I’m currently addicted to cheese. Well, it’s more of a craving, but my fascination with Applewood smoked cheddar is certainly pronounced. It’s a different type of cheese, however, that we’re going to enjoy today: the not-so-guilty-pleasure of anyone who was female and under 15 in the 1980s.
A heatwave was just breaking out the day my parents drove from Brighton to Biarritz, and all the way down on the 21-hour drive I listened to A-ha’s Hunting High And Low because that was the only tape I had on my boxy cassette walkman. I was about 10 years old.
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Suffice to say, we were still driving past the cornfields in Bordeaux when I figured that I never, ever, ever wanted to hear it again. Even so, A-ha have retained a sort of kitschy credibility among fans of 80s synthpop, so if I chose to hear them now, I’d be forgiven.
I’d get no such protection for my main choice of song (Love Is Strange by Mickey & Sylvia), which is forever linked with that holiday. I heard the soundtrack long before I saw the film, for the first time on that campsite in the south of France. Looking at the movie clip now, it reminds me of a sort of Point Break for girls – all dramatic confrontations, tears, and scenery-chewing in idyllic locations. Beaucoup de fromage, et il a bon goût.
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