Chapter 2 of Playlist of the Ancient Dead reveals my and Rashid’s disconnect from the rest of the world. Rashid is so hyper focused on the world of physics; pop culture has passed him by. Pop culture also passed me by. When Weird Al’s Mandatory Fun was released, I had not heard any of the original songs lampooned on the album. My wife created a playlist of all the original videos on YouTube, so I would know what Weird Al was parodying before we watched the comedic versions. I realized the original songs had a couple billion views. Somehow, most of the planet Earth had heard these songs that I was about to hear for the first time.
Why not turn that disconnect from the world of pop culture with an out of place opening credit song? Back in the eighties and nineties, I remember almost every movie having a pointless aerial camera view of urban landscape to a song that didn’t fit the movie. Even Groundhog’s Day, one of my favorite movies ever made had the cityscape credit sequence. I decided to choose a song from the last time I knew anything about popular music (the nineties) to not only have a disconnect with popular music, but also because in the back of my brain I’m hearing Santa Monica to pointless aerial footage of Albuquerque. That is why Rashid is from Santa Monica and not Brooklyn like I had originally wrote. But I think California makes sense. With overbearing parents, of course he’d go across the country for college.
In case pop culture has passed you by here is the song:
Did they break up with each other because they were so nineties?
Time Burrito 