My first introduction to rock music was on YouTube. Browsing through different kinds of songs, I stumbled upon a rock playlist. That was the beginning of a beautiful journey through music and the history of Rock n Roll. I remember a couple songs that stood out: Hotel California by the Eagles, American Pie by Don McLean, and Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin. These are musical ballads. What is special about these songs? To the younger me these songs told a very clear story. Maybe very clear isn’t the best description because they were mysterious. They told a story that I couldn’t quite understand.
Although I’ve been through several musical phases, I can always return to these songs. One day I’ll be playing Linkin Park, the next I’ll be trying to decode The Ballad of Hollis Brown. I suppose the appeal lies in the fact that I don’t completely understand it. Maybe this is an important part of music: mystery. I’ve had favourite songs that I have binged on repeat. Had. After dozens of plays the song you thought you loved, the song you thought you had a connection with becomes stale. The melody gets repetitive, the baseline gets muddy. One of the most tragic feelings.
What was different about musical ballads? Well, the ballad tells a story and like good literature, it is open to interpretation with deep complexity.
Take “American Pie” by Don McLean for example.
A long long time ago
I can still remember how
That music used to make me smile
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people dance
And maybe they’d be happy for a while
In the first verse a time and setting is established. We can see that the narrator is reflecting back with some kind of regret. And a few more verses pass and we arrive at the chorus:
So, Bye, bye Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
And them good ole boys were drinking whiskey and rye
Singin’ this’ll be the day that I die
This’ll be the day that I die
Clearly there is a literal meaning, but that literal meaning doesn’t fully make sense in the context of the song. So “Miss American Pie” must represent a bigger idea. I have been listening to this song for years and I know it’s about the plane crash on the “day the music died,” but I still haven’t really understood it. This is what I meant earlier by mystery. Musical ballads are filled with this kind of metaphorical language and only the song writers really know what they mean.
Another lyricist I adore is Bruce Springsteen who is responsible for (in my opinion) some of the greatest songs ever written. I suppose you could classify the majority of his discography as being composed of ballads, but some stand out a bit more than others: 4th Of July, Asbury Park (Sandy), Incident On 57th Street, Backstreets, Jungleland, Racing in the Streets, and The River.
…This could be a very long list if I kept going.
One soft infested summer
Me and Terry became friends
Trying in vain to breathe
The fire we born in
Catching rides to the outskirts
Tying faith between our teeth
– Backstreets, Bruce Springsteen
To close, I think there is a very eloquent poetic about this kind of music. It captures the essence of feeling with an amalgam of words that flow together perfectly. I suppose that is true about all music. But the ballad does it in a beautiful way. It is poetry accompanied with music and presented with the right intensity to present a package waiting to be understood.