If It Gets You There

 When it comes to music, I am what is called “poly-jamorous,” meaning one who enjoys everything from acid jazz to the stylings of Mozart. (If you want to know, my favorite song of all time is Requiem for a Tower.) In my rather vast Liked Songs library, I have at least one song in every genre I have encountered so far. I don’t like songs that sound like a man angrily screaming at me, because that triggers my PTSD, but that’s my only exception. I’d like to talk a little about music and how intrinsically subjective it is.

In the book War of the Flowers by Tad Williams, the main character -a musician- is thinking about an exchange he had with an older and wiser musician. The important sentence in that conversation is this: “If it gets you there, it’s good.” Wherever “there” is for you: a Zen state, a good mood, catharsis for your anger, or that sensation like your body is full of more energy than it can contain and you must find an outlet for it or you’ll explode. (That last one might just be a me thing.) If it gets you there, man.

There’s no such thing as “bad music.” There’s music you like and music you don’t like. Stuff that gets you where you need to go when you need to go there and stuff that doesn’t. The Insane Clown Posse once had the honor of being dubbed “the worst band in the world” and they have a fanbase so loyal that the FBI once called them a “gang.” Point being, the band you choose to reserve headspace to actively despise is somebody’s favorite band in the world.

This is another de gustibus non est disputandum situation: There is no arguing about taste. Everyone can be right about what they like.

So groove on, my groovy friends. Groove on.