100 years ago before the internet was a thing, I used to scour record stores for one thing...

The Ferris Bueller's Day Off Soundtrack. Specifically the instrumental version of Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want.

Don't ask me why. I can't tell you. All I know is - when I first saw the film... the museum montage moved me profoundly and I don't know why. The song has been a bit of a personal hymn ever since... and I wanted it. I didn't know it was The Dream Academy. A few years later I bought a Smiths tape and was pleased to find the song on there. But it wasn't the version that meant something to me. I wanted that song from the film.

I'm not saying I looked at one or two record stores a few times. I'm not suggesting I looked a dozen times. I imagine I've spent hundreds of hours scouring record stores/flea markets/thrift stores just hoping against hope to find that bastard.

No record store employee knew anything about it. They could never figure out a way to order it out of their gigantic CATALOG BOOKS. They would call their suppliers. None of them even seemed to know the song I was referring to. Just years of nothing. Nothing. Back then there was no magical google box for me or anyone else to ask.

It wasn't until years later... like 2007 or something... that I realized the Ferris Bueller Soundtrack was never released. I read a blog post a few years ago that Cameron Crowe released a limited pressing of a hand assembled soundtrack from the film (because he was a fan or something) but I can't find the reference.

Round about 2000 when Napster came along I stole the song... but that only stole some of the magic.