My Depraved Soundtrack

...May the haunting footsteps of those lost strike a chord of merriment that in fact we are not alone...

I can't even feign the importance that the circumstances of my demeanor and disposition are mine and mine alone. Millions around the world with conditions worse and ultimately heart-breaking may scoff at my despair. And while that brings some measure of comfort, I have only one life to live and when the bottom slides out from under my stable ground, I have no knowledge of the depths that I descend into.

Damien Rice said once that he couldn't write songs unless he was sad....

Melancholy melodies often find themselves more poignant than those spirited tunes, partly because we recognize and appreciate the kinship misery feels with its kind. However, I can't help but relish the serrated beating of my own heart lapping up pools of my own disdain for my own temperament. It's useless to curse the skies. It's useless to waste the bold, brave energy that being angry lazily points its beam towards. Anger has produced bombs that have destroyed innocent lives that have no business paying for other's transgressions. Angry is apathetic. Anger is easy.

I am not angry....I am disappointed and dead.

Dead to the ways of the past and born anew, fostering a new set of ideologies to tackle the obstacle at hand. I must continue to perish and awake new like a phoenix out of the ashes. I allow mere moments to mourn the passing of another son, but I must learn to remember the mistakes and improve. Anything else would be sacrilege. So, as the devil cackles somewhere in the dark, I can only begin again.

And how does this deal with music?

All conventional logic points to irrelevance, but in times like this, I think of how war-torn nations and poverty-stricken projects have produced violent light so bright it can't be ignored. Rappers such as Nas, Jay, and a slew of others that not only made it out, but brought some experiences to mainstream audiences who may not have otherwise been given such a visceral testimony. Illmatic, often regarded as the best hip/hop album of all time features first-person narrative of a young Nasir Jones accounting death, life, routine days, and grief housed within the fenced hell that manifested itself as the Queensbridge projects.

I will fall....

And continue to fall because I have too much pride not to. I am destined to do more than what I have allowed myself to waste during the first 23 years of my life. I have allowed myself to make excuses for myself and lend comparisons to others when there are none. I am an individual responsible for lifting myself out of this grave that is slowing filling in. I will fall because it's the only way we learn how to pick ourselves back up.


This. Is. Truth.