Does your music have a message?

[FLAOFEI]

Simple question. Is there anythin in particular you as an artist want to convey. It can be something like a world peace if you're miss America, or maybe love and tolerance... or stick it to the man, or maybe that everyone stresses to much and should calm down... or maybe you want to say you da beeeest... just any overhanging theme in most of your tracks. Doesn't have to apply to all tracks tho, since I guess theres a lot f diversity in your repertoires. Write a bit about it, and maybe a bit about why it's important to you.

Spoiler Rambling about pants and polka:

I my self love the idea of what I like to call "the aesthetics of functionality" and using things in ways they where not intended. A real life example is how I have my speakers without those silly grills cause I want to see the speaker cones. The cones are the active part of the speaker, so I want them showing. That doesn't show much in my music maybe... but it connects to my love of using things in unintended ways. I use hiking pants as everyday pants cause they are more functional and more comfortable, and just cause nobody else does it doesn't mean I can't look good doing so :3

So how does that tie into my music? I want mix and match things that at first glance don't mix. I want people to have an open mind to what will mix and what won't mix. I've done it in several ways. There's what I did in "Oh God No..." which had samples from all over youtube and beyond. I have samples of feedback between my speakers and microphone (amongst other things) which I use for leads and or pads sometimes. There's my genre mixing, I love breakcore and polka, and they don't seem to mix... so let's mix those! I have percussive samples used for melody, and the list goes on.

What I want to want to do is challenge the norms. I want to show how the message is more important than it's medium, song can sad with the most violent of sounds. I also want to show the raw materials don't matter, it's what you do with them. There's no rule saying Street Sharks and MLP G3 songs be in the same track, and there's no reason why breakcore can't be deep, and there's nothing inherently bad about guys watching MLP.

What it boils down to though is open-mindedness. We have a bunch of predetermined ideas of good and bad, and if you never question them and try new things you miss out on an entire world of opportunities. You should do what you want to do, and since you never know what you might enjoy you should try it all! oh god... I'm a cutiemark crusader :O

In a way it's kinda anti racism, your background doesn't matter, it's who you are that counts. It wasn't my intention, but still. Then again it can also be interpreted as I'm trying to say "GOSH DARN IT!!! PERMANENT MARKERS SMELL GOOD!!!"... It all depends on how you see it.

Anyway... Now I wrote a bunch about how I want make the world a more better place. Now you!
For the record I didn't think of this until recently, but I recognise it in both my personality and it's reflected in some way in pretty much everything I do

[Freewave]

Well the short answer is yes. Absolutely. I'd find it hard to make music (yes, even about ponies) that doesn't indirectly say something about myself. Whether that's opinions on something, finding a similar viewpoint between a character and myself, opinions on the community, an interest in a genre, thoughts about aging, being an outsider, or just painting an emotion that i also feel....it all comes back to conveying something within the music from myself and also through the show. I often put way long descriptions for my tracks just to explain all that thought behind it, so even if it's a "hey cool track" response back, i hope people can see the deeper meaning behind a track i made if they bother to look. Of course sometimes it's a song designed around a pun so it's ok to throw some humor in the mix if you use a songs theme or show samples in a way that they weren't initally intended.

If there is an overall theme for my music its that its pony focused, that i like the freedom to try many genres (jack of all trades even if master to none) and sometimes mix them together, the freedom to examine the fandom within all angles (from artwork, the community itself, to fimfiction, to ponified covers), to express that thru pmv's a lot of the time, to use samples, and to not censor myself. So the free in freewave is not just not charging money but also freedom to make it how i want to. There's people who aim to fit in and not try anything new from the community (the herd instinct) and i find it important to make sure to avoid that and take some chances and use broader and more mature themes (even if that narrows the audience somewhat).

[itroitnyah]

I think that I want to, but I need to learn more about composition and practice more. So that it feels less like I'm throwing down something that sounds catchy in an 8-bar loop but doesn't mean anything otherwise.

[CitricAcid]

My music doesn't have a message either. Sure I'll tell a story with it when I can, but I'm not trying to communicate anything personal or insightful. I would rather my audience associate their own message with it.

[ExoBassTix]

Most of my Warmonger O and Xalpheon music is based on a message. I find that to be especially my Harsh Noise.
It is, after all, usually a straightforward pour of my emotions at the time.

Though more often, I just want to show my listener something through my music, something that crossed my mind, or happened to me, that I want y'all to know.

EDIT - I wanted to put an example out here that is very important to me.
My track Brainbleed is by far my most intense story so far. At least, considering all that happened to me before, during and after recording it. Just before Brainbleed happened, my head was a warzone of emptiness, induced by my first, and huge sudden depression attack. With this recording I emptied part of that emptiness (which is scary, considering it's a small bit and already so ... destructive), to enable the natural workings of my body to expel the rest, which it otherwise would have taken much, much longer to do.
Brainbleed is a very powerful statement which speaks of the power of music and, more personally, of how much impact depression has on me. I didn't even realize it was as bad as it was, until I listened Brainbleed back after having gotten rid of all traces of the attack.
It's without doubt my most personal track so far.

[CaptainFluffatun]

I just kinda make what I think sounds cool

[Blitz-13]

Yes. I'm always trying to get a good idea for a song and play to it as how a musician score's a movie, or a story.

[Stuntddude]

No, and I hate myself for it. I constantly feel like there are stories missing from my music, that I put too much focus into the composition and production and not enough into the emotion and storytelling. My music is, much to my own disdain, almost completely void of any real story or implied context. But I can never figure how to actually work genuine stories into my music-making process. I think that's part of why I've been drawn so strongly to doing soundtracks - it's a way to work real context and meaning into my music that's very difficult for me to find otherwise.

[Injustrial]

Perhaps not a message as much as I try to tell a story with mine. I usually use the lyrics for the actual storytelling, with the music providing the scene. Usually this centers around the villains of the show, since they provide the conflict I'm looking for.

My thought process revolves around setting myself in the villain's role and imagining the world through his or her eyes. Then I find ways to sympathize with the villain in question and making it into a story. Either trying to condense the essence of the character (Electronic Devastation, The Faceless Scourge) or providing motivation and justification for his or her actions (Resist Refuse Rebel Arise, Obey, The Devil in me)

Sometimes, I go for a specific conflict, be it fanon or specific, as in Stand Your Ground (Brony Hate) and The Day We Die (Equestria Wars)

I guess I could have gone the "easy" path and just made music which is music in itself, and not centering it around anything in particular. But I felt that I had an obligation to provide reasonable justification for calling myself a Brony musician and not just a hobbyist who coincidentally enjoy MLP:FIM.

A common thread in my music is anger, frustration, rage and general emotional instability, since A, it fits the genre nicely. B, it makes for some compelling drama and C, I've always found it easier to write about. I want to make music which brings out all your aggressive feelings and lets you revel in them for a little while, so the anger can drive your dancing and let you mosh out. I'm not looking to MAKE you a more aggressive person, I just feel the aggressive genres of the world allow for exploration of a more faceted psyche. And I find it fascinating.

[Mr. Bigglesworth]

I used to try to do that but honestly I find it just muddies the process for me. I'm not sending a message as much as I'm just creating something. Maybe if I had lyrics in my music it'd be a different matter, but it's hard to convey a message instrumentally. Even with how Kyoga does it instrumentally it's pretty open to interpretation.

[TWILICORN]

As a general rule, no. I would like to make albums that tell a story though, but not individual tracks.

[Arkane]

I've been influenced by Rhapsody of fire alot that it sort of got inculcated in me to make songs that tell stories. Short Answer: Yes. But the stories I try to write are either epic bloody battles, good vs evil, typical noblebright cheesy stuff.

It NEEDS to have lots of strings, bells, loud choirs, and lots and lots of cheese.

Like this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnoUu23f4BA

[Ischi Vezon]

Simple question. Is there anythin in particular you as an artist want to convey. It can be something like a world peace if you're miss America, or maybe love and tolerance... or stick it to the man, or maybe that everyone stresses to much and should calm down... or maybe you want to say you da beeeest... just any overhanging theme in most of your tracks. Doesn't have to apply to all tracks tho, since I guess theres a lot f diversity in your repertoires. Write a bit about it, and maybe a bit about why it's important to you.

Spoiler Rambling about pants and polka:

I my self love the idea of what I like to call "the aesthetics of functionality" and using things in ways they where not intended. A real life example is how I have my speakers without those silly grills cause I want to see the speaker cones. The cones are the active part of the speaker, so I want them showing. That doesn't show much in my music maybe... but it connects to my love of using things in unintended ways. I use hiking pants as everyday pants cause they are more functional and more comfortable, and just cause nobody else does it doesn't mean I can't look good doing so :3

So how does that tie into my music? I want mix and match things that at first glance don't mix. I want people to have an open mind to what will mix and what won't mix. I've done it in several ways. There's what I did in "Oh God No..." which had samples from all over youtube and beyond. I have samples of feedback between my speakers and microphone (amongst other things) which I use for leads and or pads sometimes. There's my genre mixing, I love breakcore and polka, and they don't seem to mix... so let's mix those! I have percussive samples used for melody, and the list goes on.

What I want to want to do is challenge the norms. I want to show how the message is more important than it's medium, song can sad with the most violent of sounds. I also want to show the raw materials don't matter, it's what you do with them. There's no rule saying Street Sharks and MLP G3 songs be in the same track, and there's no reason why breakcore can't be deep, and there's nothing inherently bad about guys watching MLP.

What it boils down to though is open-mindedness. We have a bunch of predetermined ideas of good and bad, and if you never question them and try new things you miss out on an entire world of opportunities. You should do what you want to do, and since you never know what you might enjoy you should try it all! oh god... I'm a cutiemark crusader :O

In a way it's kinda anti racism, your background doesn't matter, it's who you are that counts. It wasn't my intention, but still. Then again it can also be interpreted as I'm trying to say "GOSH DARN IT!!! PERMANENT MARKERS SMELL GOOD!!!"... It all depends on how you see it.

Anyway... Now I wrote a bunch about how I want make the world a more better place. Now you!
For the record I didn't think of this until recently, but I recognise it in both my personality and it's reflected in some way in pretty much everything I do

I try to make my music emotional and coherent in tone, but not have a single message. I want the message to be subjective, in laymen's terms: I want the listener to feel what I feel, but have it apply to any situation they are in or thinking about.

Some of the songs I'm working on have a depressing emotion to them, but depression isn't the message I want to stay in their heads. The imagination is it's own world and I can't force that, but I can set the tone for the thoughts to occur.

[PinkieGuy]

My music tends to tell a story, and so in a sense the message is whatever the moral/emotion of that story entails. I think this is why when I used to put up some of my tunes people though that I must be a sad kind of person, because I was compelled to write songs that brought expressed emotion, and I find it much easier to tell a story about loss or change than I do about happiness.

That being said, some songs (and Eyes To See comes to mind here) had a positive message sitting under a lyrical story. That song for example was about both my views on parenting as well as on disabled members of the community. It was a chance to take something that another artist had created and express the resounding truth in it :D

[itroitnyah]

Welcome back after 10 months of being gone.

About your Eyes To See and about your views on parenting and disabled, I'm under the impression that you have brothers or sisters that are disabled?

[Toothpaste]

Umm... Yes and no. Considering that most of my music is instrumental, I can't really say that they have much story to them. There is an exception however: I made a series of three instrumental songs inspired by a 'fanficion' idea that takes place mostly after A Canterlot Wedding which follows the story of the changelings and how after their defeat they returned to Equestria and turned it into a loveless wasteland. Or something like that~

Then there is my music that has lyrics/voice clips. Definitely have story to them, no doubt (except maybe Horses As Hoarse As Horses). And while those songs are few in numbers, I hope to change that in the future. Wait... That means I only have one real song with lyrics .3.
...
Excuse me while I attempt to fix that~

[Yelling At Cats]

I've been trying to work on imagery in my lyrics; idioms and the like are also finding their way into my lyrics. Colloquial language is essential in lyricism if you're trying to convey a message, but the message you are trying to give may be interpreted by others differently than you would have anticipated. It's a very subjective matter.

[ExoBassTix]

I agree that it's very subjective. For me, personally, this is a beautiful thing. It would allow my potential listeners to experience their own things when listening to my music. To me, that is beauty.

[Ricky Denzel]

My music got a message. It says "Fuck you, ya fool"

[caprix snare]

my music says "I like robutts"

[NightmareRare]

I love this topic! It one of my favoite subjects, probably because it's so importat yet so vague.
I've been experiment for some time trying to find how I express my emotion best in my music, I like to think my message is more or less the journey towards emotion. I usealy take a feeling from a memory and translate it to the best of my ability, what my story says to you I unique to you.