When I was nine or 10 years old, I purchased They Might Be Giants’ fourth album, Flood. I had known about the band earlier in my life – Nickelodeon had a video music show, and actually played videos from TMBG’s first album – but I hadn’t actually owned any music until that point.

Most would think this wouldn’t be an important event, but it was. I know because I remember this. With my friend Joe, I purchased Flood on a cold Sunday in the winter, on a day that I would later help my father gather firewood, at Backstreet Records from the shop’s proprietor, Eric. That’s a memory of the event off the top of my head. For comparison’s sake, I can remember maybe three details of my first sexual experience. This tape is important to me.

That tape now sits, along with the other four TMBG albums that I have on tape (they were all purchased on tape long before I purchased them all again on CD), on top of my doorframe at home, under an ancient putter given to me by my grandfather as a gift. Those tapes are some of my most cherished possessions, and while I have considered adding them to my car’s tape collection, I have refrained lest those five cassettes be injured.

I was reminded of all of this (and thank god, I needed a column topic) at last Sunday’s Giants show at Pearl Street. It was only my second Giants show, the first one being a Fall Concert performance at West Virginia University. No offense to my fraternity brothers on campus – Tappa Tappa Kegga, what?!? – but seeing them at home, surrounded by said doofuses, was seeing them in the wrong environment. Seeing them at Pearl Street? Sublime.

Before I get too entangled in this love affair I have with the music of two dorky New Yorkers, let me also say this: you have had the same love affair. Maybe with a song, maybe with a band, maybe with a musical movement, you’ve had the same love affair with one form of music or another. Maybe you want to draw a line between your fandom and mine, but you can’t.

You love music and if somebody held a microphone in your face right now and asked you to name a favorite album, or a favorite singer, or a favorite song, you could do it because you have them. We all do. Maybe we all aren’t obsessed, but we love music. I digress.

My friends and I once sat down to recall the most ridiculous CDs we purchased in pursuit of our favorite band. My friend Rob shelled out 30 bucks for an Iron Maiden interview CD (a CD of nothing more than an interview with the band…little, if any, actual music). Mike had purchased all of the singles Oasis has ever released…ever. Me? I borrowed money from friends once to pay for a TMBG import copy of John Henry that had a six-song live second disc as a bonus. I already had one copy of John Henry, and the six songs on the bonus disc weren’t new, but dammit, they were live versions of the songs, so I had to have it.

This is my fandom. Or at least, it was anyway. I haven’t been a member of a mailing list for years. I haven’t been a member of the fan club ever. I don’t know all the insider They Might Be Giants trivia that the real hardcore fans do. If I’d forgetten this for some reason, I was forced to recognize at Pearl Street. I didn’t know any of the hand motions, or when to sway, or when to chant, or when to do the little dance the weirdo next to me was doing, seemingly only to annoy the bejeezus out of me, as nobody else joined him in his twirlings. I was an outsider at my own show.

In every sense save one: when they played the song “Dead” (track five from Flood), I sang every word. I haven’t listened to Flood in more than a year, maybe more (my copy is horribly scarred and skips on the middle tracks), but I knew every word.

I didn’t even know that I knew every word. I once dated a girl who knew every word to every song ever. Ever. I could never keep up with her, and even if she was flipping the radio stations rapid-fire, she’d know all the lyrics. It was an amazing thing, something I’ve never been able to do. Except for TMBG apparently, because it didn’t matter which song from their first eight albums they played, I knew the lyrics. And I sang them like an idiot.

I realized this early on in the evening’s proceedings, stopping for a moment to check myself and go “you’re the guy who sings at the concert that the snooty fans make fun of.” So I looked around and everybody else was singing as well. Mouthing lyrics, really belting them out, whatever; everybody was doing their damndest to keep up lyrically.

Lest you believe that this phenomenon is native to TMBG fans – if the Iron Maiden and Oasis stories didn’t sway you – see my friend Eric, who can sing Roots songs from memory. Or Aaron, who has traveled across the United States to see Phish. Or Yotam, who seriously celebrates birthdays of Pink Floyd members. Or Julie, who once asked a stranger if he was listening to the Original Cast Recording of Merrily. Or Rachel, who knows everything about Fleetwood Mac. Or Amanda, who can sing Newsies drunk better than almost anybody (save Julie, perhaps).

Or you, with whatever you love, be it Dave Matthews or Ludacris, the

Beatles or Zeppelin, Coltrane or Bach.

Music is the most important thing society has next to oxygen, food, housing andclothing. There is nothing that we, as a people, love more than our music. It is more important than literature or theater or movies or newspapers or any other media. This is not hyperbole; it is gospel truth. Every society known to man has some form of musical expression. They might not have the other medias, but every society has music. Of all the things that unite us, perhaps it is the easiest for us to understand. We, as humanity, love a beat, and everybody’s got one.

Lest this get too romantic, I offer the final quick story. When I got to Pearl Street, I noticed that, standing on one of the platforms in the back of the club, there were two or three young kids, all probably 12 or younger. They were with Mom and Dad, who were clearly going out of their way, especially on a school night. The kids were anxiously awaiting the show, watching some local folk singer who kept saying things like “that was

my song and They Might Be Giants will be out soon,” while taking in the cheers of the crowd that were clearly not for him. I had been worried that the smoke, the noise, the whole of show might not do it for these kids. After all, they probably only knew the recent stuff from Malcolm in the Middle.

At the end of the show, I turned around and, just for a brief second, saw a younger version of myself: awestruck, amazed, and addicted for life.