Hawa Recommends: “More Than This,” by Roxy Music

Warm yet wistful with lyrics alluding to lighthearted longing, Roxy Music’s “More Than This” is what nostalgia sounds like. You hear not only a fondness for some past time, but also the wisened sense of time’s inevitable passing — an awareness of the present always becoming lost to the past. The song, though, has a whimsical touch, as if its singer — having been transported by a daydream to meet his younger version— knows there’s no point in warning his former self that youth is fleeting. He knows the only way to grasp the ephemeral nature of youth is to go through the motions of outliving it.

It was fun for a while
There was no way of knowing
Like a dream in the night
Who can say where we’re going

Vivid yet illusory, memory is a kind of virtual reality. Press play and relive your own . . .