I spent an early summer in the Midwestern United States, listening to Graceland in the heat of my parents', red interior, maroon Chevy van--"You Can Call Me Al", being the top track in my opinion at the time, because it simply sounded "the best". The windows came down when that track came on, exposing the residual chunks of jerky stuck in our gums, as our whole family sang, "IF YOU'LL BE MY BODYGUARD". The cows on the prairie must have been terrified.
For a long time my experience with music had been love affairs with individual songs. In 6th grade, it was Snoop Dogg's "What's My Name?". Then it was Green Day's "When I Come Around". And those little love affairs continued. I couldn't seem to get away from them. Not that I was trying, or knew anything different.
Early in college, listening to an entire album was exhausting. I usually ended up putting the CD in the player, listening, and if the track didn't interest me in the first five seconds, I would skip to the next track. I suffered from 'musical ADD', according to my friends.
When sophomore year came around I was introduced to the music of Loudermilk, an alt/metal band from Tri-Cities. The band's first album, Man With Gun Kills Three, was a bit schizophrenic in that half the songs were very rooted in metal, while the other half were eclectic little diamonds you wouldn't think belonged to a metal group, and even these diamonds were singular in themselves. The track "Calcium" stood out as an emo/punk morsel, while "Blue Lucky Lucy" lurched forward in an atmospheric, creepy, country waltz.
I really enjoyed these individualistic songs, but found myself beginning to identify with the angst in the band's full-fledged metal songs the more I listened to the album. The motivation for not skipping those metal songs came, I think, from the wonder why the album's other half was so good. Other motivation I'm sure came from looking for acceptance from new musical friends.
When I listen to those metal songs now, I enjoy them, but I don't feel the need to seek out other metal artists. Maybe my ears just can't handle the sonic density of that genre anymore, but I'm thinking I just don't like that kind of music, outside of my collegiate musical education.
After graduation, I got a good part-time job--where I had my next musical revolution. All day at work I listened to other people's iPods, and I was baffled at what they enjoyed. Specifically, the winy Win Butler of Arcade Fire. Why did this band sound so good to my co-workers?
I got tickets for the Sasquatch Music Festival and saw Arcade Fire for the first time. They rocked. Undeniably. Nothing schizo about this band, they were in context. Everything about them from their gigantic video-boxes on stage, to their Sunday school outfits. And then they sang "Wake Up". I felt tremendous joy from the sound and people's reactions. This kind of music was made to change people. And even though I didn't know the lyrics that well, I could still shout that long chorus "O". The crowd was howling around the same big campfire, and strangely, I felt I was hearing music for the first time, since the first time, as a familial experience.
A friend of mine once said that a good album takes place in a certain time. I think more precisely, a really good album takes place around an event or series of related events in the artist's life, where time and place are referenced either directly or implied. Okkervil River's Black Sheep Boy does this. The whole album takes place at night, or at least in a spacious dreamlike state of mind, felt through Will Sheff's vocals. His voice travels and at times sounds as if he exists in two places at once. An intimacy also exist in the album's instrumentation that seeks warmth, and finds it in the presence of other instruments, especially when horns are introduced on the track, "A King and a Queen". I imagine the story behind this track taking place at a carnival in a small Midwest town.
I still have a strong attachment to songs with individuality when listening to a record all the way through. For Black Sheep Boy it's the track "For Real". However, I can hold myself from hitting the 'Next' button now. Because, I know it's really about context and how things fit together. And it's nice not to have to continually switch tracks. Now in my musical maturity, I appreciate the long-form, highs and lows that true artists experience in their daily lives, and encapsulate into songs that we the listeners can use as small opinionated mirrors to view our lives through, allowing us to see the big picture a bit differently.
