Metaphors in Music

Greetings again my minions. Now I haven’t shared my taste in music with y’all. Least til now, I love GOOD music. When I say good I mean that, like we got all these rappers talking about drugs, women, drugs and women, smacking that. I personally don’t go for that excrement disguised as music.

Now I just heard NF’s new single The Search. Interestingly an overly possessive ex introduced me to NF. Guess which one is still around in my life? Thing about NF as a musician is that he’s painfully real. He’s a Christian dude but doesn’t enjoy being called a Christian rapper.

Now his music is dark and gritty. BUT it’s real talk. There’s a couple things in his music videos that he’s released. I call them metaphors in music. Or props even. Now NF as a rapper is about telling story. His story. His album Mansion is brilliant from a writers’ perspective in that the metaphor is the Mansion. The Mansion IS Nate’s mind. He continues the journey of coming from the mansion of his mind into Therapy Session. Admittedly an AGGRESSIVE album he doesn’t pull any verbal punches at all.

Going into Perception. There’s a prop in the second track Outcast. He’s inside a cage. A cell. NF has this thing. He normally drops into the album with an Intro track. His Outros are significant too though. The music in Intro III leaves this great line. “I thought you had me imprisoned this whole time but I’m the one holding the key.” During Intro III he’s speaking to himself.

In the music video Outro from the Perception album Nate picks up the keys. He dropped a single called Why a while ago and has a shopping cart and black balloons. The significance? He walked out of the Mansion straight into venting and unpacking emotions in Therapy Session. So he’s moving through things. In his single why? There’s the shopping cart with black balloons. NF recently dropped another single called The Search. He’s got a new album coming this July. In the video the cage from Perception is open and he’s free. Or is he? He’s still lugging this shopping cart around with his black balloons.

These kinds of things are what true artists do, who knows? Maybe NF is dropping little Easter eggs we’re supposed to read into. In any case. I highly encourage everyone to give him a listen. Start with The Search and then work your way back to front. Mansion, Therapy Session, Perception and soon? The Search.