[M-Mu] My Disposition Towards Music

I think a lot about how I'm perceived, for how few people actually overall know me nowadays. A few weeks ago, I believed myself to be unreasonably positive and accepting towards music, but I don't believe this to be the case anymore. Given how I still believe myself to have an extremely broad taste in music, what gives, what changed ? If this selfish subject interests you, read on.

It all kind of clicked with me when I finally got around to listening to Metallica's newest album "72 Seasons" only to walk away with...very little to say about it. Even writing this days later, the only track I can recall at all is Lux Æterna (I love being able to flex the fact that I use a US-International keyboard layout) and while it's certainly a memorable thrash metal track, I honestly couldn't tell you anything else about it, and I know for certain I sat down with it personally, ready to be invested. It's also the album that made me reflect on why I often seem so positive about so much music, as I dug through my memories to think of other albums that I felt similarly about...

Oh Senjutsu, you incredibly disappointing, sad letdown. I remember quite eagerly listening to this album on or extremely near release, only to be met with some depressingly strained vocals that just struck me with that feeling that this could possibly be the last album we ever get with Bruce Dickinson's usually wonderful opera-like vocals, and they just sound unusually weak and tired. It's too tough of a listen for me to revisit to see if my opinion's changed, but I truly don't want this to be the last album it all ends on.

(Don't ask why I only had the Japanese version of this cover onhand, I don't have a good answer)

If we actually move backwards to Metallica and Hardwired, we start to breach into one of the reasons I'm never terribly hard on music; Memory. Memory is extremely important to me, and a big reason I will never be hard on people for their taste in music. During a short period where I lived in a not great environment, I took cold showers with a bluetooth speaker. Cold showers are extremely hard to do, so I'd use this album to amp myself up due to how strong of an opening it had, but most people don't seem to like it overall. But, the associations I formed with it were just a positive, addictive race of energy, associations only I have.

Music can take you back in time, make you relive memories you once had, emotions you once felt, things that you can't study in a classroom about musical composition, but instead the personal feelings you put towards music, the state you were in when you listened to it for the first time. Those are experiences unique to you, and they color music into something that can be emotionally intense and highly intertwined with your identity. It's why I always color my takes never with outright negativity, anger, or hostility, but with disappointment and wonder of what could be, of the elements one could love about something.

Even then, sometimes good music can also have good associations. I think it's why I can't call myself a music critic really, even if I delved deep into the theory and tried to understand what an artist was doing, as music to me is a medium that transports you someplace in your mind that makes you feel a certain way, or can be the key to a vault of memories in a way that I think other mediums have a hard time achieving.

Even when something is bad in a laughably bad way, you remember that, and think positively on that, especially if you get to share it with a friend. A dumpster fire that seems to have purple flames coming out of it, bizarre graffiti plastered about, while a group of children cheer on is memorable, you're glad to have experienced it because an equivalent may never appear, you'd speak positively about it, but prime discussion about it with an acknowledgement that it's perceived as bad. But maybe that dumpster fire gets you to think, to reassess.

The true moments of dislike and negativity often come from something that is incapable of having any texture to it that one could grip onto and tie memories to, when something just fails to engage, or do anything differently. The true "soulless" music that doesn't sound like anything, can't be remembered, invokes no feelings.

But why wasn't 72 Seasons in this same category ?

Time, I suppose. Or, my inability to articulate my point well. If I were to surgically remove Lux Æterna from 72 Seasons, I think it would fall into that category of having no texture to it. But, I also dislike throwing that kind of accusation at any kind of music, because there could be something I'm missing, and someone who hears it could have an intensely personal and positive memory associated with the album. I think music is the only medium that can invoke that kind of feeling so well.

Maybe I just, don't like spreading negativity much anymore, and prefer to just be positive and encourage others to create, no matter how big or small they may be. The world is always better for having more art in it, I believe. I have a headache, and some godawful brain rot I need to try and flush out this week. Wish me luck, and see you next week with more music thoughts, as always.