The Perks of Being a Cuban.

...watching the wheels go round and round"

Music is alive, I've realized after going to the Rock & Roll Annex today. It breathes and bleeds, it sweats and suffers and celebrates along with those who listen. A music fan is affected and changed by the songs they hear. And those songs become very much a part of the person as they grow up. You never forget the first time you've heard your favorite song, you feel it in you for life.

A singer has a duty to their fans, a duty that some take very seriously, as a life-changer/saver. Lyrics become so personal and intimate sometimes, a listener feels a certain closeness with the singer and form relationships with that singer that are hard to define. The familiarity of their lyrics become sort of friendships that you carry for life. 

I imagine that when your favorite singer dies, it hurts. Through their songs, their feelings become your feelings at times. They sing to you and they understand you like no other.  The conversations a fan has with their artist can never exist again, there are never going to be new songs and no new feelings to share. 

Today we were in the presence of John Lennon's blood; a humbling experience on its own should make more of an impact if his music has affected you the way it has many of his fans, my Dad included. He can never explain what it is about John, what it is about that music and where it takes him when he listens, but I've noticed it. Music that familiar feels so safe and warm, and since John's death I'm sure those songs have become even more powerful. We stood beside the bag of bloody clothes today, the clothes John wore as he died, and we signed our names on the white wall beside them. Like signing a guestbook at a funeral, he said his goodbyes. We paid our respects. Love/Peace written by many fans, grown men crying, reliving moments they've shared in their rooms through their stereos. Moments so intimate only they and John can ever fully understand.