The Ether

i approach new music like a grieving widow. it’s a soulful, spiritual procedure that requires a full body dedication to appreciation, and yet i crave it so. this doesn’t mean there are few variations in my manner of listening. rather, every time i decide to dust off my headphones or my crusty jbl, my listening experience is dictated by the same distinctly designed enthusiasm. 

when i find a new (good) artist i will take the opportunity that has been gracefully gifted into my open palms and peruse through their discography, slowly, carefully, hesitantly. like one misstep or oversight will stain the integrity of my forming opinion entirely. i have never been technically musical; the ability to read musical notes and ascertain the technicalities of musical jargon was a field i overlooked for the advancement of something more innately true to me, but i have always felt music in the same way i would feel carefully crafted phrases in a book-entirely. i will take note of each rise, fall, sway, build, hook, or pause of a song like i am composing a melodic eulogy. more importantly, i let the rhythm and lyrics and the subverted sounds flow through me. if there is a gap in the space time continuum, i believe that is where my soul is transported on this musical journey. 

truthfully, the way i absorb music is an extension of the way i love. i love in a manner of consumption. if i am driven by love, i am driven by a deep desire to consume the most abundant understanding of a person possible. i believe that my love is formed by admirational understanding and a subsequent, soul wrenching yearning to map the object of my affection’s brain like an uncharted planet. my musical approach follows the same guiding principles: an otherworldly compulsion to scour every nook and cranny of a song or an artist, a houndlike search for meaning between the blank space in every lyrical line, an endless obsession with untombing every melodic nuance. 

i love with full conviction, but i am granted confidence in that conviction because of my thoroughness. if i have an insatiable lust for knowledge i will fulfill the call to educate myself, on a person or a musical entity. and in the end i will either be stricken with a newfound sense of purpose and passion, or soul crushed by a battle with no loser and no winner.