Weird musical coincidences - post yours!

[Axstar]

Had a very odd coincidence happen today.

At the weekend I was in a restaurant for breakfast with my girlfriend. They had music on in the background, and one tune caught my ear, both in terms of the subtly bluesy feel and the fact that it rose to a crescendo at the end with quite a tasty guitar riff.

When this happens I tend to try and make out some of the lyrics to Google later, but on this occasion I couldn't make out anything. The song was lost!

As I'm working on a guitar this afternoon I decide to put on some music. I firstly stick on Quatermass' self-titled album from 1970 and, being in a rocky/bluesy mood, stick on the first disk of 'The Rory Gallagher Collection' once this ends.

Track 8, I fall Apart, is the exact same song I heard at the weekend. Not a tune I was previously aware of, and I barely know Rory's catalog at all. I would never have found this song by hunting for it, yet there it was coming out of my stereo!

Pretty odd?


The only other musical coincidences I have ever encountered are when the radio is playing a song I already have stuck in my head when I turn it on. Granted it is usually something like Don't Fear the Reaper or a catchier song like that.

Lastly, I heard a nice acoustic-y song playing in the background at my grandmother's 90th wedding. I assumed it would be some folk rock band, but again couldn't hear any lyrics to note down. When I bought a copy of UFO's 'Force It' album I was surprised to learn that the song I heard previously was High Flyer. I would never have pinned it as a UFO song.

Do you have any weird musical occurrences?

 

[Oddly]

That is quite the coincidence!
I'd consider myself a Gallagher fan, yet that is a song I'd almost never think of listening to.

 

[twinjet]

Lastly, I heard a nice acoustic-y song playing in the background at my grandmother's 90th wedding.

Your grandmother got married 90 times? That's expensive.

My coincidence:
I was listening to our local jazz station and came across a fantastic rendition of "Them There Eyes". Shazam wouldn't pull it up, so I spent hours that evening trying to find it online.

Come to find out it was a locally produced album by a local singer! I met her at the annual jazz festival through other jazz friends, but found out that CD was no longer in production. Bummer. But I've jammed with her and she's great, so that's a plus!

 

[Neo1]

When I first started playing (6-7 years ago?), I had a neighbor in Albany, NY (Sean) who would come over and play acoustic guitar and sing. We started with some fairly popular songs. After awhile I started adding some songs.

About a month after we started playing I pulled out a cassette of a little known band named Thrillcat I got in the 1990's while living in Virginia, and played him a song that I liked titled "All Come True." I had figured out the bass line to it, and thought we could do it.

When I played it, Sean gave a very puzzled look. Then he said "Let me look at that cassette." And then he said "Hey, I know the leader of this band - I used to work with him at the Vermont Teddy Bear Factory in Burlington." Turns out they both worked there all those years ago, and he had jammed with him back then. Small world and/or coincidence, huh! And as a post script, Sean and I now play the occasional duo act, and almost always open with that song.

 

[Axstar]

Your grandmother got married 90 times? That's expensive.

Ooops! 90th birthday! I went with 'wedding anniversary' on the first pass, but that wasn't right. I'm going to leave it...

Your jazz story is great. When Shazam can't deliver then you know you're into deep water. Glad that you could get to the bottom of it!

 

[Gravedigger Dav]

Your grandmother got married 90 times? That's expensive.

I'll bet she has one hell of a collection of toasters.

 

[Jim Nazium]

I don't know if this story will make sense, but it has stuck with me for a long time, so here goes.

Back in the mid-90s, I heard a song on the radio about a woman who washes and waxes her Jaguar (car) but doesn't drive it any more because she's afraid of crashing. It's a metaphor for her love life: she's been hurt, she's finally over it but won't take the risk again. I liked the song and thought it was very touching, but didn't catch the artists's name. I didn't have easy internet access to search for it at the time, so I assumed I would never hear it again.

Went for a walk in my neighborhood not long afterward, and passed by a very lovely woman washing a beautiful XKE in her driveway. Never saw her or the car before. I stopped and stared. I wanted to tell her about the song, or sing it for her, or say something cool and smooth. Instead I stammered "That's a lovely car and you're a lovely woman". It sounded lame but she smiled and said thanks. I walked on.

Around that same time I was seeing a counsleor. I told him that I had bought a motorcycle I couldn't really afford, a Honda Hurricane, to try to make myself feel better, not just once but twice. He asked me if I had heard the song "Eye if the Hurricane", about a girl who tries to escape reality by riding one of those bikes. I said no. He said it's by David Wilcox.

Years later, I looked up the Hurricane song, and found that the Jaguar song is by the same artist, on the same album.



"The warm water beads as it runs down the curves
Of the beautiful surface so tan
She's polishing the Jaguar again
Hasn't run in a year or two
Nice car but the wheels don't move, anymore
Maybe she remembers
Maybe something's got her scared
It's too precious to be careless
And it's finally been repaired
So you never see her drive it
She won't risk it any more
It's too easy to collide it
And it hurt so much before
Could it be
That it's really just a vehicle
Standing like a statue all this time
Could it be
Its just a vehicle
She shines ..."

"Tank is full, switch is on
Night is warm, cops are gone
Rocket bike is all her own
It's called a hurricane
She told me once it's quite a ride
It's shaped so there's this place inside
Where if you're moving you can hide
Safe within the rain
She wants to run away
But there's nowhere that she can go
Nowhere the pain won't come again
But she can hide
Hide in the pouring rain
She rides the eye of the hurricane ..."

 

[Axstar]

I don't know if this story will make sense, but it has stuck with me for a long time, so here goes.

Back in the mid-90s, I heard a song on the radio about a woman who washes and waxes her Jaguar (car) but doesn't drive it any more because she's afraid of crashing. It's a metaphor for her love life: she's been hurt, she's finally over it but won't take the risk again. I liked the song and thought it was very touching, but didn't catch the artists's name. I didn't have easy internet access to search for it at the time, so I assumed I would never hear it again.

Went for a walk in my neighborhood not long afterward, and passed by a very lovely woman washing a beautiful XKE in her driveway. Never saw her or the car before. I stopped and stared. I wanted to tell her about the song, or sing it for her, or say something cool and smooth. Instead I stammered "That's a lovely car and you're a lovely woman". It sounded lame but she smiled and said thanks. I walked on.

Around that same time I was seeing a counsleor. I told him that I had bought a motorcycle I couldn't really afford, a Honda Hurricane, to try to make myself feel better, not just once but twice. He asked me if I had heard the song "Eye if the Hurricane", about a girl who tries to escape reality by riding one of those bikes. I said no. He said it's by David Wilcox.

Years later, I looked up the Hurricane song, and found that the Jaguar song is by the same artist, on the same album.



"The warm water beads as it runs down the curves
Of the beautiful surface so tan
She's polishing the Jaguar again
Hasn't run in a year or two
Nice car but the wheels don't move, anymore
Maybe she remembers
Maybe something's got her scared
It's too precious to be careless
And it's finally been repaired
So you never see her drive it
She won't risk it any more
It's too easy to collide it
And it hurt so much before
Could it be
That it's really just a vehicle
Standing like a statue all this time
Could it be
Its just a vehicle
She shines ..."

"Tank is full, switch is on
Night is warm, cops are gone
Rocket bike is all her own
It's called a hurricane
She told me once it's quite a ride
It's shaped so there's this place inside
Where if you're moving you can hide
Safe within the rain
She wants to run away
But there's nowhere that she can go
Nowhere the pain won't come again
But she can hide
Hide in the pouring rain
She rides the eye of the hurricane ..."

Somebody somewhere was trying to tell you something!

 

[Munjibunga]

I was talking to a person one time and they had heard of the Fugs.

 

[mikeoso]

I was talking to a person one time and they had heard of the Fugs.

In 1972 I took a job at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum near Tucson. I'd been listening to the Fugs a lot that summer, and was startled to discover that Ken Weaver, the drummer from the Fugs, was working there as an animal keeper. We hung out a little bit on breaks, but he didnt care to talk about the Fugs much.

 

[kesslari]

I've told this before, but it fits. Long story. No TL;DR.

In the late 1980's I was playing in a hard-working reggae band in LA. Great musicians with a BL who was a monster at booking gigs.
Smitty Smith joined us on keyboards. Smitty was a big musical Buddha of a man who had played with pretty much everyone from Dylan on down. I knew of him from his gig with David Lindley. He had developed diabetes, couldn't go on the road anymore, and so he gigged with us because we worked so regularly.
I always set up on Smitty's side of the stage because being around him you couldn't help but grow, musically.

Anyway, the singer in this band was from one of the Caribbean islands, St. Kitts I think. In addition to the "standard reggae catalog" of the time, he had brought in a few local tunes from the island.
Our repertoire was large enough that it could take a few weeks to cycle through all the songs. So Smitty had been playing with us for a few weeks when this happened.

We were playing a club in Seal Beach, a gig we did regularly. Kitaka (the singer) called one of "his island songs". I call the chords to Smitty. And we start to play it.
Halfway through the first verse I hear Smitty shout "Mother*$*%er! I WROTE this song!"
I said "Smitty, Kitaka brought this song from St. Kitts, it was some local hit..."
He said "It's on Maurice White's album - I wrote it for him!"

Someone had recorded a bootleg in the islands and had a hit, and Smitty hadn't gotten any mailbox money out of it. We all had a good laugh and some righteous indignation...

 

[mikeoso]

Kesslari, this one isn't musical, but kind of a similar thing; I was taking a graduate course in minority history to renew my teaching license. First night, the instructor handed out the syllabus and said, "there's one of the required readings that's not in print. We'll have to get a copy from the library and have it copied." I said, "Don't bother, I'll print them off...that's my master's thesis." River of Steel, River of Sweat, Early Mexican-American Community in Muscatine, Iowa, by Micheal Hutchison

 

[capnjim]

I once had a very angry buyer for a bass show up at my house. He had driven an hour to buy the bass. We talked a couple times and did the e-mail through Kijiji thing. I don't remember what bass it was, but I had just sold it 10 minutes before, to a guy with the exact same first and last name!!
I had no idea I was dealing with two different people with the same name showing up at the same time.
I thought it was the same guy.
I'm in Montreal and was speaking French to them, and to me, they both sounded the same. Very similar accents.
He was not happy, and didn't really understand how I sold it to someone else when we had just spoken on the phone.
Very very bizarre.

 

[Munjibunga]

In 1972 I took a job at the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum near Tucson. I'd been listening to the Fugs a lot that summer, and was startled to discover that Ken Weaver, the drummer from the Fugs, was working there as an animal keeper. We hung out a little bit on breaks, but he didnt care to talk about the Fugs much.

That's wild. I know the lyrics to many of their songs and quote them often.

Ed Sanders was the L.A. Free Press's correspondent to the Manson trial.

 

[Gazman]

I was in the car one time, driving my bitter old friend Dave Mustaine home and I turned on the radio to break the silence....

No wait that wasn’t me, that was Lars.

 

[Munjibunga]

I played in a blues band for a couple years before it evaporated. When I auditioned, I thought the female lead singer looked familiar but couldn't place her. So as we were chatting she mentioned that she had been in a classic rock band about ten years earlier. Turns out I was in the same band at the same time. She was fired from the band a couple months after I joined (she sings blues a lot better than classic rock) and I quit a couple months after that mostly for logistical reasons and minor drama. I ended up playing in the ten-year reunion gig of that band, but she didn't. Don't burn bridges.

 

[fhm555]

That is quite the coincidence!
I'd consider myself a Gallagher fan, yet that is a song I'd almost never think of listening to.

Catfish Blues by Taste was patient zero for me and the blues. It infected me with a desire to know everything i possibly could about the genre. I spent years down the rabbit hole of blues history and my reward was the opportunity to be first call bass for the late great Willie King for a while. I learned more about live performance from that stint than all my other live performance time combined.

 

[Paulabass]

I found a really tacky Elvis Presley radio in a gift shop and bought it for my drummer. We were on the road, and I gave it to him at our fleabag hotel. He put a 9volt in it and turned it on, and the song playing was Heartbreak Hotel.

 

[PWRL]

Once upon a time, my only bass was a Rickenbacker 4003. I had to drop it off for a neck issue, and had a gig in a couple days, so I randomly dropped in on a used gear store and found a 77 4001 hanging there for right at the max of what I was budgeting myself for a backup. It was great, because I was wondering what would make a good backup for a Rick. I eventually sold it like the big ol' dum-dum that I am.

Another time, I wanted a USA-made P bass, so I took $700 out of the bank and told myself I was going to buy a P bass with it. I want to a Music-Go-Round and found what is now my American Special P bass hanging there, for exactly that much.

I don't know if this counts, but one night, on my way from Lake Geneva WI to Bloomington IL, I heard "Gimme Three Steps" by Lynyrd Skynyrd four times in a row on different stations.

 

[maxmaroon]

Always loved the song Sadie by The Spinners, it reminded me of my mom. The night my mom passed I listened to Sadie first thing when I got home, it is the only song that connects with me in that way.
On her first birthday after she passed I had gotten home from wherever and was thinking of her as I was putting on the soul hits channel on the television for background music, immediately when I turned the tele on the intro lick to Sadie started as if I had just hit play on a recording...that one got me pretty good.