So how did I get here? Well, that’s a pretty loaded question. No surprise here, it all started in 2000 when my mom and I started watching a new show on The WB. It seemed accessible enough: a mother and daughter trying to figure out life together.

As the credits rolled on that fateful October night, we knew we had a plan for the following Thursday. A tradition was born. It’s a common storyline for people who have been fans since the show originally began airing in 2000.

For the next seven years my mom and I would make every effort possible to be together and watch each episode as it aired on Thursday nights. Even when I moved into a dorm for college and then into my first apartment, we managed to watch almost every episode together. Sometimes with pizza, sometimes with burgers, but always together. I’m not sure my mom knows just how important that time with her was to me during those formative years, but that weekly mother/daughter time is still something I feel extremely lucky to have shared with her.

The second part of my obsession starts much earlier in my life.

I grew up with music. Some of my earliest memories include very specific songs playing over the visuals that flicker in my mind. The music started with my dad. He loves music and was a big reason why it was a constant presence in my life.

We traveled a lot when I was a kid, mostly taking road trips. Both sets of my grandparents lived several hours away and we would visit on the weekends. I’d be hard pressed to think of a time we traveled in the car without music playing. He would tell me stories about the bands when they came on the radio and so began a life-long game of music trivia. The game started simply: name that tune. It evolved into who could identify songs with the least number of notes, which album the song first appeared on and what year the song was released. (This game has become much more difficult with the advent of digital radio, google and smart phones.)

Beyond music in the car, my parents had a fairly sizable record collection. I learned how to use the turntable when I was barely through being a toddler and just able to reach the dials. I’ll never know how much damage I may have caused misplacing and then sliding the needle, but I do know this is where my love of the analog medium begins. As a fairly sentimental person, I like the notion of listening to music the same way my parents and, to some extent, my grandparents did.

As I watched Gilmore Girls, I would recognize songs, catch references and laugh along with my mom. Just a few episodes in, it was clear that my earlier passion for music was being well represented in the writing of my soon-to-be favorite show.

I’ve been collecting records since high school, and I recently realized that a large portion of my collection can be tied back to the soundtrack of Stars Hollow. This realization happened as I compiled a playlist of as many songs as I could catalog (that were also available for streaming) on Spotify. A few of my fellow Gilmore-Girls-obsessed friends pointed out that I have a strangely specific library of information that intertwines music history through the lens of Gilmore Girls… and an Instagram account was born.

After growing a small following there, I decided I needed more room to say all the things that swirl around my brain when I edit down a (often-times too long) caption. So: here I am. I hope someone joins me soon, so I don’t feel like Lane fielding calls for her “drummer seeking rock band” ad.

“No, wait, wait, wait, progressive rock is a really passé style now but I listed it as an influence because it was a progenitor of great things that came afterwards. I mean, I contend that you can draw a straight line from Yes to Jethro Tull to the Jam to Nirvana, bing bang boom… Who are The Jam?”

“These kids have no sense of history!”

Not you, dear reader, not you. You crave ridiculously in-depth analysis of how Lorelai and Rory listen to Macy Gray in episode one but somehow also love Sparks by season four. Okay, maybe I won’t ever dive into that particular trajectory, but I do plan to go episode-by-episode over the soundtrack of this truly brilliant show and the varied musical history of the characters within.

Until I can get organized enough to pull the notebooks full of information I have into something resembling a catalog of songs… or at the very least until I write my first post about the pilot, please tide yourself over by listening to the Spotify playlist I created containing (most of) the songs from the show:

(…before you mention that I left off the Rammstein song from the episode where Christopher arrives driving a Volvo (Season 2, Episode 6 “Presenting Lorelai Gilmore”), I’m aware it’s not there. It’s not there on purpose. Somehow, when I put this playlist on shuffle, Spotify assumes I would like to hear it right after some nice Rosemary Clooney or Grant-Lee Phillips. It bothered me so much I just decided to leave it off the playlist, but I’m sure I’ll add it back in at some point.)