reflection

Confession

08.20.18 — Leave a comment

Even though I love music, I am a very bad fan of musicians and artists. Until a few years ago I couldn’t really tell you who my favourite artist was, what albums I liked, what songs I kept on repeat. There was a time when I couldn’t even tell you if Beyonce or Rihanna was on the radio. I loved music, but I wasn’t very good at dividing my attention. Even now I’m someone who tends to become easily and singularly fixated on things of interest. At a time when the only thing that mattered to me was understanding my friends obscure (only to me, I admit) pop culture references and keeping up with my favourite anime or manga, knowing what songs were on the radio that I liked so much seemed pointless and overly difficult.

Now that I’m older, hopefully wiser, and have gained the ability to multi-task my affections, I can’t help but feel as if I have to play catch-up. While I am now better at defining my musical interests, I’m still no closer to keeping up with anything than before. Occasionally I even find myself listening to the same songs and albums on repeat as if possessed by the spirits of the studios that made them. As if my brain’s decision to cooperate with my desire to better embrace my love of good tunes was to chose them as my new fixation.

Who needs Naruto when you can listen to an 8tracks playlist based on Kakashi’s tragic childhood 50 times in a row?

There are so many songs out there and so many genres, and I haven’t listened to half of them. I’m physically stressed over all the good music I’m missing out on because I feel as if I got my start so late. Every time I say I “love” something music related, be it an artists, genre, or song, I find myself actually struggling to really go into and explain what exactly it is I like about it, or I realise I don’t actually have that much knowledge about the thing I claim to care so much about. I feel as though I am a fraud.

These days I find myself being bolder and less harsh towards myself. I often need to remind myself that I’m not even halfway to fifty yet. I’m young. It’s ok if my musical education started late and is self-taught. While music played in my house, my parents weren’t music-history buffs or anything like that, and I’m in a new country as well. The kids I met in later years didn’t grow up on the same music fads as I did. Everyone loves Beyonce, but I hardly know other kids who grew up on S Club 7 or even know what a Westlife is.

I know as I write this, I’ve fallen back on some old music habits (K-pop calls me, yet again, but what can I say? SHINee’s on their 10th years and I’m feeling that nostalgia, has it really been that long?) but I think I’ve picked up some new ones. I’ve been listening to more Latin pop lately. Using curated playlists to try and find artists I like and listen to more of their stuff. I think, thanks to social media, finding new music and keeping up with old faves is a lot easier as well. I was never really involved with sties like Tumblr or Twitter until recently. I find those sort of sites are more helpful in keeping up to date on news than anything, aside from actual magazines and newspapers that is, but I’ll be honest. I’m not entirely sure what all exists out there either.

Anyway, here’s to new music and new directions.

Habits

02.13.18 — Leave a comment

When I was younger I used to collect song lyrics. Every time I found a new song I loved and wanted to sing along to I would go online, copy the words, and save them to my note app. Despite my love of music and all that has to do with it, the way my brain seems naturally wired I struggled with so much related to it that I loved. I was never the sort of person who could listen to a song on the radio a hundred times and commit it to memory. I needed to keep these songs some place where I could bring them up easily and review them again and again and again.

I don’t know when it is I stopped saving song lyrics, but I did. I never got any better at remembering the words to songs, but I no longer sang to the radio like I used to either. I reached a point in my life where music no longer mattered to me like it once did.

After reading this article I realised how much collecting and reading over those lyrics probably helped me as a writer, and most importantly, poet. While at the time I wasn’t a song writer, I wrote a lot of poetry and as we all know poetry is just unspoken spoken word, and spoken word is lyrics without the instrumental behind it. It’s all music in some way.

Lately I’ve been feeling the urge to write music. A reinvigorated love of music, I can’t continue to go through life ignoring this urge. As Gerilyn writes:

“If the words are in your head, you have to let them out. Otherwise, you will be buried alive.”

I spent so much of my life ignoring my desire to create certain things. I never drew often because I didn’t think my skills were ever up to par despite the fact that I loved drawn media such as comics and cartoons. I was in choir, but rarely dared to put myself out there. I’d often sabotage myself when it came to deciding solos either by not trying at all, or not doing my best. I never danced or tried acting despite having a love and desire to do so.

This is the year I ignore my own discomfort and try all the things I’ve been too embarrassed and scared to try. Art fails when one is unwilling to be vulnerable and honest. Here’s to a note pad full of lyrics once again, the words from the songs I so love, and the words I hope to be writing myself.

Wish me luck!