Ace of Spades

 

Music can really invoke some serious emotions. This past weekend, while I was getting into it on the Lucas Avenue Turnpike, my playlist really gave me a solid run on the old feels. It was a beautiful afternoon, in the mid fifties and fairly overcast, what I would consider perfect riding weather. This is due to my preference for wearing full gear while riding and also not having the sun glare obstructing my vision. As my playlist ran through its usual cycle of the Cramps, Misfits, Suicidal Tendencies and the like, Motorhead's classic "Ace of Spades" came cranking through my speakers.

A familiar feeling began to course through my veins, a little bit like an electrical fire pumping along my arterial system. It wasn't the speed or the volume that did it, but a sort of reverie, bringing me back about seven or eight years. The same time that Lemmy passed on, my band Yosemite Slam had started playing a cover of "Ace of Spades" at all of our live shows. This was back in Las Vegas where we were gigging with solid regularity. 

Every time we played this song, I would get that same electrical charge, adrenaline pumping through my system as I slapped that blistering rhythm on my stand up bass and growled out Lemmy's words, trying to at once to pay tribute to the band without trying to impersonate them while putting on our own personal flavor on to a beloved classic. The crowds always seemed to love it just as much as we did, so we knew we were doing it justice.

So here I was, cutting the curves on a fairly new blacktopped lane, dotted with autumnal trees in steep banking slopes, and Lemmy's voice was pumping in these little surges and jolts of fight or flight. Every time I leaned into a turn, my engine seemed to sync perfectly with the chugging rhythm of the band, building up this hard charging nostalgia for those wondrous times on stage and transferring that feeling into something that made a 55mph lean feel like I was maxing out on a GP track.

Yeah man, music can really do something to the soul. So can a bike ride. What a feeling to add a soundtrack to the cruise.