Where Is My Mind
#14 by The Pixies
Whoa, I don’t think any of us saw that coming! Thanks to everyone who, read, liked, commented, shared, and submitted to last week’s prompt, Holy Water, by The Funeral Portrait. I really enjoyed seeing all the different directions that prompt went😎. Now I have an announcement — Stories from the Jukebox has added a paid tier! Don’t worry, none of the content will be paywalled — get more info here on the About page. I think this’ll benefit all subscribers — for instance look in the top right corner, we’ve got voiceover now!
Week #13 Feature🏆
The Week #13 Feature goes to Bill Ferguson 🇨🇦 for his short story titled, Hold Back The Water. What do you think of this deathbed confession? Could Rob’s friend Sam actually be the notorious D.B. Cooper?
Rob paused with his hand on the door knob. “Well this should be interesting,” he mused with a chuckle. “Morning Sam,” he said as he entered the room. Morning Has Broken by Cat Stevens was playing softly in the background.
“Do you have it?” was the immediate question as he entered the room.
Rob pulled the vial out of his pocket and handed it to him. Sam’s eyes had a crazed look as they went from the vial to Rob and back several times. A smile crossed his face that was rather holy. “Thank you Rob.”
Now here’s this week’s prompt, Where Is My Mind, by the Pixies.
“Where Is My Mind?“ is a song by American alternative rock band Pixies, originally released as the seventh track on their 1988 debut album, Surfer Rosa. (Via Wikipedia)
After receiving initial success upon release, the song saw renewed popularity after being featured in the 1999 film Fight Club. It has become the band’s signature song and has inspired a multitude of covers while several arrangements of the song have been used in various film, television, and video game soundtracks. The song was ranked at No. 493 on Rolling Stone magazine’s 500 Greatest Songs of All Time 2021 list.
The song was written by frontman Black Francis while he attended the University of Massachusetts Amherst, inspired by his experiences while scuba diving in the Caribbean.
Here’s an excerpt from our guest host speaking on that very topic!
“…writer and frontman of Pixies, Black Francis, said the song’s lyrics were inspired by an encounter with a fish when scuba diving — it was small and non-threatening, but it wouldn’t leave him alone, kept nudging him. He said it was a disorienting experience, much like the chord changes in the song. He put story to sound, and eventually it became a cult classic.”
Guitarist Joey Santiago composed the song’s guitar line. He recalled of his part, “This was actually the first thing I tried. A lazy arpeggio that instantly sounded strong and hooky.”
Our song prompt this week is provided by Jennifer N. Haddock, the Everyday Behaviorist — a place where behavior science meets real life. Her new publication Operant Spirituality has quickly become one of my favorites! Learn more about what brings her to Substack here.
I immediately fell in love with Jennifer’s submission, Mindless Brain. I couldn’t imagine a better representation of Radical Behaviorism in combination with the song prompt, Where Is My Mind. And I love how this ties back into the running theme of giving organs agency, be sure to checkout her companion posts!
As your friendly neighborhood behaviorist, I choose: Pixies, “Where is my mind?”
If you’re unfamiliar with this iconic song, for the love of rock, stop what you’re doing and listen!
A Pixies-inspired essay and show notes follow. I get into the song origins later, but it might help to know, the song lyrics mention a little fish trying to talk to a diver, and the repeated lyrics, “Where is my mind?”. It might also help to know that this piece is a continuation of a series of mine, on the topic of giving organs agency: Little Goth Heart and Big-Feel Belly, preceeded it. Please let me know if you enjoy my remix!
Okay, now it’s your turn!
Calling all Poets, Fiction, or Non-Fiction writers that love music — Share your prose of 1500 words or less, using the prompt Where Is My Mind?
Remember:
Each Wednesday I’ll publish a newsletter with that week’s song prompt — along with a featured writer’s submission from the previous week.
Anyone is then free to run with it! Just add the link to your story or prose in the comments of this newsletter.
Subscribers to Stories from the Jukebox, also have a chance to be featured in the following week’s newsletter. And I’ll do my best to give feedback and restack each submission.
There’s always rules:
All forms of prose are welcome, just keep it under 1500 words.
Submissions must be published by midnight on Monday.
Submissions must include a tag/link to this week’s Song Prompt Newsletter embedded within the post.
While anyone is welcome to add their post in the comments at any time — all rules must be followed for a post to be eligible to be featured or shared.
I’m so excited to see what y’all come up with this week!
Thanks for reading this edition of Stories from the Jukebox! If you enjoyed this post, please consider sharing it with your friends and clicking that ❤ button, and I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments. If you’re an email reader, just hit reply—I want to hear from you too!
Don’t like commitments, but still want to support my writing? You can make a one-time contribution here.
Holy Water
Week #13 The Funeral Portrait goes 2-for-2 atop Billboard’s Mainstream Rock Airplay chart, lifting to No. 1 on the June 14-dated survey with “Holy Water.”
The track, which features Five Finger Death Punch vocalist Ivan Moody, is the band’s second Mainstream Rock Airplay ruler in as many entries, following the one-week reign of “Suffocate City,” featuring Ice Nine Kills’ Spencer Charnas, last November.
Not cheating, you nailed it!
When I first read Bill Ferguson's piece, I knew he had a winner. Congratulations, Bill!
I loved Jennifer Haddock's song choice, yet another one that's new to me. Her story sets a high bar to follow, but it will be fun. Life is funny, I discovered that I graduated from UMass about the time that Black Francis was starting!