Vinyl, cassette tapes, CD’s, music videos, radio play; however you get your musical fix. Each focus on creating a polar universe of emotions with auditory and visual desires. The sole purpose of music is to be transformed into a different level of who we are. What moves me may not move the next person. It has brought me through some of the toughest times in my life, but I always focus on the good times because, hey, everyone wants to know about the good times. Let me take you on that journey, just to know where I have been and why I speak with such respect of the arts and the artists that allow me to be whomever I choose to be at that exact moment. Whether I feel like crying or smashing the sh*t out of something because someone did me wrong, it takes me to that alternate person, that higher level of who I am that no one can f*ck with. Excuse my language. As each of us handle our anxieties and insecurities in various ways, some folks talk it out, write it out, take a couple of shots maybe, I choose to listen to it. Sometimes that next person can say it in the exact words I was looking for. Maybe I had my heart broken; and I need to cry that sh*t out and say, F*** em, and that one song can cure all of that. Maybe I need to get hype to set myself up for something I don’t even feel like doing, but you know the rest….
My first love was music, that “Thriller” album on vinyl, though “Off the Wall” is my favorite, “Thriller” was my first record, followed by “New Edition” on cassette tape and listening to “Irene Cara,” “What a Feeling” in Flash Dance, believing that I could break dance. “Dirty Dancing,” “Don’t You Feel Like Crying,” bringing out my love for the old school melody, “Purple Rain,” with “Purple Rain.” Where Prince is my forever love, and shedding a few tears every time it’s played, “The Color Purple,” with “God Is Trying to Tell You Something,” “School Daze,” “Be Alone Tonight,” “The Breakfast Club,” with “Don’t You” (Forget About Me) and “Krush Groove” with “If I Ruled the World,” “King of Rock,” “Holly Rock,” “Tender Love,” and “Love Bizarre” (damn that soundtrack is forever fire). Or in middle school waiting for someone to call into the “The Jukebox Network” or better known as “The Box,” so I could hear Another Bad Creation’s, "Iesha" and wishing I was the girl in the video; all were cemented memories of my childhood. Waiting for my favorite songs to play on the radio, so I could record them from the “Quiet Storm” on FM 98 WJLB in Detroit, while listening on my pink and grey boombox with the microphone attached from my bedroom, so I could record my slow jams that evening and anticipating that special someone I had a crush on to dedicate a song to me. So many memories established, as only those 70 and 80’s babies will get some of this stuff. My point in all this was just to take you back and share with you, "Why I chose to "marry" music...Music is about that feeling, that deep sense of security that makes you feel special even if it’s just for yourself.
Nik Kimbrough
- Rep Your Music
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