Associations and Memories

For me, more than anything else, music stirs them up. From warm and fuzzies to mild embarrassments, all the way down to jaw clenching regrets – most songs I hear deliver memories and the emotions that are stapled to them. Song baggage.

When I was about ten years old I bought my first record. A 45 single called ‘The Hustle’ by Van M’Coy and the Soul City Symphony. At the time, a band called The Stylistics was another hot favorite of mine and ABBA were getting ready to release ‘Dancing Queen’. I’m not sure, but I think this sort of stuff was largely responsible for the deadly disco epidemic that followed. In fact, ‘The Hustle’ might have been patient zero.

Musically, the mid-seventies were strange times. It seemed there was no dominant genre and things were getting a little bit messy. Glam Rockers (The Sweet, Queen, Gary Glitter, Slade) were…