Art and the Freedom to be Weird

I’m pretty lenient when it comes to art. I’ve always hated the debate over art “is” because I truly believe there’s beauty in everything, and trying to constitute what is and isn’t art just leads to shitty semantic debates. Even some low-effort installation created in irony to make you question “is this art?” still has a point to it. Art is made by people that need to get something out of themselves. Sometimes it’s music, sometimes it’s a 20-foot sculpture. It’s not always pretty, but it’s a way for us to speak a different language and express the inexpressible.

Aside from music, writing, and the occasional video game, my free time is mostly spent mindlessly scrolling through reddit. A few weeks ago I stumbled across a link to an AV Club article that brought back a flood of nostalgic emotions. The article in question breaks down this specific kernel of nostalgia far better than I ever could, and as much as I’d love to talk about this book, I wouldn’t be able to add much on to what’s already written here. This article stirred something in me that made me question my taste in regards to art. Not music, not movies, not the written word, but Art with a capital ‘A’

I don’t often talk about visual art on here because I feel like I don’t have the vocabulary for it. I know what I like, but I never really questioned why I like it. When I say that I’m “lenient” in regards to art I mean that I’m not picky, and that’s another reason why I don’t talk about art; I kinda like it all. I don’t have a very discerning taste because I feel like I can (almost) always find the beauty in art. What I’ve come to realize is that while I enjoy all art passively, what I actively enjoy is fucked up.

The reason this article struck a chord with me is because it connected some dots in my mind and brought back a flood of memories that helped me remember a string of bizarre things I was exposed to as a child. It brought me back to a formative time in my childhood and helped me remember a series of massively impactful experiences that changed my artistic taste and lingered with me for the rest of my life.

1 - Lane Smith

The inspiration for this post was also, fittingly, one of my first memorable exposures to a unique art style. Again, the write-up above does a more articulate job of analytically breaking down Smith’s style, but more importantly, it served as the catalyst which helped me realize that two of my favorite books in elementary school were illustrated by the same person: Lane Smith. As a child, I read The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales, andThe True Story of the Three Little Pigs ad nauseum. Both of these books are categorized as “postmodern children’s books” which skew and satirize traditional children’s fairy tales. If you have any doubt about where my overbearing skepticism and incessant irreverence come from, make no mistake the seeds were first planted here. Smith’s dadaist take on these stories is absolutely incredible. Filled with abnormally long tounges, contorted caricatures, and general fuckedupedness, these books helped me look at the world differently.

Seeing something as simple as a cow drawn in such a foreign style made me realize how different other people’s perspectives and interpretations could be. To see so many concepts that I was already familiar with (both visually and storywise) made me realize that not only were these bizarre interpretations valid, but they still worked. I still recognized this duck as a duck even though it didn’t take a “traditional” form that I was familiar with. These unique illustrations combined with the meta post-modern writing style were a door-opening combination for an elementary school-aged Taylor. There was no turning back.

2 - Stephen Gammell

Jesus Christ. If there was any indication that I had a fucked up start, it was first evident here. While I certainly loved Stinky Cheese Man, and The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, later on in elementary school I was forced to read more “substantive” books (i.e. smaller text) so I looked for something with a cool cover (how else are you supposed to pick reading material at seven?) As I sifted through the contents of my Elementary school’s shelves like a shitty, snot-nosed seven-year-old record collector I stumbled across something that stopped me in my tracks and made my hair stand on end: Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. Illustrated by  Stephen Gammell, these books were (and still are) absolutely chilling. The short stories ranged from rewritten classics to modern urban legends, and while the written contents of the book were amazing, the real draw for me at the time was the art. A simple google image search returns a myriad of illustrations that I can only describe as unsafe for children. I don’t know how or why this book was allowed in an elementary school library, but I have a feeling that’s something that wouldn’t be allowed in 2016.

This was my first time realizing that art could be weird. Not that I’d had massive exposure to high art as a seven-year-old, but it felt like the first time I was looking at something completely unique. It was like viewing the world through a whole new (disturbed) lense. It scared me, but in a good way. It looked cool. It looked otherworldly. I wanted more.

3 - Gerald Scarfe

In 1998 my family bought a beach house in Manzanita, Oregon. That log cabin was a magical place and it contains some of the happiest memories of my childhood. My family took a trip down to the beach nearly every weekend. It became an escape. One particular weekend I went alone, just me and my dad. My mother stayed home with my younger brother, so it was a father/son weekend… which probably would have meant more to me if I wasn’t still in elementary school. On this trip my dad let me watch Pink Floyd’s The Wall, a movie that I was apparently just on the verge of being able to handle. While I’m sure he meant well (he just wanted to share his music with me) The Wall fucking scarred me. It was R-rated, sure but I think (aside from wanting to show me my first R-rated movie) my dad forgot how dark the movie was. Everything from the masked schoolchildren, graphic violence, and obtuse depiction of sex scared the absolute shit out of me. Now that I think about it, this movie is probably the reason I’m so freaked out by gas masks. Just take a look at the IMDB Parents Guide to this thing… I was a kid who was too scared to watch this scene from Winnie the Pooh a few years earlier.

Aside from the minor emotional scarring, my biggest takeaway from The Wall were the film’s animated sequences. The movie covers a double album it switches between live action and animated for many of the songs. Probably because of my age, I paid more attention to the animated sequences thinking “hey it’s like a cartoon, cartoons can’t be scary!’ The animated segments of the movie drawn by Gerald Scarfe were in retrospect more surreal and depraved than the film’s live action counterparts. Most notably the film’s dark and horrifying depiction of war (in reaction to WWII) was seared into my mind. Similar to the above entries, Scarfe’s distinct style granted me a new perspective, in this case, it was a twisted perspective of morphing objects, violence, and sexual intimacy, but it was a new perspective nonetheless.

4 - Jonathan Gourley & Ralph Steadman

On a more positive note, as I grew and developed into an adult with an only slightly-fucked up artistic taste I tended to lean towards abstract and disturbing artwork (who woulda thought?) In high school I discovered both rock band Portugal. The Man and writer Hunter S. Thompson both artists who utilize surrealist imagery to enhance their respective creations. Portugal. The Man uses lead singer John Gourley’s watercolored artwork as the cover and liner artwork to most of their records. Meanwhile, Hunter S. Thompson famously used Ralph Steadman’s artwork as a visual component to his books Fear and Loathing in Las Vegasand Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72. These artists combined with things I’d find around the same time like Wednesday Wolf all represented a further development of the style I was drawn to as a child.

Personal history obviously plays a major role in my taste, but emotion aside, I can’t really explain the psychological reason why I’m drawn to such a distorted art style. Maybe seeing the “scary” view of something makes the real world that much brighter. Maybe it’s just seeing these everyday concepts twisted and distorted to such a degree that they’re almost unrecognizable. Maybe I just like art that resembles drug use. I have no idea. But in looking back at all this, one thing is clear:

I have a fucked up taste. I’m lucky.

I don’t want to end this on a note of me masturbating to how great my own taste is, but I genuinely feel fortunate that I had the freedom and access to take this path. Being able to have a fucked up taste, or an off-kilter personality is a luxury that can only be afforded by growing up unafraid. If I had grown up in a harsher environment, I wouldn’t have had the freedom to explore “weird” stuff because I’d be too preoccupied with fending for myself and trying to be cool. I never had to deal with bullying, racism, discrimination, poverty, or violence, so I was able to flourish and be whoever I wanted to be. I’m grateful in that sense, but I’m also hopeful. I’m hopeful that I can culture the same environment for my children one day, and I’m hopeful that this path will keep me open. I don’t want to be one of those people that shits on art, or is “scared” by art… and not scared in the same way that I was when watching The Wall, but scared in the way Christians were afraid of heavy metal in the 80’s. I don’t want to be scared of the next thing, I want to embrace it. Even if it’s weird or confusing, I want to at least have some grip on art and pop culture as I grow older… but I know that’s impossible. You can only be “cool” for so long, but I think this “open” mentality can be eternal.

Remaining open to new experiences and weird fucked up shit can only open your mind. Sometimes you’re not ready for it. Sometimes it doesn’t make sense, and that’s fine, but sometimes it can click with you in a way you couldn’t even conceive of before. The times when you see something, or read something, or hear something and say “fuck, why didn’t I think of that?” or “shit, this exact sound is exactly what I needed to hear right now.” The times when you’re tapped into something greater than yourself, when you’re experiencing something on a spiritual level, when you feel connected to another creator. That’s what art is about. That’s what life is about.

Das Racist, Weed, and Artistic Hang-ups

The fall of 2011 may have been the worst, most soul-crushing time of my life (at least so far, things could always get worse!) That summer I had graduated from high school and, unfortunately, discovered weed. By the time September hit I was starting my first term of real-deal college and struggling with the weight of what that meant. Most of my friends had moved away and I was going to a massive school where I knew no one and everyone was older than me. I was in a new situation, scared, and alone, so I clung onto the things that I knew would comfort me. At the time, that meant weed. I ran in the worst direction possible.

Weed made me feel perfect. It was almost literally heaven on earth. It is terrifying knowing it takes so little to make me so happy, but it also meant my ideal night involved a vape, podcasts, and copious amounts of junk food. I was drawn towards it because it felt like the only way to adjust. I could tell college represented a major shift in my life, and I could also tell I was not ready for it. I just wanted to keep playing video games and fucking around with my friends from high school, but that was now impossible. So instead I smoked and played video games by myself. Great.

I tried pairing pot with everything I could think of, and (aside from social interaction) it made everything better. Listening to music on weed? The most heavenly sound I’d ever heard. Listening to a podcast on weed? I had a hard time trying to breathe between all the laughter. A single Jones Soda was world-shatteringly delicious. In a way it was beautiful. It made the things I already liked even better. Something as insignificant as a 99 cent can of Arizona from the shithole 7-11 around the corner could be the highpoint of my night. It was beautiful and terrifying.

I recently read a quote from Anthony Bourdain that perfectly sums up what I’ve learned from this time: “There’s a guy inside me who wants to lay in bed, and smoke weed all day, and watch cartoons, and old movies. I could easily do that. My whole life is a series of stratagems to avoid and outwit that guy.” I don’t want to fall into that. I don’t want to go down that well. I won’t.

I still learned something from this period. I learned about myself, I learned how not to handle pressure, and (more importantly) I discovered some great art during this time. I discovered the comedy podcast Uhh Yeah Dude, the crushing heaviness of stoner rock (a bit on-the-nose), and the hip-hop group Das Racist.

Aside from Eminem (every white kid’s favorite rapper), Das Racist was the first hip-hop group I genuinely enjoyed. They were the first artist within this genre that I discovered on my own. It’s selfish, but sometimes there’s a gross satisfaction with being the first person in your group of friends to discover something. For me, that was DR.

Das Racist are a now-defunct comedic hip-hop trio based out of Brooklyn, New York comprised of rappers Himanshu Kumar Suri (Heems), and Victor Vazquez  (Kool A.D.), as well as hype man Ashok Kondabolu (Dapwell). Many people were first exposed to the group in 2008 through their fluke viral hit “Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell.” While literal essays have been written dissecting the song’s lyrics and meaning, it’s likely that if you listen to this track on your own you’ll get something out of it on at least one level.

As a group, they’ve often sat in a weird position, half of the people that heard “Pizza Hut” assumed they were some one-off youtube comedy group. The actual hip-hop community still seems divided between one camp who initially dismissed them as joke rap and a second that stuck around saw something deeper. The group’s hip-hop identity crisis is perfectly encapsulated in (what I consider) their definitive song “hahaha jk?”

When I was first turned onto the group they only had two mixtapes out: Shut up, DudeandSit Down, Man. Because my only other deep exposure to hip-hop at the time was Eminem, something about Das Racist opened a door in my mind. I didn’t know that hip-hop could be this funny or this tapped into pop culture. The trio’s incessant references to junk food, internet in-jokes, and 80’s icons was an intoxicating mix. To witness all of the things that these guys were pulling from and then piecing it together for myself was a fucking trip. And even if I didn’t get every reference the group was dropping, their delivery was so silky smooth that I didn’t even mind.

The reason I started this off by talking about weed is because, yes, I used it to escape, but it has also forever tainted the way I perceive most of the music I was listening to at this time. Maybe this filter was more from the overall darkness and feeling of treading water, but the weed certainly didn’t help. Sometimes an album, video game, podcast, or movie, can become so entangled in a feeling that it becomes impossible to separate. I guess it’s kind of like nostalgia, only it’s not necessarily a positive feeling. In this case, the fall of 2011 was an absolutely terrible time in my life. I ran to weed and used it to accentuate my already isolationist and habitual tendencies. I’d listen to the same songs, podcasts, and albums while smoking. As much as I love it, it’s hard for me to listen to Uhh Yeah Dude just because the host’s voices bring this feeling back so strongly. What once was an incredible escape has now become tainted with darkness and listlessness (which is exactly the opposite of what a comedy podcast should evoke).

Nearly everything I was consuming at this time has been filtered through this lense, it’s all associated with this weird, dark, directionless sinking feeling… All of it except Das Racist. Somehow they are the one that gets a pass, and I don’t know why. I listened to “Amazing” nearly every day. The released their debut studio album that same fall. You’d think they would be just as tied to this negative emotion as the rest of what I was consuming at the time, but somehow they came out unscathed.

I think it’s just a testament to how fucking good they are. Das Racist is somehow able to levitate above my own mental connections, above this weird filter, and above my own negative nostalgia. That’s impressive. I have absolutely no idea how to end this other than saying Das Racist aren’t the typical rap group. There’s a stretch of songs on their second mixtape that exemplifies everything the group does well: Rapping 2 U,  Rooftop, and Return to Innocence. DR were able to make something wholly unique within the hip-hop genre (a scene that I was decidedly not a part of and wanted nothing to do with). They created something that left a major impression on me and is one of the few things from that time in my life that I can still listen to fresh and without any negative associations.

Weed fucking sucks. I obviously “get” weed, but after enough bad trips, stupid decisions, and perspective, I’ve come to realize that it’s not for me. I don’t look down on people that smoke, and after all, it genuinely helps some people… but I just think that in my case it did more harm than good. I’m glad that I experienced it, and it absolutely opened my mind up in different directions, but it’s not something I’d ever want to “return to.” Das Racist is my one solid tie still remaining from that point in my life, and the fact that their music was able to come out the other side of that experience unaffected is fucking commendable. It’s rap no one else does, and that no one else can do. It was cultural, self-aware, tapped-in hip-hop that is not only unaffected by my own stupid brain, but a genuine joy to listen to. It showed me what hip-hop was possible of achieving, and the fact that it’s just as comedic as it is genuine is an incredibly rare feat. Thank god for this group of three racially-ambiguous men.

Combating Fall

The thing that I love most about Oregon (aside from our craft beers, eccentric facial hair, and borderline-oppressive foliage) is that we get to experience all four seasons. The ability to witness the shift of each season is a beautiful thing, but fall always seems to be a time of the year that’s laced with bittersweet melancholy.

Aside from the turning of the leaves, the vanishing sun, and the unrelenting torrent of rain, fall has always been a season of loss. It’s synonymous with the beginning of a new school year, and that’s a feeling that I’ve always dreaded. It’s not that I disliked school, but I’ve come to realize that the first week of classes represents something more than just “the start of a new school year,” it’s realizing how little you did with your summer, and how much you still wanted to do. It’s a sea change that is so closely tied to the season that I can’t help but feel a lingering sense of sadness through the month.

I’ve realized that my nostalgic tendencies are (in many cases) simply coping mechanisms to combat the inherent feelings of sadness that some seasons bring. I’ve also realized that for about a decade every fall has represented “the last year” of something in my mind. In middle school it was ‘holy shit, high school. This is the loss of all childhood innocence.’ Halfway through high school it was ‘holy shit, I’m taking classes and I need to get a job?’ Throughout college it was a constant stream of ‘holy shit, this term is gonna be even harder than the last?’ Last fall it was ‘holy shit, I need to finish school, work my job, and work an internship?’

I now realize that each fall before this I was concerned solely (and selfishly) with a loss of free time. Summer is nothing but free time, it’s the ultimate fuck-around season. Fall is the antithesis of summer, it’s a complete sea change in everything from the weather to my daily routine. Nostalgia is just finding things about the season you like and holding onto them for dear life. There’s something comforting about breaking out your jeans from last year, or listening to an album that you only listen to during this time of the year.

But up until very recently, my free time was what I valued above nearly everything else. Fall takes all that away because what used to be endless hours of summer fuck-around time is now dedicated to school. This past year I wrapped up my final term of college and an advertising internship, and all of my greatest fears were realized. The past 8 months I’ve had the least free time that I’ve ever had in my life, but something unexpected happened: I didn’t mind. I absolutely loved that internship and rarely ever longed to go back to the carefree “fuck around” summers of past. I was willingly trading in my free time for work because I finally found something that I loved doing.

Now I sit here as I’ve finished my final year of college and that internship feeling the same creeping dread as previous years, but for an entirely different reason. Now I just hope I find a job that I enjoy as much as that internship. I want to find something that I enjoy that much and would unwaveringly trade in my free time for.  

I recognize I’ve experienced this insane level of restlessness and uncertainty before and it’s turned out okay every other time. In fact, I’ve come out of each one of those experiences a better person… but this one feels different. This one feels final.   

I think what it comes down to is that if I enjoy what I’m doing, then that panic dissipates almost immediately. I just don’t know if I’ll enjoy it until I experience it, and up until that point, it’s just an unknown that my paranoid mind fills with only the worst possible outcome. I’m afraid of the unknown. I’m terrified of change, and fall is a season that always brings change. I just don’t know if it’s for better or worse until it actually happens.

At the time of writing, I’m terrified that I won’t find a job, or that my job will feel like work. And don’t get me wrong, I love work, and I’ll willingly ring myself dry if it’s going towards something that I find satisfying. But I’ve also experienced jobs that are immensely unsatisfying. I just want to write. If I can write I’ll be happy. And if you enjoy what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life (just look at pornstars, they never have any lasting psychological issues). I don’t know. I’m on the edge of an abyss and I’m about to be in control for the first time in my life. I’m just as scared as I am excited. I don’t want to make the wrong first move. I don’t want to fuck it up right out of the gates.

Every other change has been for the best, so I can only hope that this one will be too. I can feel the existential dread creeping in, but I’m too far along to turn back now. The biggest difference is, this time, I need to seek it out. This isn’t an impending school year that I’ll have to participate in regardless of whether I’m ready or not, this is something I need to undertake on my own. Change won’t come to me. A job won’t fall in my lap. This is one change that I need to charge into headfirst. I can’t wait for life.

Tims v Lays

I may not have many skills in life, but one thing I have honed over my 23 years of existence is a delicate palate for PB&J sandwiches. They’re one of the only things I know inside and out. One of the few things I truly understand. By proxy, I’ve also become dangerously knowledgeable about potato chips. I know the history, I know the facts, I can guess the nutritional information in a serving size down to 20 kcals. As a result, I can say with 100% certainty that Tim’s Cascade Style Potato Chips are objectively the pinnacle of the potato chip art form, and I will fight anyone that says otherwise. Reasons why they are good:

1. They salty as fuck

2. They crunchy as hell

3. They’re thick as shit

4. They taste really really good

You could put a bowl of Tim’s out at a motherfucking barbecue on the fourth of July and no one would bat an eye, that’s how good they are. And I know what you’re thinking in your whiny little voice “but Taylor, what about Kettle Brand Potato Chips?” To that, I say SHUT THE FUCK UP. Kettle Chips fell the fuck off. Aside from Sea Salt and Salt & Pepper they are the chip embodiment of trying too hard. Maple and Bacon? Gimmie a fucking break. They tried too hard to diversify and diluted their entire brand in the process. You know how many SKU’s Tims has? Fucking FOUR: Original, Sea Salt, Sour Cream, and Jalapeño. Stick with what you know guys, don’t try to put bacon in my potato chip.

As a quick aside, you may have noticed that I’m not talking about anything besides kettle chips, and that’s because I’m a chip racist. Everything besides kettle chips are less than. Lays are cheap, Pringles are a joke, and Cheetos are for children. So in case you’re wondering when I’ll bring up your “favorite chip” I won’t and you’re wrong.

Now onto the main event: within the last five years, big dog Lays had swung their weight around and elbowed their way into the Kettle game providing a much-needed shake-up to the industry. Since 2011 they’ve been doing surprisingly serviceable work, walking a fine line between just enough flavor variations and just the right quality. As a mega-corporation they obviously fall prey to many of the same pitfalls as Kettle, trying to diversify and even encouraging fans to think of wacky flavors but luckily their Kettle line has remained relatively pure. In 2014 Lays released a lattice cut variety within their Kettle Chip line and betrayed any bit of faith I had in them up until that point.

These chips are awful. There’s so much wasted potential: the lattice cut represents an ideal delivery system, allowing for salt and flavoring to sneak between the cracks and into the holes of the chip. It could have been perfect, but instead, we got an overly-crunchy and under-salted piece of absolute fuckshit. These chips are like eating sandpaper. Stiff sandpaper. It’s like having your mouth crammed full of tree bark and being told it’s birthday cake. They shred the inside of your mouth and don’t even reward you for your food-inflicted mutilation. It would almost be worth it if (after bearing through the horrific chewing experience) you were hit with a wave of salty goodness…or even flavor, but there is none to speak of. And sure, Tims are crunchy, but at least they don’t hurt to eat. These Lays commit the worst sin by being unpleasant to eat and unsatisfying to taste.

Lattice cut Lays are an abomination. They have slandered the good name of the kettle chip category and don’t even deserve to be called a snack food. These chips aren’t worth the recycled plastic they’re packaged in. They have no respect for the potato chip game. If Lays think that they can just waltz into this category and shit out whatever their team comes up with, THINK AGAIN. I won’t stand for this, and I won’t go down without a fight. Kettle chips are America’s pastime, and I won’t let you slander their good name. This is about more than chips, this is about freedom. About purity. Tim’s is fighting for wholesomeness, they stand for something. Stand for something, Lays. Make the world a better place. Don’t take the easy way out.

On Lyrics

I don’t think lyrics matter.

Well they do, but that statement was the only attention-grabbing way I could think to start this. What I mean is that I don’t think lyrics should be the main focal point of music. It took a bizarre combination of music genres for me to arrive at this conclusion, but let me see If I can walk you through my reasoning.

In my junior year of high school I discovered the Icelandic post-rock band Sigur Rós. The albums Ágætis Byrjun and ( ) specifically worked their way into near-daily rotation on my iPod. At the same time I also began to fall deeply into metalcore as I frustratedly grappled with my first real breakup. Metal’s harsh screaming vocals, pounding cannon drums, and abrasive guitar seemed to be a perfect reflection of how I felt internally most of the time. Any time I needed a break from that aggressive stuff, I’d go straight to Sigur Ros and use them as an escape. It was like mixing uppers and downers: I used these two genres to accentuate whatever I was feeling at the time. In jumping back and forth between two (seemingly) different types of music so frequently I started to notice some odd similarities. The primary connection I noticed was the way they both approached lyrics. As much as I loved the hardcore scene at the time, I almost never understood the lyrics. The typical criticism of “how can you even tell what they’re saying?” was completely valid. At that time I never had an answer to that criticism, but now I realize it was because I didn’t care about the lyrics; I cared about the music.

Lyrics are great. I’m a writer, I’m obligated to love the written word. Within the context of a piece of music however, I feel that lyrics shouldn’t be viewed as the most vital element. Even in hip-hop, a genre where the voice is the primary focus, there are still interesting ways to create music without focusing on the words explicitly… but I’ll come back to that in a second.

The connection between Sigur Ros and my newfound escape of metalcore was lyrics. Not the content, or the delivery, but the approach. Unless you spoke Icelandic, you had no idea what Sigur Ros songs are saying. Furthermore, some of their songs are written entirely in “hopelandic” a nonsensical language invented by the band which has no meaning. As the band describes hopelandic as “a form of gibberish vocals that fits to the music and acts as another instrument.” While that’s an interesting and novel approach, to an average listener (especially an American high schooler) the whole thing was unintelligible to me. As was metal. I began to realize that both genres were approaching vocals in the exact same way. Obviously you can make out the occasional lyric in a metalcore song, but to me the vocals simply became a part of the larger musical texture. I understood the emotion that was being conveyed without understanding exactly what was being said. I began to view the voice as an instrument.

While both of the genres were using vocals to the same end, they both had very different applications for me. Metalcore became the devil on my shoulder that screamed unknowable words in anger, and Sigur Ros became the angel who gently sang me into a lullaby-like trance. There was suddenly a duality to nearly all of the music I was listening to, it simply became a matter of asking myself what I was in the mood for.

As time wore on I got over that relationship and moved away from metalcore. I wasn’t that mad all the time, and I didn’t want to be. I transitioned into a more positive pop-punk phase which centered heavily around The Wonder Years. While their vocals are far cleaner than what I was used to, the ever-present nasally punk style was still difficult to decipher at times. After listening to The Wonder Years for some time I sat down one of their albums album and a lyric sheet in front of me and ended up discovering an entirely layer to the songs. Not only did I understand what was being said, I suddenly saw a deeper level that the music was operating on. There was something interesting about listening to an album dozens of times and only fully-deciphering it when you sit down with that as your intent. Listening to an album with unclear vocals makes a record replayable and allows the listener to fill in the gaps with their own meaning. Lyrics can add an additional layer to something that’s already enjoyable.

Which brings me back to hip-hop. One of my favorite hip-hop artists Young Thug started out as a very divisive figure within the rap scene. This article by the New York Post does an excellent job of articulately explaining why Young Thug’s music is fascinating. I often use that write-up as a primer when trying to get friends into Thug and while I think the whole article is a great read, it is long. I’ll post an excerpt here that’s relevant:

“genius.com is the watering hole around which today’s rap enthusiasts gather to parse lyrics and ponder the meaning of life. Young Thug has pages upon pages of lyrics posted on Genius. Many are riddled with debates not over what his words might be trying to convey, but what’s actually being said in the first place.

The refrain of “Lifestyle” crescendos with Young Thug’s syllables piling up like rush-hour wreckage. The crowdsourced consensus at Genius states that the rapper is “livin’ life like a beginner and this is only the beginning,” – but “beginner” sounds a lot like “volcano,” and the garbled ambiguity of the whole thing elicits a distinct pleasure.

Of course, that hasn’t stopped conservative rap fans from turning Young Thug’s inscrutability into a punch line. Less-than-imaginative listeners simply hear it as a stylish quirk. But it’s really a mode of being. Instead of skipping off into the hyper-communicative valleys of the Internet, Young Thug conceals things. He mangles his words in mumbles, swallows them in yawns, annihilates them in growls. He’s not concerned with being understood. So we listen a little closer.”

Within the past year there have been a whole crop of new artists in the hip-hop field taking after Young Thug. Up-and-comers like Lil Yachty, Lil Uzi Vert, and Desiigner have all sparked online debates over what “hip-hop” is and where lyricism fits within that.

My two cents (as you can probably guess) is that it doesn’t matter. Music is music. In fact, two of the artists mentioned above don’t even consider themselves rappers. So what does this mean? Are we headed for a Idiocracy-like future where all music is mumbled nonsense? I don’t think so. All I think this means is that the tides are changing. There will always be lyrical music, and people who need to get something out that can’t be communicated through sound alone. The difference is it’s just becoming more acceptable for this alternative non-verbal approach to be viable.

I love this type of music because I can project whatever I want onto it. That’s why I started to love it in high school. I could listen to the abrasive angry stuff and get my emotions out in a safe, harmless way. I could listen to Sigur Ros and reflect, or use it to bounce back from a spiral caused by too much of the other stuff. It all became a mirror of my own thoughts and emotions.

I still look at music the same to this day. Sometimes I listen to an album so much that I’ll memorize the lyrics, but my first listen is always dedicated to taking the piece in as a whole. Trying to decode what’s being said can end up taking away from the overall experience, so I don’t make it my sole focus.

Lyrics are just one piece of the music. You could pay just as much attention to the guitar, or the drums, or the beat, but lyrics are an easy thing to focus on because they’re decipherable. The lyrics are often at the forefront of the music (there’s a reason people call singers as a frontman), they give listeners a common point of reference and something concrete to focus on.

Furthermore, lyrics can add onto a song, but they can also detract massively. In the case of The Wonder Years, The Upsides was an album that I already loved before I knew every single word. Sitting down with the lyric sheet simply added an additional layer and gave me a deeper appreciation for something that I already loved. On the flip side, lyrics can be flawed, and it’s easier to notice flawed lyrics than flawed music. There are only so many words at the end of the day, but there’s an infinite number of sounds. A bad lyric can stick out like a sore thumb, just look at the mania surrounding a single lyric on Drake’s most recent album. Or listen to Ab-Soul’s verse on Chance the Rapper’s “Smoke Again” and tell me his plea for ass-to-mouth isn’t off-putting. Kanye’s magnum opus “Runaway” is a track I love but one that still contains a handful of lines and deliveries I don’t really dig. The song’s verses are followed up by a four minute outro which contains no words, but a garbled vocalization from Kanye. As discussed in this video those four minutes are a prime example of what vocals (not necessarily words) can do in a song.

I believe (at least within hip-hop) the lack of emphasis on lyrics can be traced back to Kanye whose early work represented a shift not necessarily away from lyrics, but towards a greater emphasis on sound as a whole. This was movement was capitalized by people like Lil Wayne who have decent rhymes, but were carried by swag and personality more than anything else. The current crop of “non-rappers” (Yachty, Uzi, etc.) are simply the next evolution of that.

Ultimately everything falls into a spectrum: on one side you’ve got extremely lyrical artists like Kendrick Lamar or The Mountain Goats, and on the other end you’ve got the complete absence of lyrics in groups like Sigur Ros or Explosions in the Sky. Don’t get me wrong, I love it all, and I’m definitely not “anti-lyric” I just believe taking a song as a whole is more powerful than taking it at “face value” and only paying attention to the lyrics. Every piece within the music is vital, lyrics are simply one component. Lyrics are as important or unimportant as you want them to be, but I think focusing too much attention on them turns music into a narrow art form. Emotion can be conveyed without words, and songs can tell a story through sound, we just need to listen to the whole thing.