My Inner Music Slut

What is it about music from a certain time in our lives that reaches out and grabs us, whether or not we ever cared particiularly for that specific song, artist, or style?

I was driving around during lunchtime today and there was nothing on the radio. I hit the search button, cruising around the FM dial. I must've stopped it at some point, but I don't remember doing so, don't remember something catching my ear. I only suddenly realized that I'd been listening to half a song without it consciously registering in my ears or mind. But it spoke to my soul.

It was a pathetic late 80s/early 90s ballad full of shimmering synthesizers and gawd-awful lyrics about dying for love or lack thereof, etc. And suddenly I was right back there in those years. I knew the song because it had been a huge hit, but I had never specifically sought out the artist or his work (then or since). But somehow it was "my" music, the soundtrack to my life... gawd-awful, cheesy and immature as the entire song was in all respects, something primal in me resonated with that collection of sounds.

And the professional classical musician in me cowered in the corner, softly crying and muttering about betrayal...

Well, I guess I can soothe my inner snob with the fact that Chopin's Nocturnes and J.S. Bach's Fugues still leave me breathless.