May 20, 2001

2:42 AM

No link here, sorry. I was thinking today of experiences that give me or have given me chills up my spine. When I was young, the national anthem did it for me. What gives it to you?
posted by ttrendel (38 comments total)

Saying the word murder.

Mur-der. MUR-DER.

Getting chills is good...especially when you're sunburnt.
posted by thebigpoop at 2:52 AM on May 20, 2001

i get chills when i hear the white noise coming from my television set, like when there isn't any progam on. it's noise from the beginning of time. it's our creation we are hearing. it's wack! but then i start to hear those voices. and i have to turn it off. oh....and i get chills when i hear abba too!!!
posted by billybob at 3:00 AM on May 20, 2001

I get chills when I hear styrofoam squeaking....

::Shiver::
posted by Redgie at 3:10 AM on May 20, 2001

This may sound a bit hackneyed, but the scene in PT Anderson's film Magnolia when all of the characters sing along with the Aimee Mann song 'Save Me' gives me chills. It also makes me cry like a god damned little girl.
posted by toddshot at 3:15 AM on May 20, 2001

Hey, wait. Are we talking "good" chills, like when I listen to J.S. Bach's Double Violin Concerto in D minor? Or "BAAAD" chills, like when I'm all alone in the office and I suddenly hear voices in the room next to me that I KNOW is empty?
posted by brownpau at 3:33 AM on May 20, 2001

I hate to sound deep, but...

I get chills whenever I hear the word 'infinite'...

I always start thinking about it, trying to wrap my brain around the concept, and...

Shudder
posted by Opus Dark at 3:36 AM on May 20, 2001

> Hey, wait...

That's something like what I was just going to ask.

When you say "chills," do you mean that the national anthem (which one?) frightened you or that it made you tingle (not tinkle) with excitement? Was it spine-chilling or did it send a shiver up (or down?) your spine? It's a real question; I just went through a few printed and online dictionaries and I can't find the definition I think you mean, though there are some web pages that use in it the way you probably mean.

Anyway, back in the fourth grade, one girl in class knew how to physically induce a pleasant spinal shiver -- to send a tingle up someone's spine. I've forgotten her technique, but I think it involved some thumps and strokes along the spine and then a final touch on the back of the neck. She had a line of kids standing in the schoolyard waiting their turn to get a touch of that weird distant lightning.

Now I get it from nostalgia and music and poetry.
posted by pracowity at 4:25 AM on May 20, 2001

I was get chills when I hear someone saying my first name when they arn't talking about me. Which is wierd, because in this world, there seems only to be one person with my full name.
posted by feelinglistless at 4:56 AM on May 20, 2001

I was get chills

Bizarre mind to finger typing errors as well oviiousleey
posted by feelinglistless at 5:25 AM on May 20, 2001

A Good Humor ice cream truck. Not the ice cream, just the truck.
posted by davewiner at 5:37 AM on May 20, 2001

Those really intense chills are almost like a type of sexual pleasure in their all-encompassing nature. Certain music can really give me a chill, usually a really moving classical piece or something. And walking down the road at night and suddenly hearing four or five owls calling out at once right above you can do it as well. I sometimes go for walks at night and there is a wooded area that I walk through. I have seen coyotes, possoms, skunks, owls, rattlesnakes, racoons and every other sort of little creature. But it is the sounds that always make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. No matter how many times you walk through the woods, you always hear something new. It really is an amazing thing.
posted by bargle at 5:41 AM on May 20, 2001

There was one time (one time), back when I was a teenager, I was sitting in my room and playing my guitar for hours upon hours (as I often did back then), and I played something I thought to be so amazing that I sent chills down my own spine. I had to take a moment and regain myself.

That was weird. And I'm not that great, so it only happened once. Now it happens whenever I hear other people play something I think is amazing.
posted by lizardboy at 6:16 AM on May 20, 2001

When someone proposes marriage in a movie, and the other person tearfully accepts -- that usually gives me chills.

It can't be any movie. It has to be a good movie, and I have to be emotionally invested in the characters. But when all the elements are there, I get shivery all over. My eyes well up, and a huge smile grows on my face.

And it always surprises me, because though I'm happily married, I don't have any sort of belief in "the sanctity of marriage." Still, this logical part of me can be trumped by a good proposal scene. Especially if it's the payoff after a lot of romantic tension.
posted by grumblebee at 6:39 AM on May 20, 2001

Well, speaking of childhood, and of spooky chills, I remember the summer of '68 as a child, and the TV news was filled with constant reports on the "Co-ed Murders" occurring in the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti area at the time. I was only in the third grade, so I wasn't even sure what a Co-ed was, but it seemed to be the lead-off story on the 6 o'clock news for months, and scared the heck out of me (even though Ann Arbor was an hour away from us). Every time I heard the TV News musical intro, I got chills, and a sick feeling in my stomach.

As a postscript, John Norman Collins would later be convicted of the Co-ed killings, though he still claims innocence.
posted by Oriole Adams at 7:07 AM on May 20, 2001

I can't remember any chills up the spine experiences (blame it on the surgery and the stainless steel rods, I guess). But if I happen to think about being seriously hurt or killed, or if I'm wandering around in the dark by myself and feel vulnerable, I get tingling and a definite weakness in my lower legs (nothing above the knees -- just the calves/shins).
posted by maudlin at 7:32 AM on May 20, 2001

"Bad" chills: thinking there is a reptile nearby, even behind inch thick glass. For a gay guy to be afraid of snakes, well, there's gotta be a Ph.D. thesis in that somewhere...

"Good" chills (in which I reveal what I consider to be one of my most embarrassing traits): The shot in Steven Speilberg's E.T. when E.T. is on the table and Elliott is crying and there's all those faceless, uncaring medical guys around - and the potted plant droops over and dies. Weep like a baby, every eff-ing time. Same film, downstream of that shot, Elliott's laughter-through-tears as the flowers come "back to life." Sigh. What a freakin' sap... I can't even watch the movie with other adults because I'm so completely incapable of not weeping through that.
posted by m.polo at 8:00 AM on May 20, 2001

Towers of Dub...
posted by timb at 8:10 AM on May 20, 2001

Bad chills: a legit email makes it all the way through my filters and into my inbox, and I've never seen or heard of the sender before. (Why are you writing me!!! feeling.)

Good chills: Finishing a long and time-consuming console game (one of the FF series will do), or watching the end of a movie with an orchestral score, or just going to the symphony, and the music just swells up majestically... I'm a sucker for dramatic music.
posted by darukaru at 8:32 AM on May 20, 2001

I still get it from the National Anthem. Tears too.
posted by steve_high at 8:49 AM on May 20, 2001

I still get it from the National Anthem. Tears too.
posted by steve_high at 8:50 AM on May 20, 2001

I got chills just yesterday afternoon, when they started playing "Pomp and Circumstance" as my graduating class marched toward the culmination of five years of really, really hard work. Got 'em again as they called my name and I walked across the stage to receive my doctorate. Getting them right now as I write this and realize that it is finally all over.

Wheeew!
posted by apollo at 9:03 AM on May 20, 2001

No link here, sorry.

Listen, folks, this post just doesn't belong here. MeFi guidelines state specifically:

Make sure you're linking to something on the web. If you're posting a generalized question to the audience, or posting a comment as a main thread, either find an appropriate mailing list, or use MetaTalk.

RTFM!
posted by jpoulos at 9:05 AM on May 20, 2001

Yeah, I'm a sucker for dramatic music. The climax of Disc 1 of FF7 had me bawling the first time I ever saw it. The Final Battle in Disc 3 had me cheering, and the endgame was wonderful.

The song "Hymn of the Fallen" from Saving Private Ryan (I think it's called) by John Williams is one of those songs that makes me feel pride. Actually, a lot of Williams' scores are good in that respect.

In E.T. - it's not so much that E.T. dies, but it's the speech that Elliot gives just before he reawakens. Just hearing to that, along with the music is enough to get the tears going. E.T. is not a public viewing film for me.
posted by Cavatica at 9:05 AM on May 20, 2001

Went to the Vietnam Memorial in D.C. yesterday. I defy anyone to resist the power of the Wall.
posted by anildash at 9:12 AM on May 20, 2001

I'm not going to delete this because there are too many posts here and I'd feel bad doing it.

But really, MetaFilter is not here solely to share collective experiences about anything under the sun.
posted by mathowie at 9:19 AM on May 20, 2001

The statue of the three soldiers walking together at the Vietnam memorial. I can't for the life of me figure out what the sculpture is called, but when I saw it, I couldn't speak for a while.

Also, the end of FFIX got to me. Not quite the same level of importance, I know.
posted by kingjeff at 9:37 AM on May 20, 2001

I get the chills when I see a thread without a link.

I feel the flames coming...
posted by SpecialK at 10:29 AM on May 20, 2001

No, bullshit flamefests about "inappropriate front page posts" only happen when the wrong kind of people do it. Otherwise it's just a shrug and a wink.
posted by aaron at 11:23 AM on May 20, 2001

The Star Spangled Banner does that for me. The Jimi Hendrix version, of course.
posted by matteo at 11:29 AM on May 20, 2001

Oh, I see Matt's going to do something about it. Good.
posted by aaron at 11:29 AM on May 20, 2001

Yeah. When people do it innocently, it gets a calm reaction. When they do it as a way of continuing an already hot flame war, it gets a hot reaction. That's pretty complicated, all right.
posted by rodii at 12:09 PM on May 20, 2001

This thread is about everything and nothing, which is what happens when there is no URL.

When I saw the summary, I was sure it was about the national anthem. But I was practically the only one who did.
posted by steve_high at 2:30 PM on May 20, 2001

thrill (thrill) -- n. 7. a sudden wave of keen emotion or excitement, sometimes manifested as a tremor or tingling sensation passing through the body.

But really, MetaFilter is not here solely to share collective experiences about anything under the sun.

Oh oh. Cheesit.

posted by Twang at 2:32 PM on May 20, 2001

I get a bad case of the chills when I read about someone
getting the chills from the national anthem. I'm having
a real hard time with national pride manifested in symbols
like flags and anthems, too much bad memories.
posted by kenny42 at 3:03 PM on May 20, 2001

Redgie, I couldn't agree more. Once I spent a pleasant driving holiday with the family when I was a child, and a Styrofoam esky (where Australians keep their beer supplies) squeaking interminably in the boot. My Mother -"No we aren't unpacking the whole car just to shift one thing." By the time we got to our destination, my teeth hurt like I’d been chewing on tinfoil all the while.

Movies. The beer hall scene in "Cabaret" Where the power of music as propaganda (as well as entertainment) is made clear to the main protagonists. The scene in "Terms of Endearment" (rather a sentimental choice, I know) where the mother (in hospital, dying of cancer) speaks to a son who clearly does not wish to engage with her, who is unprepared. Overwhelmingly, in "Solaris" when Kris Kelvin returns to his Father's home, yet is not there, and rain pours through the ceiling. "Poltergeist" at the very end, when the family push the TV out of the door of their hotel room. "Summer Holidays, 1999" when the child is returned to the school, is reincarnated. The fireworks. "Raise Ravens" when we are not sure if the child has committed a crime, the pop music of the era, political undertones, the empty swimming pool.
posted by lucien at 4:47 PM on May 20, 2001

Towers of Dub...


No, maybe the thread doesn't belong here on MeFi, but, I've got to give a BIG muthafuckin second to Towers of Dub!
posted by lizardboy at 4:55 PM on May 20, 2001

*ahem*

see previous post

posted by lizardboy at 5:10 PM on May 20, 2001

I know I'm really late posting this but I've been away and need to respond to the original post. A moment that after at least a hundred listenings still gives me chills every time is from the Jets to Brazil song "I Typed for Miles," toward the end when it explodes and he says:

they're playing love songs on your radio tonight;
i don't get those songs on mine

Its cheesy, but I get styrofoam chills every time.
posted by tcobretti at 9:27 PM on May 20, 2001