I am an under qualified, over opinionated music lover.
I am old enough to know better, but young enough not give a fuck.
Everything I know about music comes from my experiences. I do not claim to be an expert, only someone who needs a suitable soundtrack to traverse life and has spent most of my days searching for such sounds and adding them to the playlist for my journey.
For longer than I can remember music has moved me. My “happy place” is being enveloped completely within sound, and if that sound happens to have enough bottom end to rattle my drink off the bar then all the better.
Music always elicits an emotional response from me. Good music turns me on, great music turns me over and has its way with me.
Bad music makes me slightly sad for people who don’t know there is something better. But I learned long ago not to fret for them, if they are happy I will not try to save them from themselves. After all who am I to judge them for something so subjective?
Occasionally music can alter my worldview, the most poignant example from my life was my discovery of punk. An epiphany that enhanced my life in a myriad of ways.
It takes a rare band tick all of my boxes – artistically uncompromising, musically interesting and/or different, and representing an ethos I can relate to and/or appreciate.
I intend to keep my eyes peeled and mind open for the next such band.
My pet hates in music are bad lyrics and overt commercialism. There are few things I find more off putting than vanilla music produced for mass consumption and mindless music designed to be disposable.
I believe heavy, confronting or challenging music is not often given the treatment it deserves – to be treated as art.
The mainstream media too often dismiss the artistic credence of metal, punk and their brethren. Not here at Audiocracy though, not ever.
I make music too, but as a bass player my motto is “aiming for adequate” and my musical collaborators only really keep me around for lyrics and comic relief. But I love to stand in a room with likeminded people and purge my creative juices in unison with friends. It is another way that music represents a release I have never found in anything else.
I am not sure that music has saved my life, but it has enriched it in ways I can never even begin to repay it for.
Audiocracy 