Musical Thesis (15/15): Best of Musical Thesis

On August 23, 2016, I published my first album review. The album was Why Are You Okay by Band of Horses. Since that initial review, I have published another 93 album reviews.

When reviewing movies, I am trying to uncover answers to two related questions. How does the film make me feel? Is it any good? When writing these reviews, I keep the answers to those questions at the forefront of my mind.

With reviews of albums, I wanted to do something drastically different. Instead of deciding how good a particular album is, I wanted to view the entire collection of songs as a thesis. If I could easily uncover that thesis, I would then try to judge my own emotions in relation to the artist’s intent.

This approach has radically changed how I listen to music. I have always listened to music with a detective hat on my head. This sort of curiosity keeps me busy digging through lyrics and listening closely to the message the artist is trying to get across. For me, there is a lot of joy in a song that tells a complete story, and then discovering what that story means.

With my Musical Thesis reviews, I wanted to do more than try to find what the artist was attempting to express. I wanted to uncover a thesis holding the album together. From there, I wanted to dig deep into how that thesis made me feel.

In 94 albums, I have heard heartbreak. I have heard songs about feeling lost, the passing of time, normalcy, freedom, protest, family, places that matter, America, and so much more. Together, the 94 albums I have reviewed over the last 8 years attempt to describe the human condition. When I think more introspectively, I see ways in which they describe my human condition. Ultimately, this is why I choose to think critically about art. In music, movies, books, and hundreds of other artistic expressions, I am searching for myself.

Since 2016, I have collected songs from each album reviewed in a playlist. I have often returned to this playlist. Each song mirrors a fossil like record of a time and place that can be connected back to my own life. In this playlist, representing the 15 most impactful songs of the last 15 years, I share a small portion of myself with you. I hope you can find your own story to tell in these songs.

Be good to each other,

Nathan