My song obsession of the week this week is “All My Friends” by LCD Soundsystem. This is a song that initially I didn’t think much of, but eventually became familiar enough with the repetitive beat that I started to listen quite a bit. Then certain lyrics started to stick out to me which led me to dive into the lyrics more head on and really fall in love with the track as a whole.

Originally when listening to this song I thought it was written by some kid in their 20s talking about partying with their friends, which is badass and cool and all, but didn’t really excite me all that much. However, after hearing lyrics about five to ten years passing I started to feel that this was written from someone with a bit more life experience than I was initially giving credit for.

This is about the point when my friend Jacob Walraven told me that I had pinned this whole thing wrong and the writer of the song and lead of LCD Soundsystem was actually quite a bit older than I had thought. After a quick google I realized that he was 56 years old now and had written this song around the age of 36.

With this in mind I began to listen to the song in a whole new light with it taking on a new level of meaning to me. No longer was this just a good upbeat song to listen to, but now it also served as a lesson and a reminder. It was someone with a bit more life experience telling me to slow it down and enjoy the journey.

I’ve since found out that James Murphy is pretty open about his late rise saying that he wasted away a lot of his 20s in bands that went nowhere and was always kind of dissing on the current or popular music of the time. Then at age 26 he started to have a breakthrough and get over his fear of failure that was inhibiting him from creating the great music he was capable of, and begin to join in with the current sounds and try to find his people and his spot within it rather than just being a “hater”.

As a 25 year old guy out here trying to make sense of it all this song has been hitting close to home and I think my interpretation, or how I receive the message, is to be appreciative for what you have and enjoy the moment. Rather than spending the “first five years trying to get with the plan, and the next five years trying to be with your friends again” maybe just enjoy those moments with your friends keep a positive attitude and let the plan fall into place. In life it is very easy to be your own worst enemy and to me this is a song about getting older, missing those fun times with your friends, and being a bit upset that you weren’t able to just appreciate each moment for what it is.

Maybe I’m receiving the message wrong here, and maybe its meant to be received differently by every person. Also, maybe it really isn’t meant to be received at all and just danced along to instead, but either way this is an all time amazing song that I am happy I have recently (very late to the train here) become obsessed with.

Here is a link to an interview with Murphy where he talks a bit about the mentioned realization at age 26: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYCz06bS380

Drop a comment if you agree or disagree or love this track and keep tuned for more weekly song obsessions