The other day I was reflecting. As you do when the world has gone to pieces because of COVID-19 and other things, and you have extra time on your hands. I think I was sitting. Or maybe I was standing? Anyhoo, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that as I was reflecting on the year that was and is- and boy haven’t we all have had it rough, and don’t we all wish that 2020 would be ‘over’! – it slowly dawned on me that I’ve actually written 25 blogs out of 50, for artists who I deem as just coming to be influential now (for their respective genres and for their vastly different audiences), or maybe about other artists who may not be influential yet but will be within 5-10 years. I know that that is a mouthful to remember, because one’s definition of influence differs from person to person, and who you reckon is influential is who I reckon is not, and vice versa; yet nevertheless I have reached the half way point on my musical journey that I never thought that I would ever embark on in my wildest dreams. And the results so far… well they’re interesting. I stepped into this journey not knowing which artists would speak to me and what wisdom would be imparted to me- a similar thought process to Jon when he embarked on his much grander musical journey; yet at this half way point, much like Jon at his half way point, the questions I asked myself remained, and the answers to them not so clear cut… which in some ways is a good thing as it means that God is still speaking. I mean, have I learned anything about the music industry at large at this point, or about specific genres that I hadn’t known about before, or was God speaking to me in a profound way through an artist who I previously thought was superficial or shallow? Or was I even underwhelmed by a certain artist for whatever reason? And most of all, did I feel good about my choices of artists to include on this list at the end of the day, considering there’s other talented and up and coming artists who missed the cut on this arbitrary list?
