My cousin Josh was killed when I was 14, and the song "Psycho Killer" reminds me of him every time I hear it.
This not the kind of song Josh would have liked. Josh exclusively listened to punk and had a ripped Ramones shirt he wore almost every time I saw him.
A series of awful circumstances led to me sitting in a crowded limo with four other teenagers, all pallbearers, our shoulders crammed together, all of us sniffling and silently crying. Our parents were all in separate cars, and all four of us were going through the same oppressive, heavy grief.
I didn't know any of these kids, and on the way to the cemetery no one really talked. Most of the music on the radio might as well have been static. But as we pulled into the gravesite this song started to play.
The kid in the front seat started to sing it, and we all joined in. By the time the chorus came on, the French part particularly, we were all singing, laughing, and joking with each other. A much needed moment of laughter in the black.
After the funeral, all of us went our separate ways. But when I hear Pyscho Killer, I think of those boys, now twenty somethings. I thank them for adding some levity to that terrible time.