You’ll Never Forget This
I don’t mean to steal Rick Beato‘s wind, but I feel compelled to write about this particular song.
This week has given me some time to collect myself, organize, and get everything straight. And as luck would have it, Amazon has just gone head in for music, of which I’m a big fan.
And one of the things I’m enjoying during my unexpected free time is building a large music library on Amazon Music‘s platform. I’m convinced that Amazon is going long on this endeavor for several reasons, which I’ve touched on already. That doesn’t mean Spotify, my regular music streaming platform, is going anywhere. But Amazon plopped 70 million songs in my lap with 7+ million of them available in Ultra High Def. And that last part is what I’ve gravitated towards.
Ultra High Definition
This is the pivot point. This is what is going to differentiate the competitors. It’s what’s going to set the men apart from the boys. And Amazon just leapfrogged Spotify.
I lazily signed up for their free three free month promotion because I’m already a Prime member and get promotional notices from them all the time. It’s usually an update to their terms of service or something equally thrilling. But when I updated my Amazon Music App and plugged in and set things up, there was a very big noticeable difference.
And that was their Ultra High Def option. I always max out the settings on my music apps, which incrementally may make a difference.
But when I flipped over from Spotify to this Amazon Ultra High Def setup, the room opened up. I have some nice equipment, and certainly not Jeff Bezos grade, but not bad, considering. And that jump, with my equipment, was dramatic. Enough to compel me to spend hours building a library with Amazon and write about it here.
Of course, while I’m busy setting things up with Amazon, I have music accompanying me and I’m pulling songs and albums from every place I can mentally remember to put them in place. It’s like going through the Library of Congress to complete your own home library. It’s endless fun but an overwhelming project. It’s as if someone shook the entire Smithsonian Museum like a snow globe and your task is to put it back together.
And my neurons are firing everywhere, and I’ll suddenly remember a song from 1934, or a track I heard once 15 years ago and can only remember the chorus. Making matters worse, I play instruments, poorly, and I have endless riffs and melodies and rhythms stored all around my noodle and they’re trying to make a reappearance by falling out of the dark corners of my largely empty head.
Isn’t it ironic that while we can’t remember the name, melody or important details of a song, once we hear that very song, memories come gushing up to a degree that sometimes we can’t even contain or manage them, and can even bring us to tears? I think so, and I think that speaks to the power of music.
And this is such a song. It’s brilliant in every aspect, but there are lots of reasons this song is so special. First, the woman who sings this version, which there many of, is Mama Cass, who was a hefty songbird. Which makes her voice that more sweet and rich.
But it begins with nothing more than a quiet brief introduction from an engineer is heard mentioning a drink, and then concluding with the words: “And now, to sing a lovely ballad, here is Mama Cass.” Only the last part was heard on the single version of the song. Cass did her own whistling, which is heard before the song’s fade. Yet it ends with piano, drums, bass, guitar, and a full accompaniment [That’s a big word to say and spell] and completes on a high note{that’s a pun], which it should. And from beginning to end it swells. It becomes more pronounced, richer, and inflates the room with sweet honeyed air and the smell of warm southern magnolia blossoms.
The lyrics, vocals, sustain and time of the song are perfect. Everything about it is inviting, warm, and bosomy, like Mama Cass herself. She’s sweeping you up with her feathers. And then begins the whistles and harmony to fluff up a nice warm nest to lay in. musically, there’s a lot of simplicity, but when spun together it weaves a deep hammock to roll into.
And thus the setting is laid. You suddenly find yourself slowly swinging to the soft sweet whispers of Mama Cass and her songbirds wishing you to dream a little dream of her. Rocking back and forth to the ragtime piano and shuffling drumbeat and the subtle pulse of the bass driving you forward. It’s irresistible.
The song embraces you and hugs you and doesn’t want to let you go. But you have to as the song dies and what’s left to be asked is to dream a little dream of me. And as the birds fly away that’s what you’re left doing, is thinking of sweet dreams and sunbeams.
And that’s why “Dream a Little Dream of Me” is a great song.
