I recently learned through a viral post by John Green here that he and I share something in common the almost complete and utter lack of ability to visualize and see a picture in my mind. When someone tells me to close my eyes and picture something I “picture” the words, or feelings, or ideas associated with what I am supposed to be seeing, but don’t have any visual element integrated.

It is fascinating to think about how all our different brains work and how we really don’t know much at al about how we function. I don’t know if John Green and I share this in common, but I have strong confirmation that what I am about to describe as it relates to earworms and music is also different for a whole host of people.

Do you ever have a song, or phrase, get really ingrained in your head and you cannot stop singing it? Does a small word from someone in a sentence activate a full song in your brain with the melody, lyrics, etc…? Do you find music is constantly running as background in your brain throughout the day? Me too!

I want to separately describe two earworms I have had in my head for more than a decade, but first I guess I should give a little background on how folks think this whole earworm thing works. “Recurring tunes that involuntarily pop up and stick in your mind are common: up to 98% of the Western population has experienced these earworms.1 Usually, stuck songs are catchy tunes, popping up spontaneously or triggered by emotions, associations, or by hearing the melody. Etiologically, earworms are related to memory: auditory information functions as a strong mnemonic.”

“Psychologically, earworms are a ‘cognitive itch’: the brain automatically itches back, resulting in a vicious loop. The more one tries to suppress the songs, the more their impetus increases, a mental process known as ironic process theory. Those most at risk for SSS are: females, youth, and patients with OCD.”

Statistics show that songs with lyrics account for 73.7% of earworms, while instrumental music may only account for 7.7%. So the last time you had the tune for Spanish Flea, or The Girl from Ipanema you were in the minority.

I have two tunes which have been stuck in my head for years. The first is the lead track off the second album by Poco from 1970, Hurry Up. Poco is mostly known as a soft rock country-tinged band with hits like heart of the night and crazy love. Hurry Up has this amazingly catchy riff which is when the pedal steel player in the band, Rusty Young, plays through a rotating leslie speaker. It makes the sound like a keyboard in the most amazing way. The song, Hurry Up, also has an amazing guitar solo from Jim Messina right before he started a fruitful relationship with Kenny Loggins. The song also has these vocal harmonies that just stick in your head. I find myself singing it regularly still, but I had a few months period maybe seven years ago where I would listen to the song on repeat for days.

The other song is a more recent number, in the sense it was recorded in my lifetime. The song is the title track off the 1998 Phish album, The Story of the Ghost. I have liked Phish from the moment I first heard them in the very early 90’s and have seen the band easily more than any other band. You can often find me walking around my house saying the opening words to the song, I feel I never told you the story of the ghost. There is something about the lyrics and the “cow-funk” era of Phish with the bass/guitar/keyboard interplay which makes the song super sticky in my brain. It certainly helps that they turned this into an amazing jam vehicle going forward for the next 25 years, but I am particularly attached to the versions from the first year or two.

What is getting stuck in your head?