Shallow playlists

I maintain a few playlists, and most of the songs are part of these playlists because of their music, not the lyrics. When I thought about the possible reasons for this, the conclusion was that I don’t genuinely understand most of the songs. I get the literal meaning of the lyrics but the songwriters of these songs are trying to convey layers of complex human emotions in a span of a few hundred words and I am not capable of absorbing most of it.

I also found one silver lining - with time, this will get better.

I recall that when I was in 7th class, I watched a movie named Udaan with my grandfather. The film and its songs felt unremarkable at that time. Fast forward to now, Aankhon Ke Pardon Pe is one of my favorite songs. It is relevant to the coming-of-age theme of the movie but more than that, I personally connect with the song because of the feelings that Amitabh Bhattacharya has etched in the lyrics. I felt the same way during my final years of school and college.

This realization is very exciting because each passing year brings new experiences and hopefully my playlists won’t be shallow at the ripe old age of 50-60.