30 Days of Music: 16 A Song You Used To Love But Now Hate

Stretch & Vern – I’m Alive (Youtube)

Quick one this, as I realised I hadn’t done this today. And am now doing it tomorrow. Which is today. If that makes any sense. Which it doesn’t.

I’ve already gone over my issues with hating songs previously, so perhaps this would be better titled “A song you used to love but now don’t like quite as much”. It’s difficult to really think of the songs that you don’t love any more – it’s only the good ones you remember, from putting on mixtapes or CDs, or learning the lyrics.

When I was aged 11 or so, I loved this track. I wasn’t really up to speed with dance music, or any music really, besides Blur, but I loved this one. At school, we had a trainee/student teacher in our class, who brought in pop singles on a Friday. I can’t remember how it worked, but we got to listen to them on headphones if we hadn’t eaten any glue, lost al the scissors or set fire to each other’s desks that afternoon.

I absolutely loved this song. I listened to it, over and over again. Maybe it was the sample, which I have only just realised was from the classic Boogie Wonderland. I didn’t know that at at the time, but I knew I loved it. I think I asked to borrow it, and ended up getting my own cassette from Woolworths in town. I listened to it relentlessly, jumping up and down in my bedroom, pausing only to rewind the tape. (The B-side was rubbish.) It was music that made me feel ace.

Today, the appeal has somewhat subdued, and only the memory of how much I loved it in the first place, fourteen years ago, brought me back to it. It’s alright, it’s not great, and I wouldn’t seek it out again. But for reminding me of how exciting music could be when you didn’t know about new bands, you didn’t know about Earth Wind & Fire, and you didn’t know how much else was out there to get excited about, I’ll always have a soft spot for it.