Popular musicians draw inspiration from personal lives

The 2012 Grammys have come and gone, but an interest in the honorees’ artistic inspiration remains. For many of the hottest artists, their personal lives make for songwriting gold — and sometimes the messier their lives are, the more brilliant an artist’s work becomes.

Adele took home a whopping six Grammys, including record of the year and album of the year, all of which were the result of her critically acclaimed album, 21. Her excitement was evident as she got onstage to accept each of her awards; ironically, her complete and utter ecstasy is the antithesis of her album’s subject matter.

There is no need to sugarcoat it: Adele’s music is downright depressing. She is haunted by terrible breakups and longs for what she cannot have. So, though millions of listeners sing along in a carefree manner, her music features some dirty laundry she clearly needed to get off her chest.

Fans need not look any further than her breakaway hits “Rolling in the Deep” and “Someone Like You” — both of which made the Billboard Hot 100. A recurring line in her acclaimed, lovelorn ballad “Someone Like You” goes: “I’d hoped you’d see my face and that you’d be reminded / That for me, it isn’t over.”

That line is what every bitter Facebook post on Valentine’s Day was trying to say.

Breakups are awful, but Adele utilized that negative energy and spent an entire album lamenting it. Her lyrics are so melancholic that many are surprised to learn that she has a charming, humorous personality.

As indicated by her success, she is not one to sit around and sob. She harnesses her resentment to criticize past lovers, as in “Rolling in the Deep,” which is about an unfaithful man in her life. In an interview with Q magazine, she said, “People will hear it and go, ‘Wow, she ain’t mucking around.’”

Adele could have wallowed in self-pity, but instead she took her painful experiences and used them as fuel for her creative process. And, after a sweep at the Grammys, the results of doing so speak for themselves.

But Adele wasn’t the only one at the awards show that channeled inner problems: Perhaps the most personal moment of the entire telecast belonged to Katy Perry. The usually energetic, fun-loving pop star traded in her hits from her successful sophomore album, Teenage Dream, in favor of a catchy but poignant new song, “Part of Me.”

Now, before any more speculation, it is worth noting that “Part of Me” is an old song. It was a song Perry recorded in the Teenage Dream sessions and ended up not making the cut for the album, which was released in fall 2010. Because she is prepping for the re-release of the record in March, she and her producers reworked her new single. This song and two other unreleased tracks will appear on Teenage Dream: The Complete Confection in addition to six remixes.

But that is not the juicy part. The hot gossip surrounds Perry’s recent divorce from British actor/comedian Russell Brand. Many on Twitter seem to think that this song is Katy’s response to their split — a sort of middle finger at Brand.

But the song is most likely about her previous boyfriend, rapper and frontman of Gym Class Heroes, Travie McCoy; it can be inferred that he is also the subject of Perry’s angsty song “Circle the Drain” from Teenage Dream.

It also turns out that “Part of Me” leaked back in 2010, and, aside from production changes, it had two different lines of lyrics in the bridge.

The original lyrics were “You can keep the dog / I never liked him anyway.” But Perry changed them for the song’s debut at the Grammys to say “You can keep the diamond ring / It don’t mean nothing anyway.”

And boy, did Perry’s performance pack a punch. Absent were her usual kitty cats and cotton candy. Instead, she looked like a blue-haired warrior, a sight that was further accentuated by explosive pyrotechnics. The performance was somber and ferocious, and Perry, like Adele, used her personal troubles to enhance her artistic creativity to tremendous results.

Venting is healthy and therapeutic, which is why so many artists choose to bemoan their troubles in their songs. It allows them to make peace with difficult situations, to get through them and to reach the pinnacle of creative achievement.

 

Nick Mindicino is a sophomore majoring in print and digital journalism. His column “Industry Ballads” runs Fridays.