[Aaliyah - Are You That Somebody] I am often asked about what kind of music I listened to growing up. Generally it is not a topic I enjoy going into, because the fact is I spent most of my childhood listening to Z100, until I met my friend Lauren in middle school (~2001) and she introduced me to punk and emo. That changed my life. Then in ninth grade (~2003) during an orchestra field trip, a substitute teacher at our school offered a couple of huge recommendations: Cat Power and Bjork. We called him “Emo Sub” because of his thick black glasses and messenger bag, but it turns out he was not so emo at all. I cite that as the moment we both began to develop a more refined ear and better developed taste, etc.
Anyway, in elementary school I found out about many of my favorite artists at dance class. I’m not sure if I necessarily thought of them as my favorites, but they were the artists whose CDs I would ask my mom to buy me at Tower Records and Sam Goody. These discoveries were made mostly in jazz class, and then later in hip-hop class, which was my favorite. The teacher would play popular music with a beat good enough to warm up and complete our dance exercises to. It was a lot of Destiny’s Child, TLC, 3LW, Blaque, and especially Aaliyah.
The line on Take Care referring to Aaliyah has had me revisiting her music and thinking about this lately. I joke that I love Drake because listening to his music reminds me of watching Degrassi as a kid, but I think in a way it also reminds me of some of the music I listened to growing up, too.
Spot on.
