Nights in White Satin, Slapshot and pre-teens
One of my most profound music memories of my pre-teenage years is of listening to the soulful crooning of the Moody Blues on their Nights in White Satin album which was played over and over on the speakers of the ice rink of my youth: The Ice Center in Golden Valley, MN.
In the early 1970’s, I was a competitive figure skater and spent four hours a day at the rink. We ususally finished around 8pm and waiting in the wings were the dangerously rugged Minneapolis Junior A hockey players. There was a solid 5 year age difference between us older figure skaters and the youngest of the minor league hockey players. A few of the players had boyish good looks, but most had a hard-edged look to them. The figure-skating moms always hovered nearby to make sure we never came into direct contact with any of them. Still, a few of us lingered at the end of our free skate session, pretending to have to work on that last jump after the bad boys took the ice. They would begin their warm ups by skating around and they liked to play their music. They’d put on the Nights in White Satin album. Yes, it was THEIR album and not ours. Our mothers would never let us listen to such blatantly sexual music! No, no. So, a few of us lingered on the ice when the music started and as we skated around one last time, we shared ice time with the bad boys of hockey. Why do I call them the bad boys? Well, for one thing, the infamous Hanson/Carlson brothers were on the team. And my dad was their coach. And the movie, Slapshot, was based on a team very similar to theirs a year before or after.
That’s a great story. I remember the neighbor’s barn where the long-haired teenage kid would blast 70’s rock.
It is very interesting how closely music is related to our memories. My favorite radio station has a funny promo for their 60′ and 70’s playlist. A low-voice says seriously, “They said this music would corrupt us.” Then the same voice switches to a higher-pitched happy voice and says, “Fun! Wasn’t it?” Of course, the music of the 60’s and 70’s did or didn’t corrupt anyone anymore than they would have been already, same as these generations. And now, the “blatantly sexual” music of Nights in White Satin is considered a classic. I think that’s funny.
Hi TK,
Ah yes, musical memories.
“Rag Doll” - the neighbor boy
“Big Ol Jet Airliner,” a 12 year old summer.
“Cheeseburger in Paradise” — junior high summers at the pool.
“Waiting for a Girl LIke You” - a special Homecoming dance.
“Angel is a Centerfold” - high school track
“Susudio” - dancing on a table with my friends at a fraternity co-ed
And not long after that I got married and started having babies and my musical memories dissolved into a blur that included things like Bye Baby Bunting and Disney theme songs.
Polly,
I can tell you are about five years younger than me, just by your song memories. Yes, my music life went into dormancy when my kids were young. But I loved discovering other music with my kids. It seems like I’m just getting back into my own favorites now, when my kids are 14 and 16.
Same here. I remember “Long Distance Voyager” vividly, but “Nights in White Satin” is in the memory fog of pre-adolescence. (Maybe because I always heard it as “Knights” when I was a kid.)
It is wild how one’s memories sometimes come with a sound track attached to them.
Yeah, I think pre-teen boys would prefer the thoughts of “Knights” to “nights”. Probably the only reason we 12 year old girls knew what the song was about was because of our mothers saying, “Aacck! Do you know what that song means?!?” Funny thing is that I overreact in the same way to my own kids now. I probably plant more seeds than the song. Oh well, another parenting failure…