This is a story about my long association with the song ‘Last Christmas’.
Guess I was in the class 8 (or lesser may be). I was returning from my daily evening session of Cricket from the school ground nearby. I do not remember how hot or cold the weather was (but I do remember that I was sweating). I was walking back alone thinking of the lousy homework I have to do after a super duper session of cricket (FYI, I was not that great with Cricket, but loved diving to catch and fielding, yup not the regular kid who wants to bat like GOD). It was not too dark and when I was almost home, something struck my eyes on the clean road as I almost stepped on it.
I realised its a cassette written WHAM with a sketch pen on top of it, on both the sides. What happened next changed my world.
For the benefit of younger generation reading this post, there used to be Compact Disks before the song download era came, and before that it used to be cassettes which had a magnetic tape rolling from one wheel to another in a properly boxed case (as pictured above). It used to run on a machine with a ‘head’ which read the content of the magnetic tape when a motor runs the cassette at a certain speed. It had 2 sides and covered upto 60/90 minutes of play.
Back to the story. I lifted the cassette and took it home with me. At home, we had recently got ourselves a Philips mono tape recorder, I remember the price also, it was Rs.999. Well, there is a bigger story of pursuing our (we are 3 brothers) dad to get one such tape recorder for us, but that I will write about some other time, its a much longer story. So, I got that cassette and played it all over, and then all over again, and then again, you get the drift. And ya, homework could wait.
This happened for months after that.
Initially I did not understand much of the lyrics but liked the music and the beats, I loved shaking my head as if am some cool WHAM music lover (I did not even know what the heck is Wham!). But then it stuck me that there are 2 songs in all that actually does something to me inside. LAST CHRISTMAS and CARELESS WHISPERS.
I started listening to these two songs carefully, then Last Christmas stuck me, its about betrayal. Wow, that was some enlightenment at that age. I had no girl friend (most of us suffered from inferiority complex, am using a royal ‘us’ to show you that I was not the only one, which actually could have been the case, but moving on). But as soon as I realised its about betrayal and how life goes on, I imagined recovering from a break up! This is the first time EVER am talking about this, now that’s a big confession. I created my dreamland where I loved someone so deeply and she betrayed me and I am getting sad and I AM SINGING THIS SONG.
This song does unknown things to my body, especially the mind, za goosebumps and my blood circulation slows down (I feel). It makes my heart sink and somehow I feel like getting inside my shell and get romantic, sad and become a hero. All at once.
The video is awesome too!
Even after more than two decades, guess the feeling still is intact.
Even today I love the song so much that I put it on repeat mode and listen, sometimes get to sleep with it, at times, return home after a hectic day of work, like a soothing tonic to my mind. It has now become an integral part of my life. And eveytime I listen to it, it brings a smile to my face and I remember my association with it from that day.
I cannot thank George Michael enough.