Entrance Music

Many people have told me they know which song they want played at their funeral, but few have ever had a preference for songs to play at their birth. Ok, both are a bit strange, one you can't do because it's in the past and one you won't be around to enjoy anyway.

Of course, some would argue that the choice of music should really be left to the mother.
Dr. Jeni Worden has some advice on up-beat tracks for mothers, but can have some have mixed results, for example:

I spent the early part of my labour making a mixed tape of Motown, hip hop and rock to keep me energised. While this worked when I had been labouring relatively pain-free for eight hours, I wanted to destroy it as violently as possible when I was exhausted ten hours later.

This illustrates a difference between birth and death songs. While a 12 minute guitar solo might seem a bit indulgent at a funeral, there's a lot more scope for a birth song. Wagner's Ring Cycle wouldn't be totally out of the question. At any rate, choosing a song for the 'big moment' is still tricky. A balance must be struck between the rock and roll celebration of life and the choir-of-angels pretension.

In the end (or is it the beginning?), I'd like to come out rocking. Here are some songs I'd like to emerge to (unfortunately I've taken this rather seriously and none of them are funny puns):

1. It's all too much - The Beatles
2. untitled track (Kick out the Jams) - Rage Against the Machine
3. Le Cinquième As - MC Solar
4. The Blue Mask - Lou Reed
5. Cochise - Audioslave
6. Run Rabbit Junk - Yoko Kanno/Tim Jensen