I remember when I used to love music. We hung out alone for hours. Music was great company. Music was there when I was happy, sad, drunk or high. Music was the warm arm of friendship who nurtured and understood me as I grew from a 80’s pubescent pop fan (team Cindy Lauper) to guitar-playing grunger, then hip-hoppin’ & pot smokin’ snowboarder and finally – many incarnations and memorable albums later – I eventually emerged a vaguely capable and relatively groomed human.
But, over time, I felt that music didn’t really get me anymore. Music slouched lazily in the corner of my lounge like a petulant teenager who refused to tidy up. The huge expanding mass of old CD’s, vinyl and cassettes became a constant, unsightly irritation, taking up too much of the room my shoes needed. I didn’t want to rage against the machine anymore, and couldn’t for the life of me imagine an occasion one might want to dust off the old Mudhoney LP.
Music didn’t grow up with me, so instead… we grew apart.
My relationship with film has kept me happy for these last few years. A two hour commitment – each piece needing only to be seen once – but spoken of forever. What an efficient use of time in my never ending desire to sound more cleverer about shit.
Over real ale at a particularly rubbish Soho boozer (struggling to be heard over Cheryl Cole’s latest miscarriage) I admitted to friends I just wasn’t that into music anymore.
Of course the obvious: You’re just getting older, Rebecca. And as a concession: Modern music is shit. As you grow up, there becomes something mildly undignified about discussing music in that sweaty, bearded, enthusiastic way you did at 24.
So tonight is the 30th Brit awards. And as I glance down the nominee list, I see at best a few young promising artists among some fairly average clothes horses who can barely hold a note, let alone compose a musical legacy.
Should Leona Lewis really be in a category for ‘artists’? Who the fuck is Pixie Lott – a Geldoffspring? Is Norah Jones still boring people with her music? Exactly when did Taylor Swift ‘breakthrough’ – was it that Kanye West incident? Are there really so few male artists in the UK that we need to include Robbie Williams to make up numbers? Since when was The Climb a ‘British’ single?
Its awful & depressing, totally to be expected, and almost make me want to get into film scores.
Still, at least Cheryl Cole isn’t nominated. Oh.. wait…
Here is the full list of nominations for the Brit Awards.
