The Boombox Mystery

In 1997, I was a clueless 13-year old who bought CDs but mainly listened to the singles.

One day I was lying on the carpet of our family room and I reached up to put in "Nine Lives" by Aerosmith. It was the only Aerosmith CD I've ever purchased but I liked the song, "Pink."

I put the disc in, hit the "next track" button to get to track 11, expecting to hear this.

But that's not what I heard. What came out was a mysterious drum beat that sounded far away. A guitar came in and the whole thing sounded vaguely haunted to me. I had never, ever heard this song before.

I looked at my boombox and it said track 11. I was holding the Aerosmith "Nine Lives" jewel case. I knew I put that disc in. I double-checked the back on the case, track 11 is still "Pink."

I didn't want to stop it because I loved this new song and I was worried that I might never hear it again. I didn't how I got it to play and I wouldn't know how to get it back.

I listened to the whole song. And then it went on to track 12. I didn't know what to expect. But on came another song that was clearly not Aerosmith. At this point I hit stop. I had to figure out what happened and see if I could get that song to play again.

I open the lid of my top-loading CD player and what do I see? Aerosmith. Nine Lives. I pick it up and discovered what happened.

I was now holding two discs. I had placed the Aerosmith CD on top of a CD that was already in there, another disc that I already owned. It was Third Eye Blind's self-titled album. Because the laser plays from the bottom, it didn't matter that there was another disc on top, my CD player continue to play Third Eye Blind as if nothing was wrong. Track 11 is called "I Want You."

I had being playing that CD before but I was a clueless 13-year old who mainly listened to the singles. The singles on that CD are arranged 3-4-5-6 so I had never made it to Track 11 at that point. It was a mysterious experience but it opened things up to me. The whole CD is great, and more so, it taught me to listen to the whole album and not just the singles.