Andy Gapin

It’s funny how sometimes we discover new things that we love about our favorite things. Whether it be a joke in an episode of the Simpsons that you’ve missed for the last ten years, something in the background of a scene in your favorite movie, or a trail you never noticed in your favorite park, it’s always nice to find something new to appreciate. It helps keep old things fresh.

I find that I do this with music all the time. I’m always finding a new favorite song by one of my favorite bands. Jawbreaker, for instance, they’re my favorite band and I’ve heard everything by them hundreds of times, but just a couple weeks ago, I became obsessed with the song “Into You Like A Train.” Up until then, it never really clicked for me how much I like this song.

But what really made me think about this, is the song “Turnstiles” (or “Turnstyles” as the original version was called) by The Lawrence Arms, (fittingly) one of my all-time favorite bands. I think it’s a pretty big favorite among longtime fans, judging by the fact that everytime I see them, a ton of kids are shouting out for them to play it. But for me, it wasn’t until last week that I was really all that into it. Usually my listening to them is confined to Oh! Calcutta!, The Greatest Story Ever Told, or Apathy and Exhaustion so it’s not a song that is ever in my listening rotation. But last week, somehow it got stuck in my head. I don’t know where it came from since I hadn’t listened to it in ages. So I threw it on and immediately became obsessed with it. I’ve been listening to it on repeat since then and I just can’t seem to get enough of it. I’m really into it musically, but more than that, I’ve become completely consumed by the lyrics. Some of them kind of hit me really hard for reasons I won’t go into, but they make the song feel really personal to me.

The personal feeling I get from the lyrics are probably why I’ve been so obsessed with this song over the past few days, but things like this make me really wonder how much we all miss everyday as we go about our lives. Some things we’re just oblivious to because we’re either too focused on one thing or focused on too many things at once. And some things I don’t think we’re capable of getting right away even when we’re looking for them.