Moon Tunes
“Listen to this,” I announce, holding up a cassette tape. Yes, cassette.
“Do you know what this is?” I ask Mary and Nicole, who with me are hurdling to the Cape in our 2005 Volvo wagon. “It’s a cassette!”
“Dad, your car is ridiculous,” Nicole says, stating the obvious. “Who owns a car with a cassette deck anymore?”
For this trip, I’ve dug out a case of tapes I’ve carried around in various cars since, well, since buying my first car at the end of college. Each car had a cassette player, so why would this car be any different?
“Do you know who this is?” I ask after inserting the tape into the Volvo’s player. My car’s that old, though miles driven belies its age due to my passion for two wheels over four.
“Van Morisson,” Mary says and the two of us sing along to Moon Dance, that is until the tape gets stuck, auto reversing itself over to side B where Boz Scaggs comes on singing Sail on White Moon. I’m surprised the tape doesn’t just break, or get tangled up in the works to the point where we have to pull it out and carefully rewind it with a pencil.
“It’s more like Van Morrison underwater,” I say, noting the terrible quality of sound coming through the not so terrible speakers. Over the roar of pouring rain and whirring engine, we strain to hear the track. Still, I’m thrilled to be listening to a tape created in April of 1979.
Before Spotify and YouTube, there were mix tapes, and some people made more of them than others. Toni Ross created Moon Tunes as a twenty first birthday gift, one I’ve cherished and played over and over again so much so I’m kind of surprised we hear anything at all, especially since it’s been ten or more years since its last go round.
I don’t remember much about this particular milestone, beyond a head spinning party and this tape — a compilation of songs organized in concert with a name, but also celebration of when songs became a part of our make-up. And despite liking some tracks less than others, they are now forever in me. ‘A Ross Production’ can still be found on the sleeve, written in Toni’s neat han, along with ‘made with the help of Bob, Elio, Bruce, Joan, Peter and Nancy.’ Thanks to Toni and friends, along with their extensive album collections, the team curated a snapshot of her eclectic musical taste circa late ‘70’s. NRBQ, Procol Harum, Boz Scaggs, but also Hank Williams and Ella Fitzgerald. What a line-up. The tape even includes an all-time favorite band, Little Feat, with their song Spanish Moon.
Do people make playlists for each other anymore? Do people curate TikTok videos for each other? I have to think so, at least in some form though I’d be the last to ask since I still listen to albums and FM radio. The way I discover new music these days is by streaming WPKN and WERS, two independent stations, the first highlighted as the best radio station on the planet by The New Yorker, and the latter Emerson College’s station. Like my Volvo, I’m a relic. a throw-back to needles drops and warped records. I drive an old car, live in an old house, and love this old tape.
Moon Tunes
Side 1
Van Morrison — Moon Dance
Creedence Clearwater — Bad Moon Rising
Janis Joplin — Half Moon
Little Feat — Spanish Moon
J.J. Cale — Cajun Moon
Maria Muldaur — Cajun Moon
Ella Fitzgerald — Moonlight in Vermont
Cat Stevens — Moonshadow
Pure Prairie League — Kentucky Moonshine
Side 2
NRBQ — RC Cola and a Moon Pie
Old and in the Way — Midnight Moonligh
Hank Williams — Howlin’ in the Moon
Procol Harum — Shine Softly (My Moon-beams)
Randy Newman — Underneath the Harlem Moon
Jerry Jeff Walker — Moonchild
The Band — The Moon Struck One
Boz Scaggs — Sail on White Moon
