The Burden of Choice

“But, if I have learned anything, it is that choice is best when it is counterweighted by a serious moral framework.”

When I was studying for my undergraduate degree just a few short years ago, I made good friends with a fellow eighteen-year-old who lived in the student block below me. In many ways, we were destined not to be friends: I studied history and politics and was an avowed Tory. He studied geography and extolled the virtues of socialism and dabbled with veganism. I was straightedge, and he definitely was not. I had a conscience for Christianity, even if I did not yet have a faith, and he was interested but fundamentally did not believe.

What bonded us was a shared love of music. Even there, we were apples and oranges; I loved hardcore and punk music, while he had a soft spot for rap and indie rock. That notwithstanding, we shared stories about gigs that made us feel completely alive, albums that had brought us back down to Earth, and singles that were there for us in sorrow. We would often share with each other songs we loved, trying and failing to inspire the same love in the other for a particular song.

My friend also ran a music blog. It had a solid following on social media and secured respectable levels of readership each month. He also had a number of writers that contributed regularly, and he came up with inventive and interesting ways to drive content. The writers were all bound together by a love for music, regardless of the genre, and they benefited from being invited to review shows, albums and singles, as well as interviewing interesting young acts.