ヨルシカ

Back in 2020, on my 16th July, I had an epiphany that radically changed everything I knew about music.

The wreck that had been the year proved too harsh for my freshly graduated ass. I despised online school, owned a miserable journal and did everything humanely possible to quell a burgeoning crisis borne of social isolation and brutal introspection. Unsurprisingly enough, I resorted to binge-watching. A splendid curse of the modern human. I was sat on my living room futon, watching anime from a laptop that had been overexposed to the internet in the weeks prior. While my mind refused being sucked into the romance that had been simmering since the start, it wasn’t until the yandere drama poured out into a heartfelt scene between the two protagonists when a quiet guitar tune started playing in the background. And before long, the exquisiteness of the female voice that followed, blended with my emotional vulnerability and blew away the roof of our tiny apartment.

The horror of auditioning

To say I was awestruck would be an understatement. I spent the rest of the evening researching the musicians responsible for wielding such extraordinary magic. About Yorushika, the Japanese duo who had taken my senses hostage. As it would happen, I came across a song from their debut album called 言って。(Itte), written from the perspective of a lover in the wake of the devastating loss of her counterpart. The gut remorse and guilt from one’s incapacity to change the course of reality rises to a cry in the final refrain of the song. I had never felt so captured and sentimentally bogged down by an electric guitar and a voice before. I never knew the price of your selfish death paid by the ones you leave behind. The distraught, paralyzed souls of your loved ones who are doomed to a lifetime of irredeemable loss. That our thoughts and actions bore consequences no matter how useless we might feel and that’s exactly why we need to make the best of what we have. Every day until the end.

Congregation for recreational purposes

I didn’t speak Japanese. Yet, I could listen to their songs without a hint of understanding and still not feel foolish. I liked them for how they made me feel and I didn’t care.

My weakness for their upbeat pop-rock sounds and soulful vocals swelled me up like drugs. The powerful guitar riffs that is a characteristic in many of their songs had upset my mental chemistry. I felt happier and forgiving. I could plug in my headphones, detach from this universe and return better than I had hoped to be in months. I had successfully deceived myself into a healthier state of being and there could be no qualms about it.

But as time progressed, a mix of maturity and subtle curiosity advised me to go through the trouble of reading translations and truly acknowledge their words. I discovered that much of their work has been inspired by literature and explores profound experiences relating to the human condition. This paired well with the duo’s anonymity, which as they say, helps keep their work pure and enigmatic. If you dig around their subreddit, you will likely stumble across a lore surrounding their songs and albums. All of it has been summarized into one gigantic document compiled by the fans. While it’s certainly interesting to inspect the passive artifacts in a work of art, I personally do not like to indulge in a critical and intellectual study of an artist’s work (unless required to for good reason) for I am neither qualified, nor especially enthusiastic about it.

I still don’t speak Japanese. Maybe if I did, I would have a more lucid perspective on the picture Yorushika is trying to paint. But if that were to happen, I’d also lose the naive canvas that I painted through their songs. Since translations are only as good as the translator, I do not wish alien interpretations to affect how I’ve enjoyed their artistry. While it is also true that I may never be able to deeply appreciate their genius poetry, their music has left nothing that owes an explanation.

That’s why I gave up on music

If there is one thing about being human that I regard the most precious, it would be our ability to create and admire music that moves us. When your favourite songs liberate you from your cataclysm and leave you feeling unfettered and limitless, you bloom into someone you’re proud of being. There may be times when you feel burdened by responsibilities and spend sleepless nights under the shadows of unfounded fears concerning your future. Times when everything seems to head south. In those moments, when giving up on life presents itself to be an easy choice, you seek refuge in music. Unable to give up on what keeps breathing you back to life and pushing you beyond what you were capable of. Because you never can.