The Scintilla Project, Day 3

I will catch up!

Day 3: Prompt A: Talk about a memory triggered by a particular song.

Here I am at the coffee shop by my house, and when I came in, the baristas were playing "Spanish Eyes," old-school Madonna. I asked if it was the whole album, or just the song--one of the baristas said it was the whole album, but it was "The Immaculate Collection." I said, "But 'Spanish Eyes' isn't on 'The Immaculate Collection.'" Barista girl (who was probably in elementary school--or younger--when "The Immaculate Collection" came out) said, "Yes it is." I didn't argue it with her. The other barista turned off Madonna in the middle of the next song--I don't remember what the next song was--and maybe the first song was "La Isla Bonita," not "Spanish Eyes," and "La Isla Bonita" is on "The Immaculate Collection." Anyway the other barista switched it to "Nashville Skyline," which at this point in my life I have listened to many more times than I've listened to "Like a Prayer" (the album that "Spanish Eyes" was originally on) or "La Isla Bonita" (originally on "True Blue"--I never owned "The Immaculate Collection")--as a kid with my dad, and later when I'd outgrown Madonna (or something) but kept my love of Bob.

The first song played was "Nashville Skyline Rag," which is instrumental, but I said, "Ooh, I know all the words to this album too." Which is true of the other songs. I guess I know all the words to "Nashville Skyline Rag," too.

I'm not really completing the prompt here. Okay, here's my story: July 29, 1987, about a week after my eleventh birthday, my mom took me to the St. Paul Civic Center to see Madonna on her "Who's That Girl" tour. I'd been to a few concerts: Raffi, HARP (Holly Near, Arlo Guthrie, Ronnie Gilbert, and Pete Seeger), Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers--but maybe this was my first concert reflecting my own grown-up musical taste. Raffi was kids' music, my hippie aunt Marti had worked for Redwood Records back in the day and had HARP connections, and Dolly is amazing, always, but me and my mom and sister went to that one in 1984 or 1985 (I couldn't find the exact date online for the Real Love Tour in Minneapolis/St. Paul--and I looked!). But I decided on my own (well, without input from my family, anyway) that I liked Madonna. Loved Madonna, even. So my mom got us tickets, and she was so disappointed when I was exhausted during the encore and wanted to leave in the middle of "Holiday," but we went. It was an incredible show.

I guess "Spanish Eyes" or "La Isla Bonita" triggered the story, even though she didn't play anything off of "Like a Prayer" at that show because the album didn't come out until 1989. In fact, here's the set list for the show, according to Wikipedia, according "to the booklet available with the show" which I owned once, but no longer. I don't have my t-shirt from the Janet Jackson "Rhythm Nation" tour either, which I'm occasionally very sad about. Not too often, but--yeah.

"Open Your Heart"
"Lucky Star"
"True Blue"
"Papa Don't Preach"
"White Heat"
"Causing a Commotion"
"The Look of Love"
Medley:
"Dress You Up," "Material Girl," "Like a Virgin" (contains excerpts from "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)")
"Where's the Party"
"Live to Tell"
"Into the Groove"
"La Isla Bonita"
"Who's That Girl"
"Holiday"