As a uni student with an hour long commute to and from RMIT, I had a lot of time to listen to music. And although I have since graduated, it has become something of a tradition to blog about the music that defined my year. I’ve reflected on it for my other years at uni so why not the last one?

I knew 2015 would be a great year. Call it intuition, superstition, or a self fulfilling prophecy, but long before the year began, when we were still in early 2014, i knew 2015 would be great. And It didn’t dissapoint. This year i finished uni on a high, aced my classes, made tons of new and wonderful friendships, took huge strides personally and professionally, and am just in a really happy place. I turned 21 and had a fabulous party, with a fabulous playlist, and just as the year has been good to me, so has the music in my rotation. Without further ado, my top 10 experience defining songs of 2015 (in order of when I listened to them in the year.)

1. ‘Way Down feat. RZA, Barbie, John Frusciante’- N.A.S.A

2. ‘Rainbow’- F(x)

These two songs remind me of the beeginning of the year. In december 2014 i fell in love with the Red Light album, and its continued all this year as well. Going back to uni, doing a painting class as an elective, making films about old buildings, uni excursions; it all comes back to be when i listen to these two songs. I was determined to be on top of things at this time, I went to the recomended galleries and exhibitions from my tutors, I did the extra work, I was on top of it, and listening to these two songs the entire time.

3. ‘We Are Bulletproof pt. 2’- BTS

4. ‘Let Me Know’- BTS

Both of these songs not only signify the BTS concert around this time, but I had just recieved their discography off a friend and was listening to their songs constantly. These two stand out to me as defining this time. I remember this was the beginnning of semester 2, I had started Spanish as an elective and would listen to these songs in the morning before class. I would also listen to them as i walked around melbourne and the city during my breaks. It reminds me of mornings, cold, and light rain, but I also fondly remember listening to Bulletproof just before all of my Spanish tests to pump up my confidence. I guess it payed off?

5. ‘Strange Enough feat. Karen O’, Ol’ Dirty Bastard, Fat Lip’- N.A.S.A

6. ‘Flashing Lights feat Dwele’- Kanye West

These remind me of a similar time to the last two entries, I have similar memories associated with them. Trying to fill up my annoyingly long, 3.5 hour breaks between classes at uni, and specifically, Strange Enough reminds me of walking in really heavy gross rain. As well as crappy group projects… Together these songs remind me of long solitary walks with my ipod and a warm coat on in the evenings. Dull weather, but great music. It was also around this time I celebrated my 21st. I also give an honorable mention to ‘Make it Real’- BABE. Only just missed the cut but was pretty iconic of this year and this time of my life.

7. ‘Airplane’- F(x)

8. ‘Perfect’- The Smashing Pumpkins

Post birthday, My playlist was a bit more chill, to match the weather easing up, and just the general feeling of the time of semester. These songs were iconic of my spring. Getting to the end of the semester, only going in for assignments and presentations. I went back to a couple of old albums around this time and just chilled out. I was a bit over uni work, I had kept on top of it all year, I had put in the hard work and just needed to finish it off.

9. ‘Surrender’- Gavin Turek

10. ‘Automatic’- Red Velvet

These two songs not only wrapped up my year, being on holidays, graduating, selling our house, all the purchases I made; they also give a good indication of where my music taste is at the moment. For the majority of the year I’ve been gravitating to a sort of mature sound, and then indulging in my other bangers and pop occasionally for fun. I feel like this has really reflected in my attitude as well, and it brings me to where I am now. I still enjoy all the bands I did before, but I never indulged in this sound before past Late Night Alumni, who are still one of my favourite bands and could honestly be on every years list if it wasn’t redundant.

Who knows what 2016 will bring. I dont have a good feeling about it like I did this year, but ill put on my brave face anyway and give it my best shot. I look forward to hearing the music it brings.

Okay, this month I started a project that I’m excited about. Or, rather, I finished part one of said project. I want to fill up a full visual diary with polished drawings/ paintings etc. Polished. So each one has to have a decent amount of work put into it. I finished the first one in around 5 hours, and I think I’m most proud of that for this month. It was my first time ever drawing on black paper with white mediums, and it turned out surprisingly good. I am even more motivated to push myself to experiment and create more since. I also exercised more yesterday than I have pretty much all holidays. So that’s a step in the right direction.

I am also pretty proud of everything from White Night weekend. I woke up early to help my friend on a Channel 31 shoot. Did my best, learned a lot. I hadn’t worked in a studio before so I was nervous, but I knew I had to learn sooner or later. So I’m really glad I went outside of my comfort zone and learned something new (as well as helping out a friend of course!). I then went home very briefly to refresh and meet up with another friend. Then we both went back to the city for White Night pretty dang early. Got there at about 8:30. We ended up staying there until it was well and truly over. So, not counting my brief stop home, I was in the city, awake and functioning for over 24 hours. Which is a pretty solid effort I think. I’m proud of such a thing because it has legitimately been a while since I’ve done anything like that. Particularly this holidays I’ve been pretty lazy and whenever I go out or meet with friends it has been a fairly comfortable occasion, so I’m glad I went outside my comfort zone.

Additionally, I have been practicing guitar a lot more and have been learning as much as I can, both practical and theory, and I already see a huge improvement. I can play one of my favourite songs and have been getting good feedback online. I’m pumped for the next month to see what more I can do.

Not a great start to the new year. I know I slacked off too much. I’ve been making an effort to use my 2015 planner more this year, and have been recording weekly goals in it. I need to work on discipline though. Having short-term goals is good, but only if you actually achieve them. And thus, I don’t really feel proud of anything in particular this month. Which, to be honest, is rather upsetting. I had all month to produce something and I didn’t. Instead I worked on a range of little things but didn’t fully achieve them. I painted a fair amount, but not enough, I started cleaning my wardrobe, but didn’t finish, I learned a song on guitar, but didn’t practice it, I knitted a fair amount, but haven’t finished it. If I were to pick something that I could be proud of this month, it would be a difficult task. I suppose the thing that I am most happy about doing is finally getting around to working on my current internship stuff. I’ve had it all ready for a long time but just didn’t get it moving. There is still stuff to do on that front, but I am proud I actually got it going, because I’ve been putting it off for a long time, which has been stressing me out.

Overall, a pretty pathetic month. This isn’t what I envisioned when I set myself this resolution. Even my November was pretty weak on this front. If i’m going to improve in any area, I need to dedicate myself to it for the month, and make sure I achieve something. Otherwise I’m just improving at a regular pace and the resolution means nothing. The pressure is on now, I need to make up for the previous months failures. February, come at me.

Last year I talked about the top 5 songs that reminded me of certain times in 2013. I wanted to do the same thing this year, but I listened to so many different songs and so much more happened this year that i found it difficult to separate them and narrow it down to only 5. I’m sure I could, but excluding the rest doesn’t accurately reflect the music of my 2014. So this time, I have a representative playlist of 10 songs, that reflect, in order, what I was listening to and the songs I associate with certain times of the year. Some hold special memories of their own, others are just the songs I had on repeat for a while and have thus become ingrained in my head as reflective of a certain time. Without further ado:

1. Don’t Forget Me– Red Hot Chili Peppers

2. Sexy Ladies feat. 50 Cent– Justin Timberlake

3. Reflection– Girls’ Generation

4. Skinny Love– Birdy

5. Do I Wanna Know?– Arctic Monkeys

6. Happiness– Red Velvet

7. Wake Me Up When September Ends– Green Day*

8. Whisper– Girls’ Generation TTS

9. Holler– Girls’ Generation TTS

10. Third Day Of A Seven Day Binge– Marilyn Manson

(*I was listening to this in September… hmm.)

The final month of the year. I’ve been thinking about various goals and resolutions I want to achieve, but after enough thought, I decided what I have already been doing is a good resolution to continue with. Something created or achieved every month. That way I have freedom, but also a deadline to have some sort of finished product.

This month I hoped to have my current painting done. My estimation for it was 60 hours or so, but it looks as though it will take more like 90+ hours. I’m 45 hours in, but not finished… again. However, I am proud of what I came up with this month. I went to Port Fairy over Christmas. I usually go there every year or two. While there, I decided to take some photos and capture the space. Its very pretty and different to the city. The beaches and quiet streets were captivating. And I’m very pleased with the photos I took. I am still an amateur when it comes to photography, but I can definitely see a lot of improvement happening. Here is a selection of my favourites; the rest can be found on my Tumblr page.

For the next month and the next year, I hope to be more proactive in achieving my goals and being creative. 

I found it more difficult to get things done this month. I spent a week recovering from surgery and wasn’t able to paint or practice anything really. I did work further on my current painting, however, that piece is not close to being finished, so I can’t show it as this months ‘thing.’

Instead, this month was the month of planning and inspiration. I’ve been discovering new music and sketching out ideas. I have an idea for a triptych, and I also made the decision to take up the painting elective at Uni next semester. I miss art classes and having people to discuss art and creativity with. I enjoy Media but the people don’t seem to get as excited about these things there. As well as the sketching and brainstorming that I’ve done, I’ve started creating an inspiration collage wall. Most of my door area is covered in things like this, but I’ve decided to extend it onto the surrounding wall. I found a collection of images from my Tumblr page and ‘likes,’ and interspliced them with works by my favourite artist; James Jean. I  have around $70 worth of printing credit in my building at Uni, so I abused my access to the HQ design printers, and made these lovely prints.

Additionally, I have been steadily working on other little projects. I’ve started knitting again and am working on a media piece. But I don’t expect they will be finished very soon. I anticipate for December I should have finished my large painting.

So, it is November right now… I feel I should make a post about how my resolution is going. In this post I explained that I will complete something each month that I can be proud of. I kind of combined September and October together, because, as I anticipated, they were both very busy and I didn’t have a lot of my own time to work on outside projects. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t reach any goals.

The thing I am most proud of from September is doing my first ‘internship;’ filming at the Royal Melbourne Show for Channel 31. It was very chill. I was working with people my age and some were still students. But it was a great experience and I had a lot of fun the entire time. Something from October that I am proud of is not only finishing my 2nd year of uni, but finishing my film, ‘Fans and Followers.’  I was primarily the Director and DOP, but I also shared other producing, editing and sound roles.

Through both of these experiences, I have learned so much about filmmaking; in terms of technical knowledge and experiential knowledge. So I’m proud of what I accomplished and am happy with the confidence and ability I can take away.

Fans and Followers from Jackie Matthews on Vimeo.

Excuse me while I run my thoughts:

I’ve been having mixed feelings on my impending 20th birthday. There’s nothing I can do to stop it, I will be 20 tomorrow, and while i probably shouldn’t place so much importance on age, i wish i could be 19 for a while longer. I cant say i have any specific regrets, but i wonder whether im ready to forever give up teenagedom.

Ive more recently been interested in the idea of the ‘mid life crisis,’ possibly because i felt ive already had one. The feeling that its your last chance to change direction, that youve wasted a portion of your life, and you have to acheive your life goals now before its too late. Many people my age ive brought this up with agree they already had a period of their life similar to this. Is it a product of our current world? A result of the pressure put on young people to choose a path and define thier lives before theyve even defined themselves? Probably. I felt this crisis in my final year of highschool, and it has recently surfaced once again. What am i doing? What have i done? What will i do?

Whenever someone does anything impressive their age is always a factor as to how impressive the thing is. If they are really young, amazing, if they are really old, inspiring. If they are a twenty something… Will my art be mediocre for the next 50 years until im on my decline? Will i even live that long? The suffix ‘teen’ has become so valuable to me these days. Being able to say im a teenager, im youthful, i still have a lot of life to live. But when artistic prodigies begin their careers at 14 i realise how mediocre my art is. Ive been working on a mediocre timeline, advancing ever so slowly and steadily. And although im only 20, have i already missed my chance at being extrodinary? All the skills ive given myself the responsibility to learn; painting, dancing, music, languages, film. Im still falling short. Perhaps im spreading myself too thin. But that doesn’t sound right to me, i think the problem is im not working to my full potential. If i was, i would be far more advanced in all of these skills than i am currently. I like my paintings, i think theyre nice. But nothing spectacular. I just struggle to find the motivation to practice. And thats why ive hit 20 and have a collection of half finished paintings hidden in my room.

When i turned 19, i charged myself with the responsibility of ‘leveling up,’ in a way. Such as in a video game, i wanted to ‘increase my stats.’ Perhaps my expectations were too high. I should know myself better than that. I cant lie, it has indeed been a good year, but i expected so much more of myself. so what do i plan for the next year of my life? my 20?

I know i must get my drivers license, earn more money, and forge a career path for myself. So obviously those goals are the priority. But what do i really want for myself? I need to get out of my head for starters, keeping track of all these projects is too much. So i guess i need to set a timeline. I’m giving myself September off. I have too many responsibilities to internships, uni work and group projects to direct my attention elsewhere. October should be quite intense too. But here’s the responsibility I’m charging myself with. Create something, anything, that i can be proud of each month. It might be a painting, a piece of writing, a film, a photo, a level of ability, anything. but at the end of each month, i want to be able to notice a change or a product.

This year i tried to draw something every day, it was a worthwhile exercise for a month or so, but i found myself struggling to keep up. I gave myself goals in my 19-ness to do 3 large paintings. I only finished one, and am halfway through two others. After reflecting, i found i didn’t work on these things because i wanted to work on other skills for a while instead, and thinking about them was taking up too much of my energy. I just want to get my thoughts and ideas out there. I started this journey when i turned 19, and I’m not saying i have wasted this year or i failed my goals. When i look back, i made a huge improvement from 18 year old me to 19 year old me. I painted a few things, i drew some things, challenged myself in photography, made my first short film, got my first internship(s), met some awesome new people, did well at uni, started learning an instrument, watched some great movies, discovered some great talent, and improved myself in so many ways. I will continue this path, and  refine it for this coming year, and really produce my own content and art.

I was in my ‘True Lies: Documentary Studies” lecture as we skimmed over the way that in the past, people would become scared of moving images and run out of the cinema as a reaction to what they were seeing on the screen. I began to think about how that differs from the way we interact with media today, and one word in particular came to mind; ‘desensitisation.’ But then suddenly something clicked in my mind, they are desensitised to the medium, not the content.

It has been argued that children are more violent due to violent video games and television shows (which is complete nonsense, by the way) as they are able to play/ watch this content without being scared or emotionally affected. But that would only be true if we were back in the days where people would run out of movie theaters. Children are smarter than a lot of people give them credit for, and they know that what is on the screen is not actually real, unlike the people watching those first motion picture films. And that is just the effect that media has on our perception of reality. We find ourselves less emotionally affected by what we see on the news than the situations we experience first hand, because although we know the event is real and affects a lot of people, i have a theory that we subconsciously separate ourselves from it, because we have learned that what in the screen isn’t really there.

Just a thought…

It is the month of reflection, and I have been realising recently what incredible power sound and music have. As we listen, we are able to recall certain times in our lives when these songs seemed to be always in the background. I began to wonder, what songs will I associate with 2013 in the future? Not nessicarily what is my most played, but what takes me back to specific experiences that I have had this year. After much reflection, I  have managed to narrow down my 2013 to around 5 songs.

Girls’ Generation- I Got A Boy

This song was released on the 1st of January this year, so it is fitting that I would have to call it my ‘Song of the Year.’ If I was to choose one song that reminds me of 2013, it is this one. Having the most play counts for this year, as well as on my itunes library as a whole, I was listening to this all year, so it is somewhat challenging to choose one particular memory for this one. Regardless, I still strongly associate 2013 with this song, it not only being the background music through my experiences, but it impacted aspects of myself as well. Fun, vibrant and girly, I Got A Boy coloured my year.

Girls’ Generation TTS- Goodbye, Hello

Released in early 2012 on the ‘Twinkle‘ EP, I didn’t give this song too much attention until this year, where I would listen to it together with ‘Romantic st‘ and ‘Baby Maybe,’ two songs that also share the light and carefree feel of this song. These three tunes have the strongest memories associated with them out of all of the songs on this list, because when I listen to them, I am immediately transported back to my first semester of University. It reminds me of warm weather, newly found independence and discovery. I had to adjust to many new situations and environments this year, but I listened to these songs a lot to remind me that although this is all new and somewhat daunting, it will be okay, and to just stay positive and keep smiling.

MFBTY- Sweet Dream

http://youtu.be/qLrM_auor2Q

I listened to this song a lot when the weather began cooling down, and it is particularly memorable for that time of my year. I had more or less settled into uni and had a grasp of what was required of me. Throughout the whole year I have put most of my effort into doing well in my classes, and I remember it was around this time when I was taking more initiative and being happy going outside of my comfort zone. My first few media projects for my writing and editing classes were around this time, so I also think of creativity and independence when I hear this song.

U-Kiss- Standing Still

Though my love affair with this song was shorter lived than the previous songs on this list, I distinctly remember listening to this a lot when walking home from uni in those last few weeks. The weather was barely warming up, it was windy, and usually quite dark as in second semester, I scheduled all of my classes for the late afternoon. By the time I got home it was usually dark, but I liked this time of year. I was accomplished, but still quite busy, my timetable suited me perfectly, and I loved the contrast of the cold air with the orange sunsets as I walked home. To top it off I listened to this song as I walked home from my last day at uni for the year, so I think of it fondly.

G-dragon- Crooked

It wasn’t until a few listens that I realised this is one of the best I have heard all year. This song really makes me feel that I am on holidays, but I particularly associate the song with this summer because it also reminds me of my independence and ambition. Last summer, although I had finished high-school, I still felt somewhat held back. And although I still have a long way to go until I reach independence, this song reminds me of these past two months, where I have felt more empowered and know that I can start being more ambitious and independent. An honorable mention for this time of year would also be the Red Hot Chili Peppers- By The Way, as I have been listening to them both a lot at this time.

There are so many other great songs that I have loved this year, but if I were to associate specific songs with my 2013, it would be this collection.