Today I purchased a DVD of ten episodes of "Friends," one of my favorite shows. As a great surprise to me, the DVDs include the music video for "I'll Be There For You (Theme From Friends)" performed by none other than Phil Solem and Danny Wilde - THE REMBRANDTS. I haven't seen this video in years, and it was spectacular to see the boys in action after I now know so much more about them and have come to love their music so much. When this video was first getting mtv and radio airplay, I was just 15. We had just gotten cable, so the whole "culture" of pop music was beginning to enter my life, and soon I turned the radio on in my room as I sat in front of a typewriter with a blank sheet of paper inserted in it, humming quietly while I waited for inspiration to come over for a visit. One day, by request, a radio station played "I'll Be There For You," by some group I'd never heard of before. I liked it. A few days later, the video was all over mtv. Featuring the cast members of Friends, the video enjoyed heavy airplay along with Alanis Morisette's "You Oughta Know" in the days before boybands and trl. I would watch for a while, then take a dip in the new pool in our backyard before heading off to driving school, where I would quietly long for the girl in the back row with the dark skin and shirts that fit tightly in all the right places. My sister bought "L.P." and "Jagged Little Pill" on the same day, being one of those pop consumers who must have the album with the hit song on it. Luck must have been with her that day, since finding even one great album based on hearing one hit song is very hard to do, let alone two. These two CDs found their way into my room, where I played them on a borrowed stereo as I thought out plotlines for my future novels. This was before I'd ever written a song, stayed out past midnight, or kissed a girl. But things were changing for me. The pool had gotten me out of the house more, the driving class had got me lusting for women, and those two CDs had got me interested in something that hadn't held the same attraction for me before: music.
On the night of my sophomore homecoming dance, my mom drove me over to Angela Bowman's house. My first date. "L.P." was playing in the car on the way there. Angela was the gorgeous blonde who sat behind me in homeroom (her name coming right after mine in the alphabet). Later that night I asked her to be my girlfriend; not knowing that years later I would be planning on asking her to be my wife. Not knowing that I would lose my virginity to her or have my heart broken (several times) by her. "L.P." played on the way home from her house - my dad and I didn't talk, I just listened. My obsession with "L.P." and music in general grew and grew. For my 16th birthday I received my own stereo from my parents, the Rembrandts first CD from my sister, and the soundtrack to "Friends" from Angela, who also later suggested that "I'll Be There For You" be our song. "L.P." followed me in my car to school, in a walkman into the hallways, and on a discman on every vacation I've ever taken since. I'm listening to it right now, and I just heard something new: there is some airy electric piano just barely audible at 2:54 on "Comin' Home." How did they create such a perfect album? Right now its joining the extremely short list of music that can make me cry. It's so good it hurts.
