ABSTRACT
It is widely recognised (Frith, 1996; Bennett, 2006: 221; van Dijck, 2009) that the power and potency of popular music is such that it is able to stimulate and maintain memories of an idealised past, most notably through engagement with recorded media. Serving as vehicles for memory (Pickering and Keightley, 2007), songs on different recorded formats can reflect periods of high levels of personal engagement with popular culture, particularly those time frames that encompass youth and early adulthood, and evolve to soundtrack what could be regarded as key stages in the life of the individual (Frith, 1996: 142). However, while such recordings can engender distinctly individual memories, initial engagement with songs of this nature inevitably emanate from within the realms of shared listening experiences and social practice (van Dijck, 2009: 114), with this collective framework serving to blur distinctions between songs that symbolise ‘individual’ or ‘shared’ memory vehicles. Furthermore, the practice of appropriating popular songs to provide soundtracks that epitomise specific generations or periods in history (Burns, 1996), as well as for political purposes and to reflect aspects of nationhood (Frith, 1993: 529), serves to highlight that defining songs can facilitate both autobiographical and collective memories.
