𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝗼𝗳 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗩𝗼𝗶𝗰𝗲 (𝙵𝚞𝚛𝚛𝚢 𝙱𝚡𝙱)

Track 49 | 𝗖𝘂𝘁𝗲 𝗧𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴

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I can barely remember what my life was like before I discovered music.

I like to think it all began when I was nine years old. 

June 10th, 2012 was the day I actually started to exist as a living, breathing, body of matter with actual interests and a personality. 

I had found my father's cassette collection in a beat-up cardboard box inside his closet. He barely listened to them, though. He only saved them to sell at auctions or garage sales or pawn shops when they had racked up enough value and became ancient artifacts of history. Of course, he couldn't see into the future, so he had no idea which ones would become valuable and which ones would stay obsolete. So, he just bought as many cassettes as he could find and hoped for the best. We were always low on money, and if I'm being really honest, Mom and Dad weren't exactly the best role models.

I distinctly remember the feeling I'd received when I held one of those cassettes in my paws for the first time. I was terrified, but the horror and suspense excited me. If Dad had caught me in here, rooting through his things, I would've been done for.

Though my father loved me, he was strict. And punishments were punishments to him, no matter who he was delivering them to. He was abusive towards my mother. My mother was a spendthrift.

They both adored me. But they weren't the best parents.

And although little nine-year-old me tried to deny it, I always knew it was true.

Knowing that my parents were gone for work, I utilized my time at home alone. I had found my mother's Walkman in her room and placed the skinny, uncomfortable headphones over my ears; you know, the old ones with the steel ring head mount and the orange circular foam muffs. 

The first cassette I shoved in there was a 1980s Michael Jackson mixtape. I pressed play like I'd seen my mother do before. And then I heard it feed into my ears.

That was the moment I had finally found something to connect to.

Music became everything to me.

Every day, when the house was empty, I would sneak back into my parents' bedroom and listen to a new cassette. I went from the essentials of Billy Joel to Jeff Buckley in one week. Then, I got into the Rolling Stones, and soon, The Beatles. A month later, I had gotten my paws on a cassette with a blank, white casing with a small toddler-like-doodle on the front of two smiling dogs sharing a deep embrace. It was the only cover that had no words to tell me who the artist was.

When I had popped open the casing, I read the label inside: 'Twin Fantasy, Car Seat Headrest'. It was certainly one of the more independent and underground records in my father's collection. I found it all the way at the bottom of the box.

But, after my first listen, I immediately fell in love.

For a good month straight, it was the only cassette I ever listened to whenever my parents were out. Something about the slurred vocals and the discordant indie rock songwriting had connected with nine-year-old me. I would lie on the floor of the living room and listen to the entire album, front to back. I would break down the lyrics and uncover hidden meanings that didn't exactly make sense to me back then. Piece by piece, I would pull apart every little sound and noise, finding myself obsessing over the smallest details in the vocals or the instruments. I loved it for what it was, even if I didn't understand what the message was yet. I just loved it because it made me feel happy. And before I knew it, I was dancing all around the house.