Music is a wildly popular form of art and cultural activity that consists of sound organized in time. Being embedded in each and everyone’s life to a certain degree, music has played a huge role in the development of human civilization. Music comes in different styles and forms and each person has their own unique taste. So why is music such an important medium of entertainment for so many people? Why do people listen to music in the first place?

First of all, music can affect our lives by being a source of light in dark times. By escaping the harsh reality of everyday life, music can help you to heal open wounds. Sometimes life is difficult and people find refuge by entering a different world, by listening to music to take their mind off everyday problems.

Break-ups between romantic partners or friends, for example, can be really hard and agonizing. To cope with the pain, people often engage in listening to music to heal, to meditate or to just further nourish their emotional state. Personally, songs like “Black” by Pearl Jam or “Schism” by Tool are some of the most powerful songs when life is at its lowest. Furthermore, people might like to listen to songs to enter a new reality, a different world, usually to escape their boring, routine and monotonous existence: for me, such songs can be “Lady” by Modjo or “Paradise” by Coldplay.

Music is also a form of art, the creation of a person’s soul and mind. Just like paintings or drawings, music has its own meaning and it can be appreciated and interpreted in many different ways. Music is more about feelings and emotions and less about understanding and rationalizing. This is why I really like more experimental stuff, that mainly consists of instrumentals and lacks lyrics: songs like “Soothsayer” by Buckethead and “In the Hall of the Mountain King” by Grieg

With the technoligical advancement of mankind and the arrival of the internet, listening to music has never been as easy and as accessible as it is nowadays. However, I personally think that now that music is so easy to access, people are afraid to dive deeper in the huge diversity of songs and prefer to scratch the surface, to only consume what the masses consume: songs from the Billboard Top 100 or other “popular” charts.

The problem with pop music is not that it is bad, there are many pop-songs that I really enjoy, like Adele’s “Hello“. The problem with a large quantity of pop-songs is that they are really similar: they are radio-friendly, heavily commercialized, have uninspiring lyrics, follow basic music structures and use a lot of auto-tune (see “Friday” by Rebecca Black).

Also, hip-hop and rap music can be a really bad influence for our children, mostly because it often incorporates a lot of profanity, hypersexualization and/or drug & alcohol use, just like Gery-Nikol – “Gotina & Luda” or Nicky Minaj’s “Anaconda“. On the other hand, hip-hop songs can be really inspiring and meaningful, justifying the use of profanity/drugs because they are created to be real art and not just radio singles: see “Changes” by Tupac.

All in all, music should be about creating something original, something from the heart and from the soul. For me, music is not about showing off posessions, money or how much weed you smoke. But at the end of the day, everyone should decide by themselves what kind of music they like. Music is a form of art that is created to be enjoyed and that is the most important thing.