Music Review // Reid Parsons "Lightbulb"

 

There is a smooth, slow pace to the song "Lightbulb" by Reid Parsons which makes it easy to get into.   This song moves just enough that it isn't a slow ballad but also doesn't have a fast pace.  It's just that perfect sort of pace, like a moving train you can easily jump onto.  This, combined with the way that the overall sound can be rhythmic like Norah Jones or just melodic like Slothrust gives "Lightbulb" a way of being easy to listen to without being easy listening as a genre.  

One of the things which will stand out during "Lightbulb" that you don't hear a lot of artists do is the way that Reid Parsons can sing a line where you can really just let every word soak in, but then also have a part right before the chorus where there are so many words coming out it feels hard to keep up. This can be heard in the lines: "And though I have a tendency to look at things so cynically you talk me down until I see every beauty surrounding", which hit right before the chorus.

Lyrically, "Lightbulb" is the type of song people will write entire essays about because of the complexity of it.   Some lines come out as simple as "We're great alone / But we make a better team" and the overall feeling of the song is that one person doesn't need anything else as long as they have that other person.  This is plainly stated in the chorus: "That's all there is / That's all we need / Just a little lightbulb on the ceiling".  The way that this is presented as an idea but also the lightbulb going over your head in a cartoon means an idea is just going to give you a lot to think about when listening.

As the years go by I feel like as a society we become more and more materialistic.  They've even found a way to make it feel like we need a cell phone while at the same time constantly giving us new versions and forever keeping us buying.  But life is not about who has the most or coolest stuff.  Life is more about the people we surround ourselves with, and this song does a great job of showing that.  Hopefully some people who already have enough realize that as well.