I have this memory of my mother sitting on the living room floor by the hi-fi with a stack of jewel cases nearby. She’s wearing thin, foam-padded, on-ear headphones; the flat, thin silver metal band contrasts with her dark hair. Bleeding through the air, I can hear the tinny sound of Matchbox 20’s Yourself Or Someone Like You, Soul Asylum’s Grave Dancers Union, or maybe Bon Jovi’s Crush, accompanied by the sibilance and clicks of my mom silently mouthing the lyrics along with every track. She’s neither whispering, nor singing; just silently enjoying every note, with each word on her lips.

It’s easy to treat music as a background element while going about the day, but I’ve found so much fulfillment in sitting with an album and giving it undivided attention; listening to every lyric, deconstructing every layer of the mix, finding every nuanced synth or percussion hit or guitar melody or double-tracked vocal line. I try to notice how some sounds may cross between left and right channels, or how melodies and basslines stack and compliment one another. I’ll listen to the drum fills used, and try to pick out the variants of toms and cymbals struck to make each intricate fill.

The first time I recognized synths in Blink-182’s “All The Small Things”, or the sound of stacks of money being thumbed through in the hook of Biggie’s “Warning,” it was like I was listening to these songs all over again for the first time.

And speaking of listening to music for the first time, that’s a special opportunity.