Thoughts on Writing About Music

I have a few entries on music that are stewing around in the back of my mind right now, and that may eventually get put up here. But thinking about those entries, and starting to write them, got me thinking about what I want to write about when I write about music.

I don’t think I’d be very good as an “objective” reviewer of music, and that’s not really my interest anyways. One of the writers that I’ve read for a few years online (Caryn Rose, formerly of 5h, now of jukeboxgraduate) once wrote something about how she wasn’t writing about music per se, she was writing about listening to music. That’s what I’d like to do here. Not an attempt at objectivity or ranking, but something much more subjective: how does it make me feel when I hear a song, what memories get dragged out, and does it make me tap my feet?

The first album I was going to write about was Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks, but that one is cutting a little close to home right now. I’ve moved from “Simple Twist of Fate” and “You’re A Big Girl Now”, going briefly through “Idiot Wind”, and settled in now at “If You See Her, Say Hello” and “Buckets of Rain”, thanks for asking.

Instead I’d like to write about Pearl Jam, and their new album. This post will either eventually be complemented by a bunch of others, or will stand here alone mocking me! The plan is to go through the new album, track by track, with a few autobiographical detours thrown in as necessary.