August 2020

Tethered To Life
How music plays an important role within our lives.
Article By Dean Cacioppo

  Music has played an important role in my life. Music was continuously playing in my home growing up just as my children have grown up exposed to an ongoing playlist. Just about every memory I have is deeply connected to the music I was listening to at that time. As someone who has lived their life of almost a half-century with a soundtrack playing in the background, an album or song transports me back to earlier days.

I have had a visceral connection with music. Whatever was in heavy rotation at that point in my life paralleled my state of mind. There has been exuberant electronica such as New Order playing from car stereos while playing volleyball as a teen. There have been times of the passing of a loved one where Bonnie Prince Billy - Will Oldham playing on repeat. "Brown Eyed Girl" was playing quite loudly at the birth of my now college age, blue eyed daughter Ashley. Burned in my brain is the vision of my oldest daughter (at around two) dancing to Fontella Bass "Rescue Me" with a litany of amplifiers and huge speakers playing at an obscene volume. Every year when I start hearing Mardi Gras music, it instantly makes me want to drink excessively.

Even me in my 6th grade school photo, you can still see my Mötley Crüe pins.

Just like everyone else on the planet, I have been through a myriad of ups and downs and hype-personal experiences, all with music setting the scene. Almost like the lighting of a well taken picture - just there. My oldest memories have my father playing Chicago II and Songs In The Key Of Life and the music is as much of the memory as anything.

Sidenote: Everyone should listen to Stevie's classic album today in light of our current climate; remembering it is from 1976.

Music has been there through every stage of my life, good and bad. When I hear a tune that I have forgotten about, it can instantly bring me back to a remembrance that was otherwise erased.

My wife says that she knows my mood by the music that is playing. I don't think about when doing it, but she is 100% correct. Music has always and continues to set the backdrop of my life; able to time warp me to specific moments with the drop of a needle.