For two Saturdays, I spent the day ensconced in my room, sprawled out on my back, head and arms hanging loosely over the foot of the bed. I moved only to thumb through records or flip them over. I occasionally read an album sleeve, but mostly just drifted through notes, lyrics and random pops or fuzzes. I’m not usually romantic, but I was searching for love songs.
Valentine’s Day, that saccharine holiday both adored and reviled, was fast approaching. I wasn’t on some love-spurred mission, though. I was on assignment. My goal? The perfect V-Day mix tape.
College students are poor practically by definition. Pocket lint and imagination have to take the place of pungent bouquets and diamonds when Cupid comes around. But how? Pink paper hearts, the staple of kindergarten glue-eaters and sixth-grade boyfriends, are sweet but boring. Homemade dinner is potentially disastrous and doesn’t last. Hand-picked flowers have an air of “I forgot” hastiness. A mix tape is the perfect combination of cost (practically none) and effort (possibly endless).
Mix tapes have a strong history of personalized obsession. Rob Gordon, the quintessential music nerd, played by John Cusak in the movie “High Fidelity,” is consumed with creating the perfect mix.
“The making of a great compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do and takes ages longer than it might seem,” Gordon said. Not exactly great foreplay, but it gets the idea across: Making a mix isn’t easy. But the thought and effort makes it such an appealing gift.
I love the idea of someone imitating my Saturday, wasting languid hours immersed in music and thinking of me. It may be Mick Jagger singing that wild horses couldn’t drag him away or Joan Jett saying she thinks she could love me, but the sentiment is all mine.
A good mix, like my Jagger/Jett collaboration, follows a theme: Love, long car rides, lonely nights. But a great mix flows like honey. It weaves a complex story: First glances and first dates, nights under stars and cars’ back seats, awkward fumbling and first “I love yous.” Or maybe it just recreates a feeling: Stomach butterflies, sweaty palms, soft kisses, long tumbles head over heels.
Mix tape geeks, like Gordon, create rigid rules in their pursuit of perfection: No more than one song by a single artist, only one genre, no CDs. The Web is flooded with internerds expounding on their proven method of creating a mix. Right guys, your lovey tapes work great. Oh, and I saw your e-girlfriend at RadioShack yesterday. She’s neither “HOTT” nor “SXY.”
Your rules don’t matter. I’m inclined to agree on the tape part, but my tastes are esoteric: More Luddite than space-age. But format doesn’t matter, either.
What does matter is that you were thinking of someone when you made your compilation. You got excited about sharing your favorite songs, inside jokes and unsaid words.
I panicked at the thought of writing this column. The mix tape idea was mine. The V-day theme was not. I admire romance in others, but can’t pull it off myself. My tape was going well until I thought “Like You Better (When Yer Drunk)” would be a funny addition.
Anyone receiving my tape, though, would understand the joke. Music is personal and intimate. A mix tape is tailored to the recipient yet flavored with the taste of its maker. It contains your thoughts, your humor and your love. So it doesn’t matter if your mix starts with “Shake Ya Ass” or “(Everything I Do) I Do It For You” — just please, please, please don’t send me anything you’ve heard in an elevator. All booty music and rock ‘n’ roll will be gladly accepted.