I’ve begun to reexamine my taste in music after an icebreaker.
Over the pandemic, I’ve attended my fair share of webinars and Zoom meetings, but this was the NCTE Sandbox: I had to apply and be accepted into this webinar, and I was supposed to share with other English educators my ideas rather than sit passively through a lecture. I had already found the cleanest area in my house, arranged the lighting and the camera, and rethought my decision about 10 times before clicking on the link.
Ernest Morrell, one of the presenters, gave a sort of “get-to-know-you” activity that propels students into thinking about their own media consumption. He invited us to open up iTunes (or Spotify or Netflix), pick a song, and reflect on it. What do you like about this song? What would you change about this song? What are the values that the song holds? And, most interesting to me: what does this song (and the fact that you enjoy it) show about you?
Kacey Musgraves’s “Space Cowboy” (which, no, isn’t about Cowboy Bebop or cowboy aliens or alien cowboys) immediately popped into my head. Besides the clever writing and laid-back vibes, I hadn’t considered the song very closely until this activity. The song complicates the idea of freedom, noting the costs it demands and drawing distinctions between the speaker’s quiet bounded freedom with the lover’s wild dreams of freedom. It’s a breakup song, but the speaker’s stance is very passive (“I ain’t going to fence you in”) and yet firm (“I know my place / it ain’t with you”).
It also is very country and very nostalgic, which complicates my love for the song as I grew up on Country 102.5 and have since realized how it intertwines with misogyny and racism.
I don’t often think deeply about my music. When people have asked me what I look for in songs, I often shrug. A kicking drum beat, solid songwriting, a hook that gets stuck in my head: it seems to differ from song to song and from month to month.
Phoebe Bridgers released her album Punisher on June 18th. By June 20th, I had already fawned over it to all my housemates and my friends with whom I share similar music tastes. It’s one of those albums that I would happily listen to any song; however, “Chinese Satellite” quickly established itself as one of my favorites. Again, the writing is immaculate, the soft indie pop creates a somber and dreamy atmosphere, and I’ve definitely belted the chorus to my ever-patient housemates.
What really draws me is how Bridgers tugs at faith: how the speaker “wants to believe” but instead looks “at the sky and feels nothing.” As someone who grew up in Christianity and has had multiple conversations with my fellow members in the dead parents club, I find it difficult to believe that some people just can’t make the leap of faith, even if they want to. At the same time, the lyrics really capture the feeling of having some idea, some dream, just out of reach and deluding yourself that if you just tried a bit harder, maybe you’d be able to catch it.
I’d like to believe as a pretentious English major I’d only love songs with really clever lyrics. But you can’t really call “Over My Head” or “Roman Holiday” lyrical masterpieces: sometimes I just want a bop.
Obviously, you know about Taylor Swift’s surprise quarantine album folklore. I feel like a poser saying this, but cardigan, the lead single (if you can even have a lead single for an album whose advertisement time totals less than 24 hours), captured me. The ambient clicks and the repetitive piano theme underlying Swift’s soft vocals bring me to a new place where I’m scorning and yearning for some lover that I can’t seem to let go of. It, as all good love songs, glamorizes the mortifying ordeal of being known and brings back the hope that young love will, against all odds, come back. You all can psychoanalyze me for this one.
After diving into these current obsessions, I emerged recognizing how white my music is. I listen to no artists of color beyond an occasional Beyonce. LGBT+ artists are barely represented. I am not excused by my choices of genre: with minimal searching, I’ve found awesome folk artists like Joy Oladokun and top-notch country in Our Native Daughters.
It’s been a few months since that Zoom call. I have not overhauled my music library, but I’m striving to be more aware. It is not all I am called to do, but it is enough for now.
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