Music Review // Martha Johnson and Company "Slow Emotion"

 

When you think of things as being in slow motion, Martha Johnson and Company is showing you how they can be in "Slow Emotion".   Isn't this accurate though?  When you rush into decisions, especially based on your emotions, things usually don't go as planned.   Anger, fear, jealousy- these are all emotions which can give us those knee jerk reactions and those typically end up not working out so well in the end.

"Slow Emotion" begins with the dreamy and ambient sounds.  The percussion slowly comes in to where it is followed by the bass line.   This is unlike any song I've ever heard before.  It has this groove to it, where it can even begin to sound like funk, but there is something in between being that coffee shop type of sound but also that soul/blues type at the same time.  It's channeling so much it's just finding its own sound so quickly.

This song also becomes a little bit trippy (and the accompanying music video helps with that) as there are also these acoustic guitar notes that come through while the singing shifts to la la la la la la la.   But the lyrics are there, especially in the chorus, as it says: "Take it slow / and then you'll know / how to be kind / how to be free"  It just feels like so much done in haste is also done in a negative way.

Realistically, this is the type of song that I wish I had to listen to back in my 20s.  Not just because of the style of the music but also just because it would be more meaningful to know that just because you have that one moment of struggle, you don't have to throw the whole thing away.  This is something I've learned about now more, as I've gotten older, and so I think the youth really need to take heed of this message while the older folk can just nod along in agreement.