MUSIC FOR THE MASSES

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVME_l4IwII&spfreload=5

So, it is all true, when you keep telling your kids that today's music just ain't the same, in fact, it ain't 'music' to the ears at all. Music has influenced my life from a very tender age. My mom was a hard core fan of Elvis, P Ramlee and Saloma and my dad introduced me to classical music, the likes of Beethoven, Bach, Schubert and Tchaikovsky. My brother used to watch 'Top of the pops' and he introduced me to my most favourite genre, New Wave, the likes of Depeche Mode, Duran Duran, New Order, OMD, Thompson Twins, Yazoo and more.

As I grew older, friends introduced me to punk rock and heavy metal and so, I expanded my listening skills to include Faith No More, Metallica, Helloween, Iron Maiden and the ilk. Growing up, music inspired me in so many ways that I believe children today may not be so fortunate.

Listening to 'Love is a battlefield' at a tender age, it made me want to be tough, independent and to fight for my rights as a woman. My most favourite song to listen to when I felt down was 'Never surrender' written by Corey Heart. Music and lyrics that highlighted the flaws in the system and the inequality influenced me to think about the rights and wrongs of this world, such as 'People are people', 'Everything counts' and 'Ruined in a day'.

I even improved in my vocabulary through music and the bands, I really wanted to know what Manoeuvers meant in 'Orchestra Manoeuvers in the Dark', Most of these bands also liked to name themselves according to historical objects or events such as the 'Foo fighters' and Ú2'. Foo fighters was the term used by the Allied aircraft pilots to describe 'UFO' or mysterious aerial phenomenon as they flew above those European and Pacific areas. 'U2' is a name of a US spy plane. The song 'Enola Gay' refers to the B-29 bomber that dropped the first atomic bomb ever, onto Hiroshima. Enola Gay was the name of the pilot's mother and the bomb was code-named 'little boy' hence, the lyrics of the song says, "Enola Gay, was momma proud of little boy today..."

Not to mention all the lyrics that actually talks about historical events such as the infamous 'Winds of change'. I just can't believe some kids nowadays have never heard of that song, and don't even understand the significance of the fall of the Soviet Union or the Berlin wall, how it has affected their lives and made the world even more of a mess today than it ever was during the cold war.

Listening to all these songs growing up made me interested to learn about the world, to understand why things were the way they were. Listening to the Rage against the machine, it felt in line with my inner self, that yearn for justice and equality, a fight against injustice and corrupt policies. That is why people like us can never be mainstream. Many of these bands draw inspiration from previous bands, that used to have an impact on society such as the Sex Pistols with their anti-government stance. Music and lyrics used to be a medium of expressing oneself, expressing dissatisfaction and disgruntlement towards policies and systems. Maybe for today's generation, it felt like rhetoric but for our generation, it was within our hearts and soul.

Growing up, apart from the mainstream Tommy page songs, I hardly listen to 'love songs' and love songs are often associated with love themes from the movies such as 'Take my breath away' from Top Gun or 'Almost paradise' from Footloose. Love songs are okay but in small doses...not the way it is just being churned out like some kind of M&Ms nowadays. We had those kind of teen pop monkey love songs from Kylie, Jason Donovan and 'We could be together...for a  while' Debbie Gibson. Okay, they were cute,  happy, cheerful songs but nobody ever took them seriously as 'music' or 'musicians'. I mean when people talk about musicians they spoke of Bob Dylan, David Bowie, Led Zeppelin, Sting and all those singer and song writers. Nowadays, the charts are just full of the same ole' thing and I just want to know, what are we doing to our kids?