Tag Archives: mix tapes

Breaking up is hard to do

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Hey, remember when I said I was going to start that series of mix tape posts? Yeah…that was a while ago. Anyway, here’s a mix tape I made way back in January of 1997, when I was trying to get over my *real* first love. I had already made the “I’m so sad, I’m wallowing, and please oh please won’t you take me back” mix tape, which has since been destroyed. This one came a little bit later. (incidentally, I have several tapes in the breakup series. I had a really great angry one from the breakup with X, but it was purged…I may try to recreate it.) Anyway, here it is, with selected notes/lyrics.

I Will Survive–Gloria Gaynor

Needs no explanation.

The Great Wall of China–Billy Joel

From the River of Dreams album, which, yes, I did own. This was a song he wrote about getting screwed over by his former brother-in-law, but it still worked.

Why tear this heart out if it’s only been broken?

So Much for Pretending–Bryan White

I was looking forward to a happy ending
So much for pretending.

Tainted Love–Soft Cell

King of Pain–The Police

You Give Love a Bad Name–Bon Jovi

Who Needs Love Like That? –Erasure

All I Want–Toad the Wet Sprocket

And it won’t matter now
Whatever happens to me
Though the air speaks of all we’ll never be
It won’t trouble me

Heartbreaker–Pat Benatar

I am a Rock–Simon and Garfunkel

You Learn–Alanis Morrissette

I recommend biting off more then you can chew to anyone
I certainly do
I recommend sticking your foot in your mouth at any time
Feel free
Throw it down (the caution blocks you from the wind)
Hold it up (to the rays)
You wait and see when the smoke clears

One More Heartache–Blackhawk

She’ll go one more time
Down that lonesome road
Till she finds that turn off
That leads back home
Then she’ll dust her dreams off
And dry her eyes
She’ll leave one more heartache behind

Come Sail Away–Styx

I’m not sure why I included this one.

Don’t Stop Believing–Journey

You’re Only Human–Billy Joel

Someday I’ll Be Saturday Night–Bon Jovi

Life’s a Dance–John Michael Montgomery

Life’s a dance you learn as you go
Sometimes you lead, sometimes you follow
Don’t worry ’bout what you don’t know
Life’s a dance you learn as you go

Unanswered Prayers–Garth Brooks

Be Good to Yourself–Journey

Safe in the Arms of Love–Martina McBride

This song has gotten me through many a rough time…

I want a heart to be forever mine
Want eyes to see me satisfied
Gonna hang my heartaches out to dry
Someday I’m gonna be safe in the arms of love
Safe in the arms of love

The Dance–Garth Brooks

The song remembers when*

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(this will be the first of a series of posts)

During the move, I found a box full of old cassette tapes. Most of them were mix tapes I’ve made at one point or another…I thought it might be fun to pull them out and post the track listings with a bit of background as to what was going on in my life at the time.

I’ve arranged them more or less in chronological order. People who know me well will notice some major holes, and here’s why…after every breakup I’ve ever gone through, there’s been a massive purge. I made *dozens* of lovey-dovey mix tapes for K in college, and they’re all gone. I just couldn’t bear to have them around, and putting them in a box and hiding them wasn’t enough…

Ahem, anyway. The first one is titled “And So It Goes…”, and it was made during the summer of 1993, between my freshman and sophomore year of college. Earlier that year, I had broken up with J, and when I came home for summer vacation, I briefly dated this guy (we’ll call him E) with whom I’d engaged in mild flirtations with the previous summer. E was also freshly out of a relationship. We tried to do casual, but neither one of us seemed to do that very well…and when he finally broke it off, I made him this mix tape:

Side A

This Night — Billy Joel
And So It Goes — Billy Joel
Take This Heart — Richard Marx
Kiss — Prince
Send Her My Love — Journey
Can’t Fight This Feeling — REO Speedwagon
In Your Eyes — Peter Gabriel
Something About You — (I have no idea…I don’t even know what song this is.)
If You Leave — OMD
The Longest Time — Billy Joel

Side B

No Ordinary Love — Sade
All Shook Up — Elvis Presley
Kiss the Girl — from The Little Mermaid
Fever —
If — Janet Jackson
Paradise City — Guns ‘n Roses (this one had an inside meaning)
Can’t Help Falling in Love — Elvis Presley

(I had thrown in a couple of lame instumentals to fill up space. and as with most mix tapes, the first side is much stronger than the second…)

Was I in love with E? Did he break my heart? I don’t know…I was in a pretty vulnerable place that summer. When I think about this tape, I remember sitting alone at night on a swing at the park, wondering if anyone would ever love me again, though I know that was more about J than it was about E…

I linked to the lyrics to “This Night,” because that song, more than any other one, sums up that short-lived romance with E. We’ve been in contact since then. He’s married. And I, after a few wrong turns, soon will be. I have no hard feelings, and I smile when I think about him and the summer of 1993…

*post title is from a Trisha Yearwood song that I always powerfully identified with. Music is so strongly tied to our emotions, isn’t it?