Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song...

I have in the past made a lot of jokes about meeting people online and how it's impossible to tell anything about someone from their online profiles aside from their favorite music (and books and movies and television). In fact I went so far as to post a facetious profile on the Yahoo personals saying as much (well, actually kind of saying the opposite, but...you know...irony and all that).

I just didn't think someone's taste in music said much about them, or I didn't think that I thought that. It's come to my attention recently that I actually put a lot of weight on a persons taste in music. Maybe more than any other single factor.

Also, the truth is, with my songs of the day, I was hoping to tell someone something about me. I said before that their purpose was to keep in touch (and that's true, and it was pretty effective) but also there was someone I didn't know very well and, while I wanted to get to know him better (probably because he had such great taste in music), more than that, or at least as much as that, I wanted him to get to know me better and I thought a good way to do that was songs of the day.

Being totally honest with myself here, the first time I saw him, the first thing I noticed was that he was wearing a Social Distortion shirt, and one of the first conversations I had with him he was talking about seeing the Who live (a subject that I continue returning to, by the way, as seeing the Who live was one of the defining experiences of my adult life). Is it any wonder I wanted to get to know him better (and wanted him to get to know me better)?

Since I didn't actually send the songs of the day daily I often tried to tie songs together with a theme (the Diablo series, or the Chicks Rock series, or the Cheesy Romance series, etc), but with very few exceptions, I didn't really explain why I'd chosen the songs. Once he asked me how I picked them and I told him the same vagueness that I said here (that sometimes they were my favorites, sometimes songs I thought he'd like, or ones that reminded me of him, or songs to suit my moods, and sometimes they were random).

Sometimes I wonder if he got to know me better because of the songs, or just because of time, or because this blog is kind of tell-all-ish, or if maybe he knew me better than I thought already. I tend to believe that there is something fundamental about my character that some people just "get" and others don't and it isn't a matter of them knowing my favorite songs, or even my life story they just get it or they don't.

I like music. A lot. But it's a funny thing, you know. Some songs I like because because of the lyrics (they tell stories, or they make me feel something, or they describe something I have felt), some I like because of the music (they have interesting melodies, or just catchy ones, interesting arrangements, or use of unexpected instruments, etc.), and sometimes I just like a song for no reason that I can identify. Just like the songs of the day...

January 11th - In Gods Country (U2) - Well, U2 is one of my favorite bands, but that's not why I picked this one, he was in Israel (i.e. Gods country)
February 2nd - Never Been to Spain (Three Dog Night) - One of my favorite songs and at that point I hadn't ever been to Spain.
March 6th - Why Don't We Get Drunk (Jimmy Buffett) - I generally put my Zune on shuffle all the time and this song seemed to come on just as I was arriving at class, not every time, but enough times to be considered an interesting coincidence (if you believe in coincidences)
March 7th - Thrill of It (Robert Randolph) - I'd been to see Robert Randolph play at the Showbox that night.
March 12th - Then I'm Gone (Supersuckers) - I thought the titled was fitting since that was the day I left for Switzerland.
March 14th - Old College Try (Mountain Goats) - I thought he'd like this band and this is one of my favorite songs by them. It contains one of my favorite song lyrics ever ("in the way those eyes I've always loved, illuminate this place, like a trash can fire in a prison cell")
March 17th - Fiesta (the Pogues) - This song reminds me of him. He likes it, we talked about it.
April 20th - I Want to Break Free (Queen) - I'd been to see We Will Rock You in London that day
April 25th - Pints of Guinness Make Me Strong (Against Me!) - this was a band he'd recommended to me (that I love), and I'd been in Dublin.
May 7th - Love the One You're With (Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young) - A lyric from which was the title of my blog that week.
May 13th - Jack and Diane (John "Cougar" Mellancamp) - A song I had stuck in my head that day, which I'd had stuck in my head before thanks to him (and thanks to a blizzard which got me snowed in where I was house sitting with among others a Jack and a Diane)
May 22nd - Bring it on Home (Led Zeppelin) - My second favorite Led Zeppelin song. My favorite is Over the Hills and Far Away (song of the day February 18th).
June 9th - Graduated (John Haitt) - This one is pretty self explanatory...it was the day I graduated.
July 21st - It's Only Me (Wizard of Magicland)(Barenaked Ladies) - The day the new Harry Potter book came out

That's just a dozen or so songs (out of over 400). There are, of course, more like these, that I chose for specific (and for the most part fairly obvious) reasons, but in a list of 400 songs, the ones with clear meanings (to me) are the minority. And even the one's with clear meanings...well...

I just wonder, does it really stand to reason that music is somehow a window into my personality?