Yeah, it's been a while. (But at least I still updated before Zach.)

A disclaimer. I've been working, reading and writing assignments rather than posting here. It's been two weeks now since my last post, and much has happened. Parties came and went along with a rekindled Starcraft obsession, though the Starcraft has stayed, to my euphoria.

But, like most of my posts, music is involved.

Why is it that before large gatherings of my friends, I hear and succumb to the siren call of Thursday's "War All the Time"? The first verse is about committing suicide with a friend in the garage with the car running. And I play this before parties. Where people are having fun. And enjoying themselves, and perhaps, even my company. There is something wrong here.

I'm nervous, and large crowds scare me. That shouldn't be news. I do want to inoculate myself with melancholy, and said song is quite the powerful fix.

Its position may soon be usurped by Crime In Stereo's "...But You Are Vast", a melancholy song about either the singer's medication (the singer had cancer when he was 18, and it's now in remission) or a girl. The first line? "You're no good for me." Jesus. That's how the song begins.

Late at night, when my phone hasn't rung for days and it's 40 degrees in the house, my fingers worm their way to Boysetsfire's demo for phonecall 4 AM, with the line "please believe I've lost myself inside of you". Or, when all of the above are happening, and when I feel like the beat just can't go on.

Then there's Nick Drake. His body of work like a very powerful, addictive medication. The music powerful and the sorrow is palpable as it comes through the speakers. It is the kind of music I listen to when I just want to hear music and I don't care who is listening. It is not quite sad bastard music. American Football is sad bastard music, they are a group who (in my opinion) made a full length that should be the soundtrack to crying over the opposite sex, if you're straight, and the same sex if you're not. (For all the bisexuals reading this, forgive the gender binary.) But Nick Drake carries a different melancholy. I'd argue from what little I've heard, Nick Drake is more about reminiscing about previous partners. Now, the Styrafoam remix of the Postal Service's Nothing Better arrives on the airwaves, and the dagger that is the song slips in between my armor. Moments later, more people enter the DJ booth, and the armor goes back on. Sigh. That'll stay with me for a while since the DJ booth is cold, and I'll stew in my memories until I can leave the booth and begin the uphill walk home.

Suddenly.

I'm Yours, Boston begins playing, and suddenly, I don't need the armor, and the feeling of melancholy evaporates.

Music can fuck with your emotions, and thank God for that.