Hopelessly hopeful

 One of life’s struggles can be that of trying to balance between the positive and negative and, if possible, to focus on the positive. Life can be wonderful, filled with awe and wonder for nature, full of rich friendships and conversations, study and work that help us to feel a sense of purpose and value, as well as romance, passion, excitement, travel, exploration and growth. However, it is also frequently filled with conflict, sickness, death, the awareness of cruelty and suffering… a feeling of hopelessness. 

                  Morrissey’s My love, I’d do anything for you plays as I lie on the couch and contemplate life. ‘Who am I? Every night of my life always missing someone’ he sings, accompanied by a dance-like rhythm. The album, Low in High School, is one of the greatest, in my opinion.  Full of Morrissey’s classic self-deprecating lyrics, which are funny but also absolutely accurate in terms of their social awareness and attacks on modern man, modern government, traditional institutions, and beyond. It’s also one of the more adventurous albums musically, some of the newer ones sound a little more Karaoke Esque (sorry Moz).

                  Bad Religion comes on next… thirty-three years after I first discovered them and, to this day, they fill me with joy and hope and enlightenment. Hearing them for the first time that day in 1993, I leaped from my seat at a party. I knew it was something special. A unique pace, voice, lyrics, melody… it was their song, Generator. From that moment on, I was fixated, and, finally, in 1998, I saw them live for the first time in the UK at the Reading Festival. A night of chaos and wonder. Since then, I have seen them nearly forty times in different countries. 

                  Motorhead is next up. A band I never saw live. I had tickets to see them in Madrid and two weeks before the show, Lemmy did something we never thought he would do… he died. 

                  Ultimately, the thing that blows my mind is when I read that people think science, saving endangered species, climate change, and helping children with cancer is communism. It makes me feel angry and sad and scared and hopeless. 

                    I go on reading and listening to music and hoping against all hope to exit the new dark ages. 



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