It's a journey of extremes. Bible school fostered a new outlook on life, and, with it, a new lease on artistic freedom. I shunned my former self, and all things artificial - all things quick - were to be avoided. Amplification be damned, the organic ruled the day! And I found myself digging into meatier fare. There was heavy discovery there, and much of what I loved then, I love now. Some things don't go out of style.
Today... well, today I listen less as a spectator. I buy less music, to be sure. I listen to less music. But what I do listen to, I value more. My friend Grant and I have had countless discussions regarding music as an involved experience. Music as an activity. In high school, music was a means to an end. A mechanism employed for the synthesis of emotion and energy. It pumped me up. It tore me down. Whatever it did, it was more about 'me' than it was about 'it'. As is so often the case with commercially successful music.. The Kanye-blaring low rider is undoubtedly less concerned with Kanye's craft than he is with how Kanye affects the version of himself he's attempting to project. Digression...
Annnnyway, today, I listen for the joy of it. I LOVE music. And there are some guys who just do it in ways that make me laugh for the shear joy of it. That list is always growing, morphing. Some artists, albums.. are ever-present. Others come and go for reasons as varied as the music itself.
Back to the idea of music as an involved experience. I like that. Life is an involved experience. Faith is an involved experience. When we approach our faith as an act of receiving, we've lost the plot, haven't we? Yes, faith becomes something when we engage, and wrestle. The real meat of faith is bound to that intellectual struggle. Those rules are echoed in art.
This record caught me lately. Dylan is devastating in his ability to lock you into a moment, a story... Never has a man so effectively avoided paying mind to verses and choruses for want of a good tale. "The Ballad of Hollis Brown" is a song I think about for the entire day. Dylan isn't making this stuff up. He's there, in the cabin, watching the whole thing unfold. He can smell the stale whiskey, the moldy floorboards. He's looking into the man's eyes... following their slow climb up the wall, to that 12 gauge hanging up over the doorframe.
This is heavy you just can't touch with volume, or overdriven tubes, or strained vocals.
It isn't about melody and rhythm. Dylan, it seems, was never particularly gifted at either. It isn't easy. You can't listen to this in the car.. on the road, in traffic. It's lost.
It seems like everybody I listen to has, at one point, said something like, "Bruce is the reason I do what I do..." One of Canada's great exports. There's something here, something embodied in the jumpy up-down, summer stroll sound that I recognize. I think there's probably a great deal of Toronto in this record. The speed of the city coming up against a love for the open skies and cleaner air that lies north.
What I love about Bruce is that everything sounds as though it was done in one take. Never one to let perfection get in the way of the more important pursuits... beauty, depth...
I don't really listen to music in the car anymore. At least not this stuff. Only my own work, as a point of reference. If its worth listening to, then it's worth waiting for the proper moment.
Try an experiment with me? When you have a moment this week, try this:
Turn off the TV, and sit down with a great album. Give it your full attention. Dive into your own thoughts, and go wherever the songs take you. But listen actively. Engage with that artist, and try to better understand what he's chasing. There are plenty of examples of simple artists making mindless music. But the great stuff, those guys are serious about their craft. It's surprising how valuable the experience can be when you dedicate yourself to better understanding it.
Lemme know how it goes?
JB
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