No One Like You (Scorpions)/Round And Round (Ratt) - day 34

So, to know me is to know I am obsessed with everything eighties, from the fashion to the movies to anything pop culture. One hit wonders and blockbuster artists, new wave and MTV, cheese-tastic power ballads and memorable top-40 songs, each delivering as much delight as it can muster. No decade strikes the same chord within me the way the eighties does. And no decade’s worth of music has me as enamored with every possible genre. Well, except headbanging hair band metal. Ucccch, no thank you ma’am. I have never understood the appeal.

Today’s duo of songs tells the story of the rare exceptions to this rule: No One Like You by the Scorpions and Round And Round by Ratt. These songs actually have similar tones, as most of the hair band music does, but these two don’t immediately make me groan in disapproval.

When I used to skulk through the hallways of Pocono Mountain HS, trying desperately to hide from bullies while masking my true identity, I was surrounded by an onslaught of heavy rock music. My love for AM radio and disco was something as far back in the closet as my growing sexual identity; I could never admit I liked that kind of music, for it would connect the dotted lines to the location of my closet door. So instead I pretended to like certain rock songs; strangely, I didn’t have to pretend to like this one. I think I liked the fact that you could kind of hear his German accent as he sang, set against the metal backdrop. And the song still holds up today. Crank that shit UP.

The same story of fear and self-loathing and begging the gods not to let anyone figure out my true identity, held true as I ventured off to college, teased by freedom while still terrified to be my actual self. It was during these times that I found songs like No One Like You and Round And Round to be strangely comforting, for liking them meant I could fit in. I was recently reminded of the latter when it was overused on a Geico commercial, and that sparked the memory which inspired today’s post.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VwbyBGbqPY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u8teXR8VE4