I started this post in the "What are you listening to" thread, but because I didnt name any particular artists and kinda went off on a little tangent I figured this topic might deserve its own thread and discussion.
Since many of you are teenagers I am very much interested to hear your take on what Im about to say. Keep in mind I am 26, and am reflecting back, and I understand that teen angst and frustration may have lost its significance on me in the past 10 years.
To start, I like happy songs. Songs that make me smile and want to dance around and feel good and feel happy. There's too many to name by too many artists to name. It wasn't always that way though...
I listened to Nirvana all during the early 90's along with all the Nivana-lites of the era. Music does effect your mentality, I very much believe so now. I still think Mr. Kurt was a very troubled, but equally gifted man, but shit, I could have been a much happier teenager if I chose to listen to something else a little more uplifting.
Listening to depressing music can be seductive, though. You can feel deep and feel as though you are more complex listening to music that just feeds how down you feel.
If I knew then what I know now I would have realized that I was creating a wheel of misery for myself that unfortunately I would have to disengage in adulthood. But the thing is...I think I liked the wheel. I mean, c'mon, being all grunge, heroin-chic and Seattle-miserable was hip at the time, man. It was what was on the radio. It was what was in the magazines. Kate Moss and her little cocaine scandal wouldn't have been the scandal then it is today. She would have got a nice photo spread in Vogue, pics done in black and white, looking all gaunt and sickly, hanging over a dirty toilet with her eyes rolled in the back of her head and we would have framed it and called it art, and be envious of her glamourized misery.
I was a smart kid, though. I had to know what I was doing to myself, but I think like most kids, I was unable to foresee the consequences of my actions. It wasn't until the misery continued after the fad faded when I didn't find it quite so fascinating to be miserable anymore, that I felt my influences became a problem for me personally, and I saw the effect it was having on my well-being, my performance, and my opinion of myself. But it was intoxicating still. Nothing makes you feel more justified about your shortcomings (or bad attitude) than wallowing in your own misery and life's wrongs.
Dont get me wrong, I love music that can evoke emotion. Music that can relate pain, loss, heartbreak, sadness. But I now believe that a song like that must take skill, it needs climax, like a good drama. A song touching those kinds of emotions should make the hair on your neck rise and make you get chills down your cheeks. Many of these angry songs I hear on the radio are too straightforward: I'M ANGRY! I HATE EVERYTHING! I HATE MY PARENTS! LIFE IS UNFAIR!
Blech. Count me out, Mr. Crankypants. I'd rather be happy, uplifted and/or inspired, and no thanks to you and your whining/screaming Im not - or rather - Im not until I change the station to some other artist who can actually make me feel good about life and myself. You almost kicked in my misery-wheel Mr. Crankypants with your lamenting, but I am stronger than that to take on your misery as my own, to relive my misery as you relive your own. I'm stronger than to become intoxicated by your negativity, self-loathing, and hatred of events you have no control over, Mr. Crankypants. I know life is all about cleaning up shit. Some days there's a big shit pile, other days its a bunch of little shit piles. Its too bad you find the need to bellyache over it instead of just accepting the shit in life and redirecting your focus on the great.
I think it takes a lot of discipline to not make your misery the focus of your identity, which is why I often have high respect for those who possess such discipline, and have drive to be in the same light as the people I so admire.
I know my miserable stories. I know all the unhappiness I have experienced in my life. Why listen to audio influences that remind me of all that? Will it help me any? Will I discover something about my misery that Nickelback or some shit is going to enlighten me with? The only answer I can come up with, the answer I see before me whenever I pass some kid blasting his angry music, whenever I see some miserable being wearing all black and looking all depressed is because misery can be an identity to those who have no other identity. Drowning yourself in your own misery I do believe is intoxicating. And I do believe engaging yourself with misery-inducing influences has a hangover that popping a couple of aspirin wont cure.
