The element of surprise: something that sits with us in every aspect of our lives, whether we welcome it or not. It makes our days worth waking up for, and it makes every interaction we have, whether it’s physical or internal, that much more intense and real. Every day of our lives, we face unpredictable events that make us experience a range of emotions. And just because the element of surprise has such a heavy connotation with life itself, doesn’t mean it’s only confined to specific moments in life. You know I’m going to talk about music, and that’s exactly where I’m going with this.
The element of surprise that one experiences in music is so special because it only happens a certain way, and it only happens once. You’re never going to be surprised again, after that first time you listen to a song and hear an unexpected woman’s vocals alongside a “sexy cocktail lounge beat” (my roommate’s words, not mine) and that’s something to relish in. It’s a feeling that I can only assume is similar to how a child experiences the world for the first time, that freshness that is so genuine and not replicable.
Sometimes, listening to a new song is the only way we can go back to that time where we were five years old and experiencing aspects of life for the first time without the societal pressures on our back of how we should react. There is no precise way to react to a song, and there is no formula for what is and is not right.
That said, I’ve loved this song by Disclosure for a really long time, and I somehow feel surprised by it every time I listen. I know it’s never going to be the same as that first time I heard it on my headphones at work in the middle of several different things, during which I promptly dropped everything I was doing to take this song in with all of its perfection. Hopefully, you’ll have a unique experience to call your own though when you listen, if you haven’t already heard it.