Dear Scott,
I bought my first car in the summer of my 17th year. A decade old sporty white Acura. For $4,500 dollars, it came standard with A/C, warped alarm system, static-heavy radio, and tape deck. The sound through the dusty speakers was always slightly foggy, and muffled with an underlying soft buzz, it must have been what trained my ear to be sweet on lo-fi.
Tapes were foreign objects to me, I was a child of the CD age. Their sole purpose was to play 60’s era Hindi loves songs for my mom while she absently hummed along on chores days, and to have their guts of murky brown film explode from within when least expected.I used to roll them back in for her with my Lisa Frank pencils.
With the addition of my fancy new car tape deck, I needed to get my hands on a few tapes, or forever be cursed by bad radio. I found yours. It was Core, buried under 80’s soft rock mixes like ancient treasure in a friend’s garage.Robert Smith was keeping you company,he was also wiped clean of dust, and joined us in my car. You would often be played back to back, your voices tagging each other in for the hour.
We drove around aimlessly on many occasions, you and I. As jaded youth typically is, I was so utterly frustrated with my surroundings. The banality, and small town mentality of Texan suburbia weighted down my soul, and made me long for things I didn’t quite understand then, and may not even understand now at 28 years old. Your music provided the most beautiful escape. You were rock n’ roll personified,an unstoppable force somewhere between the electric glamour of David Bowie, and the rumbling grunge of Kurt Cobain. I don’t know where we went on those night drives, past the flickering lights of the superstores, movie theaters, and faux downtowns, but it was somewhere where I felt greater than the sum of my sadness. I calmed my demons to the tales of yours.
For your music that kept me company, and helped me to feel okay, I want to say thank you.
I sold my tape at 22 during a garage sale. My new decade old car came with a CD player. I made a mix with the Jesus and Mary Chain, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Robert, and you. A few notes of familiarity among new loves. I like to think sometimes about a kid out there, finding a Stone Temple Pilots tape in a garage, a Sharpie heart drawn over the front cover by a girl just their age a decade ago.
Rest In Peace,
Sania
DarkLanguages 