Dear readers and listeners, this very evening, I read an article upon the music publication site of Pitchfork that honestly upset me. Certainly, it was nothing that would have ever placed an immovable cloud over my day or anything but it was an article whose mere suggestion contained within its title that filled me with a sense of incredulity while the work in full left me in a bit of disbelief...and therefore, inspired me to write this month's opening words to you.
The article I read is entitled, "Why Do We Even Listen To New Music?" and was written by Jeremy D. Larson and originally published April 6th of this year, right as the global pandemic had been unleashed and much of our nation was in the beginning weeks of lockdowns, quarantines, safer at home mandates and mounting anxiety as we really had no idea of what exactly we were facing, the severity of what we were facing and for how much longer we would be forced to face it.
Now to be fair, the concluding statement of the article ultimately merged with my own feelings of this specific matter, such as it is. But, the road Larson took to get there, essentially a dissertation about the 1913 premiere performance of Igor Stravinsky's The Rite Of Spring and attached to the piece's truly clickbait title, just left me cold, especially when one could answer the article's title with something more personal and not at all self-congratulatory.
And so...let's just star with the obvious question: What is new?
For me, the concept of "new" works on three differing levels. One level is the most obvious, a work that has not yet existed within the world and now...here it is! It is NEW! On the second level, there is also the means of discovery. Certainly, there is that means of discovery towards the just released into the world artistic works. What I am speaking of now are the works that have existed and have since become parts of the on-going and ever evolving story of whatever artistic medium we are involving ourselves with, which for the purposes of Synesthesia, I am speaking of music. And in this case, being introduced to material that has long existed within the world but not yet experienced by the listener...then, that is also new. On a third level, there is the process of re-discovery, where the works that we are most familiar and have grown with still exhibit a profound hold over us, for it is the music that contains our memories, have helped to shape who we are but also harbors the power to reveal more of themselves to us over time, therefore, making what was once old feel new all over again.
I have felt that sense of the new in all of those levels before and again and throughout this horrific year of 2020. I do not know about you, but for me, and despite everything that has been so awful, so stressful, so frightening, so saddening about 2020, the music I have heard and experienced, from one end of this year to the other, has proven itself to being exemplary.
To my ears, the music created, released and even re-issued this year has, in totality, possessed an urgency, relevance and vitality that is ultimately exclaiming its intense need to be heard and therefore, exist right here, right now. That the precariousness of our time together has been funneled into the music, suggesting that if this is the last thing to being heard, the final statements that one can make, then now is the time to make everything count. From musicians on the rise to our long established living legends, albums released in 2020 collectively felt not like music created just because it could be done. In actuality, it was music created because it simply had to be made. In doing so, once heard, everything felt to being designed to meet this moment signifying a sort of harmonic convergence.
I do realize that a statement like that feels considerably lofty and perhaps even some of you may even find it silly or "hippy dippy." I guess what I mean is simply this: that the music released in this year was decidedly meant, whether by accident, coincidence or design, to meet the listener directly in this moment for the purpose of helping all of us to process in any conceivable way necessary to emotionally help us survive. Hearing something new helped us to examine our own feelings. Hearing something new helped us to articulate our own thoughts back to ourselves. Hearing something new helped us forge connections, which then helped us feel less alone, an emotional state that has become more isolating whether through politics, social causes, racial and gender issues and again, by holing up and staying in our homes due to the social distancing necessary to keep ourselves safe due to COVID-19.
For the artists, as well as the rest of us, being isolated forced us to engage in different ways and that included with our own sense of creativity as well as with our own sense of discovery. Case in point, Rodrigo y Gabriela's just wonderful (and almost daily) lockdown videos contained live performances, dialogues from themselves to viewers and even segments devoted to their favorite albums, not only drove me to their own music but also to Metallica's "Master Of Puppets" (released March 3, 1986). Music from present day and the past and all of it...NEW!
Throughout this entire year, I have been able to keep up with the new releases and new discoveries by reaching out to my beloved B-Side Records, a local business that I have not set foot inside of since last February but I have continued to support with my frequent phone calls to purchase over the phone and have music shipped to my house. Yet for myself, the greatest adjustment occurred when I began creating new episodes of my radio show for WVMO from home, a process that I am continuing with for the duration as the COVID-19 numbers have only continued to rise and in doing so, I am still trying to keep my "pods" as small as possible...even as much as I deeply miss sitting in that studio chair with the console in front of me and I am just responding to the music in real time for those 60 minutes each week.
Above all, I am endlessly thankful that I am able to produce content from home because I know how devastated I would be if I was unable to creatively express myself in that fashion for such an extended period of time. The new-ness of recording from home has illustrated to me powerfully of how to engage with my show a little differently.
I always have tended to think of these radio shows in somewhat of an album format, that each section of the show is akin (almost) to either, album sides, or that what is being heard cold be one full album that lasts for the one hour duration, a listening experience that has a clear beginning, ending and the requisite peaks and valleys contained therein. Now, since I can record from home and make as many shows as I wish to at a particular time, I try to get weeks ahead of myself to get as many shows "in the can" as possible...which then allows me to pretend that I am Prince, filling up my "vault" with "albums" upon "albums" of material just waiting to be heard.
From here, I hope that it is obvious that I am using Savage Radio as a means to communicate, to express myself and share of myself as we hopefully connect through the music, all of which has been curated to reflect my moods and means of processing the events of the day, while also trying to ensure the show is an enjoyable listening experience.
The concept of the new and my desire to keep hearing and purchasing new music, is not solely because I want to the chance to play brand, sparkling new music. It is also found when I am digging through my own crates and collection for songs to play that I have often found myself re-discovering large amounts of "old" music, which delivers a revitalized freshness that allows me to re-encounter whomever I happened to have been when I first heard and purchased said music. It is just as what Questlove so eloquently said:
"When you live your life through records, the records become a record of your life."
So...why do I listen to new music? I always listen to new music because my relationship to music is such that I am unable to live a day without it. And so, if every single day we wake up is new, then so is the music that we listen to, so to speak, especially for those of us who live their lives through records. Listening to new music is a means to show me where I was, where I am and what I might be headed. And delving further, listening to new music is ultimately hopeful. That we are hearing what has once been unheard and so that excitement contained within how will be we changed after hearing it is powerfully exciting.
Hope and change?
Could it really be that simple?
You know...right now, I am starting to piece together the next radio show which is scheduled to air on December 9th, which is the second anniversary of the passing of my Dad. For the past two years, I have played tribute shows to my Dad, showcasing the music that he and I bonded over. For this new tribute, I wanted to try and create something that might sound like a trip through his incredible record collection, and in doing so, I am hoping to create an audio picture of the man he was.
As of this writing, I am listening to Chicago's classic "Beginnings" from their debut album, "Chicago Transit Authority" (released April 28, 1969), a work that entered the world a mere three months after I was born. It is a song I have known for so much of my life and have enjoyed but now, it just sounds different. In fact, it almost sounds new as I am listening in a different context, more engaged than passive, and as a means to hopefully once again connect to my Dad, even though he is no longer here. Hearing the song now is changing me and damn, am I hoping for so much as I listen.
Hearing new music is hope. Hearing new music invariably invokes change. And in this year, which has so often felt like that we are nearing the end of things, the necessity and audacity of hope and change has become more paramount than I could have imagined. Hearing new music is a means of showing us that there is always something to look forward to, to reach for, to strive for, to learn from as well as about, to be inspired by, to grow with and to enhance our dreams.
That is why we listen and when we do listen...PLAY LOUD!!!
I love the thought that new music is hopeful. Spot on.
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