Thus far, I have shared with you all some pretty big moments of my life: moments that show you what music is all about to me. This has been the bedrock, if you will, for this blog.

However, today I do not want to share my thoughts about a life-changing concert or how an inspirational band helped get me a girlfriend. I want to take a step back and simply reflect on a song. You could look at this as a pseudo-review, or something like that. I also want to reemphasize a notion that I have not stressed in my most recent posts: I am going to strive to talk about what my music means to me in the most real way possible. My music, however, is mostly metal, a type of music that is often shunned and looked down upon by the masses. It is my hope to show you all the power and beauty of metal, as this music has helped me form relationships and build memories in a way that no other genre could ever do.

Although I may digress, I want to let you all in on something personal. College life for me has been difficult. Terribly difficult. I thought I had everything figured out, and 4.0 GPA Corey was going to conquer the world. But you know what? I never thought that the same Corey would be so changed by leaving everyone and everything that he loved at home. Since I have arrived at Penn State, I have honestly felt loneliness, confusion, and fear in a way that I have never felt before. I feel as if I have been taken away from everything that I love and know and am now all alone in the quest to figure out what my life is all about.

The song I am going to share with you today has spoken to me and my situation. The song is “Ephemeral” by the band the Canadian progressive metal band Intervals. I encourage you all to give this song a listen. As the first track on the band’s latest album A Voice Within, “Ephemeral” opens with a thundering guitar track, which soon becomes accompanied by the powerful voice of Mike Semesky and the ever-soothing melody of Aaron Marshall’s guitar. From there, the music all flows together.

I’m not really trying to review the technical side of the song. I want to talk about how this song has spoken to me and why its melody and lyrics have been stuck in my head since I’ve arrived at Penn State. You know how it feels like a song “gets” you? How it speaks to your exact situation? That is what “Ephemeral” has done for me.

The song begins with these lyrics:

A distant vision
In the closest of moments to my being
Standing free of design, an entity of my own

At Penn State, I have felt, for the first time, a sense of individuality. I am no longer just the Corey that I was just a few months ago. I now am, as the song suggests, free from design, ready to show the whole world exactly who I am and what I am about. I, as an adult and a college student, am now an entity of my own. I am on the quest to figure out my place in the world. To be honest with you all, this scares me. The fact that I am supposed to have a vision and plan for what I want to do for the rest of my life is daunting and even terrifying.

The chorus of the song, though, is what gives me chills at every listen:

Say goodbye to the world as we knew it
To the eyes that couldn’t see
Now we’re dying trying to find out
What this life could mean

Readers, that is what my (and perhaps your) journey at Penn State is all about. I have left the world that I have known and loved for something new. I, at college, am on the quest to discover myself — to find out what my purpose in life is. That is why Intervals speaks to me in this song. I can’t quite pinpoint what it is, but hearing a song that PERFECTLY describes how I feel is both therapeutic and powerful in an inexplicable way. Do I still feel scared at college? Yeah, sometimes. But ever since I started listening to this song, everything has felt a little easier. Music can do that for me, and it can do that for you. Why does it have the ability to do such powerful things? Maybe we will never know.

This may have been quite the pathos-centered post. Maybe it was a little too personal, and I hope that it didn’t feel like a sob story. Are you able to relate to the song and/or my situation? I would love any comments or opinions. You can view the full lyrics from “Ephemeral” here.