Photo Credit: rcstills, rcstills@live.com
Everyone has their own way of processing the surrounding chaos that bombards us on a daily basis. If you happen to be a singer and songwriter writing a song is one way to try to deal with the madness. That is essentially the motivation behind “Troubled Mind” the new single from Canadian indie artist Dan Mangan.
On the YouTube page for the tune’s lyric video, Mangan made the following statement: “Troubled Mind is about the struggle to maintain any kind of mental equilibrium in the day-to-day as we are bombarded with fake news, sensationalized swipe-culture and increased access to the woes of the world. As the inflation of urgency increases, so does our capacity and appetite for it. It might also be my most dance-able song, and I wanted to indulge that whim with the lyric video. I thought it would be funny to see people whose body language was in complete contrast to the lyrics – both in denial of the troubled mind, as well as in defiance against it.”
The way that both the music and video images contrast with the lyrics provides fitting symbolism of the fight to try to put on an appearance of normalcy even when everything around you is figuratively burning down.