Some impressions of ‘The Spoken EP’ – Part 2

Some impressions of ‘The Spoken EP’ – Part 2: ‘Moments’

Above all, there are two phrases in this beautiful lyrics which catched my attention from the first listening with my friends (as already mentioned in Part 1):

...we can truly create something to value
Though value of course is arbitrary

And:

But I don’t want to live my life wanting

Besides the facts that this is another kind of Möbius strip in a sense, or some paradoxon, and that it is the only phrase to be repeated in Afke’s ‚Moments‘ lyrics, I see in these words the outreach to the very NOW instead of an undefined future and to something solid or constant within a stream of perpetual change. And this later leads me back to her earlier words that value be arbitrary.

The word arbitrary holds in German a place between random/ by coincidence and voluntary/ by free decision. Value in this regard is random as seen from natural sciences – any given value seemingly could be otherwise. No mathematics nor physics nor Evolution Theory can tell us which value should recognised to be the best of all. But value as seen from a non-materialistic view is part of one’s belief and therefore chosen by free decision and meant as the best possible. If this view be conceivable and consistant is one of the oldest questions in (Western) philosophy…

I don’t know if Afke intentionally wanted to touch this dimension, but now it is within her words.

Please let me mention one more observation:

...a language without words

I studied both – musicology and linguistics, and I’ve learned that there is no language without words. But of course there is an old, a very old topos of music being something like a language. I guess Afke got already deeper in this realm whilst studying at the conservatoire. It is a fascinating and exciting area! But I think it reveals more of what we want music to be than of what music really is. Nevertheless it is not my point to critizise these lyrics lines! In Afkes context it is very clear that she wants to be heard in and through her music (of which spoken or sung lyrics are an integrational part) and to communicate (‚connect‘) to others. In this regard there is more similarity than difference between language and music. What I wanted to point out is that there lies some danger in taking too literally the topos of music as language.

Perhaps it’s the fleeting nature in which we gain
The richest of the human experience

Great thought!
And I think it’s the link to the music – since music far more than speech relates on the moment. Speech runs in time just like music but gives us in its semantic dimension the feeling of a solid meaning whereas music unfolds its melodic and/or harmonic structure which ends with the last chord or sound. From then on we have some memories of what we listened to but no images or concepts like arguments or judgments, assertions, claims – still further no negations, no questions. Music seems to be one of those fleeting things ‚in which we gain the richest of the human experience‘, just as she says.

So let’s see, where we are up to here:
There was a crash against a wall in part 1 (‚Rant‘) by which we had to STOP, and now we are thrown or at least lead right into the moment itself. So I’m very curious how this journey might go on and where it takes me to. Maybe I’ll follow Afke into a ‚Dream‘ or I’ll first step into a ‚Cycle‘. But before that I’d like to think about that thing called ‚human experience‘: Is there any such experience without reflecting, abstracting, building of concepts – and thus leaving or transcending the basic moments and intentionally even leaving time behind?

So I wonder how long a moment might be – as long as the song, as long as my memories, as long as my reflecting attempts (though they be interrupted by other events)? Maybe – as long as my life? Listening to the music of ‚Moments‘ there opens something like a blossom and closes its unfolded leaves again. Listening again there appear more details, deepening my experience of the song without renewing it – is this a new moment or the same moment but still more unfolding itself?

In other words – is a moment a point or a short segment in time, or is it beyond time?