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Ok, so I’ve never actually never seen Pretty In Pink. I only have the most basic grasp of what the movie is about. I know there is a guy named Ducky and he wears all sorts of awesome clothes and he’s really funny. I know that Molly Ringwald is in this and she’s really good at expressing sad faces and general disappointment. And there’s this other dude Andrew McCarthy that kind of looks like a serial rapist in the same vein as Ted Bundy. I’m not sure what Andrew McCarthy does but I think Molly Ringwald really digs him despite the fact that Ducky is obviously cooler, with his sick threads and pompadour hairdo.
And to tell you truth it’s not that I haven’t had the chance to watch the movie. Molly has the DVD and by judging her movie habits I’d estimate she’s seen it somewhere in the ballpark of 200 times. That’s a conservative estimate. No, I’ve been waiting to see it because I’ve been afraid that it will ruin the soundtrack for me.
Until I picked this album up yesterday from a guy selling records out of a horse barn in Covington I’d only heard the soundtrack at one other location: Christy’s Rathskeller in Clifton. For those who haven’t been there I’ll give a brief description. The rathskeller is positioned beneath Lenhardt’s German/Hungarian restaurant which inhabits a 19th century mansion built by a Cincinnati Beer Baron from the Moerlein family. As you’d expect from a Germanic demi-castle the basement is dark, dank and smothered in fine wood appointments. Strewn across the walls are pictures from the early 90s of the bar’s patrons donning large metal-rimmed glasses, new jean shorts, and ill-fitting BUM equipment sweatshirts. For some reason, along with their barfly exposé, Christy’s never got around to updating their jukebox since the first Gulf War.
The rathskeller’s jukebox has a copy of the Pretty In Pink Soundtrack. I am a hopeless jukebox hero. Can’t get enough of it. I’m also a sucker for 80s prom songs. So of course I would play something from this disc almost every time I slipped a $5 into the slot. After a few drinks of Wild Turkey and Ginger ale I’d fade away into my past where I had my first encounter with cool in the 80s…..
I was 5 years old in the first half of 1988. In my neighborhood there was a teenage girl who thought it would be a good idea to ask her crush to prom by putting together a jar full of candy with a note attached that stated “Will you go to the prom with me because omg your butt is, like, SO rotund” as an invitation. Of course she was too nervous to deliver said invitation personally so I was chosen for the task. I don’t really know why it seemed like a good idea to send a 5-year-old boy into a classroom before first bell with a memorized poem and a jar full of jellybeans to talk to a high school boy but it was the 80s and things were different back then. Everyone was living the satin dream. Anyway, I forgot the poem as soon as I stepped in the room and just handed this jar of jellybeans to a dude who looked twice as confused as I was. I don’t know if they went to the dance, it doesn’t really matter.
What does matter is that my impression of cool was formed from what I saw when I walked through the halls of that high school in Sandy City, Utah. Big hair, big shoulder pads, tight pants, baggy shirts, maybe some hip kid was rocking the first run of LA Gears. Neon fabric as far as the eye can see. Basically, everyone wanted to look like the cover of this album. Frump on top, party on the bottom.
I’m deathly afraid that when I watch Pretty In Pink my memory of what cool was will be washed away and replaced by Andrew McCarthy’s unsettling upper lip. It will just sit there on my lobes, twitching, eyeing me with imaginary mustache eyes. I just hope the soundtrack and I can still be friends after her best friend Andrew forces his sweaty paw down my pants after I pass out from too much sparkling wine while attending the Fancy Town Ball. My tears will be infinite.
Track List
1. Orchestral Maneouvres In The Dark – If You Leave
2. Suzanne Vega w/ Joe Jackson – Left Of Center
3. Jesse Johnson – Get To Know Ya
4. INXS – Do Wot You Do
5. The Psychedelic Furs – Pretty In Pink
6. New Order – Shellshock
7. Bolouis Some – Round, Round
8. Danny Hutton Hitters – Would It Be Good
9. Echo & The Bunnymen – Bring On The Dancing Horses
10. The Smiths – Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want
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Download Pretty In Pink Soundtrack HERE
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