y high school boyfriend played bass in a series of bands that seemed really cool when I was 17. Until I met him, my record collection ran toward Top 40 with sprinklings of bookworm weird-girl pop like 10,000 Maniacs. But over the next three years, he introduced me to David Bowie and Elvis Costello, which we played in his room while we were making out. In his car, he kept a passel of tapes I now recognize as representing the bass god triumvirate—Rush, Primus, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, with the occasional Steely Dan. What I didn’t appreciate at the time was that he didn’t just love these songs, he was learning them, and their constant rotation in his 1972 Chevy Nova allowed them to soak into his consciousness.

I mention this because I recently discovered I am living next door to a bass player. How do I know? How could I not know? He (an assumption, perhaps) plays the same line over and over again, for hours. Back in my college dorm, the girl across the hall spent an entire weekend learning “Sunshine of Your Love.” It was maddening, but at least it had melody. Listening to a bass line ad nauseam is almost like a spooky kind of hypnosis. The notes vibrate in the wall. I find myself staring into space as it repeats and repeats. Man, somebody get this guy a Chevy Nova already. I’ll spring for the Rush tape.