Songs about Tragedy
I listened to the leaked Folie à Deux last night while cooking, and then again with headphones while doing laundry, and several more times while driving to and from work, and I think I finally have moved to the point where I can reflect on it and not just be all wavy hands and flailing, though this is by no means a song by song essay. I'm really still just talking about how much I love Pete Wentz.
I keep trying to compare Folie à Deux to The Black Parade, not just because I have such an emotional connection to that album, one that built up over time, but because some of the songs on both those albums shine a light straight into the dark of your heart. Famous Last Words and Disloyal Order of Water Buffaloes ping the same issues for me, the same dangerous line we walk between joy and desperate sadness, that same struggle to be alive, to have our art, our lives mean something, and mean something to someone else. To be awake, to have a chance at life, to experience our own catharsis through other people's songs and stories about tragedy.
I feel like Pete speaks to that part of me that most of the time I'd like to think wasn't there, the part that gets inconsolably lonely, the part that's feeling sorry for myself in the face of even a perfectly fine life, the part that's looking for some answer that we can't know, the thorn in my heart. Pete has this astounding ability to see into our hearts, the parts we never show anyone, and to make it seem less dangerous, to make it a pop rhyme so he can speak it for us, to disarm it in a chorus.
I hate it when reviewers apologize or come up with excuses that supposedly undermine or justify their love of Fall Out Boy. I hope I'm never embarrassed to like their music. We should never be ashamed of what we love. And it's not hard to love Fall Out Boy if you give up a little bit of control, loosen the lid on the bottle you keep those pesky emotions in. It's part of the reason they're so appealing to teens, who feel the world so strongly, so intensely, for the very first time, like every day was a album of their favorite songs that make them cry.
And, oh, Pete, of course we want to hear you sing about tragedy, because there's no point in not acknowledging that it's there. Even when we're happy, we remember when we weren't, and it feels good to accept the part of our hearts for the length of a song. It feels good to hear it in someone else's words and music, to hear our hearts sung back to us, so that we don't feel so alone.
I keep trying to compare Folie à Deux to The Black Parade, not just because I have such an emotional connection to that album, one that built up over time, but because some of the songs on both those albums shine a light straight into the dark of your heart. Famous Last Words and Disloyal Order of Water Buffaloes ping the same issues for me, the same dangerous line we walk between joy and desperate sadness, that same struggle to be alive, to have our art, our lives mean something, and mean something to someone else. To be awake, to have a chance at life, to experience our own catharsis through other people's songs and stories about tragedy.
I feel like Pete speaks to that part of me that most of the time I'd like to think wasn't there, the part that gets inconsolably lonely, the part that's feeling sorry for myself in the face of even a perfectly fine life, the part that's looking for some answer that we can't know, the thorn in my heart. Pete has this astounding ability to see into our hearts, the parts we never show anyone, and to make it seem less dangerous, to make it a pop rhyme so he can speak it for us, to disarm it in a chorus.
I hate it when reviewers apologize or come up with excuses that supposedly undermine or justify their love of Fall Out Boy. I hope I'm never embarrassed to like their music. We should never be ashamed of what we love. And it's not hard to love Fall Out Boy if you give up a little bit of control, loosen the lid on the bottle you keep those pesky emotions in. It's part of the reason they're so appealing to teens, who feel the world so strongly, so intensely, for the very first time, like every day was a album of their favorite songs that make them cry.
And, oh, Pete, of course we want to hear you sing about tragedy, because there's no point in not acknowledging that it's there. Even when we're happy, we remember when we weren't, and it feels good to accept the part of our hearts for the length of a song. It feels good to hear it in someone else's words and music, to hear our hearts sung back to us, so that we don't feel so alone.