When this song came on, I had an immediate flashback to being about fourteen, and being so very cool.
And by cool, I mean, not at all cool, not even connected to the right century of music for my classmates.
Dad introduced me to the music of his youth, including Madness (Our house… in the middle of our street). Because I was going through this very _edgy_ ska phase that I thought was just the best, I lapped it up. All the two-tone stuff, all the checkerboard vans, everything. Much eyeliner. In reflection, and in reviewing those early facebook photos, I realise that I didn’t really get the whole ska aesthetic – I tended to pair my checkerboard vans with multicoloured hippy pants.
Also, a note on _edgy_… I was never edgy. I was too much an excitable puppy of a human to go through an emo phase (my dad used to wind me up a bit by calling it emmo), and too much a people-pleaser and nerd to act out. Honestly, one of the things I regret most about high school was sticking to the rules too closely. I didn’t drink as a teen, even at that one infamous party after a school play that was a wall-to-wall disaster. I attended… for all of about fifteen minutes, before I went to sleep over at my equally nerdy friend’s house. I think we were the only people in the grade who got more than six hours’ sleep that night.
Madness has a nostalgia to it. Full of interesting people, interesting dance moves, interesting clothes. Having the heavy heavy sound of madness, or House of Fun blaring… what an excellent jam. 🙂
Lightning blog 59.
Writing song:
Everyday Adventures 