“When the Samba takes you out of nowhere,
and the background’s fading,
out of focus.
Yes, the picture’s changing,
every moment,
and your destination,
you don’t know it.”

Avalon was one of those albums that I played over and over again, letting the songs – this one especially – fill the room, and in the process, change it. I was too young to be out in the world – too young to drive, to date, to go out dancing, to lose myself on a dark and smoky dance floor – but I was not too young to imagine it. I remember the sound the needle would make as I laid it down gently on the vinyl, the crackle and hiss it would make just before the opening moments of More Than This would begin. I would lie on my floor, a notebook open in front of me, and write about things I had yet to experience. The music, the way it swirled around me, I almost felt as if I had lived lifetimes already.

Did my musical imagined experiences live up to what life was later on?

Sometimes an artist can get lost in his or her own imaginings, the painted or scrawled images often so pure, beautiful even if tragic, and unfettered by the pitfalls that lie hidden away. But, I don’t know, I think the way I saw things, even at that young of an age, listening to Bryan Ferry sing
about after parties and romantic possibilities, I saw the cracks in the picture, too. I never remember thinking that life could not be broken, or break you, at times. Though I do think I have carried with me a bit of a dreamer’s view, which I hope brings out passion in the things I create, and in the way that I love.

Sometimes I wish I still had my turntable; that I could spin all those records I still have, and write – not type – in spread open composition books while lying on the floor, letting the music take me across the bridge of imagined, and real.

Avalon :: Roxy Music