No. 014 - WHAM!’s "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" changed my life
How a dance-inducing song helped awaken the artist in Matthew Miller
🌸 A Grace favorite
This Song Changed My Life is an independent music publication featuring essays from people all around the world about the songs that mean the most to them. Created by Grace Lilly, supported by readers.
• 5 min read •
When I tell someone that I was raised in the Mennonite church, I’ve learned to contextualize it by adding that I owned a car, watched TV and wore pants with zippers.
People tend to be surprised that the Mennonite community, far from being one-size-fits-all, exercises a diversity of lifestyles, norms and belief systems.
My upbringing was undeniably conservative, deeply rooted in traditional values, and anchored in the rural, blue-collar backdrop of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. Many of my friends were from farming families or lived on farms, as mine did.
My three brothers and I were raised doing chores, instilled with traditional notions of masculinity, played football and listened strictly to country and Christian music.
There was a small window of time when I was about 3 or 4 years old when my parents were still listening to the music of their youth and playing Top 40 pop music in the car and around the house. It was during this time that a transformative song swept into my life, WHAM!'s "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go."
Upon my first time hearing it, “Jitterbug,” as I came to nickname it, became my absolute favorite song. The first few notes of the song would propel me out of any seat, unleashing a whirlwind of ecstatic gyrations and spinning on the floor.
My parents were so amused by my exuberance that they carried a cassette tape of the song wherever our family went, showcasing my spontaneous dance moves to friends. I reveled in the attention, I was a miniature George Michael!
These moments became a spectacle. I took dancing to “Jitterbug” very seriously and immersed myself in all things WHAM!: memorizing all of their songs, studying their photos and posters and imitating their fashion and hairstyles (lots of hairspray!).
While dancing, I earnestly kept my body in rhythm with the song and copied some of the breakdance moves I had been seeing on TV. Dancing to this song was exhilarating. Of course, the paradox of a little Mennonite boy cutting a rug to “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go” is also amusing.
My parents eventually tightened the reins on our exposure to music and pop culture. I also learned to be self-conscious and to fit in with the other boys around me.
Dancing, much less dancing to WHAM!, was not the best way to conform to the masculine norms of my upbringing. When I heard “Jitterbug” in subsequent years, it still sparked excitement within me, but I had learned restraint.
Many years later, as a sophomore in high school at a school dance, a friend of mine physically pulled me onto the dance floor. Everyone was watching and laughing, I couldn’t tell if it was with me or at me, but I was embarrassed. He cleared some space and began encouraging me.
He began showing me how to confidently dance to the beat - he showed me how to start with the shoulders and then let the rest of the body follow. It clicked, it all came back, I was the exuberant 4 year old again. It had never left my body. I would never miss a high school dance after that, my wallflower days were over.
I have always loved dancing and still do.
This “Jitterbug” episode super early in my life is curious to me. Was I born with a desire to perform, to express myself in front of others and to make art? Is everyone born with this? Did WHAM! lead me down this path? How does one even become an artist? Am I reading meaning into a goofy childhood phase?
I constantly wonder why and how I became an artist. Normally, I reach for reasons that suggest art has chosen me, like a cosmic force plucking me out of the masses. Other times though, and maybe more accurately, my path to becoming an artist seems totally arbitrary.
I don’t have a clear answer, but I believe that it was a whole series of moments like my “Jitterbug” phase that shaped my identity, personality and interests.
Dancing to “Jitterbug” was the first of many periods in my life that, while maybe not independently very significant, all add up to an artist.
Art self-replicates. A 4-year-old Mennonite boy encountered art, in this case a WHAM! song, and it awakened an artist in him. ◆
About Matthew
Matthew Miller is an artist who lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. He spends most of his evenings and weekends in his Brooklyn studio making paintings about portraiture. By day, Matthew works for Saks.com on the Business Operations team. His parents and wife, Claire, are the biggest supporters of his art.
Instagram @matthewmillernyc
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