Ode to Oldies

My husband is a Chicano, classic rock kind of dude.  He actually resents that I say that, insisting that there is more to his musical taste than the KROQ/KLOS I ascribe to him.  True.  We were both KDAY fans.  We do have our old hip-hop in common.  He carried the linoleum for his homey but didn’t breakdance, and I carried the linoleum and DID breakdance.  We dig Run DMC, Eric B, BDP, Roger and Zapp and Slick Rick together.  Our first date was a Santana concert.  We realize that Santana is a hybrid artist for us.  Pablo was jamming to the rock and roll songs, and I was dancing to “Oye como va” and “Samba pa ti.” So, ok, we also have that.  He’s NEVER pretended to know my barrio oldies though.   With humility, love and devotion, he’s allowed me to introduce him to all of the Lowrider and Eastside Story oldies that are mapped on my heart. 

Oldies are an affirmation of the lives my friends and I lived in the neighborhood.  When we hear the songs, we remember our first loves, getting loaded at a ditching party, getting pregnant in high school, losing our virginity, the song we cried ourselves to sleep to when we had a broken heart, the song that was playing when our parents were in some kind of rage, destroying themselves or our family, the song we listened to after we kicked someone’s ass or got our asses kicked, the songs our moms snapped their fingers to, while cooking dinner in their moo moo dresses with rollers in their hair, the songs we listened to the first night without our friend who was murdered earlier in the day, or the song we listened to when we were going to jail, coming out of jail, visiting someone in jail or waiting for someone to come out of jail.    Oldies were the affirmation of our lives, and the lyrics precisely described what was happening to us. 

“How can I tell my Mom and Dad, that I’ve been bad?”

“Pull the little string, and I’ll wink at you, I’m your puppet.”

“I’m eighteen, with a bullet.”

“Tonight is the night, that you, make me your woman.”

“Smile now, cry later.”

“Why did you go? I loved you so.”

“Daddy’s home.”

“You’re a thousand miles away.”

“Break up to make up, that’s all we do.”

“Diamond in the back, sunroof top, digging the scene with a gangsta’ lean, ooooh yeah.”

“I think you got your fools mixed up, you must think I’m somebody else.”

“He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother.”

“It’s ok. I’ve been hurt before. It’s ok, you don’t love me anymore.  Maybe someday, I’ll find a way, without you.”

This year, I just wanted to sing with my friends, so Pablo and I had an oldies party.  I specifically know the friends of mine who know the lyrics to oldies by heart, and who would be willing to drink and sing with me.  My faithful friends showed up, and we did just that.  We drank it up, sang it up, in my backyard, for hours and talked about our lives, our work and our families.  It was serious and deliberate.   

My dear friend invited me to a Brenton Wood concert a few months ago.  I was beside myself with excitement!  For some odd reason, it didn’t occur to me that these vatos sang these songs like fifty years ago.  So when they came out singing, paralyzed and in wheelchairs, I was shocked.  Um. Duh? Dude.  That was a little intense.  Jimmie JJ Walker was the host and that brother looks exactly the same.  Anyway, the Nokia center was packed, with all ages and ethnicities.  Can we talk about the Asian delegation?  I have never seen so many Asians in their sixties and seventies, decked out in zoot suit attire, singing their hearts out to the Chi-Lites and Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. It was epic.

Once, Pablo and I stayed on a farm while backpacking in Guatemala and met an ex-gang member from Pico Union, who had been deported back to Guatemala for criminal offenses.  I know, what’s the likelihood we’d meet a fellow thug on the road?  The owner of the farm, a US citizen who had settled there, had hired this guy to work for her, as her farm was also a hotel.  She hired Tony because he spoke English (he grew up in the United States) and because he was also Chapin.  We got to talking with him and I discovered we had a lot in common, were about the same age and ran in similar circles.  When he found out I had a cassette tape of oldies, he damn near fainted.  For a few weeks, we’d sit and listen to oldies every night in the pine forest under that massive star-filled sky, drink Gallo beer and he’d cry about all of the shit he went through in LA.  It was deep.  This music triggered so many memories for him, and I felt like I had to be a witness for his recollections of violence, loss and regret.  I gave him all of my oldies tapes when I left. 

One of my favorite breakfast places is Ciros Restaurant in Boyle Heights.  They have a juke box that is filled to the brim with oldies and ranchera music.  I am always sure to have cash on me so that the boys and I can walk up to the juke box and spend a few dollars on my favorite songs.  When the music starts, the waitresses start to sing as they take and deliver orders.  The patrons at the tables start to sing too, or start to share anecdotes about their lives that the songs remind them of.  A lot of LAPD officers eat there too.  Behind their uniforms, holstered guns and big mustaches, their barrio identities emerge, and sometimes, I see them ease into their booth seats and sing under their breath.  I know, the music is irresistible. 

Tonight, I was listening to the Brenton Wood station on Pandora.  My two boys, were eating dinner and dancing in their seats.  When Roger and Zapp came on, Ernesto said it sounded like space alien music.  When Duke of Earl came on, they both looked at each other and started laughing.  I told them that this was our people’s music and to not make fun of it. “You cannot get your certificate of being Chicano, unless you come to love this music and recognize it as part of our culture.” They both looked at each other and rolled their eyes. 

I sign off, listening to Otis Redding’s “These Arms of Mine.”  I hope I’ve convinced you of the power and meaning of oldies in the lives of some of us, and I hope I’ve affirmed its meaning and power in the lives of those of us who go into a trance when we hear it.  Hopefully, I told it like it is.  Can I get a witness?