When I heard that Melanie passed away I remembered the song 'Brand New Key' that featured on a compilation record of hits from K-Tel, a Canadian record label that was the soundtrack of my childhood. My mom would pick the records up at the mall where where she worked and they featured a mix of everything from the bubblegum pop to hard rock anthems. 'Brand New Key' always stood out for its lyrics and the pleading earnest way that Melanie delivered them. She sounded honest and sincere and a little desperate. What did the words mean? 

Well I got a brand new pair of roller skates

you got a brand new key

I think we should get together and see

I've been looking around for awhile

You got something for me

What was that 'something'? I wondered. I probably still don't know. But those records and those singers were kind of surrogate authority figures for me - like parents or older siblings who could provide what the world couldn't. I remember staring at the cover photograph of Jim Croce on his Photographs and Memories album asking myself what kind of person he might have been. I didn't even have a photo of Melanie. Just that voice and those lyrics, oddly just as ambiguous and innocent now. The songs were a kind of back gate to the world of adults that was temporarily unlatched when the records played. In one of her songs she sings about wanting to live in a book to escape the world that has become too much for her. When I felt like I couldn't fit in to the world I'd live in those songs for a few hours.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mXlW9LytYo