Amerie - Behind the Song

BY AMERIIE

Music is the soundtrack of our lives.

A melody can transport us to a particular moment in our past. It can keep us stuck in the present, too, if we prefer ( No, I dont want to go out. I just want to play Wrecking Ball on repeat and wallow in this until Im all cried out, OK? ). Sometimes we need a song to take us to an oft-imagined destination in our future. Sometimes the future destination is right around the cornerlike, literally, the party is five minutes away and we need this pre-jam session. Sometimes its as simple as requiring a song for much-needed gym inspo.

We often listen to a song on repeat to remain fixed on a feeling. Music is a sort of time capsule that way; it marries a moment in time to an emotion, and its there whenever we need it. I have a theory about this. Whenever we find ourselves excited by a new artist, its because their music speaks to us in a very specific way. Whether their sound exports us to a singular point in our past, or it speaks to a current circumstance, this new discovery imprints itself into our lives and onto our very souls.

This cannot be undone, cannot be unseen.

This will likely be our favorite piece of music from said artist because theres nothing quite like Firsts, much to the chagrin of many an artist. Im pretty sure You still havent topped Reasonable Doubt ! drives Jay Z up a wall.

A curious thing about music is that it requires hardly anything of you. You neednt think, you neednt process, you neednt give much of your time. All you need to do is listenand even half listening will do. Because music has a way of slipping into your subconscious. Its a straight hit to the bloodstream.

Ive always thought that if humanity were to be visited by malevolent extraterrestrials, that if theyd been observing us for a while, they just might blast us to smithereens. We have, after all, been doing that to one another for eons. But if they had a chance to listen to our music, to our art, to the language of our souls Well, lets just say we might stand a chance.

Music not only dissolves boundaries between ourselves and sound, but it also has the potential to dissolve boundaries within humanity, itself, even if, upon first impression, we might feel we have nothing in common but the song were listening to. Thats the thing about boundaries: once they disappear, they take a whole lot of preconceptions and misconceptions with them. Its the reason music from outsiders tends to top lists of Things You Are Not Allowed to Have. This goes for repressive governments and elders alike. Music is practically a zip file of culture, ideas, and free thought, and its no wonder that in Nazi Germany, for instance, the last thing the Nazis wanted was the countrys citizens reveling to Negro music, as jazz and its jungle sound was viewed as a threat to morality and Aryan purity. They understood how music could be as dangerous to their Nazi future as physical weaponry.