Advice from a song (with a backstory)

🎵 Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

Welcome to this week’s issue. I’m glad you’re here.

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As graduation season arrives this month, I am reminded of a song that I first heard many years ago that has stayed with me ever since.

Photo by MD Duran on Unsplash

The Song

In the spring of 1999, a new song started to get airtime on local radio. It was catchy—noticeable in how different it sounded from anything else on the air that spring. It was spoken word. The lyrics were encouraging. It was engaging. Also, I had absolutely no idea who the artist was, nor even what the name of the song was. For weeks, I listened to the radio, hoping to hear the full song and hear a DJ intro the track so I could go buy it.

It would be years later when I would finally figure it out and buy the single on iTunes. The song? Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen) by Baz Luhrmann.

What I wouldn’t know until later — much later — was the role a local radio station (KNRK 94.7 FM) in Portland, Oregon had in making this song a hit in the United States. From the New York Times:

After great success Down Under, the disk was released in the United States last spring and the tune went nowhere, largely because it took 7 minutes and 4 seconds to play. But then KNRK-FM, an alternative station in rainy Portland, Ore., sensed hit, edited out an extraneous vocal riff and started playing it at a cool 4:30. “It's definitely the most requested song we have now,” says the station's program director, Mark Hamilton.

The Backstory

The song’s backstory is even crazier. It began as a satirical commencement speech in a column published June 1, 1997 in the Chicago Tribune by Mary Schmich. Later, it became attributed to Kurt Vonnegut as his commencement speech at MIT in 1997. Only thing is, he didn’t actually deliver the commencement speech at MIT in 1997; Kofi Annan, then-current Secretary-General of the United Nations, did. No matter, the “speech” went viral via email. Kurt Vonnegut’s own wife, photographer Jill Krementz, forwarded it on to a lot of people, including Vonnegut’s kids. The New York Times reported at the time, “I have to say that I tend to get rid of those kinds of things really fast," said Barbara Reiss, a 32-year-old psychotherapist in Manhattan, who received it Thursday. “In this particular case, I thought it was poignant enough to forward it to, I don't know, a whole lot of friends whom I believed would appreciate it.’”

One person who received it was Baz Luhrmann, an Australian film director, producer, writer and actor. According to OpenCulture:

He, along with Anton Monsted and Josh Abrahams, decided to use it for a remix he was working on but was doubtful he could get Vonnegut’s  permission. While searching for the writer’s contact information, Luhrmann discovered that Schmich was the actual author. He reached out to her and, with her permission, recorded the song the next day.

Go deeper:

• Real ‘sunscreen speech’ author sets record straight (MIT News)

• The Sunscreen Song: The class of '99 (BBC World Service The Documentary - 50 minutes, fascinating)

• Two Years Later, Mary Schmich's Mock Graduation Speech Continues To Inspire (Seattle Times)

Baz Luhrmann was quoted in March 1999 in the Washington Post as saying, “What I think is extraordinary, apart from the inherent values in the ideas, is that we were experiencing ourselves a historical moment in the life of the Internet, an example of how massive publishing power is in the hands of anyone with access to a PC.”

Indeed. Also, still true.

🎵Everybody’s Free (To Wear Sunscreen)

The complete song is embedded below (via YouTube) and the full lyrics are below.

• If you’ve never heard this song before, I encourage you to take five minutes and listen to it. Listen carefully. It will impact you.

• If you’ve heard the song before, but it’s been a while, I encourage you to listen to it again and see how it hits you today. What stands out?

• If you love this song, please share it with someone who could benefit from it.

Lyrics

Ladies and gentlemen of the class of '99
Wear sunscreen

Photo by Onela Ymeri on Unsplash

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it
A long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists
Whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable
Than my own meandering experience, I will dispense this advice now

Enjoy the power and beauty of your youth, oh, never mind
You will not understand the power and beauty of your youth
Until they've faded, but trust me, in 20 years, you'll look back
At photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now
How much possibility lay before you and how fabulous you really looked
You are not as fat as you imagine

Photo by Lesly Juarez on Unsplash

Don't worry about the future
Or worry, but know that worrying
Is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing Bubble gum
The real troubles in your life
Are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind
The kind that blindsides you at 4 p.m. on some idle Tuesday
Do one thing every day that scares you

Saying, don't be reckless with other people's hearts
Don't put up with people who are reckless with yours

Floss

Photo by Clay LeConey on Unsplash

Don't waste your time on jealousy
Sometimes you're ahead, sometimes you're behind
The race is long and in the end, it's only with yourself
Remember compliments you receive, forget the insults
If you succeed in doing this, tell me how
Keep your old love letters, throw away your old bank statements

Stretch

Don't feel guilty if you don't know what you want to do with your life
The most interesting people I know
Didn't know at 22 what they wanted to do with their lives
Some of the most interesting 40-year-olds I know still don't
Get plenty of calcium
Be kind to your knees
You'll miss them when they're gone

Maybe you'll marry, maybe you won't
Maybe you'll have children, maybe you won't
Maybe you'll divorce at 40, maybe you'll dance the 'Funky Chicken'
On your 75th wedding anniversary
Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much
Or berate yourself either
Your choices are half chance, so are everybody else's

Photo by Vinicius "amnx" Amano on Unsplash

Enjoy your body, use it every way you can

Don't be afraid of it or what other people think of itIt's the greatest instrument you'll ever ownDance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your own living roomRead the directions even if you don't follow themDo not read beauty magazines, they will only make you feel ugly

Get to know your parents, you never know when they'll be gone for good
Be nice to your siblings, they're your best link to your past
And the people most likely to stick with you in the future

Understand that friends come and go
But a precious few, who should hold on

Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle
For as the older you get
The more you need the people you knew when you were young
Live in New York City once but leave before it makes you hard
Live in northern California once but leave before it makes you soft

Travel

Photo by JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash

Accept certain inalienable truths
Prices will rise, politicians will philander, you too, will get old
And when you do, you'll fantasize that when you were young
Prices were reasonable, politicians were noble
And children respected their elders

Respect your elders

Don't expect anyone else to support you
Maybe you have a trust fund, maybe you'll have a wealthy spouse
But you never know when either one might run out

Don't mess too much with your hair
Or by the time you're 40 it will look 85

Be careful whose advice you buy but be patient with those who supply it
Advice is a form of nostalgia, dispensing it is a way of fishing the past
From the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts
And recycling it for more than it's worth

But trust me on the sunscreen

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Nigel Andrew Swanston / Tim Cox
Everybody's Free lyrics © DistroKid, Peermusic Publishing

If you just listened to this song, what resonated with you? Share in the comments.

Thanks for reading. I hope you have a great weekend!

-Bryce