The second entry in my MVP Brandy Senki week is probably the song I think of the most if I just think of the band.
It’s called “Coming of Age Story”:
That musical shift right past the 1 minute mark is like…love poetry for the ears and brain. Thank you for writing those notes in that order.
The Nathalie Scarlette directed music video is a perfect exemplar of that not precisely uncommon trope: the imperfect memory of youth’s faux perfections. A nostalgia bait video about the kind of day that some people might have had but in general never fits into our actual experiences. A glory just out of reach. A self-lie.
This childlike need to return to an Eden from which we never fell informs so much of our literature and music that we barely noticed that a multi-billion dollar algorithmic industry grew out of the desire to profit off our false impressions of loss.
There is a stage in our life when we look back upon our youth and we judge our present on our past and it is not uncommon for us to realize we had been holding on to something not only not there but also somewhat never was.
Which is not to say they do not have some grains of truth. Stupid days with friends were magical. It is simply that the magic covers up all the flaws and downtimes and stupid fights and the rest.
The lyrics encapsulate this mood shift (note: English language taken from the Youtube video)…
This is the worst
I’m not good at coming-of-age story
Even though I’m still here in this story
I felt the agony of teenagers that’s left behind
Can’t be hasty
Can’t be hasty
The pain I was exposed to
is ignored and just turned into sound
I think it’s my last chance
I just want to see something beautiful
Please
drift into later on…
It just ends while I’m still sitting down
This day
Gradually these feelings turns to lies
Can’t understand each other anymore
Are you angry?
Before she repeats that just wants to see something beautiful.
I think a lot of us feel those moments. In some ways, social media and the way it traps us in our old pictures and old videos and old posts make it worse. We lose that bit of ourself that was right there in that “coming of age story” and see it replaced with the social-version that was never us. More “perfect” and more “planned” but absolutely never quite as beautiful.
My Music Video Picks [MVP] is a series of posts highlighting various music and dance videos from Youtube (usually). No particular schedule (sometimes lots, sometimes little). It might not even all be music or dance videos. Absolutely picked by me, though. Usually I have to like both the song and the video, but we’ll see.
You can see the most recent songs here: [Doug’s] Music Video Picks [Youtube Playlist]. Size of that list will change as the mood strikes. Playlist might contain spoilers for unpublished posts. Just enjoy.