Music Love Week: Kickstart My Heart

Howdy all! Hope your Valentine's Day was spent with someone sweet. Or maybe that you were able to eat something naughty. (I got some heart-shaped Reece's!)  Or, better still, both. :)


However, I know this week hasn't been all sunshine and over-priced roses for everyone. No, sometimes love hurts. It's a special kind of agony, a pain that almost everyone has felt at some point in their lives. Yet, mysteriously, the loss or absence of love almost always leaves us feeling isolated. As if that giant hole in the middle of our soul can't be seen--or filled--by anyone. One of life's more torturous ironies, I think.


In that vein, I wanted to dedicate my last post of the Music Love Week to the folks who are going without. The people to whom the L word sounds more akin to an impending war drum of doom than the sweet nothings tossed from a lover's lips. An ode to the jaded, the angry and the resigned. Again, we've all been there. Most of us more than once.


Being a writer type, I'm always interested in how people articulate emotion. Expression is the meat of what we do. Do your characters get pissed when they're having love problems? Do they pine? Do they withdraw? Do they get reckless? Do they over-think? Go all stalker-crazy? Hopefully any and all of those things, because that's how real people deal with it.


Thing is, writers often get it wrong. Our characters all too frequently fall into the depression/hopeless side of things when love doesn't go their way. Sure, that's a typical way of dealing with it, but sometimes people lash out too.


I've found that musicians are particularly crafty when it comes to expressing love and the angst it can cause. None more so than rock musicians. You wouldn't think so, because the genre isn't always the most subtle and nuanced. But that's why I think they're specifically gifted at it. 


Love isn't always very subtle, particularly in the moments when it's causing problems. It can scream. It can bite. It can twist us up in knots that take years to be undone.


As such, here are some of my all-time favorite rock songs dedicated to the destructive power of love. Give 'em a listen and see if you can't find a better way for your characters (or you) to express the hardship. And to those who might be experiencing real love strife, I'll leave you simply with this:


ROCK ON









What are your favorite love tunes (angry or no)?


~EJW~

14 comments:

  1. Is it wrong to want to spend Valentine's with someone naughty and eat something sweet instead? *ahem*

    Great song choices. I would, of course, add Adele, any and all, to the list of love gone wrong songs.

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    1. Nothing wrong with that at all LG. ;) Totally concur on Adele.

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  2. These songs are great. There is a radio station here that plays love songs on Valentine's Day and Breakup songs the day after. Had fun listening to some of the songs.

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    1. Thanks Carrie! I love the celebrations of anti-love too.

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  3. There are as many reactions as there are people. Everyone has their own way of dealing with it. One of my characters withdraws to avoid it.

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  4. What a sweet and sensitive post. I love your choice of words and I started to think about that sad song "Saving All My Love For You" and how it used to mean a lot to me but not to the someone I was saving it for. Then I started thinking--did Whitney Houston sing any happy songs? Oh well, hope you had a great Valentine's Day!

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  5. I've always liked angry breakup songs, because I think they're a good way for both the musicians and the listeners to vent what they're feeling. And when I listen to the lyrics for those types of songs, it makes me feel a little better to know that someone feels the same way that I do.

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  6. I love Pat Benetar's Heartbreaker. And I love your blog, too.

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  7. I've been blessed these past 23 years. HOwever, before that I had to deal with broken hearts. I can't think of any music at the moment but I'm sure your choices rock.

    Love the new look of your blog. It rocks too. E.J.!

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  8. Great music picks. I love Buckcherry. And that Pat Benatar song.
    I love so many rock songs. Some fave love-ish rock songs include Forever by Papa Roach and All You Need is Love by the Beatles. But I love so many more.

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  9. So true. Love isn't always chocolate and roses. It can be messy. And desperate. And sometimes even a little (or very) bleak.

    But I disagree with rock bands lacking nuance. Some are brilliant at it. Take Muse:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8OOWcsFj0U&ob=av2n

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IgH7XF_l-VE&feature=fvst

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOCZFChafOQ

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  10. Angel is totally one of my favorite Aerosmith songs :) Thanks for all the great music! I know this isn't the same as what you're posting, but I've been on a total Disney kick lately. Journey from the Past from Anastasia has been on major repeat. (ok, so that's not Disney directly, but...)

    Sarah Allen
    (my creative writing blog)

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  11. Sarah McLachlan singing Answer...

    And U2, singing All I Want Is You.

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“Much unhappiness has come into the world because of bewilderment and things left unsaid.” ― Fyodor Dostoyevsky

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