Page 38 - Black Velvet Issue 90

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A (Musical) Note From...

JOsh kemp

ello Black Velvet readers! My name’s reinforces how you feel at the time, so then and positively.
HJosh Kemp, I'm a singer/songwriter why is it a form of catharsis? I believe that it Is it sensible to try and change something
from Nottingham, and I want to ask: What is it makes us feel connected to something, an socially or emotionally through music? Is it
about music that we enjoy? idea or a person’s experience, an experience sensible to exude positivity through music? Is
Is it escapism? Storytelling? Accessibility that we share and relate too, which I kinda it sensible and more accessible to moan about
or honesty? think is our base desire with music. It’s to hear things through music?
Maybe I'm over-thinking and it's just a that how you’re feeling is how other people People who historically have made a dif-
catchy guitar riff, but I like to think that people have felt/are feeling. ference socially have rarely achieved that
find comfort in music and lyrics, whether it's a I’m not sure that we actually listen to music through music alone, it’s taken a huge commit-
lyric they can relate to or a song that reminds to make us feel happier but to confirm that we ment through their personal lives too, mainly
them of a certain moment; music can evoke aren’t alone in feeling how we do, and when politically. Generally, people’s minds don’t
something in the brain commonly and fiercely. you feel you aren’t alone it helps you to not feel want to be changed, we seek to justify and to
Back in November I came to the realisa- wrong for feeling how you do. After all they do rationalise, not question why and revolutionise.
tion that we are frequently bogged down by say ‘misery loves company’. Is it simply con- So how do we get through to people?
negativity, in the news and our day-to-day necting to someone’s feelings and experi- Start with a simple message - the world is
lives. I think bad things are a lot more sensa- ences that provides us catharsis in music or what you make it. “The real voyage of discov-
tional/memorable; as a result we are faced by does music have the power to influence our ery consists not in seeking new landscapes
a barrage of negative stories and images deepest moods and emotions by pulling on our but in having new eyes.”
every day. Negativity sells, and yet the spread- memories? We already know that music and A Sunday on the Brecons in Wales, or the
ing of good things are often deemed cliche, memory are closely linked, in 2009 a study on Angel of the North in Newcastle. Seeing the
boastful, too personal or alienating. the ability of music to invoke memory in great urban expanse that is London from the
I've just released my new music video, Alzheimer patients was led by Petr Janata, as- top of the Shard or hanging your feet off
'Imaginary Friend: What a Wonderful World', sociate professor of psychology at UC Davis' Brighton Pier. The Derbyshire Dales and York-
shot on location around South East Asia. The Center for Mind and Brain. He concluded: shire Moors, or the old underbelly of Edin-
song is effectively a list, painting a picture of "What seems to happen is that a piece of fa- burgh. You don’t need to travel a thousand
some of the incredible things I've been lucky miliar music serves as a soundtrack for a men- miles to see something remarkable, but famil-
enough to see or notice about the world we tal movie that starts playing in our head. It calls iarity breeds indifference.
live in, from big elaborate views like the emer- back memories of a particular person or place, There’s hypocrisy here, which is do ex-
ald green waters of Halong Bay, the jungles of and you might all of a sudden see that per- actly what I’ve just said you don’t have to,
Laos and the white beaches of Thailand, to the son's face in your mind's eye. Now we can see which is travel a thousand miles to find some-
simple things like the dance of fire, or some- the association between those two things—the thing new. The whole point of my trip to Asia
body laughing, truly and uncontrollably. music and the memories.” was to see things I’d never seen before, to see
After losing a friend to suicide this year it's But did that help my friend? Did that make a way of life very alien to my own and to ap-
inspired me to open my eyes to the little things, him question his impending decision or did it preciate all the beautiful views, vibrant cultures
the common things we see every day and it strengthen his resolve? and religious faiths I didn’t understand; to learn
takes something truly devastating to make you There’s a huge amount of songs about and be a guest in another world. Which is just
appreciate their importance. sex, and people are really interested in how as important as appreciating what you have, I
I remember going through an emo/no-one that influences our children, but that opens up think.
understands me phase in my teens, and one several avenues, because the majority of Josh Kemp
thing it really taught me is the power that music songs are written about two things, love and Photo By Karina Lyburn
has to influence how we feel and also the heartbreak and severe sadness (aside from
power it has to both help and hinder us. A par- politically-based tunes, which by nature are In a band? Want to write a one-off col-
ticular lyric in a song you are listening to can more inciting and inspiring). This all comes umn for Black Velvet? Get in touch. Email
editor@blackvelvetmagazine.com.
make you feel better but more often than not it down to what music can achieve. Negatively
JOSH KEMP