How do you hear it?

I was at a concert a while back when I noticed something odd. We were all clapping in unison, 1 clap 3 clap 1 clap 3 clap, the entire crowd..except one person. My friend was clapping completely off beat. I tried to follow him, but could not unify my claps with his. The entire concert I kept looking at him, and to my amazement, he was bopping his head off beat too, almost as if he was on a 1.25 and 3.75 measure. Again, I tried mimicking him, but I could not hear the beat he was hearing. I came home, super puzzled, trying to understand what I’d just witnessed. Was he tone deaf? Or were the rest of us just wrong, and this one man held the key to a secret universe that allowed him to hear music in its purest form. Probably the tone deaf part. To this day, only one question bugs me; who was listening to the music correctly: him or us?

That got me thinking about the way each person can listen to one song so many different ways. And not just different from eachother, but different from our own selves. When you first hear a song, maybe you’re captured by the melody or lyrics. Then, the more you listen to it, you’re only hearing certain parts of the song, singing to some, dancing to others, and clapping to the parts where the beat stands out.

The more I listen to a song, the less cohesive it becomes. I start to dissect it and separate beats and lines until its unrecognizable. After completely deconstructing a song, I only see my structured visualization whenever I hear it, and that’s when I say “I’m sick of this song.” I’ve realized that the truth isn’t that I’m sick of it, it’s that I think I’ve figured it out and there’s no where else to go with it. So I move on to another song until I’ve exhausted it too. I’ve tried not to do this with songs I really enjoy, thinking I can listen to them everyday and not go through this analysis, but it always ends the same.

And so comes the exhaustive part. I sat down to physically manifest my visualization of a song I’ve deconstructed. I’ve coded it different colors and fonts based on what I’m seeing/hearing at each part. I’ve done this for two reasons. First, I wanted to see whether there was stuff I was missing out on. Second, I wanted to see whether there was another individual who could hear this song exactly as I did. If not, how would he depict this song? At this point, I’m secretly hoping that nobody hears this song like I do. Not because I want to feel unique, but because it would answer the question of why my friend was clapping to his own beat that day. He just heard the music differently. If I do find a match, then I’ve taken on a lifelong burden to teach him how to clap on the right beat.

So here it goes..Here is my “ohmygodispenttoomuchtimeonthisbutdontblamemebecauseunemploymentratesarehigh” visual depiction of

Crystalized by xx.

Intro

oooooooooooooooo

tun, tanana NANA nananana’uh tan tanana nan tana’an

tun, tanana NANA nananana’uh tan tanana nan

tanananaNARNAnananaNaNa tanananateernana nananaNaNa

tanananaNARNAnananaNaNa tanananateernana

VERSE 1

click.
click.
click.
click.
click.
click.
click.
click.
click.

BOOM BOOM

click.
click.
click.
click.
click.
click.
click.

BOOM BOOM..BAdABOOM

click.
click.
click.
click.

BOOM BOOM

click.
click.

BOOM BOOM

click.

BAdABOOM. BOOM. BOOM.

click.
click.

BOOM BOOM

click.
click.

BOOM BOOM. BAdAboom click. BOOM.

hi-yiye

ooooooooooooooOOOOOoooooOoooooooo

when you’re the one that i’ve kept closest.

hi-yiye-yiye

Chorus

one two threefour, one two four, one two four, one two four, one two four, tan tan tan tanteyrnanaNanaNana

one two threefour, one two four, one two four, one two four, one two four, tan tan tan tanteyr

VERSE 2

you don’t move slow. nananananana and taken steps in my direction.

dig. dig. digadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadigdigadig

you say I’m foolaysh, for pushing this asiiIiIyde

Nana-Nana

tanananaNARNAnananaNaNa tanananateernana

iy-iye-iy

tun            tun            tun            tun            tun

      tun            tun            tun            tun            tun

             tun            tun            tun            tun            tun

                    tun

i wish the tide would take me over.

tun            tun            tun            tun            tun

      tun            tun            tun            tun            tun

             tun            tun            tun            tun            tun

                    tun

and you just keep on getting closer.

hi-yiye-yiye

one two threefour, one two four, one two four, one two four, one two four, tan tan tan tanteyrnanaNanaNana

one two threefour, one two four, one two four, one two four, one two four, tan tan tan tanteyr

VERSE 3

boom.

boom.

boom.

boom.

i wish the tide would take me over

boomboom

boom

snap

boom.

boom.

snap

and you just keep on getting closest.

go-oo-ohoh slow.

dundundundundundundundundundundundundundundundun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun.

go-oo-uhoh slow.

go-oo-uhoh slow. oo woh-O

go-oo-uhoh slow.

KEY:

CAPITAL LETTERS: The notes that stand out.

Green: Portions I dance to..no matter what the restrictions.

Bold+Italic: Very strong. Bold: Same family, Strong. Italic: Same family, but with a lighter variation (either with regard to speed or pitch)

Blue: To be read as a cascade. Sometimes I see these “tuns” as flashes in different areas of a black backdrop, kind of like how the eye doctor flashes an image during an eye test, asking you which corner you saw the image in.

Red: My favorite part.

My Analysis

1. Hardly any reference to the bass.

2. I don’t bother with getting the lyrics right.

3. I prefer low “u” to high “a”, thus going for “tun” not “tan” as my go to sound.

4. I’m a percussion gal.

5. I’m almost always dancing to everything in my head, but the green portions are the parts where the dancing has to physically manifest itself. Pretty proud of how much of the song I’m able to hold back on.

Am I missing out on anything? Yes, the feeling that the song gave me the first few weeks I heard it. I don’t have that feeling of my heart muscle being pulled everytime the guitar went “teyrn” during the chorus. I don’t feel relaxed when I hear it. It’s just as functional to me as a mathematical equation. I could go on to talk about how this is symbolic of how I deal with any emotional item in my life, but then this entire thing would go somewhere it wasn’t meant to go. So instead, I will end with just one question:

How do you hear it?