compulsiverambler
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- Sep 15, 2009
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I was going to post this under the INFP songs thread, but I don't know that it's an INFP thing. Might be an Fi, NF or Enneagram 4 thing, or just a me thing again. But if anyone has any songs like these to share, please do, because I eat them up, lol. I'm talking about songs that muse on and humanise villains, or reflect on or speculate on their thought process, more fully expose the senseless by forcing it to make some kind of sense. It can either make it sad from a new perspective or seem more obscene, or be startling in how relatable it's made.
Morrissey has quite a few of these, although the classic example for me is The Boomtown Rats' I Don't Like Mondays. There's The National Front Disco (about someone joining the racist British group The National Front, possibly a specific notorious nailbomber, and his loved ones' sense of confusion and loss) The Last of the Famous International Playboys (about a murderer wanting to impress his 'heroes') and The Youngest Was The Most Loved (another murderer song, my personal favourite) and The More You Ignore Me The Closer I Get (a darkly humourous look at stalkers - I love how vivid the characterisation is). I think there are more by him I've forgotten.
It's just refreshing to be reflecting on those issues in a half intelligent way and to explore the human psyche and experience unrestrained by needing to do the predictable thing of explicitly condemning those actions and explicitly expressing sympathy. The sense of horror at the tragedy is conveyed implicitly by the ostensibly pointless, earnest attempts to see more deeply inside the minds of those involved from various angles. You can tell the event or concept has really had an effect on the songwriter and they're trying to break it down in their own way. Some people are offended by songs like these, but I find them enormously powerful and as I said, they make the crimes seem even more sad or obscene or baffling, or just more real; they don't glamourise them.
Is there a type correlation with really 'getting' this kind of thing? I suspect so. There's something quite Fi/NF about being fascinated by the mind of someone you can't understand. And the morbidity is quite 4ish. Either way, do add any others you think of.
Morrissey has quite a few of these, although the classic example for me is The Boomtown Rats' I Don't Like Mondays. There's The National Front Disco (about someone joining the racist British group The National Front, possibly a specific notorious nailbomber, and his loved ones' sense of confusion and loss) The Last of the Famous International Playboys (about a murderer wanting to impress his 'heroes') and The Youngest Was The Most Loved (another murderer song, my personal favourite) and The More You Ignore Me The Closer I Get (a darkly humourous look at stalkers - I love how vivid the characterisation is). I think there are more by him I've forgotten.
It's just refreshing to be reflecting on those issues in a half intelligent way and to explore the human psyche and experience unrestrained by needing to do the predictable thing of explicitly condemning those actions and explicitly expressing sympathy. The sense of horror at the tragedy is conveyed implicitly by the ostensibly pointless, earnest attempts to see more deeply inside the minds of those involved from various angles. You can tell the event or concept has really had an effect on the songwriter and they're trying to break it down in their own way. Some people are offended by songs like these, but I find them enormously powerful and as I said, they make the crimes seem even more sad or obscene or baffling, or just more real; they don't glamourise them.
Is there a type correlation with really 'getting' this kind of thing? I suspect so. There's something quite Fi/NF about being fascinated by the mind of someone you can't understand. And the morbidity is quite 4ish. Either way, do add any others you think of.