At some point in every dream, it loses its shine. Most people aren’t interested in talking about that point. Most people are interested in the dream. The initial momentum. Late-night idea sessions. Inspirational quotes overlaid on stock photos of mountains. The dreams where you wake up to it all working out, then do a magazine interview about perseverance. The middle section doesn’t get the airtime. The years where you keep trying. You keep grinding. You keep believing. You keep wondering if you’re absolutely, unequivocally certifiable insane.
That’s the space “Live My Life” exists in.
Written, produced, performed by and more-or-less pieced together on an individual level by the independent artist Philmac, “Live My Life” starts as a deeply personal declaration and then grows into something more encompassing. On paper, it’s about the hustle toward the goal and never giving up. In practice, it’s the sheer endurance that gets you from where you are now to who you aspire to be. Which, by default, is most of your life.
Musically, the song occupies a strange but pleasing center between hip-hop, rock, soul and cinematic pop-the kind of blend that has the potential to sound like a badly configured playlist algorithm struggling for a unique selling point but which Philmac uses as a framework, building out from a surprising and old-school foundation: the power of songcraft.
The live instruments provide gravitas. The hip-hop backbone adds drive. The hooks hit the necessary notes exactly when they need to. Everything feels like a buildup toward something more epic, the kind of track that soundtracks the version of your life where you’ve finally gotten your act together. Or are at least very good at pretending to.
Traces of Philmac’s many influences are apparent everywhere: the audacious genre-hopping of Prince, the categoryless boldness of OutKast, and the sheer larger-than-life ambition that fueled Michael Jackson’s anthems into events, not just songs.
The cinematic production is also crucial: in a genre saturated with artists claiming their sound is ‘cinematic’ purely based on a single string pad in the background, “Live My Life” truly earns the distinction. The track is vast and constantly driving forward toward the kind of distant, shifting horizon you can just about glimpse which makes it fitting for the theme.
In essence, “Live My Life” is not so much about achieving your goal as it is about the continuous drive to reach it, ignoring the inevitable setbacks, the disappointments, and the occasional little voice in your head reminding you how much easier it would be to take up professional alpaca herding instead.
“Live My Life” thrives on a simple understanding: becoming who you’re supposed to be rarely occurs instantly; it’s a step-by-step, stubborn process.
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About the Author
A tenured media critic known working as a ghost writer, freelance critic for publications in the US and former lead writer of Atop The Treehouse. Reviews music, film and TV shows for media aggregators.
