Some songs that remind me of being young. Well, younger:
Silverchair - Tomorrow (1994): I used to listen to the album Frogstomp at my friend Nick's place. He was a very pasty, big-eyed, big-lipped Asian kid who owned a copy of Mortal Kombat, which we used to play in his room for hours. Oddly, I don't remember his parents ever being home. I used to think he was a bit lame and unoriginal for liking Silverchair so much - hey! I knew Daniel Johns was just ripping off Kurt 'Recently Dead' Cobain - but I secretly liked this song and secretly liked it when Nick would put the album on... which he did a lot.
Savage Garden - I Want You (1996): Savage Garden were the band of 1996. Not the Australian band. The band. Every single they released raced up the charts. People hadn't gone this buckwild for national musical produce since INXS' heyday. Most of the girls in year 6 loved the girlish Darren Hayes, but the really cool girls loved the enigmatic, behind-the-scenes Daniel Jones. Their ubiquity irritated me, but upon recent listens I findd myself impressed by the universal appeal and songcraft that came out of two floppy-haired nerds from Brisbane.
Darryl Braithwaite The Horses (1990): No song was more ubiquitous during my youth than this. I've never been much of a radio listener, but that didn't stop me hearing the Sherbet-singer's refrain everywhere I went, for years: 'that's the way it's gotta' be little darling / We'll go riding on the horses, yeah.' I still hear it whenever I enter a hamburger shop, or a taxi driven by an old Australian bloke, or a car repair shop.
John Farnham - You're The Voice (1986): I was two when this was released, but it feels like I must have been listening to it in the womb. It is, by my unscientific approximation, the biggest single in the history of Australian music. Every Australian knows - and, by rights, loves - this song. It's a climactic triumph of a single from a man most had written off a decade ago, after he failed to deliver a song anywhere near as huge as the 1968 sensation that was Sadie The Cleaning Lady (which still holds a special place in the hearts of many middle-aged Australians today). You're The Voice is Australian pop at the absolute peak of its game.
Listening to it reminds me of growing up in Australia, playing on play equipment at Cronulla beach, having picnics at Bundeena with the family.
Spice Girls - Wannabe (1996): At my 'alternative' primary school, we had a radio / tape player in class. In between class discussions and the occasional English lesson, we'd listen to pop radio or tapes that kids had brought in. This was the song that everyone in class wanted to hear, whether they'd admit it or not.
Joel, the goofy-toothed Jewish kid, he loved it. Ben, the sarcastic sportskid, he loved it. Amanda, the precosciously big-boobed braceface, she loved it more than anything else in the world, and she dreamed of the day she'd join the Spice Girls. Even Liz, the long-haired, book-obsessed Alanis lookalike who I had my first ever crush on, she loved it. And I loved it... I'd even admit it.
Alanis Morissette - One Hand In My Pocket (1995): Alanis had bigger songs, but none of them captured my imagination quite like this. There didn't seem to be anything out there as evocative as the image of an inexplicably beautiful, sometimes bitter Canadian woman with a hand in her pocket. That said something to me. It evoked real mystery when I didn't even know what mystery was. What was in there? What secrets did Alanis Morissette hold close to her thigh, pinned in by denim?
Silverchair - Tomorrow (1994): I used to listen to the album Frogstomp at my friend Nick's place. He was a very pasty, big-eyed, big-lipped Asian kid who owned a copy of Mortal Kombat, which we used to play in his room for hours. Oddly, I don't remember his parents ever being home. I used to think he was a bit lame and unoriginal for liking Silverchair so much - hey! I knew Daniel Johns was just ripping off Kurt 'Recently Dead' Cobain - but I secretly liked this song and secretly liked it when Nick would put the album on... which he did a lot.
Savage Garden - I Want You (1996): Savage Garden were the band of 1996. Not the Australian band. The band. Every single they released raced up the charts. People hadn't gone this buckwild for national musical produce since INXS' heyday. Most of the girls in year 6 loved the girlish Darren Hayes, but the really cool girls loved the enigmatic, behind-the-scenes Daniel Jones. Their ubiquity irritated me, but upon recent listens I findd myself impressed by the universal appeal and songcraft that came out of two floppy-haired nerds from Brisbane.
Darryl Braithwaite The Horses (1990): No song was more ubiquitous during my youth than this. I've never been much of a radio listener, but that didn't stop me hearing the Sherbet-singer's refrain everywhere I went, for years: 'that's the way it's gotta' be little darling / We'll go riding on the horses, yeah.' I still hear it whenever I enter a hamburger shop, or a taxi driven by an old Australian bloke, or a car repair shop.
John Farnham - You're The Voice (1986): I was two when this was released, but it feels like I must have been listening to it in the womb. It is, by my unscientific approximation, the biggest single in the history of Australian music. Every Australian knows - and, by rights, loves - this song. It's a climactic triumph of a single from a man most had written off a decade ago, after he failed to deliver a song anywhere near as huge as the 1968 sensation that was Sadie The Cleaning Lady (which still holds a special place in the hearts of many middle-aged Australians today). You're The Voice is Australian pop at the absolute peak of its game.
Listening to it reminds me of growing up in Australia, playing on play equipment at Cronulla beach, having picnics at Bundeena with the family.
Spice Girls - Wannabe (1996): At my 'alternative' primary school, we had a radio / tape player in class. In between class discussions and the occasional English lesson, we'd listen to pop radio or tapes that kids had brought in. This was the song that everyone in class wanted to hear, whether they'd admit it or not.
Joel, the goofy-toothed Jewish kid, he loved it. Ben, the sarcastic sportskid, he loved it. Amanda, the precosciously big-boobed braceface, she loved it more than anything else in the world, and she dreamed of the day she'd join the Spice Girls. Even Liz, the long-haired, book-obsessed Alanis lookalike who I had my first ever crush on, she loved it. And I loved it... I'd even admit it.
Alanis Morissette - One Hand In My Pocket (1995): Alanis had bigger songs, but none of them captured my imagination quite like this. There didn't seem to be anything out there as evocative as the image of an inexplicably beautiful, sometimes bitter Canadian woman with a hand in her pocket. That said something to me. It evoked real mystery when I didn't even know what mystery was. What was in there? What secrets did Alanis Morissette hold close to her thigh, pinned in by denim?
VIEW 19 of 19 COMMENTS
Gloria Estefan was my favourite in around grade 4 & 5. i remember rocking so hard to her music out the back of the house on the patio. i thought i was hot shit!
[Edited on Jan 29, 2006 2:26PM]