My knowledge of contemporary music is woefully limited. People my age and older typically tend to have fallen into their musical ruts for a while - they stick with familiar sounds and voices from the past. Then there are those who look to Pandora and the like to give them their sampling platter of familiar music from newer, unknown sources. The niches are too small these days in music just as they with books - too many acts in the fray for people to focus on anyone for too long.
Tween music seems to be slightly immune to this phenomenon. At eight and ten years old, kids have just dipped their feet in the online media consumption experience and still live most of their lives offline. They are able to stick with one band or singer for a year or longer, replay a favorite song to death - things that used to be possible for teens and even adults back in the day. It took J's fascination with a song Fireflies to introduce me to the sound of Owl City. I found the music distinctive enough to want to learn about the musician.
One of J's persistent complaints about about music she hears around her is that it is always about love. "Isn't there anything else to sing about other than love ?" J asks. So even if the tune resonates with her, the lyrics don't - so the song ends up having limited appeal. I could see how Fireflies would be perfect for a tween - a catchy tune for a song that is strictly not about love with a sound soft and cute enough to be appealing eight year olds.
Tween music seems to be slightly immune to this phenomenon. At eight and ten years old, kids have just dipped their feet in the online media consumption experience and still live most of their lives offline. They are able to stick with one band or singer for a year or longer, replay a favorite song to death - things that used to be possible for teens and even adults back in the day. It took J's fascination with a song Fireflies to introduce me to the sound of Owl City. I found the music distinctive enough to want to learn about the musician.
One of J's persistent complaints about about music she hears around her is that it is always about love. "Isn't there anything else to sing about other than love ?" J asks. So even if the tune resonates with her, the lyrics don't - so the song ends up having limited appeal. I could see how Fireflies would be perfect for a tween - a catchy tune for a song that is strictly not about love with a sound soft and cute enough to be appealing eight year olds.
Comments
Perfectly resonates with me. There is an overkill of this ' love ' in our movies too.
Today we find Indian filmstars including Naseeruddin Shah , Vidya Balan etc kissing. I find the chemistry/passion starkly lacking.
Guru Dutt , Waheeda Rehman , Balraj Sahni , Sanjeev Kumar ,Jaya Bhaduri, Meena Kumari achieved much more by not kissing or taking off their clothes more than necessary.
I can never forget a Hollywood movie I watched unplanned. Hence cannot recall the name of the movie or the cast.
The heroine in her teens with a loyal pet dog , with parents living apart , an unstable boyfriend , gets into bouts of depression caused by loneliness ( dreams of gorging on chocolates & thus ending her life).Volunteers to work in a hospital. She comes across mostly geriatric patients with different kinds of phobias & prejudices.
How she interacts with them unpretentiously , allaying their fears thus finding a purpose and meaning to her life constitutes the crux of the movie. In the end she does not even pine for her boyfriend who hooks up with another girl. Her random musings on life in written form also get published.
I wish someone could tell me the name of the movie.