I feel light in my feet. It is because of the music coming out from my phone. I love music. It has an important place in my life. It has been a refuge for me in dire times as well as a medium for sharing my happiness during the good times.

I used to listen to quite several bands and artists during my school days. It was the time of audio CDs. They were costly. Also, they contained only an album full of songs which would amount to some ten-fifteen songs. Some of them would stretch this limit by one or two but that was it. Then came the era of MP3. I was glad it happened. A blank CD cost fifteen to twenty rupees. A CD can hold nearly 150 songs. That was a tenfold increase in the number of songs that can be squeezed into a single disc. I did ask one of my computer geek friends how this was possible. As far as I knew the size of the discs being used for the audio CDs and these MP3s were the same. The difference was in the quality of the music that was being stored on these discs. I took the information in but it had little importance. I wanted to have as many songs as possible in a single disc. I didn’t find any difference in the quality of the music coming out from the two formats. I went back to writing CDs in MP3 format.

At fourteen my music tastes were limited to boy bands and pop hits. My primary influence was MTV and V channel in the telly. I didn’t have much taste in English music back then. I was more into burning Malayalam and Hindi songs. I didn’t have a CD writer back then. So I used my friends to burn the songs that I loved to hear.

Two years later Dad gifted me a small MP3 player. It had 512 MB of space in it. It was tiny and used AAA batteries to run. He knew the problem of running out of batteries. To counter that he also bought me a pair of rechargeable batteries and their charger. I was sorted with my music. I used to copy all the songs that I loved into it from my computer and listen to them on the go. It became one of my trusted companions when I traveled for my coaching classes after school and on holidays.

My tastes in music were refined as the weeks passed because the boys in our class would come together and talk about the new songs they had discovered and were listening to. By new songs, I am not referring to the new releases. It simply means a new discovery. Like the songs by Akon and All Rise by the band Blue. This song was being sung out loudly during recess times. It became so popular among us, we decided to sing it out in a group for the farewell of our seniors. Needless to say, it was a disaster. I mean we thought it went well. But later on, when we came to know about it, we realized it was horrendous. Since we had performed it as a group, the shame got divided among us and became meager. Put this topic up for any discussion with any of my school friends and it would result in a contagious laughter session. I still don't know why we did that.

Fast forward to my college days. Whatever tastes I have in music are all because of my exploration over these four years. In the first year, the seniors in my hostel would play out some of the upcoming Bollywood movie songs on repeat for hours and hours. These became ingrained in me to a good extent. I still remember those songs and their lyrics. In the second year, I graduated from having a basic phone to one with a memory card and extra features - essentially a music and video player. It was a time when micro SD cards were catching up to the needs of all who needed extra space in their mobile phones. I had mine filled with music I had been listening to in my school days. That year itself half of it was replaced by rock songs. I was introduced to the world of rock music. I took my baby steps by listening to Metallica, Linkin Park, and the like. Their songs held a prominent place in the phone.

I don't know how it came but the music that followed this phase was Death Metal. Lamb of God, Children of Bodom, and similar bands started to impress me. The growling vocals were something that fascinated and gripped me. I would growl from time to time in my bathroom at my home. It was sort of letting go of all that was happening to me. I was growing up through adolescence. My hormones were raging. There wasn’t any way to vent them out except this. I felt as if music understood me. For college fests, most of the bands that came to play took to this genre and rocked the crowd with their beats. I fondly remember how Purple Blood (a band from a prominent college in the city) was an act we all looked forward to listening to. Their anger and frustration were ours. Their head banging and screaming were ours. Their rhythm and thumps were ours. It brought in a feeling of being in a collective, which was what we wanted at that age.

As I started consuming more and more music, I came across Avial. It has struck with me ever since. I remember how I was mesmerized by a rock band making such beautiful songs in Malayalam lyrics. The songs felt like folk songs adapted for the modern generation. The eight songs in their first and only album have been with me ever since. They bring in me an energy I can't describe in words. No matter how low or high I might be, their songs ground me. They make me sing to their lyrics and transport me to a world that is simple and peaceful.

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Along with Avial came Motherjane. This band impressed me the most when they came to perform for our cultural fest. They blew the show. It was one of the best stage performances I have ever witnessed in my life by a band. The lighting and the mood followed by the near-perfect rendition of the songs live made the whole event something that I treasure to date. Actually, I started listening to them after this performance. Just like Avial, this band has also stuck with me ever since. These are the two bands that I go back to from time to time whenever I want to feel connected to my roots. They have that charm in them. I can't explain why. It is there and I am forever grateful for it.

Nada nada has come to a finish. I know what the next song is going to be. And the next one.

I have reached the old house that Anna likes and wants to buy. In the darkness, it sits majestically in its triangular plot. It seems like a perfect fit for the song that comes up next.

Towards the end of my college days, I progressed to old-school rock and the ones from the golden era. Jefferson Airplane, Led Zeppelin, Beatles, and Queen all made it into my playlist. They would go on in repeat for hours and hours. Among them, Pink Floyd became my favorite band. Their songs had a sweet feel to them. They can't be called a band. They are avant-garde musicians. Over the years I have come across many articles and essays that describe the kind of experimental work they were doing with synthesizers and instruments. They were happy to deviate from the textbook definition of a rock band only to mesmerize their audience with elements that could be found in other genres of music. The dark side of the moon is the best among their studio albums and easily my favorite. If I had a time machine, I would have used it to go back in time and watch them perform live. It is an experience I have missed out on. I envy all those who have been able to attend their live performance. They have witnessed a great act of art.

Next, I started to listen to all kinds of music. I didn’t restrict myself to a genre. Was it the atmosphere during the final year of college or not, I can't say. But it surely expanded my music tastes. I was listening to World music, Carnatic music, Psychedelic music, etc. I would be exposed to different kinds of music throughout the day and they all existed in me in a peaceful space.

I am still a die-hard rock fan. With the advent of the internet and technology, it has become much easier to listen to music. A streaming service and good internet are all you need to listen to songs from near and far. I didn’t have this privilege when I set out. I would download the music I wanted from third-party websites and store them on my phone. Smartphones had conveniently replaced music players. They are great in that regard.

Recently I have been very much into techno music. My bestie introduced it and I have slowly fallen in love with it. I like the groove and rhythm to which the music plays. I had been listening to many other EDM artists before that. They were loud and full of energy, the kind you hear at parties and in pubs. I loved minimal techno and what it brought to the table. I could distinguish the beats and get the repeating patterns incorporated into the music. Techno seems easy and fun. But I am pretty sure they do take a lot of effort. In a time when people have the more the merrier mentality, to keep something minimal takes more effort.

I am pulled out of the blissful state I was because of some movement I hear behind me. I turn around. The two dogs that had gone into the lane previously have come back out. They look at me for a while and trod ahead on the road. I am thinking about whether I should turn off the music or not. Or reduce its volume. I need to be on the lookout for these dogs. I am at the entrance to the lane that leads to our apartment. I lower the volume and let the music continue.

In the absence of the internet, I can enjoy my music. Nothing can stop me from doing that. Back in my college days when collecting music was a thing, I have a hard disk that has somewhere close to 100GB of music. There are discographies of my favorite bands followed by some of the greatest collections of the different eras. I have been like this since then. I have always made it a point to carry my music with me. One of the things that I now look forward to while buying a mobile phone or a tab would be the amount of space it has to offer. This is common now but my reason is for stocking up on music. I will gladly weed out all of the redundant photographs or documents or any other thing if I am running out of space. My songs would be the last ones to be touched.

I enter our lane and walk towards our gate. The third song started playing from the phone. Its loudness melts into the surroundings. For once I have a way to pierce the eerie silence that engulfs me. I can now put on my earphones and play some music as I go about my day. I will be distracted by it and kept at bay from the circumstances. But I can never hold it for a long time. Even on a three-hour long flight, I cannot sit listening to songs for the entire journey. I might doze off or I might simply be silent. Music is therapeutic to me but in a certain quantity. I know this and I respect it.

As I enter our apartment complex, I take one more look out into the starting of the lane. I see no movement in the darkness. I light up my torch and flood the area with its brightness. There are no dogs. They might not come now. I cannot be sure. I close the gate and latch it from the top. Knowing that I am alone I can latch the bottom one also. But I leave it open because if I latch the bottom one it becomes difficult to open the gate from outside. That is me hoping someone will enter after things revert back to normal during my sleep. I let out a deep sigh and walk away from the gate.