Teenaged Tunes
Many people judge others off of their taste in music. Do you listen to rap? Do you listen to country? Do you listen to pop? Do you listen to EDM? Well, then we can be friends. It is amazing how in a culture inundated with technology music is still used as a basis for connection. Within this spectrum of listeners I would like to claim that I have no category. My taste in music is largely as a result of my many car rides and “music pop-quizes” with my father. In addition to this, my musical selections often are based less on genre and more on message either through lyrics or connection to personal memories. Through my teen years, my top three influential songs are as follows:
- Green Day, “Brain Stew.”
From the well known album by Green Day, Bullet in a Bible, the song “Brain Stew,” among many of the other tracks, was very important in my young life. I like to accredit my inconsistent, confusing, and awesome music taste to the musical selections of my father. He was a man of many genres and taught me to appreciate all kinds of music (although I’m sure that was not his original intent; he just liked to control the radio). From Rob Zombie, to Flyleaf, to Phil Collins, to AC/DC, to Led Zeppelin, to Green Day, and many more; we listened to it all. As a kid who traveled a lot for soccer games, soccer practices, and to-and-from karate classes, I had plenty of car music quizes to fine tune my music taste. My father would often quiz me on what song or musician was playing as we were on our many various car trips; it was a kind of game that really made me pay closer attention to the kind of music we listened to. One of my favorite musical experiences that I carried with me through a majority of my young life was my appreciation for Green Day and their daring decisions. Bullet in a Bible was one of my favorite albums, and “Brain Stew” was one of my favorite songs, and I owe this discovery to my father, who introduced me to the band and their sound.
2. Cady Groves, “Changin’ Me.”
On a more personal level the song, “Changin’ Me,” by Cady Groves was my go-to song. Whether in a good mood or a bad mood, this song was always able to reshape my perspective. My favorite section of this song ends with the line:
Can’t change history,
but history is what’s changin’ me
I took this song to heart and it became, in a way, the introductory song to the sound-track of my teenaged years. I knew, much like the song says, that although I cannot change the past, I can learn and grow from what it has taught me. As a person who is very introspective and over-thinks almost everything, I enjoy the message this song sends. We cannot change the past, and thus we must move on and learn how to adapt with what we are given. I did not have the most stereotypical childhood. I was a black-belt at the age of 12, a young karate instructor, often played for two soccer teams at once, and was very into my academic career (from way too early on if you ask me now). I never left much time to appreciate being a kid and having fun time or social time and often as a teen I looked back on that with regret. Fortunately, I used the message from this song to remind myself that although I cannot go back in time, I can take what I learned from my past and use it to control the course of my future. Additionally, I use this song as a sign that if I did not take my past so seriously, I may not have ended up where I am today, and I am more than happy with the person I turned out to be.
3. Monica and Megan, “The Journey.”
Looking back on my teenaged years, nothing is more influential than the song my friend, Monica Murphy, and I wrote for a project titled 100 Reasons to Live. Where I grew up, some would say, that there was a time where suicides were occurring at an alarming rate. As an initiative, a project entitled 100 Reasons to Live began, and it brought about positive change. Locals arrived during the beginning phases of the project and wrote on a huge sheet of paper (posted on the walls of a local recreation center) their reasons to live. As project contributors, Monica and I wrote and produced this song as our way of turning peoples’ reasons to live into art, which was the main goal of the project (what the song lacks in quality of sound, it makes up for in quality of message). Our goal was to help people see the beauty in life and why it is worth living to the fullest. As project contributors, we wanted to show people to love and appreciate life in the same way as we did. Our song was released in a form of an “art exhibition” with many other works of art by other project contributors. Producing this song as a sophomore in high school was a major point of pride in my life, and to this day I have it on my iTunes rotation, as well do some of my fellow classmates from high school. This song helped us heal, and definitely impacted my life in an extremely positive way as a person who grew up in an area with such a negative stigma.
Life is a journey so enjoy the view
These songs, “Brain Stew,” “Changin’ Me,” and “The Journey” greatly impacted my young life, and have helped shape the adult I have become today. My weird, random, and awesome music taste is definitely a unique feature of my personality, and I love sharing that with people! Most people do not always understand what I mean when I say I will listen to anything (but not so much country… sorry country fans…) and most people even ask me to show them my playlists to prove that I will pretty much enjoy my time listening to anything. My teenaged tunes are definitely a testimony to the randomness of my music taste… if only this list could be longer.