Tuesday, July 9, 2019

Emotional Growth Through Music


Lately I’ve been extremely proud of my fiancee for her developing tastes in music. Now don’t get me wrong, I’ve always shared similar tastes in music with her and we’ve gone to many concerts and music festivals because of our shared love of live music and certain bands. But recently, she’s begun diving into the sound of music, not just the lyrics or the poppy overtones of certain things.

This time, she’s getting into the likes of Radiohead and wanting to understand what makes music unique and emotional. In fact, she’s the type to let tears go at any little thing, especially happy things or cute things. Well, we watched a short musical film directed by Thom Yorke of Radiohead and by the end, she was in tears from the emotional aspects of it all.

This is what I love to see. Music isn’t just for listening to on your drive to and from work. It’s not just for partying to when people are over and you’re hosting an event. Music is emotion embodied in sound, which is why it’s art at its very core.

So when I go to discover new bands, I do it in search of an emotional response. I want to feel angry or stressed if I hear something faster paced with strong beats and thrashing guitar solos. I want to feel the melancholy of slower chords and distant lyrics. I want to feel weird and disoriented when I hear trippy music dripping by and ethereal voices floating. I want to feel uplifted and happy and cry at beautiful lyrics with empowering music. And I want to feel loss upon hearing ballads that recall visions of past faces.

When I listen to music, it’s not just something “to do.” It’s something to live by and learn by.

So when we pack up and move into our new house next year right before we get married, I want to have a few cheap moving boxes full of records that mean something to us. That’s why we collect vinyls and listen to them on our record player. Because those albums mean something to us as a couple, and because they’re straight up unique and emotional from the first track to the last. Those cheap moving boxes full of records also hold some her father gave us, and I know they meant something to him back in the day as well.

Otherwise, what’s the point in music? I’m not sure I agree with it being background noise for some people. I mean, that’s their prerogative, so I can’t fault people for not understanding it like I think I do. It’s all perceived, after all. But I like to think that the music I love was toiled over by the artist who created it, that it was meant to make me feel how it does.

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