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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/18/terrible-week-orlando-shooting-lgbt-community-music-heal-hope
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| It's been a terrible week. Only music can lift the clouds | |
| (2 days later) | |
| Related: 'I'm gonna die' is a text no mother wants to receive. Mine always feared she would | David Ferguson | Related: 'I'm gonna die' is a text no mother wants to receive. Mine always feared she would | David Ferguson |
| Music has been one of the only things that brings me any form of real comfort. Science has shown that music can make us physically stronger. Music acts as “a type of legal performance-enhancing drug,” giving athletes more stamina, more energy and increased ability to ignore and overcome pain, says a wealth of research. | Music has been one of the only things that brings me any form of real comfort. Science has shown that music can make us physically stronger. Music acts as “a type of legal performance-enhancing drug,” giving athletes more stamina, more energy and increased ability to ignore and overcome pain, says a wealth of research. |
| I needed its magic powers this week. So many of us are struggling with how to manage the ocean-sized sadness and boiling rage that we’ve been feeling since the attack on Pulse nightclub in Orlando last weekend. I spent Monday and Tuesday having a bit of a malfunction on social media, shouting at people, hurling epithets. | I needed its magic powers this week. So many of us are struggling with how to manage the ocean-sized sadness and boiling rage that we’ve been feeling since the attack on Pulse nightclub in Orlando last weekend. I spent Monday and Tuesday having a bit of a malfunction on social media, shouting at people, hurling epithets. |
| It all came to a head when I remembered my mother’s fears that she would lose me to a homophobic attack. There were times that day when I just wanted to stop typing the essay I was working on, stop reading and curl up in a ball on the floor. | It all came to a head when I remembered my mother’s fears that she would lose me to a homophobic attack. There were times that day when I just wanted to stop typing the essay I was working on, stop reading and curl up in a ball on the floor. |
| Instead I put on my headphones and drowned myself in loud, propulsive music. Every time I felt my resolve slacking, I closed my eyes and lost myself in the pumping bass lines and pounding drums. I took deep breaths, steadied myself and kept going, just like I would in the middle of a workout. | Instead I put on my headphones and drowned myself in loud, propulsive music. Every time I felt my resolve slacking, I closed my eyes and lost myself in the pumping bass lines and pounding drums. I took deep breaths, steadied myself and kept going, just like I would in the middle of a workout. |
| Then, when it was over, I did curl up on the floor. I put on a playlist of gospel and soul, the music I go to when I need real solace. Mavis Staples’ scratchy alto sends healing warmth spreading out to my limbs like a shot of whiskey used to back in my drinking days. Aretha Franklin sings Bridge Over Troubled Water like her voice is parting the Red Sea and she’s coming to save you and take you to the Promised Land. | Then, when it was over, I did curl up on the floor. I put on a playlist of gospel and soul, the music I go to when I need real solace. Mavis Staples’ scratchy alto sends healing warmth spreading out to my limbs like a shot of whiskey used to back in my drinking days. Aretha Franklin sings Bridge Over Troubled Water like her voice is parting the Red Sea and she’s coming to save you and take you to the Promised Land. |
| When I was 20 years old, I got my heart really broken for the first time. Most people, I think, go through that sort of debilitating breakup in high school, the one that leaves them stunned and aching, amazed at how much their heart can hurt. | When I was 20 years old, I got my heart really broken for the first time. Most people, I think, go through that sort of debilitating breakup in high school, the one that leaves them stunned and aching, amazed at how much their heart can hurt. |
| Food tasted like glue and wet paper. Sleep was a miserable cycle of urgent, painfully real dreams about the guy who dumped me, followed by waking up and remembering everything all over again. | Food tasted like glue and wet paper. Sleep was a miserable cycle of urgent, painfully real dreams about the guy who dumped me, followed by waking up and remembering everything all over again. |
| Suddenly, all the music I loved wasn’t cutting it. Morrissey’s asexual moaning and endless, airless Depeche Mode remixes were falling short of actually ever reaching the soul-deep ache I felt. | Suddenly, all the music I loved wasn’t cutting it. Morrissey’s asexual moaning and endless, airless Depeche Mode remixes were falling short of actually ever reaching the soul-deep ache I felt. |
| I told a nurse I worked with named Angela about what was happening. The next day she brought me a cassette copy of Otis Redding’s Greatest Hits. She pointed one perfectly polished nail at track one on side two called Pain in my Heart. | I told a nurse I worked with named Angela about what was happening. The next day she brought me a cassette copy of Otis Redding’s Greatest Hits. She pointed one perfectly polished nail at track one on side two called Pain in my Heart. |
| “Start there,” she said. She was absolutely right. Otis Redding, 21 years gone at that point, was right there with me, singing from inside my aching heart. From there I went to Etta James’ I’d Rather Go Blind. This was something I could understand, something I could really feel all the way down where it hurt. | “Start there,” she said. She was absolutely right. Otis Redding, 21 years gone at that point, was right there with me, singing from inside my aching heart. From there I went to Etta James’ I’d Rather Go Blind. This was something I could understand, something I could really feel all the way down where it hurt. |
| Black American music is the sound of triumph over pain, of beauty and spirit winning out over sadness and despair. When Rosetta Tharpe asks “Didn’t it rain, children?” and makes her electric guitar’s sound glitter like the sun, it’s clear that the rain has passed and the time to rejoice has come. | Black American music is the sound of triumph over pain, of beauty and spirit winning out over sadness and despair. When Rosetta Tharpe asks “Didn’t it rain, children?” and makes her electric guitar’s sound glitter like the sun, it’s clear that the rain has passed and the time to rejoice has come. |
| Everyone has their empowerment music of choice, whether it’s Prince, Bob Dylan or Beyoncé. At times like this, when no words can soothe our hurt, no kabuki-performing politicians with their promises of “thoughts and prayers” can ease our suffering and fear, music has the power. | Everyone has their empowerment music of choice, whether it’s Prince, Bob Dylan or Beyoncé. At times like this, when no words can soothe our hurt, no kabuki-performing politicians with their promises of “thoughts and prayers” can ease our suffering and fear, music has the power. |
| What do you listen to when you need to feel better? | What do you listen to when you need to feel better? |