Rock n’ Roll Déjà Vu

​Do you occasionally take notice of the fact that there is a song playing in your head?  When this happens to me, I can sometimes quickly connect the experience with a song that I recently heard on the radio, at the gym etc.  But, on other occasions, I find that it is a complete mystery.  Through my dream journaling practice, and especially a recent Billy Idol dream (described below), I’ve come to realize that the original source of the song in my head at least occasionally comes from a dream.

Over the years, I’ve recorded dozens of dreams that involve rock stars or concerts.

​In one of my Billy Joel dreams, Billy appeared as a much younger version of himself.  Concluding that I had traveled back in time, I walked up to Billy and hilariously told him: “I’m from the future”.  The sheer absurdity of the situation eventually triggered me to become lucid in the dream.

​I once dreamed that I was in a church, with none other than James Brown seated in the pews not far from me.  As the service came to an end, James suddenly bursts into song.  I’ve encountered Michael Jackson several times in my dreams.  In one dream, he exited the scene by doing back flips and cartwheels.  In another, Michael started breakdancing in front of me.  For me, I think both James Brown and Michael Jackson represent the idea of spontaneous creativity.
 
I once dreamed that I was talking with Axel Rose (such a symbolically potent dream figure name!).  We decided to exchange contact info and he gave me his cell phone number.  However, I could not remember this phone number upon waking.  If I had, it would have been cool to “honor the dream” and try the phone number.
 
I’ve had several Bono dreams including one where Bono appeared as a very sharp dressed tailor, with a tailor’s measuring tape wrapped around his neck.  Thus, for me, Bono may represent the idea of the precise execution of one’s art form.

Sammy Hagar is my most frequently recurring rock star dream figure.  I’ve come to understand that he represents the idea of being authentic, “singing my heart out” and not being afraid to “get on a stage” and express myself to others (like I am doing with this website).  Sometimes, however, I think that I dream about Sammy simply because I love his music.  In one dream, I was at his show and singing along to I Can’t Drive 55.

Looking over my dream journal, some of my other rock star dream encounters have included Pit Bull, Ice-T, Bruce Springsteen, Weird Al Yankovic, Darius Rucker, Jon Bon Jovi, Stevie Wonder, Bob Seger, Eddie Van Halen, Taylor Swift, David Lee Roth, Susanna Hoffs, Stephen Pearcy, and Rod Stewart. Quite a roster!

​Just this week, I dreamed that I was attending a Billy Idol concert at a small club.  This was Idol’s first appearance as a dream figure in my 12+ years of active dream journaling.  About 4 years prior to this dream, I listened to Billy Idol’s brutally honest autobiography.  It’s a wildly entertaining book, filled with tales of the birth of the punk rock movement and, of course, Idol’s over-the-top indulgences with sex, alcohol and drugs.  Not surprisingly, some of Idol’s superabundant debauchery filtered into my dream.  

While not X-rated, the dream became NC-17 when Idol’s band was joined on stage by a group of topless women.  Attempting to record as many details as I could upon waking from this dream, I tried to recall, without initial success, the song that was being performed at the show.  I then suddenly realized that I already had Billy Idol’s Rebel Yell playing in my head.  This led me to conclude that Rebel Yell must have been the song being performed in the dream.  This experience caused me to speculate about how frequently my dreams are the source of the otherwise unexplainable songs that I find playing in my head.

If I were being more accurate with my borrowing from the French language, I should have titled this blog post Rock n’ Roll Déjà Rêvé instead of Rock n’ Roll Déjà Vu, as the French language actually offers us two separate but closely related ideas.  Déjà vu translates as “already seen” whereas déjà rêvé translates as “already dreamed”.  I note this because I’ve come to understand that many of my déjà vu experiences can be more precisely and accurately understood as déjà rêvé.   
 
I had an interesting precognitive dream experience in 2011 that illustrates the déjà rêvé principle.  In waking life, I was out running errands on a Saturday.  My wife texted me with the suggestion that we reactivate our Costco membership, and I added this task to my agenda.  As I was walking into Costco, I crossed paths with my friend Stacy* as she was exiting Costco with a full cart.  Stacy was a commercial banker that I had known for many years.  It was a seemingly random encounter and she mentioned to me that this was her first ever trip to Costco.  After a brief conversation, we went our separate ways.  But, the encounter triggered a strong sense of déjà vu for me.  Then I suddenly experienced a dream download.  That morning, I had recorded two dreams in my journal.  I now spontaneously remembered a third dream and this one featured Stacy.  In the suddenly recalled dream, Stacy was looking for a new banking job and I had walked into the office of another banker with a copy of her resume.
 
A couple of takeaways from this experience at Costco:
• It reminded me of the importance of having a steady dream journaling practice.  By journaling my dreams on a regular basis, I am effectively exercising my dream recall muscles.  I am building a bridge between my waking mind and my subconscious mind.  If I had not been journaling my dreams, I think my experience at Costco would have simply left me with a vague and unexplained sense of déjà vu.  Instead, I was able to have a fuller experience by recalling the dream that triggered the déjà vu feeling.
• This experience was different than my other precognitive dreams.  On the one hand, you could say that I dreamed about Stacy and then I encountered her at Costco.  But, as far as my waking mind was concerned, I first encountered Stacy at Costco and only afterwards recalled that I had dreamed about her that same morning.  As with my other precognitive dream experiences, I’m led to question the true nature of time, as there was another part of me that appeared to know about my encounter with Stacy prior to my waking reality encounter with her.
 
Dream on and rock on, my friends!
 
* Named changed for privacy purposes