Thursday 1 February 2018

Mid-Life Crisis Songs #14: The Fire Inside



Here's a song I remember well from my radio days. It was out around the time the presenter's free choice of music was being restricted. I'll write more about that soon. On the late show I worked on (more about that soon too), we played it just about every night, while we still could. It wasn't a hit, but to me it was a Number One.

On the surface, it's a song about looking for love, the loneliness of trawling bars and clubs hoping to meet that special someone, maybe even winning a one night stand, but ultimately knowing they wouldn't be there in the morning or ever call you again. I think it's written from a woman's point of view, although I know for a fact there lots of men feel that way too.

But then at the end, come these lines... lines I keep coming back to as I grow older.

Then you walk to the window and stare at the moon
Riding high and lonesome through a starlit sky
And it comes to you how it all slips away
Youth and beauty are gone one day
No matter what you dream or feel or say
It ends in dust and disarray

Like wind on the plains, sand through the glass
Waves rolling in with the tide
Dreams die hard and we watch them erode
But we cannot be denied
The fire inside

No matter how old we get, we still have those same feelings from our youth. The passions. The loneliness. The longing. We may submerge those feelings, bury them, pretend they don't exist anymore... but the fire inside can never be denied.

I was 19 when I first heard this song. It seems so very long ago. It seems like just yesterday.
 


12 comments:

  1. Excellent mid-life choice. Mid-life: the time when that fire inside is down to embers?

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    Replies
    1. And then someone chucks a bucket of water on it.

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  2. Replies
    1. Hmm... I can't decide if your tongue is in your cheek or not?

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  3. Superb song and even better lyrics. I haven't listened to a ton of Bob Seger (except the hits). What I have heard is excellent driving music

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  4. These are excellent lyrics and ones I hadn't heard sung before. You are right of course, although we have aged, deep down inside, the fire can never be denied.

    I think that's why I've enjoyed blogging so much, because I've been able to revisit the songs of my youth and remind myself of the feelings they are associated with. The feeling of anticipation on a Friday evening of what the weekend might bring. The feeling of disappointment late on a Saturday night when the object of your affection goes home with someone else. The feeling that anything is possible....

    Also, on the blogosphere it's the words that are important, so we are all in effect ageless which is a nice feeling. On the outside I may be middle-aged, but when I write about my memories of songs from the '70s I am a teenager again!

    I will probably regret pressing publish on this tosh (as I often do) but I'll roll with it for now.

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    Replies
    1. Don't worry, Alyson, nobody reads this but us!

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  5. I'm surprised every time I look in the mirror. Who's that old duffer looking back at me? Surely only a few days ago I was in my early 20s and looking at the wide open road ahead. Now, even though the brick wall at the end of the cul-de-sac is hurtling towards me at an alarming rate, somewhere deep within, the fire still burns.
    I know relatively little of Bob Seger's music, but this is excellent.

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  6. Not a huge fan of the song (shockerooney!!), but what a fabulous piece of writing today Rol.

    Can't argue with your conclusions!

    JC

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