UK: BPS Langar.

I signed up for the RAPS course, which involves a day of ground training, then beginning with static-line jumps, culminating in learning how to freefall from the full altitude of 13,500 feet.

For some reason, this song (and a few others, though this is the most prominent) evokes for me the feeling of rising at 6:30am (outrageously early for a student on a Saturday) to get in a car and go to the dropzone, generally in a state of pants-wetting terror.

Since learning to skydive, I have made some amazing jumps in some amazing places. I have met a bunch of the craziest, most outgoing and genuine people possible. I have had some incredible experiences - there have been a couple of bad moments too - and made some (hopefully) lifelong friendships.

This song was one of a dozen or half a dozen that I'd listen to whilst waiting to be picked up to go jumping, and whenever I hear it - which is seldom, to be fair - it takes me right back to the most worthwhile decision I made whilst at University.

"Oh let the sun fall down on me...."
(anvil, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 21:56, 1 reply)

"Bit" of a downer, but...
Used to work with this great bloke, 35 years old, just got married 6 months prior, had step children,and a boy of his own. One day, he walked into the kitchen at work, said he "felt a bit funny", and collapsed. 20 minutes of CPR later and the ambulance finally arrived. Massive heart attack, the only thing remotely unbad about it is that he wouldn't have known a thing.

Cue his cremation service, as the curtains closed on the coffin, and family, friends and relatives said their final goodbye, a song lovingly chosen by his younger brother starts to play, very loudly. I didn't know whether to cry or burst out laughing.

Firestarter by The Prodigy.

Still raise a glass to him every time I hear that song. Life is bloody short. Do all those things you keep putting off,and do them now.
(Carmen Dyslexia, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 21:55, Reply)

The Penis Song.
Youth weekend in a small country chapel. Card school is going on the Communion Table. Some of the stewards of the chapel are visiting and aren't too impressed but tolerate it. Pile of cassetes by the player which are put in by whoever is nearest. A very varied compilation is playing. At the opening chord Mike's chair at the card table flew back and he covered the length of the church before Eric Idle got to "tossed".
www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcP8sVjZ5qg
The other memory of that weekend is sleeping in a small sideroom with 8 young ladies and Mike. We behaved like gentlemen. Couldn't do a lot else. 3 people had to move to open the door. How I finished up next to him I don't know but on his other side was his then girlfriend. He told me that at some point he woke up and decided to kiss her but started going to the wrong side. I would have preferred not to know.
(jvz, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 21:53, 1 reply)

Craig David, Seeeven Days (almost)
No funnies but this is one QOTW I can definitely contribute to.

I'll keep the backstory brief, even though it felt like a lifetime when it was happening.

My brother forages for food - it's awesome, he'll find most of a meal growing wild for nothing. I've eaten foraged meals of his and they're mostly delicious, apart from the odd one which tastes more on the rectal side of "interesting". Another fact you need to know is that when he was younger he had a sort of quasi-ironic obsession with Craig David. You remember - "seven days" and "can you fiiill me iiiin".

Last spring he accidentally ate Hemlock. This is one of the half-dozen most deadly plants growing wild in the UK. It causes total body paralysis, including vital organs. He collapsed at his house and stopped breathing. He was airlifted to hospital, and his heart stopped at least once.

When I arrived there, he was in a coma. My family were there, and we held each other up as best we could, but it was a tough call. I hadn't seen my dad cry hysterically, ever, and it still makes me get pretty choked thinking about it. None of us were ready for him to die.

He stayed in a coma for six days. We spent most of that time in the intensive care waiting room. When they said they were going to try and bring him round we were terrified. He might not wake up - he might be braindead. If he did wake up, he might be brain damaged, as the time not breathing might have starved his brain of oxygen.

After an agonising wait whilst they brought him off the drug cocktail which had been keeping him alive, they let me and my other brother in. His eyes were half open. I started crying immediately just because he wasn't braindead. My other bro, who is well'ard, started talking to him, telling him things were going to be fine, that we'd been here all the time, that mum had kept a diary so that when he was back on his feet we could fill him in on what he'd missed.

without even thinking, i sang the little craig david line "fill you in" at him, like we used to as kids.

he smiled, and it was the best, most amazing thing i'd ever seen. cause that, that little smile, that meant that inside that puffy, swollen, half-shaven face, those red, teary eyes, inside that head my brother was still in there and still knew me and our stupid in-jokes.

craig david, thanks for making such bloody catchy music, you old bastard.
( greenish, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 20:59, 5 replies)

Nothing stops a polite conversation at dinner better than.....
The Macc Lads: Sweaty Betty. The lyrics still make me smile every time. Loved it since I was at school and I just cant grow out of it.

God bless you Ipod shuffle function: Musical Russian Roulette.
(Big Winn, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 20:56, 1 reply)

This song has been brought up manys the time before on this qotw,
but Foo Fighters Everlong is the best song to ever come on shuffle on my Zen, it's guaranteed to cheer me up no matter how down I am. It takes me back to an Oxegen festival a few years back, when I had the best group of mates ever around me, nicely buzzing sitting out in the sun singing our filthy, crusty socks off. The next day though wasn't so good, jeebus the sunburn nearly kilt us!


Oh, and also Pendulum's Propane Nightmares, it's a fairly recent fave but I'm sure it'll stay the test of time, it always reminds me of badly twisting my ankle but it was so worth it!
(hashorangutan is watching iCarly on, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 20:03, Reply)

Soundtracks for different moods
The first has to be "Had Enough" of The Who's Quadrophenia album, followed by a close second by "Dreaming From the Waist" of of The Who By Numbers.

The second batch is "Without Your Love" off Roger Daltrey's McVicar album.

I don't want to talk about it.

Length? 12 inches.
( BrokenCoccyx doesn't mind if you grope on, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 19:55, 1 reply)

Of Elvenkind and Rammstein
One day, many years ago, my eldest came home from school with a big smile and a CD. Not unusual in itself, but the music was unlike anything I'd ever heard before. Kind of like opera, but with loud, heavy guitars, and electronics skittering away in the background. Also, like opera, there was singing in a foreign language. This turned out to be German, not a language I was familiar with, but, raised on a mixed musical diet, I was able to recognise portentous guitar noises when I heard them, and some counting in German. My son asked "What's he singing about?"

"I dunno, I've only just started learning German, so it could be anything. That's definately counting though" said my daughter..

"It's all very portentous, like the angel opening the seals in Revelations or something?" I wondered aloud. I could only compare it with Black Sabbath, so the idea of bibleish shouting plus loud guitars would make sense. (?)

Later that year, the larger of the Junior Beer Elves started the orthodontic treatment, as she was still a nipper really, I went along with her. On the bus. For hours and hours. This was lightened up considerably by sharing the headset to her MP3 player, with lots of the former mentioned shouty German industrial metal, including the counting song from earlier. My daughter's liking for them not diminished by my continually nudging her in the ribs and asking "What's he singing now?".

"He's singing about the sun, in the sky, and how it beats down and the heat burns people."

"Ah so it's not biblical then?"
Beer Elf Jnr giggled "No not at all, he's warning his fellow pale skinned Germans about the dangers of not wearing sunblock! or something"

This set us both off giggling again. and as time went on, my eldest started having more and more trouble at school, culminating in a course of treatment by a variety of head doctors. All of which needed a lot of travelling by bus, accompanied by our now favourite German minstrels. We resolved then that if they ever toured this country, we would definately go and see them play.

I even promised to put up with camping at Download Festival, should they have appeared there. But it doesn't matter, because..

We're going to see Rammstein on Wednesday, finally, for my birthday. I am soooo excited, and if they play "Sonne" Those two wobbly lasses jumping up and down in tears... will be us!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yl7Pe-yW11w Probably NSFW, some drug use and S+M overtones.. It still makes me laugh/well up and gives me goosebumps...
(Beer Elf Thought this was like a campfire, anyhow, on, Mon 1 Feb 2010, 19:45, Reply)