Rare News Desk
On Monday morning, Stephanie Dale, a 28-year-old actress from Buffalo, New York was searching for treasures at a thrift store in Austin, Texas. When Stephanie came upon the Goodwill Blue Hanger Outlet there was no way she could have expected to uncover a glimpse into the heart of a young man. While rummaging through a blue box of knick-knacks Stephanie found a vessel to the past – a mix tape.
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At just ten cents, it had to be hers.
The beaten up cassette tape will take you back to a period when telling someone your feelings still happened in an analog world. The mix tape, from “Brian” bears the title “miss.ya!” It’s contents? 18 gems from Bryan Adams, Van Halen and Gin Blossoms.
Why just those bands? Nobody can be certain, though the cassette does give some clues as to what “Brian” from the mix tape was thinking when he wanted someone to know that he missed them.
Brian vs. Bryan
We can assume that Brian can spell his own name correctly, however it appears that the Bryan in Bryan Adams can be up for debate. On side one, track two, you’ll hear 1985’s smash hit “Summer of 69” credited on the mix tape to “Brian Adams.” By side two, track eight, the last song of the “miss.ya!” comp, “Brian” has evolved into the rightful “Bryan Adams” for the mix tape closer–1993’s “Please Forgive Me.”
So to recap, in 18 songs, mix tape Brian has gone from telling his love about a summer spent having sex, to begging for his or her forgiveness.
What a bummer.
Brian <3 Van Halen
Mix tape Brian loves Van Halen. Mix tape Brian loves Van Halen so much that “When It’s Love,” off 1988’s “OU812″ (the one when Eddie Van Halen cut his hair), appears twice on the 18 song mix tape. 44 percent of Brian’s ability to miss whoever received this mix tape involves Van Halen. 25 percent of that love can be found in “When It’s Love.” That song begins:
Everybody’s lookin’ for somethin’
Somethin’ to fill in the holes
We think a lot but don’t talk much about it
‘Til things get out of control
Who? What? When? Where? Why?
The biggest question remaining is when and why this mix tape was made. Steve Ciccarelli of Property of Zack points out that while most of the songs indicate a late 80s time period, 29 by the Gin Blossoms wasn’t released until their second album, in August 1992.
My guess: In August 1992, Brian went off to college, and sent this mix tape to his high school significant other, longing for the days they would be reunited. Perhaps they had rocked out to “When It’s Love” during their freshman year of high school, and loved “Summer of 69” from when they met in middle school.
Maybe we will never know. At the very least, it looks as if mix tape Brian was aware of the rules John Cusack would outline in the 2000 film High Fidelity.
“The making of a great compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do and takes ages longer than it might seem. You gotta kick off with a killer, to grab attention. Then you got to take it up a notch, but you don’t wanna blow your wad, so then you got to cool it off a notch. There are a lot of rules.”
