The song (below) "Reflections of My Life" was a 1969 top-40 song by The Marmalade. I'm pretty sure the first time I heard it, in passing, on AM radio when I was in Junior High, it struck me in a powerful way. I've some dim memory of it "choking me up" and affecting me very emotionally...though at that young age I probabaly couldn't have put all of it into words.
I became re-acquainted with this classic song about two years ago while scouring YouTube for anti-war songs (see my series of posts every Monday entitled: Fornicate Bellum*). In fact, I may re-post this song next Monday with the accompanying Vietnam Vet pics. I'm sure that video was put together to honor the fallen soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen, but to any thinking soul (not that we should not mourn the loss of these fallen young men...the loss was tragic beyond words...hence the videos and photo tributes cut deep) the video is a damning indictment of war and the monsters (the War Pigs as Ozzy so correctly called them) that fed themselves on the carnage...may they all rot in hell....
But back to the song....it is one of the most moving and heart-wrenching songs to come out of the rock n roll era. It still causes me to take a gasp and not to let my tear-ducts get out of hand. I am touched deeply in a way that I still CAN'T quite explain. There's the sorrow of loss....lost time, lost past, lost friends, family, and experiences. There's the bitter-sweet recognition of the inevitablilty of old age and death. It is the one song that demonstrates with heavenly vocals and harmonies the dynamic tension between beauty and pain. Dean Ford sings like an angel; an angel that knows how the story ends for everyone. This song is on my all-time favorite list of songs...and for no other reason (although the rest of the catalog of THE MARMALADE is strong!!!) this group ranks on:
EUGOR'S FAVORITE MUSICAL BANDS list at: # 67 THE MARMALADE.
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