This is an article I wrote for Vice's Anti-Music Issue. I was commissioned by the Aussie Office to write it, but then they didn't publish it. The US issue and some other random countries did feature it though. I don't know what this means.
Photos by Neil Buckingham and Blake Calderwood
As I write this, I am recovering from spending two weeks without hearing music of any sort. Two. Fucking. Weeks. It’s been awful, really awful, and, for the most part, mind-bendingly depressing.
I turned into a whining, unsociable, borderline agoraphobic manic-depressive. I hate everyone. Everyone hates me. My girlfriend told me I’m an asshole, my housemates think I’m a prick, the general public probably thinks I’m deranged to wear construction earmuffs everywhere during a heat wave, and I think I agree with all of them.
I was allowed to choose one song to listen to before my two weeks began. I decided to pick something that could potentially get stuck in my head for a fortnight without causing me to hang myself. I chose “Raspberry Beret” by Prince. An easy decision. I listened to it three times in a row the night before I began. Prince was to be my bastion of sanity.
I kept a diary for the entirety of my musical anorexia. It consists of me bitching about how shit life is when you can’t listen to music. Here is some of it.
