Like the beginning of every year there is a mix of both hope and crushing anxiety as the next 12 months of possibilities stretch out in front of us. We combat this huge amount of time, and the potential it brings, by trying to take control as early as possible, which means making New Year resolutions. Resolutions are a bugger, they’re symbolic booby traps that we place in our lives knowing that we will eventually trip the switch and fall into the pit of shame because we had that one cigarette 8 days after vowing to quit forever. As you can probably tell I’m in my second day of quitting, and things are getting dark.
So, in order to combat the sting of New Year’s resolutions I’ve came up with a way that makes most things in life better: add some music to it. Make some musical resolutions for 2017, and for some handy guidelines I’ll share some of mine.
Stay away from greatest hits
When you want to get into a band it’s easy to take the greatest hits option, the problem with this is that many bands greatest hits don’t give you the full picture of their career, so much as their chart success. Take The Cure’s Greatest Hits, which I bought a good number of years ago. If I had taken that collection of songs for granted I would have missed out on the band’s first four albums, which are the best ones apart from Disintegration.
Go to lots more gigs
This is a no-brainer considering that I write about music for a living, but I’ve become less and less adventurous when it comes to gigs. I’ve become too safe in my tastes that each gig holds fewer surprises as I only go and see bands that I’ve been listening to for years.
Finally get my head out of the 80s
There is literally decades of music, genres, bands, and trends out there to explore and I’ve spent nearly a decade obsessed with the 80s. My love of the 80s has lasted longer than the decade itself, if that’s not a prime example of being in a rut I don’t know what it.
