[StevenNemcek]

I’ve come to really enjoy a song which I’m guessing will be contentious among subscribers.

The song is “Thinking Out Loud” by Ed Sheeran, and the music video, which is just as great as the song in my mind, can be viewed here:

Thinking Out Loud

The lyrics are a mix of modern mushy love song with a touch of the classic individualist, selfish, depiction of passioned love portrayed by older generations of love songs. 

Samples which subscribers might appreciate:

“Well, me – I fall in love with you every single day
And I just wanna tell you I am”

and 

“your soul could never grow old, it’s evergreen”

The first reminds me of Rand’s famous “To say ‘I love you’ one must first know how to say the ‘I'”. It’s brilliantly selfish, as true love must be, and the double entendre at the end with “I am” always moves me.

The second is a statement of values in my mind; while a person’s body may grow old, his or her passion for life and his or her values can still burn strongly… “Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark…”

A sample which subscribers probably won’t appreciate:

“I’m thinking ’bout how people fall in love in mysterious ways
Maybe it’s all part of a plan
Well, I’ll just keep on making the same mistakes
Hoping that you’ll understand”

The music video features the singer, Ed Sheeran, ballroom dancing with the beautiful Brittany Cherry, who performed on the TV show “So You Think You Can Dance.” Perhaps her dress and the dance itself are a bit salacious, but I found her performance stunning. The lighting in the room was focused on the two dancers, and they were alone in the beautiful Tiffany Room at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel. I saw a young couple selfishly in love and expressing their love artistically through dance.

I found the song and video to be a treat, but again, I’m prepared for strong dissent.

[Chuck Butler]

In addition to my composing/production work, I perform regularly with a for-hire band. We sometimes perform at weddings, and you may be interested to know that since its release in 2014 this has become our most requested tune for bride and groom’s first dance.

My $0.02: It’s a sweet, simple pop song inspired by traditional R&B. I like it too, though compositionally it’s hardly on a par with classics from the American Songbook. I can appreciate what you’re hearing in the lyric, but I guarantee that yours is a more rational interpretation than Sheeran et al intended.

In a better culture we’d have better popular music, but until then I’ll take Ed Sheeran over much of what passes for music today . . . so that’s a qualified +1!

[Harry Binswanger]

Yes, Chuck B. nails it. Compared to Old Standards, operetta, or most anything popular before 1968, it is musically dismal, but compared to most anything since, I don’t know, 1990, it’s sounds good.

[ThomasdaSilva]

OK, here comes the contentiousness. Please don’t take this personally, but I really don’t undestand the appeal of that kind of music (Thinking Out Loud); the overwrought whininess of the vocals, the oversimplicity of the composition, to me, invokes hopless boredom.

So, to be fair, I should post some of what I like (opening my self up to contention).

Music: In addition to much of Lanza, I like this piece by Sinatra https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoSbnAFvqfA

Of course the classical and opera offers quite a bit: Dvořák / String Quartet No. 12 in F major, Op. 96 “American”, Also I love Strauss’s Im Abendrot, Drdla, Kálmán’s Die Csárdásfürsten, Lehar, etc.

Painting: I am a big fan of David Ligare.

I also like some contemporary music: The Walkmen “the Rat”, Beirut “Elephant Gun” are a couple of examples.

As for poetry, I like Landor, Swinburne, (some) Shelley, (some) Byron, (some) Rilke, Sappho, Whitman, Catullus, and Freneau.

 

[StevenNemcek]

Thomas,

Thanks for sharing your taste in music. I’ll be giving most of these a listen in the upcoming weeks. 

I googled David Ligare because the name sounded familiar, and imagine my surprise when I saw that he had painted works I’d seen in the past three weeks!

Many of his pieces reside at the Crocker art museum in Sacramento, CA where I am now residing. I’ve been there twice in the past three weeks and I too really appreciated his art. I can’t believe my mind didn’t immediately make the connection when I saw his name.

Edited to add: Though, his piece of this rock:

http://www.davidligare.com/img/Ligare_Rock-home.jpg

Is one of my least favorite works of all time. 

No offense intended ” class=”spSmiley” />

[ThomasdaSilva]

Steven Nemcek, it’s fantastic that you live close enough to see his paintings practically at will! And I actually agree with your assessment of the rock piece, well maybe not of all time, but certainly perhaps the least interesting of his work. No offense taken.  

[JulianHassan]

I like a lot of popular music… Katie Perry, Miley Cyrus, etc.

Just try to find what’s best in the piece and recognize that it’s subjective. I wouldn’t read too much into Sheeran’s song being about a rational love. The value in music is not about portraying someone as selfish. That could be a value of literature. Music expresses an emotional state and selfishness is not an emotion.

Take any pop song, and you’re more likely to have more success with a religious or spiritual interpretation. Music is normally about some sort of ideal state (there are also cynically, naturalist, slightly stylized ones like The New Americana / high on legal marijuana). I liked the use of “evergreen” when I heard Sheeran’s on the radio.

If we are talking about music that defines us, that’s different (it is objective) and I would not choose a pop song. I would choose something by Rachmaninoff. But for the purposes of driving down a road at 3am, I might want to listen to a pop song. I think we might be in danger of repressing what we enjoy if we don’t make this distinction, or worse, we might feel it’s dangerous to enjoy something on the radio because it might say something non-heroic about us.

I don’t believe this warning applies to the older guys in this discussion (such as HB). They grew up in a different time period with better musical composition and their preferences are already formed. But we young guys are more at risk of repressing since we are forming our preferences and that might mean we like a 2015 pop song.

[JulianHassan]

It’s cool that you have unique preferences, Thomas. To open you up to some contention, I do find it a bit weird

I’m more evaluative of literature, but for music I am laid back and I would not put as much effort into identifying old-fashioned favorites. I do subscribe to Sirius XM, so I can get classic or oldies channels when I am in the mood of discovery. I rarely make a mental note of something, unless if it’s an unfamiliar symphony piece on the Philharmonic channel. There are a lot of people who put effort into evaluating music. I would only put effort into evaluating a piece by a composer.

It is interesting to see Ayn Rand make an impromptu music evaluation of a popular song on the Johnny Carson show:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBmViYDlrjU

“I approve enormously of that which makes people like the song, but I do not approve of its content. I say man can be happy, can achieve the ideal here and on earth.” AR (around 4 minutes in)

Notice that she makes a statement about the ideal, an emotion, and a place, earth. To use a modern example, I might say, “I really like what makes people love Locked Out of Heaven by Bruno Mars, but I don’t agree with the lyrics. I think we can really overcome what’s keeping us from just feeling ecstasy when we’re in a relationship.”

Ayn Rand’s formula is an attractive way to evaluate music without hating on the mainstream entertainment viewers. It’s a way of positively relating to the music and identifying if there’s a value at stake.

[Author]

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