Subject to Change

Recently Alanna Matty released an EP entitled Subject to Change. It includes live demo’s of a number of tracks and it can be found here on Bandcamp. I will start out by saying it is fantastic! I have written quite a few posts about Alanna’s music over the past few years and have tried many times to state why I find it so moving and I don’t know that I have ever done a very good job at that. I would that it is beautifully tragic, in the most cathartic and uplifting kind of way. Sometimes you need to feel emotions in your life be it sadness, pain, anger or any number of other emotions in order to work through your life experiences. Alanna’s music has a unique way of getting me to feel things.

There is something else I really enjoy about Alanna’s music and I don’t believe I have stated this previously as I don’t that I have consciously noticed it before. It is how much I enjoy the chorus in their tracks. The chorus always ties the song together in such an outstanding way and there is so much substance to be found within them. I really enjoy Alanna’s style of writing; it always feels as if it is this stream of wonderfully authentic free flowing thought. I find that it is often the chorus which I instantly resonate with and latch on to.

Every track on this demo is incredible and I have thoroughly enjoyed my time with it. There were two tracks that I felt I had something to talk about that was good enough for other people to read.

Don't know how empty

\

feels so heavy

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Don't know how empty \ feels so heavy \

“Restless”

To put it simply, I feel that this track is a lot. There is much to be gleaned and dissected from the emotional odyssey this track takes you on. Here are a few things it has brought to my mind thus far.

“'Cos every moments a missed opportunity

If I sit still too long what will become of me

When every minute is a chance to do something

To bring me success, get me out of this mess

I am restless, I don't know what to do

When I am the one in control of my dreams coming true”

I remember hearing this and thinking wow that is a great summary of what growing up and what adulthood has felt like. There is no guidebook or instruction manual and you are trying to figure out what works for you. All the advice you may get from others could quite possibly do you zero good. You turn a certain age and suddenly you are supposed to go out into the world and make shit happen. I know I have frequently thought to myself “well how in the hell am I supposed to do that?” I will do one thing that seems right for a while and then it doesn’t so I change things up and do something else until I feel the need to change things up again. It may appear to those on the outside that I know what I am doing but really I usually have no idea perhaps you can relate to that in some way.

“And I know the tank is empty

Looking for answers to what is wrong with me

And I know the tank is empty

I'm looking for answers for what is wrong with me

And I know I can't make everyone happy

Am I the best that I could be?”

Self-doubt is what this brought to my mind and that is certainly a relatable feeling. If you are me it can take you quite a while to make a decision. Then once you have made that decision you will spend and least as long pondering on how it is probably the wrong decision and also what other people will think of it, how will this decision be perceived? I don’t care so much about what others will think or if it will make others happy like I used to. Growing older has knocked a lot of people pleasing out of me but that certainly wasn’t the case until I hit my late twenties. It is hard enough to make decisions but when you are trying to factor in what others will think and trying to fit into whatever box society says you fit in, well that turns decision making into a herculean effort.

“Serotonin”

Serotonin is a neurotransmitter with a number of complex biological functions. These include but aren’t limited to: mood, cognition, learning, and memory. This also includes physiological processes such as vasoconstriction. In short if your serotonin levels are off you can have a whole slew of issues which could be physical, mental and emotional.

I feel that this track is just as complex as its chemical counterpart. I feel that there is so much more to glean from it than what I have thus far. Here are a few parts that have always really stuck out to me.

Serotonin has been linked to feelings of depression and that certainly one major aspect of this track. This line has hit hard since the first time I heard it and I have thought about it quite a bit.

“The door was almost open but you just knocked and walked away”

It is hard to explain exactly what this feeling is like unless you have experienced it. Sometimes you can be in a place where you just feel so off and so down its like you are living in a different world than those around you; like you are in this constant horrible rain storm and others seem to be thriving in springtime bliss. Some magnificent opportunity could come your way but you just cannot physically, mentally or emotionally motivate yourself to move towards it. A particularly difficult part of such experiences can be the fact that you don’t have anyone to talk to that understands what this is like.

“I'm on a hunt for Serotonin

Feels like I've left all mine behind

Don't know how empty feels so heavy

Like time is weighing down my mind”

I feel like there are still people out there that don’t truly understand that depression is able to not just affect you mentally and emotionally but also physically. This part of the song describes so well what it can be like. I can vividly remember hearing this for the first time and tears just streaming down my face. Of course you never wish your bad experiences on other people but there is this overwhelming feeling of relief when you discover that someone else out there really knows what it's like. I felt that so strongly the first time I heard this. I remember thinking “yeah Alanna really gets it”; if you hadn’t experienced depression yourself you would not be able to articulate what it feels like in such a beautiful and poetic way. I still get a bit teary eyed at times when l listen to this track.

“I think I'm better alone but there's no place in my home I can be that

And I would pick up the phone but there's no one awake I could call”

I of course don’t know what this part of the track is speaking on exactly but I can state how my own experiences relate to this. There are times when I do just want to be isolated; shut myself off from the world both physically and digitally but that can be really hard to do in the world we live in. Both because technology is so integrated into everything we do but also because most of the people who I feel can relate to feeling such emotions are those I interact with online. Yet as the next part of the track states it is quite challenging to reach out to someone and talk about such things. It could be that it is the middle of the night or more likely that you may not have anyone that you feel you can talk to about something that is so personal, that makes you feel so vulnerable. It is so antagonizing when you don’t have control over what you are feeling and it's not something you can understand unless you have been through it. I felt so good after I heard this track for the first time. I simply cannot overstate the uplifting emotions I got from not feeling alone while listening to this track for the first time. There are few things that effect you so magnificently as feeling that someone else understands what you’ve been through. It has been a while since a song has hit me way this song did.