INVINCIBLE SUMMER Playlist: Song 1

SONG #1: "Turn Up The Sun" by Oasis.

The first song on my playlists has to set the mood. Which usually means that it needs a really great intro.

There are few songs with better intros than "Turn Up The Sun."

I started listening to Oasis when I was about fourteen, and this was the first song of theirs I knew. I heard about it on a music blog I used to read, and it said that there was one correct way and one correct way only to listen to this song.

The advice was:

--Wait for a sunny day.

--Find a door, preferably a set of sturdy double doors, that you can push through to get outside. Something like the front doors at a school or the lobby of a theater.

--Get it as dark as you can inside.

--Put your headphones in.

--Count 37 steps back from the doors. Stand there. Press play.

--Slowly walk forwards. One step per second.

--At 37 steps/37 seconds, push those doors open and step out into the sun.

I don't blame you if you don't actually do that. I didn't. I still haven't. But every time I listen to the beginning of this song, I feel like I'm doing it anyway. I feel the dark and then the doors thrown open and the sun beating down like an attack. I feel grungy and grimy and I taste like sunscreen.

It's that good.

SAMPLE LYRIC: Yeah it's not about the lyrics.

CORRELATING PASSAGE:

"Up."

I'm sticking to the sheets with sweat, and the smell of Noah's sandals attacks my face. It is so summer.

At home, we each get our own rooms, but here, Noah and I share, even though there are enough rooms for us each to have our own. Part of the feeling of summer depends on waking up when he wakes up, or putting on a shirt gritty with sand and sunscreen that might not even be mine.

--p. 14.