Monday, January 3, 2011

Music

Music's a funny thing. Some days you feel like a certain type of music, and some days only one song will do. Each song has a unique ability to hold a particular memory or emotion, at least for me. Situations each come with their own song in my memories. Other times the lyrics or chords will play in my head, or I'll hear a snippet of a song and suddenly be back to a certain time or place that somehow became connected to that music. I have no idea why my memory works like that, but work it does.

I also seem to have my own private radio in my head, that plays music and lyrics from the countless songs I've listened to over the years... from Elton John and the Spice Girls (my two favorite artists when I was about 4-6), going through the Beatles, Queen (the first record I ever heard on vinyl), the Rolling Stones, Destiny's Child, a brief stint in R&B/ hip-hop, moving on to Top 40 pop, tangent-ing into Good Charlotte and MCR, migrating to Green Day, Nirvana, the Ramones, and the Strokes, hopping over a little to Streetlight Manifesto, taking the plunge with Black Sabbath, Seether, and Metallica, riding the wave to Smashing Pumpkins, the Sex Pistols, and Pearl Jam, surfacing for some Zac Brown Band, Miranda Lambert, and Trace Adkins, and finally landing (for the moment) with Avalanche City, the B-52's, Sons of Admirals, Eddplant, and Tom Milsom. Each of these artists have affected me differently, given me a little bit of them, their music, and their culture. The beauty of music is that the artists give only themselves and their music, and we, the listeners, take so much. On that level music is completely pure.

I remember the first time I heard Black Sabbath. I was in study hall, trying to do some homework, with my headphones in and my Pandora radio on. Suddenly there was a science, and then a single drum, pounding, pounding, and then that chord. That single power chord, building, building, rising up, and then the riff. I was floored. I'd never heard anything even close to that type of raw, heavy POWER. I literally stopped what I was doing, sat back in my chair, and just listened. I think I actually felt my heart beat in time with that riff. Going back and listening to it again, it still has that sense of pounding, inevitable, incredible power to it. Admittedly, there's not that first impression of starkness and "wow", but there's still something that resonates. I guess it's one of those things that will stay with me for a long time, simply for the impact it had at that one moment in time. Music's like that. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

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