Arts

The Phillipian Playlist: Parents Edition

With the annual Family Weekend welcoming clusters of parents and siblings to campus, this week’s edition of The Phillipian Playlist is on board for experimenting with a different decade of music. From classic ballads to catchy country, parents of current students were asked to share their favorite songs of adolescence—their fond memories of music create a collection of hits that are guaranteed to give listeners “a blast from the past.”

John Rogus, Parent of Class of ’23
“The song ‘Africa’ by TOTO saved my sanity during my freshman year of high school. My carefree best friend, Jason, would constantly make us late for the bus each morning, which always stressed me out. Then, MTV started to play the ‘Africa’ video every day around that dreaded time. It was such a chill song and always put me in a better mood. 40 years later, Africa is a staple on SiriusXM’s Yacht Rock channel, and I still love hearing it. Too bad MTV isn’t a thing anymore.”

Rebecca Tola, Parent of Class of ’24 and ’25
“My favorite song in high school was ‘I Wanna Dance with Somebody’ by Whitney Houston… The song reminds me of good times, goofing around with friends, [and] lots of laughter. I even remember, at my friends house, all of my friends would hang out there every Sunday, and we would crank up this song on their record player…It really was this song that made me fall in love with Whitney and her incredible voice.”

Capri Santiago, Parent of Class of ’24
“One of my favorite songs from Selena was, and is still ‘Bidi Bidi Bom Bom’… It’s really nostalgic to me and brings me back to those places of high school, living carefree, and just enjoying my time with my friends…The song is really important to me because you didn’t see a lot of mainstream Latin artists… so that was really a key point in my life just to know that someone like her that looks like me, actually is on an American English radio station.”

Mark Garret, Parent of Class of ’24
“‘Pickup Truck Song’ by Jerry Jeff Walker…I remember driving around in my friend’s pickup truck in the hill country of Austin, Texas…Jerry Jeff Walker’s lyrics are very simple, and he always said that anybody could sing along and sound good…When I moved to Texas in high school, I didn’t know much about country music, and it sort of represents a chapter in my life that was a formative period.”

Gordon Turnbull, Parent of Class of ’24
“‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’ by Tears for Fears. This was the ’80s, so [it belonged to] maybe the early English new wave…I remember spending a lot of time in the dorm, hanging out with my friends…Classic song, it aged very well, I still play it today. Composition wise, unfortunately I’m not a music theorist, but I really resonated with the melody, and instrumentation.”

Dana Rowland, Parent of Class of ’24
“‘Sweet Dreams (Are Made of These)’ by Eurythmics was a song that I played over and over and over again and probably drove my family crazy…It reminds me of all the friends that I had in elementary school…I think that it was just a song that brings back a lot of memories where friends were hanging out at sleepovers and singing it and having a good time.”

“‘You Give Love a Bad Name’ by Bon Jovi, and it’s about romance gone wrong…It reminds me of being a teenager and just enjoying rock music…[My favorite part is] Richie Sambora’s guitar solo…It’s like the anthem of our family at this point.”