The Groove: The shadows grow so long before my eyes

One of my favorite films to this day is a John Cusack movie by the name of "High Fidelity." It very might well be one of my favorites for possibly some of the following reasons: A. It's a movie about being a music snob who gets shafted by the opposite sex. B. It has a cover of Peter Frampton's "Baby I Love Your Way" as a delightful deus ex machina. C. It has Jack Black.

Then again, it's probably on my list for all of those reasons. Yet there is a theme I find very intriguing, one that is the centerpiece to what I find is one of the most mentally provocative opening monologues in a motion picture.

It is the main character Rob's personal anecdote about the influence of popular music upon youth culture, culminating in a question of its influence upon himself: "Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?" It's not a divine literary maxim, but it is something that I often think about.

I have an ungodly musical library. Some people are into collecting stamps, car magazines or ex-girlfriends. I find my musical collection is an addiction by the same law, if not a different spirit.

Chances are then, that I probably often discount the effect that my listening has upon me. Often times I might be having a rough day, and all I want to hear are Joe Hisaishi soundtracks, Radiohead and Antony & The Johnsons. But that music, almost all of it, is of a melancholy nature - introspective and intelligent yes - but sometimes bordering on ridiculously depressing.

I'd like to believe I have a brain enough to wrap around and appreciate Radiohead, but sometimes the stuff is so ridiculously dooming that it just scares the daylights out of me (example: listen to "Exit Music [For A Film]"...it was written for the ending scene of Baz Luhrmann's "Romeo & Juliet," when Claire Danes holds a gun to her head).

So where then is the rub? Do we listen to melancholy music because we're temporarily depressed? Or is it just the opposite? Regardless, I know I can say with certainty that I don't remember ever being in a great mood and simultaneously having this uncontrollable joyous impulse to listen to Thom Yorke wail on "There There (The Boney King of Nowhere)." However, if there is at least one thing that I've discovered during all this introverted rambling, is that by way of complete accident, the direct opposite force to Radiohead is most definitely Al Green. That said, I'm gonna go get my soul on and sing along to "Let's Stay Together," and then probably Marvin and Tammy's "Ain't Nothin Like The Real Thing Baby." Man I love Motown.

 

- Wilson Skomal is a senior history major and Mirror copy editor.