Music makes you feel happy you’re alive

“If music be the food of love, play on.”

– William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night –

In my humble opinion, Matt Corby is a living legend. He is also the closest thing I have ever heard the legendary Mr Jeff Buckley, who immortalised Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah with his own very special version.

I was lucky enough to be introduced to Matt by a very good friend of mine (Mr Ben Levy) one day when we were driving together. He was giving me a lift to a place where I would be cat sitting in Manly for a friend of theirs for a week or so over the Christmas period (Dec 2011). We were listening to Triple J (an awesome alternative radio station in Australia) and just as we pulled up to the house, Matt Corby’s ‘Brother’ came on. He told me that I needed to listen to him, so we sat in the stationary, parked car and listened to the entire song all the way through. I was blown away, and that was the day that I fell in love with his voice and his music. Captivating, mesmerizing and very beautiful.

I then started to read up a little about him and realised that he had taken the number 3 spot (behind Gotye’s Somebody That I Used To Know at 1 and The Black Key’s ‘Lonely Boy’ at 2) of Triple J’s hottest 100 in 2011 for Brother. Later in 2012 I went to see him play at the Metro in Sydney with Ben’s girlfriend’s sister, Sabrina. We had a blast and both drooled over him and his music all night. A month or so later I was lucky enough to score tickets to see him play at Cockatoo Island in Sydney and took another girlfriend. It was an electric night and his music electrified the island. Truly fantastic.

Which brings me to now. Darren and I went to see him at the iconic and eponymous Enmore Theatre on Friday night and he kicked ass. His voice sounded as stunning as usual, at times so smooth it could melt butter and others so raw you could feel the emotion that was in him when he wrote the song.

His music is (in my humble opinion) a blend of Jeff Buckley’s voice, with the earthy rawness of Mumford & Sons and I just stumbled across a recording of the last song that he played (My False) to demonstrate, just how brilliant he is live. The entire venue lit up when he played this, and it was just the most perfect way to end his set.

He recently spent a while in the UK with Mumford & Sons, and he is also signed to Ben Lovett’s record label, Communion, so you can see that there is a definite influence from them in this song.

Today’s post is about how music can make you feel happy you’re alive, and Matt’s music makes me feel happy that I am alive to listen to it and witness it live. Is there music that makes you feel like that in your life? If so, fill it with more of it!

Inspiration for this post

Matt Corby live at the Enmore Theatre in Sydney – My False

Matt Corby – Brother

Jeff Buckley – Hallelujah

We have nothing to fear

“Lately I’ve found
When I start to think aloud
There’s a longing in the sound
There is more I could be
In darkness I leave
For a place I’ve never seen
It’s been calling out to me
That is where I should be”

Birds of Tokyo – ‘Lanterns’ 

My boyfriend Darren and I went to see Birds of Tokyo in Sydney this weekend, which was a real treat as it was the first time I had ever been to the Enmore Theatre. Better still, we rocked up about 5 minutes before the band were on, had found a parking spot super easily, sauntered straight into the venue, grabbed a drink and walked right through into the crowd just as the band came on stage. Too easy (as the beautiful Aussie’s would say).

It was a night of effortless grace and fantastic music. The light show that accompanied each and every song lit up the stage and the band and intensified the power and energy of the music they performed.

I was first introduced to Birds of Tokyo, by a lovely guy called Will who I met in 2011 when I was backpacking in Vietnam. We hit it off as soon as we met and within a few hours we were sharing a room with an American girl in Hoi An and swapping music recommendations. He had been living in Australia for a few months and had falled in love with the band and based on my musical tastes thought I would like them too. Which I of course did.

The music from their self titled 2010 album then became the soundtrack of my time in Cambodia, which I travelled to after Vietnam, and they were the very first band that I ever saw in Australia, when I saw them at the Metro in Sep 2011.

So what’s the relevance of them to my blog post? Before I left the UK for my 9 month Round the World backpacking trip on 19th May 2011, there were two things that I was most worried about. 1) Getting malaria and 2) getting an infected insect bite.

According to Susan Jeffers and her bestselling book ‘Feel the fear and do it anyway‘, 90% of the things we worry about never happen, which I agree with. However, I also believe that, even when the things you worry about do happen, everything will be OK and you’ll deal with it. Which is what happened when I got an infected spider bite about 3 months into my trip, while trekking in the Cameron Highlands in Malaysia.

I got very sick indeed and needed emergency surgery, but, in the end, everything worked out fine.

And since then, I have also learnt, from Buddha that ‘We become what we think‘, so if I had in actual fact, not even thought or worried about those two things, not even allowed them into my head, neither would have happened. If I had instead chosen to think, ‘Everything will be fine, I will have a safe, easy, happy and wonderful trip’, I would have had nothing to fear at all. And the next time I go travelling, that is what I will be filling my head with.

Since coming to Australia and achieving the seemingly impossible, by becoming the first person in history to come here and set up my own company from scratch and sponsor myself for a visa through that company (within 6 months of setting it up), I have had to live almost permanently outside my comfort zone.

Obviously it’s called a comfort zone for a reason, and a lot of the time I have felt pretty uncomfortable, but brilliantly, it is also where the magic happens. I have taken risks that most people wouldn’t take. I’ve lost my flat and emptied my bank balance in order to be able to gain a visa through Thought Cloud to live and work in this beautiful country. And the silver lining to all of this discomfort? A visa and the knowledge that I am here on my own terms, working for myself, in control of my own life and career. The greatest gift I could have given myself.

And so, really, in the words of the 32nd President of the USA, Franklin D. Roosevelt, ‘the only thing we have to fear, is fear itself’. And if you imagine that fear doesn’t really exist, there’s nothing stopping you from achieving some really spectacular things.

So, if you could feel the fear and do it anyway, what would you do in life if you knew you could not fail?

“Our life is shaped by our mind; we become what we think. Suffering follows an evil thought as the wheels of a cart follow the oxen that draws it.
Our life is shaped by our mind; we become what we think. Joy follows a pure thought like a shadow that never leaves.” – Gautama Buddha

Lots of love, hugs and light,

Kat x x x

P.S.

Inspiration for this post –

Video for Birds of Tokyo ‘Lanterns’

Susan Jeffers book ‘Feel the fear and do it anyway’

Buddha

Franklin D. Roosevelt