Friday Favourites - Bands & Artists

Friday Favourites #2: Bands/Artists

Continuing on with last week’s theme of music, here is a list of my favourite bands and artists and why I enjoy their music. I aimed for 10 but, as you will see, I squeezed another onto the end!

My Favourite Bands/Artists:

Westlife (and all solo) – I have been a fan of Westlife since I was a little girl. Their music is what kept me going in my darkest times and still does to this day. If I’m having a really tough time or I am in an anxiety-inducing situation, such as being on public transport, then they are my go-to to calm me down. I saw them in concert 4 times in their career (all post Brian) and was even fortunate to meet them thanks to my dad and his “I will do anything” attitude to making me happy. He knew how much it meant to me to meet them so, after numerous let downs, he was the one who took me and my friend to stand in the middle of Glasgow’s town centre at 2:30am in the middle of winter.

Little Mix – Little Mix, to me, are a symbol of “Girl Power” (well, more like “woman”). Their songs are uplifting and empowering (“Power”, “Grown” & “Salute”  for example) and I find many of them really encapsulate how a lot of us feel (“Good Enough”, “These Four Walls” & “Little Me” to name a few). It always warms my heart to hear them dedicate “Secret Love Song” to the LGBTQ+ community. Their harmonies give me chills. I won tickets to see them live at the Apple Music Festival in 2015 and I was floored by their vocals in “The End”. I had goosebumps and was moved to tears. I definitely recommend seeing them perform live and would love to see them again.

All Time Low - I’ve only recently gotten into All Time Low (last couple of years) and I blame my best friend for my new-found love for them. I mentioned last week that I love songs with a rockier edge so their music really makes me happy. I can sing along at the tops of my lungs and really give it my all – something that makes me feel alive. I really want to see them live as well just so that I can have a couple of hours to just get lost in the music.

5SOS – Although I haven’t seen them headlining a gig, I have had the pleasure of seeing them support One Direction and they were amazing. I used to watch all of their livestreams and still do when I feel low – those videos really made me fall in love with who they are as people. What I love about them is that when they make mistakes they own up to them and don’t try to remove whatever happened (tweets, for example) so they can claim it never happened/or blame it on being young. That’s a lesson a lot of people still need to learn.

1D (and all solo) – I’ve seen these beauts twice; once pre-Zayn and once post-Zayn. I’m a sucker for boybands/men in music. I may or may not have a soft-spot for Niall (it’s the accent, OK? Sue me.) but that’s between us ;). I love their on-stage energy – even now they are doing their solo endeavours they still own the stage; they clearly belong there. The last time I saw them live I was having such a bad time with my anxiety but being in that audience gave me a couple of hours where I could just block everything out and feel alive for a while. It also made up for the fact that the first (and the only other ) time I had seen them I was so far away that I couldn’t see anything. I was so close to them that Harry even managed to splash me with the water from his bottle.

Demi Lovato – I really admire Demi for talking so openly about her struggles with mental illness. There was an article featuring an interview that she did regarding mental health that really made me realise how ill I was. I showed it to my mum and she agreed that I definitely was ill and was right to keep going to the doctor’s to get a diagnosis. It made me feel a whole lot less alone and crazy – that, despite being mentally ill, it wasn’t “all in my head”. Without that article I would’ve given up and not gotten the treatment I needed back them. I wouldn’t still be able to have access to said treatment either. In regards to her music; I do prefer her rockier sounding tracks to the more “dance-y” ones.

Taylor Swift – Taylor just has a song for every occasion. You can listen to her when you’re sad and want to wallow for a little bit or need a song to let out your frustrations to. Songs like “Shake it Off” really pump you up and her latest video for “Look What You Made Me Do” makes you want to take on the world. I also really enjoy the fact that if you look at her album sleeves, you’ll see that the song lyrics are all written in lower case except for certain letters. This is because each set of lyrics has a hidden meaning in them. For example, the capitalised letters in “The Best Day” spell out “God Bless Andrea Swift”. Not only is the song a loving tribute to her mum but the message is too.

Carrie Underwood – As I mentioned before in my previous favourites blog, Carrie is one of my favourite vocalists. Her songs transport me to different place and I love to just zone out and listen to the meanings behind her songs. She’s another artist that I would very much love to see perform live as I’ve got the feeling that, like when Little Mix sing acapella, she can captivate the whole room.

Selena Gomez – I really appreciate who she is as a human being and admire that, as a celebrity, she still manages to keep most of her life private. She’s always down to support a good cause and comes across as really supportive of other artists. You’d also never know that she suffers from lupus and has had a kidney transplant other than from the few times she’s mentioned it. Even then, it wasn’t for attention; it was to get awareness out about the condition and to thank one of her best friends who donated her kidney to her. I also enjoy a lot of her movies – “Another Cinderella Story” and “Monte Carlo” are two of my favourites.

Kelly Clarkson – Kelly is, for lack of a better, less pun-ny word, one of my idols. She’s not afraid to be herself not matter what size she is and that is really inspiring for people like me who hate the way we look. She gets so much flack in the tabloids for how she looks but she doesn’t give a damn which is a great example that we need to see more of. I’m not going to get into the whole “size/weight = healthy/unhealthy” debate as I’m quite sick of society deciding that how you look equates to how much love/self-love you are worth and, to be honest, I could do without the headache in the comments. She’s another artist whose music speaks to me and I can’t wait to get my hands on her new material (which will probably be out by the time this post is published).

Pink – Pink is another artist who sticks both middle fingers up to the world and declares “fuck you and your norms”. Forget wanting to be like Britney or Christina when I was younger; I wanted to be Pink. She was about the only artist at the time who said that it was OK to be yourself as she wasn't what you expected a popstar to be like. She showed me that it was perfectly fine to be myself even if no one else thought so and that it was OK to do your own thing, that you didn't have to follow the crowd to make a difference or to be accepted. I love that this is also something that she is teaching her daughter. She’s ballsy and takes risks yet also comes across as one of the nicest people to ever walk the earth. As with All Time Low’s music, I love to sing along to her songs at full volume and release all my pent-up emotions. It’s cathartic. Even now as an adult I still aspire to be more like Pink.

Join me next Friday for some more of my favourites!

Anxiously,
Me

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