Soundtrack of Our Souls: Finding Solace in the Musical Anthems that have Helped Us Heal
Mar 19, 2024Season 2Episode 10
Tina and Ann
As we commemorate the 30th anniversary of Kurt Cobain's untimely departure, we find ourselves discussing the impact music makes in our lives. Tina and Ann discuss healing through music, a collective cry as many find their voice in the gritty anthems of a generation. Th pair talk about the artists who've given voice to their deepest struggles and how they have been helped through music.
Tina and Ann invite you to a space where they share personal encounters of solace and healing in the music that has soundtracked the highs and lows of their lives, recognizing the irreplaceable role these cultural icons have played in their collective journey.
The melodies that resonate with us tell a story far beyond their lyrics, often becoming enmeshed with our most pivotal memories. In this heartfelt dialogue, we reflect on how the simple act of listening can transport us back in time, reawakening emotions we thought were long since laid to rest. We discuss the importance of understanding the deeper narratives woven into the songs we hold dear, as we encourage you to unearth the tales behind your own cherished melodies. Join us on 'Real Talk with Tina and Ann' for an episode that promises to be as much a tribute as it is a testament to the transformative power of music in shaping our emotions, memories, and the very essence of our being.
Many artists and songs are mentioned during the podcast. All are cited and honored with how they have changed our lives.
As we commemorate the 30th anniversary of Kurt Cobain's untimely departure, we find ourselves discussing the impact music makes in our lives. Tina and Ann discuss healing through music, a collective cry as many find their voice in the gritty anthems of a generation. Th pair talk about the artists who've given voice to their deepest struggles and how they have been helped through music.
Tina and Ann invite you to a space where they share personal encounters of solace and healing in the music that has soundtracked the highs and lows of their lives, recognizing the irreplaceable role these cultural icons have played in their collective journey.
The melodies that resonate with us tell a story far beyond their lyrics, often becoming enmeshed with our most pivotal memories. In this heartfelt dialogue, we reflect on how the simple act of listening can transport us back in time, reawakening emotions we thought were long since laid to rest. We discuss the importance of understanding the deeper narratives woven into the songs we hold dear, as we encourage you to unearth the tales behind your own cherished melodies. Join us on 'Real Talk with Tina and Ann' for an episode that promises to be as much a tribute as it is a testament to the transformative power of music in shaping our emotions, memories, and the very essence of our being.
Many artists and songs are mentioned during the podcast. All are cited and honored with how they have changed our lives.
Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Ann. I am Tina.
Speaker 2:
And I am Ann. This is a little different episode. You know, tina, you were only 10 years old when Kurt Cobain died, but I was old enough to remember and his music spoke to where I lived. So when he died at the time it felt like a part of my soul was ripped apart. This April 1994, 30 years ago I mean, that's just crazy to me when he died, when that happened, thousands flocked to Seattle to mourn his death. You know, there is a reason I am talking about this and just bear with me, because this is really different.
Speaker 2:
But in the 1990s Kurt Cobain was someone that kids, young adults identified with that type of grunge, alternative kind of music, because there was a lot of pain going on. Life Magazine put out a 30-year anniversary edition of his death and they say the similarities in the upbringing of Kurt Cobain Dave Grohl and if you don't know who he is, he's Foo Fighters and Courtney Love, who, cobain's wife, came from a splintered home. They all did. They were all raised by one parent or no parent. This kind of new normal for thousands of kids, tens of thousands hoping to find refuge and purpose or at least a way forward in their version of America. It says a core of Nirvana's fans identified with Kurt's disenchantment with the way the world worked. You know he had this disappointment in how the world was. So Kurt, courtney and Grohl, and even Courtney's really good friend, drew Barrymore, had broken families and it was a time of a lot of drugs and grunge and kind of a defined group of kids who were hurting. It was a type of identifying or a group of people coming together because of a cause or a similarity in their pain to get through.
Speaker 2:
You know, when I was younger I lived in the clubs. I mean I was there every single weekend Thursday, friday, saturday, from the time I was like 16 in the club the teen clubs until I was like 30. And one of my favorite nights was Alternative Night and you know it was like this passive movement of rebellion because our parents were not there for us and it was just such a broken time. Now that is the norm for a lot of people to identify with a cause or a movement because of pain or trauma. I think it was kind of beautiful. I mean it's been done all generations, from Bob Dylan. I even thought of Woodstock Run, dmc, eminem, lady Gaga, pink. I mean the article says if young people think a famous person is speaking to or for them. They think they are understood. And what Cobain did was sing directly to the disconnected the angst. You know that angst was at an all-time high and teenagers were singing out their pain. Did you ever experience anything like this?
Speaker 1:
Tina and I feel like what you talked about was helping other people feel not alone. He made them feel like, oh okay, someone that I can relate to, who's you know bigger than me, if you will, and I'm sure that that's what the connection is. So the closest thing that I can relate to is when I kind of laugh at this when new kids on the block disbanded I was 10 years old then and I was crushed and they were the boy band like the boy band of all boy bands, probably probably the greatest one of all time. I mean, I know Backstreet Boys and then Sink came along, but it made me feel like the connection to the band and to their music died. I remember sobbing and feeling like nobody understood my pain, especially my parents, over this news, because to me, when the group fell apart, I felt like that meant I would too, because listening to them made me feel like all was right.
Speaker 1:
So then I remember feeling a similar way after I met Mario Lopez one time.
Speaker 1:
I got a picture with him and I got his autograph. I was a huge Saved by the Bell fan and that was my first Starstruck experience, okay, and also that was right around the age of 10, maybe a little bit younger, but I sobbed when I got home, knowing that Mario Lopez had to leave. So I think it's that connection and the feeling that I didn't want to go away, and I think that's what you're talking about when you're talking about Kurt Cobain.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I think that coming together as a generation or in a movement, or in that moment in time when you're across from somebody who's really connected with your soul, you know it helps to not feel alone, it helps to give purpose and it helps to not feel so silenced.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I think it's all about the emotional connection and what the person or a song or anything that invokes inside of you when you hear it or see it or read it. You know.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, when people share the same cultural experience, it brings a shared pain, you know, a collective experience, and it's like we've been wronged and we can walk together in this. You know, tina, you and I worked a story together. That's how we met and one thing that came from that was I was able to join a domestic violence walk and there were people from every walk of life walking for people who had been affected by domestic violence and it brought this sense of healing for everybody, a sense of we will not be silenced and we're all walking together in this purpose, and it just feels so beautiful.
Speaker 1:
Overcoming is just the best you know. When you overcome the pain or when you overcome whatever it is that you've been working towards, there's really not much of a greater feeling is there.
Speaker 2:
No, have you ever listened to a song and just screamed it to the rooftops where it hits your pain, and you are just saying I am done with you pain and you just feel triumphant.
Speaker 1:
Yes, several songs are floating around in my head that either helped me understand the next step. For me, like there's a song, take Courage, by Kristen DeMarco, that gives me all the feels, and the Pink Song, sober I Jam, so that song, and I don't even know exactly why that particular song, but oh, it makes me feel so good. There are a few songs, just a handful, that when they come on I can block out whatever the kids are screaming in the background and I just sing it out.
Speaker 2:
You know I just want to say something quick about Pink and then I'll personalize it. But when I am in the car with my kids and his chaos, I just turn Pink on and everybody just starts belting out Pink and nobody is arguing anymore or anything. It's just like this experience. So it's really cool. And also, you know, we know every song of Pink. I have seen her five times in concert. I've taken my kids to her and it's just a beautiful experience when we get to do it together.
Speaker 2:
Her songs are an anthem for me and when you go to a concert of hers, I have struck up so many conversations with the people around me who were singing and actually the last one we went to, this lady was crying through the whole entire time and she's just like. You know, this is church for me and everyone there is just singing this, a song called Try. You know that was one of the Try and it's all about moving forward from your past. You know you got to get up and try, try, try, and just imagine a whole stadium of people saying that all at the same time. I mean it's an experience. The song Perfect is so empowering as you scream to look past your imperfections and no matter what, you are perfect. Just the way you are being me up is one for people who have lost children. And have you ever listened to a song? Because of how much you've heard and listened, to feel the pain? I mean actually purposefully do it.
Speaker 1:
Yeah. So the song do something by Matthew West where he says I shook my fist at heaven and said God, why don't you do something? And he said I did, I created you. That song hit me to my core when we lost three cousins to addiction. We had three cousins within five months die addiction, and I guess that's not a song that I purposely listened to.
Speaker 1:
I heard the lyrics in a different way after that had happened and I was so angry. It was like that song was spilling out what I felt inside and once it got to the part where I did I created you, it lit me up in a way that I've never experienced before and ended up starting was asked to help start a community grassroots effort for fighting addiction, which I did for six years until we kind of merged into a bigger like, almost like sold the grassroots thing to a bigger organization so that they could do more with it. But the point is that song jump started me to do something. It was like I understood in that moment what I was supposed to be doing, even though it was hard. Now the one song that I will listen to if you're been really feeling sad and I just, I just wanna get it out is close when bells you should be here and it's a song about missing people who should still be here with you. And that one, that one helps really get all the water works out when you just feel it.
Speaker 1:
You just you're in it. It's like sometimes, do you ever have moments where sometimes you just need to feel it and get it out, like there is no joking, there is no making you laugh, you just gotta cry it out, yeah.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, well, songs can actually take you right there. So, yeah, they can break me for sure. You mentioned some godly songs and I've had quite a few that I used to listen to on a regular basis. But then I had a situation happen to me that was happened within the church and it kind of robbed me of being able to really go there again and I stopped listening to a lot of that music. I mean, it's really interesting how a song can take you someplace, positively or negatively, and it can, yeah, it can take you right to a moment in time and I completely stopped because of trauma.
Speaker 2:
I wasn't able to connect with the Christian music or godly music anymore. It just took me right back to the trauma. So I had to stop listening to it. You know I'm that person that for lost situations I just can't go there. It's just too hard for me. That song Be Me Up would be more than I could handle. But I have felt empowered by a song. Family Portrait by Pink is about her family dysfunction and her parents cried for the first time when they heard it because it was a release for her and for them. So they went there as a family when they listened to the song that their daughter wrote. You know I used to sit in my room and write poems and you know it's the same kind of concept and it was very healing for me.
Speaker 1:
I love that there are so many different outlets that can help people through whatever they're going through. It could be music, it could be poems, it could be some sort of journaling, it could be running, it could be such a variety of things, and I think that's what is really important to know is, even if your thing isn't through music, you can find it in another way.
Speaker 2:
You know, there's an interesting twist to this, because when Kurt Cobain died, seattle Crisis Hotline was inundated with crisis calls from teenagers, according to Life magazine, and it made me think of, like when Prince died or when Michael Jackson died, whitney Houston, and how much we put into someone who has carried us through life with song, how much we relate to them and we feel with them, we hurt with them, have an anthem with them, heal with their music and when they are gone, it can be a major loss because of what they have done for us. Is there anyone like that, where their death touched you deeply because of how they touched your soul, with music or in another way?
Speaker 1:
I just think it's profound that we can feel so connected and like we know someone we've never met, just because of their words or their feelings. Again back to that connection. So I remember vividly when Michael Jackson died and it just rattled me because I love his music. I still love his music. Obviously I don't know him as a person and there's a lot of different opinions about him, but I really remember it because I was working my second radio job at the time and had to go on air with this news and it didn't seem real to me. And all of a sudden I just kept thinking about all of the songs that he'd sang that had really stood out to me. And my parents used to have me in pageants and so my routine was a roller skating routine and I always chose Michael Jackson music. So it just made me think about all of those things. And it's crazy to also think that, even though he's been gone for like a decade plus, which seems crazy, it does.
Speaker 1:
That he is still, his music is still so vivid and still making money off of that it's you know it talks about. It speaks, at least in my opinion, to the connection and the power that someone's job can have and in this case, his artistry.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I had several too. I can remember right where I was when Prince died. You know that was a really big one and I loved Purple Rain and that was another you know album. That and his music was just so deep and it touched my soul. I think I knew every song. And you know, like I already mentioned, with Kurt Cobain it just was. So it was a really major loss and I can remember exactly where I was when I found out that he had passed away. You know, I just saw Taylor Hawkins, the drummer for the Foo Fighters, at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony and you know I saw the Foo Fighters play with Paul McCartney and it was, I mean, live. It was such a really cool experience. But right after that, david Grohl, who is he used to be in Nirvana with Kurt Cobain and the founder of Foo Fighters is now, you know, here he is and then Taylor Hawkins was his drummer and right after we saw him live, like very shortly after he died. So you know, that was really an interesting thing.
Speaker 2:
You know, music can be a movement and represent an entire group of people. It can be healing, it can be a place where you scream and just feel so wronged. It is a place where you can be who you are and you know you were with a bunch of other people who feel the exact same way. You know it is that feeling that we talked about earlier of not feel, of not being alone. I mean, I think you feel like you're the only, like you're in the shower, you're in the car, in the car, you know when you're screaming your anthem to these songs. But then when you see thousands of other people doing the same thing and you're doing it with them, it just creates such a camaraderie and a different kind of healing.
Speaker 1:
So I have a feeling you're going to ask me about some of my favorite song lyrics and I have to look up one of them because for the life of me I cannot think who sings this song. It is a country song and, oh okay, it's Cain Brown. Thank God. It's called Thank God and it's the lyric that talks about. And I really thought about my husband because I know sometimes I can be a little bit hard to deal with. I'm maybe we all have that side, but I love how the lyrics say you love me. When you didn't have to, you did, you do, you knew or he knew. Thank God for giving me you, and I love that part of it. That really helped solidify just a piece of my heart with my husband when that song came out. I really, really love that song.
Speaker 1:
I love, like I was saying earlier, the lyrics to the Matthew West do something song. You know, whenever you're feeling like there's injustice, I really think, or something that your heart is really tugged at, that that's, I think, the direction that you need to go in. That song really helped move me toward that. So I wondered I know that Pink speaks a lot to you and you have mentioned some of the lyrics, but is there one in particular that maybe stands out to you In this season of life?
Speaker 2:
That's a really good question. I'd have to, because I'll tell you so many of her songs and I think that that's why I connect with her so much. They're just so authentic and they really do speak to what and who I am in so many different ways. I think that that perfect is a really good one, and the one that I mentioned earlier try this is us as a really good one, because I think that so many people just feel wronged you know, or look that in judgment and for just being who they are. You know, and I just I don't know that there's just so many that what I really love is watching my kids, just they love Cover Me in Sunshine.
Speaker 2:
I don't know if you know that song, but it's such with her daughter, willow, who sings too, and my kids they. Just when that, when Willow starts singing and they start singing, it's it melts my heart. That's that hits me right there, I'll tell you, because it's just so innocent and beautiful. We went to a show this summer where they had a karaoke thing and two of my kids got up on the stage and they sang Cover Me in Sunshine.
Speaker 1:
It was so cool.
Speaker 2:
It was really beautiful, yeah. So yeah, I would say most of her songs really are great and, like I said, I know every single. You know what this is another thing with songs I have a really difficult time remembering a lot of things in life. I would win name that tune. I would win it.
Speaker 1:
There's something about putting it to music, so I couldn't tell you the Constitution.
Speaker 2:
but in middle school we learned a song to the Constitution In order to form a more perfect union.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, Because it was sent to music. I can still recite it. Yeah, there's there's really is a connection with music in our brains.
Speaker 2:
I'm telling you, as soon as I hear a song or the beginning of a lyric or whatever, and it wants you to finish it or whatever I can, and it's just about every song. I mean I know a lot of people can, but it's really interesting how it speaks to me so much so that I can just like talk it. I mean I just, oh, yeah, okay, I know that, I know that, but I couldn't tell you what I learned 10 minutes ago if it wasn't a song.
Speaker 1:
I know, I know I think I need music too. Well, how about maybe a little homework for our listeners? How about you pick your favorite song and you write down the lyrics to it, or whatever your favorite lyrics are, I should say, and then I don't know, maybe do a little research and see what the song is really about.
Speaker 2:
I've actually done that. Have you do that? Do you look up the lyrics and look up what?
Speaker 1:
I'm meaning to. I will, yes, on occasion, not all the time, but there have been a couple times where I have looked it up because I've been so curious.
Speaker 2:
You know, going back to Pink, when she does these songs and I've watched a lot of her interviews you know she'll talk about each of the songs and what they mean. And speaking of Pink songs, you know there's two. Do you know that one Never gonna not dance again?
Speaker 1:
Oh, that song, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:
Oh my gosh, that is so good. We just all get up and start dancing as soon as we start hearing it.
Speaker 1:
Is there a sting song? That's actually? Oh, that's actually about stalker. He's stalking someone, but you would think that it's a every step you take. Yeah, that's about stalking. Did you never know that?
Speaker 2:
No, I never did.
Speaker 1:
Yes, yes, yep, it's about stalking. So it sounds so, so nice. You know I'll be like, like so sweet, but no, it's about. It's about stalking your ex-lover, so that isn't that interesting.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, oh, you know what. Point out one more song of my absolute favorite song that I just it brings so much healing to me more than any other song. So Glitter in the Air. She is that song. Glitter in the Air, that's an absolute. Have you, if you've ever seen her do all the aerials and you know twisting and turning and everything it's, and she gets soaking wet they and she just flies all around and that's to the glitter in the air. That's one of her best. And it goes something like have you ever hated yourself for staring at the phone your whole life waiting on the ring to prove you're not alone? Have you ever been touched so gently you had to cry? Have you ever invited a stranger to come inside? It just goes like that. One of my other favorite songs I used to.
Speaker 2:
I love the musical Wicked. Broadway shows are so important to me. They always were really important to my family. We used to buy season tickets to things, and gravity from Wicked just hits me right where I live. Lots of times it says something has changed within me, something is not the same. I'm through with playing by the rules of someone else's game. Isn't that great. Too late for second guessing, too late to go back to sleep. It's time to trust my instincts, close my eyes and leap. It's time to try defying gravity. I think I'll try defying gravity. Kiss me goodbye, I'm defying gravity and you won't bring me down. I'm through accepting limits cause someone says they're so. Some things I cannot change, but I'll try. I'll never know. Too long I've been afraid of losing love. I guess I've lost. Well, if that's love, it comes at much too high a cost, so it just kind of goes like that. But it just makes me wanna take that jump and leap, and you know let's I can totally see why.
Speaker 1:
Well, hopefully, hopefully, it's inspired some of our listeners to write down those favorite lyrics, what they mean to you, and then look up what do they really?
Speaker 2:
mean, I don't think we need a quote, because I think we've had many quotes today with our songs. I agree, all right. Well, thank you so much for listening to Real Talk with Tina and Anne. As usual, we are very blessed and thankful for each and every one of the listeners that we have.