Personality in light of favorite singer-songwriter

[Splittet]

I was laying in bed, listening to Damien Rice, thinking about singer-songwriters, concluding my personal favorite is clearly Nick Drake, thinking about how it tells a lot about my personality (especially my emotional side, my depressive tendencies, my love of melancholy, me being kind of a loner struggling to find his place and purpose), and realizing that indeed the favorite singer-songwriter of somebody reveals a lot about them...

Generally the musical taste of a person tends to reveal a lot about them, especially if they care a lot about music, which should be a rather uncontroversial claim. But I was thinking the favorite singer-songwriter of someone is especially significant, maybe more so than favorite group, for example. Often your favorite singer-songwriter is someone you identify with quite significantly, also on a personality level, making them stand out as your favorite, more so than with for example favorite group.

Who is your favorite singer-songwriter? What do you feel it tells about you, if anything?

[PinkPiranha]

Question: What it is about Damien Rice that draws you in particular and what song of his would you typify as being the most "you"?



For me, it's the Clash. Joe Strummer is the sort of NFJ I always wanted to be. Strong, creative, caring, audacious, intense, digging in when the going gets tough. He had a higher purpose than just being involved in the punk movement, that flash in the pan. I listened to the Clash a lot when I was very sick and dealing with constant pain that I couldn't escape. Gave me my fight back.

His version of "Minstrel Boy" is enough to make a grown man cry.

[colmena]

I identify far more with the music; lyrics tend to pass me by, although I like the voice as an instrument. So..

Erik Satie.

I like this track, too.

[Jack Flak]

I'll say Phil Collins, just for fun. Maybe because we're both melancholic yet don't act like big wet blankets about it.

The roof is leaking and the wind is howling
Kids are crying 'cos the sheets are so cold
I woke this morning found my hands were frozen
I've tried to fix the fire, but you know the damn thing's too old
It's been months now, since we heard from our Mary,
I wonder if she ever made the coast
She and her young man, they both moved out there
But I sure hope they write, just to let us know
And me, I'm getting stronger by the minute
My wife's expecting, but I hope she can wait
'Cos this winter looks like it's gonna be another bad one
But Spring'll soon be here,
Oh God I hope it's not late
Ma and Pa lived here, and theirs before them
Tried their hardest to make it a home
Seems so long now since they passed over
Hope my children'll try to make it their own
The roof is leaking and the wind is howling
Kinds are crying, 'cos the sheets are so cold
I woke this morning found my hands were frozen
I've tried to fix the fire, but you know the damn thing's too old
And me, I'm getting stronger by the minute
My wife's expecting, but I hope she can wait
'Cos this winter looks like it's gonna be another bad one
But Spring'll soon be here,
Oh God I hope it's not late

YouTube - Phil Collins - The Roof is Leaking/Droned

[Splittet]

Originally Posted by PinkPiranha

Question: What it is about Damien Rice that draws you in particular and what song of his would you typify as being the most "you"?

I have hardly ever listened to Damien Rice. The first sentences was really quite pointless. :P

Originally Posted by PinkPiranha

For me, it's the Clash. Joe Strummer is the sort of NFJ I always wanted to be. Strong, creative, caring, audacious, intense, digging in when the going gets tough. He had a higher purpose than just being involved in the punk movement, that flash in the pan. I listened to the Clash a lot when I was very sick and dealing with constant pain that I couldn't escape. Gave me my fight back.

His version of "Minstrel Boy" is enough to make a grown man cry.

The Clash is a band, not a singer-songwriter. :P The answers I was looking for was favorite "standalone" singer-songwriters, giving out records under their own name and so on..

[entropie]

I go with "Delerium - Truly". Mainly I like them because there lead singer is hot xD
----

I know good things
I know bad as well
Any witness to the world will tell
If there is sorrow
Then there is beauty and trust
A secret pearl inside the heart of us...

So truly, if there's light then I want to see it
Now that I know what I am looking for
Truly, if there's joy then I want to feel it
Here in this world is where I want to be
'Cause I can't cry anymore

And there is magic now, under blood red trees,
All the sky will scream a mystery
And if we're strangers here
From the day we are born
Why be afraid of freedom if it is yours?

So truly, if there's light then I want to see it
Now that I know what I am looking for
Truly, if there's joy then I want to feel it
Here in this world is where I want to be
'Cause I can't cry anymore

All the world is calling, calling out my name
All the world is saying it won't be the same
All the sky is showing how it's gonna be
But I'm scared and I'm tired of being like me...

[Haphazard]

I don't like lyrics.

[substitute]

Really? You like Nick Drake? Not shitting me or anything? Cos I really dig him too.

I'm not sure I have a favourite - which probably says as much about my personality as having one would. Y'know, there are too many I like just as much as each other and they're all so different and diverse, which is really me to a T cos I'm pretty versatile and have very wide interests and stuff.

If pinned down though I might go with Leonard Cohen or Benjamin Biolay. Something about them, especially Laughin' Len, the only guy I can think of whose songs literally transport me, everything about them, lyrics, music, everything. I say everything but I lose interest in most of his stuff once it gets to about the 80's. Albums like New Skin... and Songs From A Room though, strike a real deep chord in me. No pun intended. And there's a verse in Biolay's Une Chaise A Tokyo that sometimes I have to skip on the CD cos it's too close to the bone for me.

I'm not sure what lovin' Len says about me. Maybe that I'm as crazy as him and just as tormented? haha... well I dunno, there's something about him that I relate to, the way he's kind of so astoundingly cynical and yet, at the same time, he isn't - as though there's a romantic or idealistic core of him that just refuses to let him give in completely to cynicism and I think it's the battle between those forces that I feel pulling each other apart or more, pulling him apart from the inside, in his music... well, I relate very strongly to that. 'Torn' is a feeling I'm very used to, like an old pair of shoes

[Splittet]

Thanks for a great reply substitute, which was exactly of the type I was hoping for...

Originally Posted by substitute

Really? You like Nick Drake? Not shitting me or anything? Cos I really dig him too.

Hehe, yeah, proof are my 1500 song plays (the artist I have listened 2nd most to in the last year) on Last.fm... I just really relate to him, but it's not all about the music, because I have read quite a lot about him, and have seen a couple of documentaries. That stuff made the music more powerful. I love many singer-songwriters, but what makes Nick the clear favorite is just that he is the one I relate clearly the most to... He was young, went though a lot emotional difficulties, was very introverted, kind of disconnected from the world - and I simply relate. :P But I can find peace in his music, even if it's only temporary... I doubt many INTJs feel similarly...

[substitute]

Well I'll be damned. I've never known another person besides my brother and I who even heard of Nick Drake

Oh but also the dude who wrote all the songs on the Libertines' album Up The Bracket seems to have a way of working deep into me with the combination of lyric and melody that seems oddly matched to just, I dunno, resonate something in me. Some of that working class frustration yet the defiant sorta "don't let the bastards grind you down" thing... the way he combines complaining about the bastards' efforts to grind him down whilst demonstrating with all his energy that it hasn't worked. At least, on that album lol I relate very much to all of that.

It's a bit like how Nirvana used to appeal to me as a teenager, but better, because Cobain pretty much complained about being ground down but in a whiny way, as much as to say it'd worked and he was just whining about it, whilst Doherty fights back with every breath.