It has gotten to the point where I don’t want to turn on the TV or even open a newspaper. The Internet is no longer a safe haven. Every little thing that goes wrong in the world, as well as the not so little things, gets splashed all over whatever site you may happen to hang out at. Facebook is no longer just a fun place. In short, it’s depressing.
So what’s a guy or gal to do? I mean you can’t escape it. And it wouldn’t be so bad if it was just one thing going on that was so bad. But right now, it feels like the end times.
Think about it.
We’ve got the fighting going on between Israel and Hamas. We’ve got the fighting in Afghanistan. We’ve got this ebola thing that could very well wipe out our planet. We’ve got this solar super storm due any day now (last one was 1859 and they happen every 150 years) that could totally destroy our electrical power grid and send us back to the stone ages, and if all that isn’t bad enough, Jack Bower has been banished to Siberia.
Okay, that last one was an attempt at humor. So sue me.
Truth is, things are bad. They’re worse than bad. It reminds me of that classic scene from Network that ultimately won Peter Finch is Oscar. And the poor guy never even lived to receive it.
Well, I don’t feel like sticking my head out a window and yelling “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!” I have to conserve my voice for Sunday church service.
So what’s a guy or gal to do?
Music, that’s what. Music is the best therapy for what ails you. In fact, it was a bad experience that got me writing songs in the first place. But I won’t get into that here. It was 35 years ago and I thank God every single day that I went through that hell. Otherwise, I might not even be writing this today.
Therapy works wonders. And the beauty part of it is that therapy can take many different forms related to music. I’m going to go over just a few of the things that I do that are great therapy for me.
Probably at the top of the list is composing music. There’s just nothing like it. The feeling of creating something from nothing is one that is hard to describe. And what’s great about it is if you want to create something really special, you have to really put your mind into it. That means you’re not thinking about all the crap that’s going on in the world.
But every once in a while the well runs dry and you just can’t think of anything to write. Or maybe you’re a little burnt out from writing. What do you do then? Well, I still have other things musically related that I can throw myself into.
One of the best is synth programming. I love diving into complex synths. I have a collection of VSTs that could choke a horse. I have to have well over a hundred. And some of them are rather complex like my Synthmaster 2.6, Massive, Zebra2 and Reaktor 5 just to name a few. You could get lost in any one of them for hours and hours tweaking patches and learning new programming techniques.
Now, I have to admit that I have become pretty good at programming these things because of all the hours of study I’ve put into them, so every once in a while I’m just not in the mood to tinker with these beasts. So what do I do then if the songwriting well has also run dry?
Have you ever been to Soundcloud?
Talk about being able to get lost at a place. I have no idea how many people have Soundcloud accounts. I just opened up one maybe a week or so ago and put up close to 40 tracks just to get started. But what I have the most fun doing is just searching for original music that others have done. There is everything on Soundcloud from acoustic to world music. There’s even demos of synths if you want to listen to that sort of stuff.
In short, you could get lost at this site for hours on end and not even put a dent into all the music that is up there. I’m following like 14 people and haven’t even come close to hearing all of their music yet. Some of them have thousands of tracks on their account.
But what do I do when I’m tired of Soundcloud and hearing new stuff, I’m done tinkering with synths and the composing well has still run dry?
Well, there is always old established music. You know, the stuff that you grew up with. In my case, that’s over 50 years of music. My first exposure was to the Beatles in 1964. I have lived through everything from the British invasion to bubble gum, to disco to new wave to, well, you name it. I’ve lived through it. Do you have any idea how much music that is to choose from if you just want to sit back and listen to some hit tunes? Heck, pick just one year and that could kill a whole a day.
And if all of that isn’t enough as far as therapy goes, you can always take an online class. I’m taking two right now. One of them is on music production and the other one is on songwriting. I’m probably not going to learn a heck of a lot that’s new, but I’ve met some nice people and the instructors are interesting to listen to and I am getting something out of the courses. If nothing else, it’s keeping my mind off of all the crap that’s going on in the world.
So things might be bad around you. Maybe even scary bad. But if you lose yourself in your music, in your art, in your reason for being, you can get through just about anything.
I learned that 35 years ago when a girl broke my heart and I wrote my first song.
Someday, maybe I’ll put it up on Soundcloud.
If I can remember how it goes.
For The Love Of Music,
Steven “Wags” Wagenheim