Everything Is Fine

Category: Music

  • Music in a Language You Don’t Speak is Fine

    Earlier this year, Bad Bunny (the most streamed artist on Spotify, by the way, or maybe Taylor Swift has passed him – either way, he’s incredibly popular) performed the Super Bowl halftime show. It was a good time; he really showcased Puerto Rican culture and put on a show that looked and felt like a big party. He also sang in Spanish, because he’s Puerto Rican, and that’s his native language. The FCC received a lot of complaints about this, many mostly about the fact that performing in Spanish is somehow anti-American. (Never mind that Puerto Rico is in America.) Personally, I thought it was a good show. (Technically, I guess I thought it was fine.) I didn’t understand all of the lyrics (despite having studied a LOT of Spanish… it’s been a long time), but to say I didn’t understand the performance would be wrong. It was pretty apparently what the songs were actually about – life, and love, and family – all of the things that featured in the performance. (And some sexy stuff. Turns out, people like sexy stuff.)

    Toward the end of last year, I saw Avatar at the Fillmore in Silver Spring. One of their openers was a band I hadn’t heard of before I saw them on the bill – a band from New Zealand called Alien Weaponry. The band’s members all have Maori ancestry, something of which I know little. The band performs in a way to really express that, though. Their set started with a haka (one part of Maori culture I am somewhat familiar with) and right out of the gate, they were intense. They sing in Maori, so like Bad Bunny, I didn’t necessarily know what words they were saying, but I understood.

    See, you can tell exactly what the song is about, even if you don’t know the words. (And if you’re not 100% certain, you can just look it up – a Taniwha is a guardian spirit that protects people and places, and these indigenous folks are calling on that spirit to get rid of the colonizing forces. (Not gonna get further into any opinions about that, but it owns.)

    More recently, I saw another band that didn’t perform in English, and also made it very clear what they were talking about. I’m talking about The Hu, a Mongolian folk metal band. It sounds simplistic, but these guys are Mongolian; they sing in Mongolian (including throat singing), they play Mongolian folk instruments (some of them – there’s a guitar player and a more contemporary drummer) and their songs are basically war chants or, as far as I can tell, more generally about how badass they are. (There are some more serious ones, like Song of Women which is about how important wives and mothers are, too.)

    You can’t tell me you don’t have a very good idea of this band’s vibe after that. Or that you don’t at least feel like you’re getting a little slice of authentic Mongolian culture. (Maybe it’s a little shallow, but you know what, a lot of American music can be pretty shallow.)

    Anyway, I just wanted to throw those out there. Go listen to some music you don’t understand. It’ll be fine.

  • You probably won’t reach “the top”, but it’s fine.

    I just got back from a weekend at a couple of concerts. On the drive home, I was hit with a few musings about the music and the overall experience, so I’m going to vomit out a couple of posts right here before I go back about my regular life and habits again. If you don’t see any others yet, check back; I’m writing them all at once but scheduling them to publish over the next day or so.

    One of the bands that played was Beartooth, and they played a song called Doubt Me. It’s a “fuck the haters” song about doing things people told you that you weren’t capable of doing. That’s basically a genre – sitting here and thinking about it, so many bands have at least one song in that category. (Several just from the two shows in Baltimore this weekend.)

    It makes sense – it’s probably a good analogue of being in the music industry. Lots of bands and artists come along and most of them don’t “make it,” so odds are, you aren’t going to, either. When you start out playing local venues and submitting demos, you probably hear “it’s not gonna happen” a lot.

    I really enjoy those sorts of songs; it’s fun to throw your success back in the face of the people who tried to stand in your way. But do most of us have those people?

    Personally, I think I might be the opposite. I was told that if I just put my mind to it, I could do anything. (At least by anyone whose opinion mattered – there are always just shitty people.) I just never really aspired to that level. I never dreamed of being the president, or a rock star, or an astronaut or anything like that.

    I don’t really know where I’m going (or where I’m even really trying to go) with this – I just had the though of like “yeah, fuck the haters… wait, who even are my haters?”

    I guess what’s really important, haters or not, is to make sure you have a grounded definition of success. If nothing short of being the best in the world will satisfy you, then regardless of people supporting you or not, you’re almost certainly going to fall short. If you treat each step along the way as another step up, though, then all of the efforts you put in will be validated.

    I’ll celebrate my accomplishments, and I (or someone who actually knows you) will also celebrate yours. To end on another Beartooth line, “come join me at the top.”

    It’ll be fine.

  • “Weird” is fine; “normal” is also fine.

    I just got back from a weekend at a couple of concerts. On the drive home, I was hit with a few musings about the music and the overall experience, so I’m going to vomit out a couple of posts right here before I go back about my regular life and habits again. If you don’t see any others yet, check back; I’m writing them all at once but scheduling them to publish over the next day or so.

    The first of the two concerts featured The Funeral Portrait, and they played a song of theirs called Stay Weird. It’s an anthem for the “weird” (read: emo/goth/punk/whatever) kids to not change and keep being their true selves. Now, in general, that’s a great message, and I’m all for music containing messages like this that people need to hear.

    (There’s a whole slew of what I’m sort of calling “mental health-core” about dealing with depression or addiction or self-harm; I’m glad these topics are out there in ways that aren’t as preachy or “after-school special-y”. Thinking about it, I think at least three out of four bands on Friday and two out of three on Saturday have at least some material like that.)

    But here’s one thing – when you’re playing an arena in downtown Baltimore with a capacity of 13,000 people, is anyone there “weird”? Sure, 13,000 isn’t a football or baseball game, but it’s also still a pretty good-sized crowd.

    I’m not weird. I work in an office at a consulting company. I have a 401(k) and a mortgage. I don’t dress all in black. (Except at concerts – note to bands: sell more t-shirts that aren’t black. At Summer of Loud, I got a Parkway Drive shirt that’s blue. At a Nothing More show, I got their tour shirt that’s red. There were cool Beartooth shirts, but I’m not that huge of a fan of theirs, but both of their live sets I’ve seen have been great. I expected Bad Omens to have something maybe red, but nope.)

    But then again, I’m into curling. Is that weird? I play board games, which feels like the normie-est shit out there, what with 70,000 people at Gen Con every year, but even other gamers often think my games are weird. Is professional wrestling weird? Conceptually, I think it’s mainstream, but it doesn’t draw the crowds it used to (although that could be mostly due to ticket prices).

    I’m reminded of the tagline (or one of the taglines) for the YouTube channel Wrestling With Wregret – “Like what you like, just don’t be a dick.” You should “stay weird,” not by specifically trying to be a non-conformist, but by just finding your lane. Find your style, your music, your hobbies. Enjoy things unashamedly. Don’t “be weird”, but don’t be afraid of being called weird.

    Because weird is normal, and normal is weird.

    And they’re both fine.