Music
During an average day, I listen to about three or four hours of music. But I didn't listen to music as I know it until I was 11 or so.
No, before that, I was one of those poor kids who answered "classical" when they were asked what kind of music they listened to. I had started playing the piano when I was 9, so that felt like an appropriate answer. You had to listen to what you played, right? But I was too young to really appreciate classical music, so that answer was a desperate one, at best. I'm pretty sure I loved the Backstreet Boys when I was younger, maybe when I was 9 or 10. I was ashamed of it when I finally learned what the prescribed fate for young boys who liked Backstreet Boys was at school, so I repressed those memories for a long time. I have no problem admitting that now, though, and I'll gladly belt out the words to my favorite tunes when the opportunity arises. So yeah, you might even say that, uh, Backstreet's back, alright! ... Ahem. Anyway, when I was 11, a friend decided to make it his mission to disabuse me of the notion that "classical" was an appropriate response, so then I could finally say that I listened to Eminem and Limp Bizkit instead. I thought I was pretty cool then, but oh man--what a bad start.
Things didn't really improve for much after that, but I eventually found my way to pop and Billboard top-whatever. I had a huge Mandy Moore craze (sort of like a... crush? Man, I'm on a roll) and even watched that movie. A Walk to Remember. Twice. And I remembered. Whatever happened to Mandy anyway?
But there was some good to come out of that era. One of my favorite artists to this day is Michelle Branch and I still return to The Spirit Room from time to time. I also listened to a lot of Staind and Creed, but I didn't know what Creed was about at the time. I know now though. It's funny. I mean, just imagine Billboard top-20 around 2000 and you'll know what I listened to.
But let's fast-forward to junior year in high school when my life changed completely. I heard about this band called Something Corporate. I'll always remember that day. I was in a physics lab group for the semester with the three most popular girls in the class also smart enough to be in physics (that particular intersection totally has single-digit cardinality). How I ever ended up in that situation is beyond me, but I loved every moment of it. So of course, instead of doing labs, we were just hanging out. Or maybe they were hanging out, and I was just there. Anyway... I realize now the irony of the situation, but one day they raved about Something Corporate and being the impressionable young man that I was, I made it my duty to find out more about this band that somehow had paved its way into these girls' hearts. I needed Something Corporate, whatever it was.
The first music video that came up in a search on Yahoo! Launch (remember that service?) was "I Woke Up In A Car." I watched the video and listened to the song, but didn't think much of it. Yet a few days later, I found myself with the tune stuck in my head. Over the next week or so, I looked more closely and listened more carefully, and before I knew what happened, I loved Something Corporate, too. I realize that this story sounds completely ridiculous to anyone but me, but at some point I really did "make it my own," so to speak, and really felt like the music was personal and my own discovery. I include the anecdote about the physics lab mostly as a reminder of how random situations really do end up changing your life. The day I discovered Something Corporate is important because it marked the beginning of a long, long emo phase that I'm not even sure has quite subsided yet.
It's tough to say much more without giving away very personal details, but the events that followed ultimately culminated in me fronting a band called A Moment's Peace. I still have some crappy recordings that we did and to this day I'm really proud of some of the songs that I wrote. I realize that I'll never be able to write anything like it again. In retrospect, I would describe AMP as prEmo, meaning that instead of crying over relationships that fell apart and girls that don't want you, you cry about relationships that never happened (because you had never been in a relationship) and girls that don't want you. It's an important distinction.
During that time, I also learned to play guitar, a hobby that has followed me to this very day. I'm far from being able to do anything remotely cool on guitar, but there's just a lot of satisfaction to be had from covering your favorite songs, even if it's just for yourself. Knowing some basic guitar definitely enables that.
Later in college (around junior year), for reasons that I don't understand completely, I got into hardcore screamo and skramz, which I listened to pretty exclusively until the day I graduated. It might have been the stress, I dunno. France really takes the cake when it comes to skramz, with amazing bands like the now-defunct Anomie, Amanda Woodward, and Daïtro. Otherwise, From Autumn To Ashes has been an American favorite.
These days, my musical preferences are much less focused, being more of an eclectic amalgamation of everything that I've liked in the past. I'm listening to a lot of Swedish music these days, simply because I identify more and more with the language as I'm rediscovering it for myself. It's also really cool to hear lyrics that you can't quite capture in English if you tried, but I suppose that goes for lyrics in any language. It's just cool to know that you experienced an idea or concept that couldn't be expressed in the language you know best. It almost allows you a tiny glimpse at the paradox of how thoughts might transcend language, yet are bound by them at the same time.
