Songs can be gateways into worlds or other ways of being. Sometimes they're poignant, beautiful reflections. Sometimes they're incessantly optimistic pick-me-ups, challenges to be happy. And, at other times they're those weird dance tracks that say the same...

Part One: A writer is someone who writes, right? In my teens, I kept notebooks which recorded thoughts and feelings and the ‘goings on’ in my wild, rock ‘n’ roll life as a nerd. I thought that ‘writing out’ problems would help me fix them, or purge them, or at least understand them—and I hoped […]