Songbook by Nick Hornby and thoughts on music
I finally finished a book with no pictures. Holy cow, I sure didn't think I'd do that this year, the way I've been going. But I'm not surprised it's Hornby that's broken my funk; I'm surprised it's a book about music.
Anybody with a passing familiarity with Nick Hornby knows he is a music fan. Perhaps that's putting it lightly really. Hornby seems to be a music fan the way people are fans of oxygen. He knows his shit and it works its way into a lot of his novels. I am not a music fan to this level. That's not to say I don't like music; I love it. But I don't breathe it the way Hornby does. I'm not even sure I would be classified as an enthusiast. I'm like the John Cleese character from a Monty Python sketch that says, "I don't know much about art, but I know what I like."
This book is a series of short essays about just that, songs that Hornby likes. Songs that meant something to him at some point in his life. It may not be a huge emotional connection, but it's a song that stuck with him, that he feels resonated and embodied a period of his life. I'm not sure I can say the same thing about music. But that's what so amazingly cool about Nick Hornby. You don't have to feel as passionately as he does to enjoy his writing, and this is a highly enjoyable book. It had me checking out some of his recommendations on YouTube. So while I don't connect as he does to the things he connects to, the book accomplished its goal by making me seek out something I never knew existed until this moment.
It makes me think, though (another good quality in a book), about what my connection to music is and why it's so weak. I started out listening to really old country and early 70s pop/rock. In retrospect, the number of times I listened to Bobby Goldsboro's song "Honey" should have told me that Jane Eyre was destined to become my favorite novel. My dad listened to a lot of Chicago, and I can almost picture myself still in the back of some car or other as we were driving who knows where with Tony Orlando and Dawn singing "Tie a Yellow Ribbon." Mom's favorites at that time were Barbra Streisand (whose Christmas album I would play over and over, no matter the season), The Fifth Dimension, Roberta Flack, and Isaac Hayes. All these still seem to me like cleaning music, because that was always what she played while cleaning.
I dabbled in disco (oh, Donna Summer!) and eventually was turned into a pop/rock lover by "Gloria" by Laura Branigan. I tried punk for about two days, but I couldn't find it on the radio and couldn't be bothered to seek it out. And I think that says a lot about what I've become. While Hornby is a musical connoisseur, I'm just a musical dabbler. My Spotify list is filled with musical paradoxes. Is it only on my playlist that you can go from Bach's "Air on the G String" to Kanye West's "Stronger"? From Hillsong United's "Oceans" to Eminem's "Without Me"? Am I weird? I just like what I like.
I wish I could pinpoint the variable that groups all these disjointed songs together into something that I find pleasurable. What is it about them that makes me like what I like? Some of these songs speak to me with their lyrics. Some of them, like Albinoni, Bach, or Vivaldi, bring emotions to the forefront with not a single word uttered. Even Pearl Jam's "Yellow Ledbetter"; I count it as an instrumental because I can't understand a damn word he says, but the rasp of Eddie Vedder's voice singing the incomprehensible is an instrument unto itself that no other man can recreate.
But then there's my recently discovered love for DNCE. God I wish I could explain this. They just make me want to move, and I'm not really one to move to music (I won't debase the art of dance by calling what I do "dancing"). Bruno Mars' "Uptown Funk," Robin Schulz's "Sugar," Panic! At the Disco's "LA Devotee," and Kesha's "Blow" all do the same thing. That's gotta say something for them, right, if they can make me wish for a dancefloor?
So, suffice it to say, I feel a bit schizophrenic when it comes to music. I wish there was some kind of Buzzfeed quiz (and honestly I'm surprised there isn't) or some app that can look at your playlist and tell you what your taste in music says about you. I think that could be a really interesting psychological study. I wish I could be as into, well anything, as Hornby is into music. I dabble in life, knowing a little about a lot of things. But although I will never reach Hornby-esque levels of musical knowledge, it doesn't change the fact that even my bourgeois taste in music makes me who I am. So if Bruno ever comes on after I've socked away a few screwdrivers, just clear the dance floor and don't say I didn't warn you.
Anybody with a passing familiarity with Nick Hornby knows he is a music fan. Perhaps that's putting it lightly really. Hornby seems to be a music fan the way people are fans of oxygen. He knows his shit and it works its way into a lot of his novels. I am not a music fan to this level. That's not to say I don't like music; I love it. But I don't breathe it the way Hornby does. I'm not even sure I would be classified as an enthusiast. I'm like the John Cleese character from a Monty Python sketch that says, "I don't know much about art, but I know what I like."
This book is a series of short essays about just that, songs that Hornby likes. Songs that meant something to him at some point in his life. It may not be a huge emotional connection, but it's a song that stuck with him, that he feels resonated and embodied a period of his life. I'm not sure I can say the same thing about music. But that's what so amazingly cool about Nick Hornby. You don't have to feel as passionately as he does to enjoy his writing, and this is a highly enjoyable book. It had me checking out some of his recommendations on YouTube. So while I don't connect as he does to the things he connects to, the book accomplished its goal by making me seek out something I never knew existed until this moment.
It makes me think, though (another good quality in a book), about what my connection to music is and why it's so weak. I started out listening to really old country and early 70s pop/rock. In retrospect, the number of times I listened to Bobby Goldsboro's song "Honey" should have told me that Jane Eyre was destined to become my favorite novel. My dad listened to a lot of Chicago, and I can almost picture myself still in the back of some car or other as we were driving who knows where with Tony Orlando and Dawn singing "Tie a Yellow Ribbon." Mom's favorites at that time were Barbra Streisand (whose Christmas album I would play over and over, no matter the season), The Fifth Dimension, Roberta Flack, and Isaac Hayes. All these still seem to me like cleaning music, because that was always what she played while cleaning.
I dabbled in disco (oh, Donna Summer!) and eventually was turned into a pop/rock lover by "Gloria" by Laura Branigan. I tried punk for about two days, but I couldn't find it on the radio and couldn't be bothered to seek it out. And I think that says a lot about what I've become. While Hornby is a musical connoisseur, I'm just a musical dabbler. My Spotify list is filled with musical paradoxes. Is it only on my playlist that you can go from Bach's "Air on the G String" to Kanye West's "Stronger"? From Hillsong United's "Oceans" to Eminem's "Without Me"? Am I weird? I just like what I like.
I wish I could pinpoint the variable that groups all these disjointed songs together into something that I find pleasurable. What is it about them that makes me like what I like? Some of these songs speak to me with their lyrics. Some of them, like Albinoni, Bach, or Vivaldi, bring emotions to the forefront with not a single word uttered. Even Pearl Jam's "Yellow Ledbetter"; I count it as an instrumental because I can't understand a damn word he says, but the rasp of Eddie Vedder's voice singing the incomprehensible is an instrument unto itself that no other man can recreate.
But then there's my recently discovered love for DNCE. God I wish I could explain this. They just make me want to move, and I'm not really one to move to music (I won't debase the art of dance by calling what I do "dancing"). Bruno Mars' "Uptown Funk," Robin Schulz's "Sugar," Panic! At the Disco's "LA Devotee," and Kesha's "Blow" all do the same thing. That's gotta say something for them, right, if they can make me wish for a dancefloor?
So, suffice it to say, I feel a bit schizophrenic when it comes to music. I wish there was some kind of Buzzfeed quiz (and honestly I'm surprised there isn't) or some app that can look at your playlist and tell you what your taste in music says about you. I think that could be a really interesting psychological study. I wish I could be as into, well anything, as Hornby is into music. I dabble in life, knowing a little about a lot of things. But although I will never reach Hornby-esque levels of musical knowledge, it doesn't change the fact that even my bourgeois taste in music makes me who I am. So if Bruno ever comes on after I've socked away a few screwdrivers, just clear the dance floor and don't say I didn't warn you.
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