ferlinfie

our very late Throwback Thursday.

Title: Poison Gas
Music and Lyrics: Kang Gary(KG)
Album: Asura Balbalta
Video: http://www.youtube.com/user/Beautifulsoul2828

Poison Gas is one of the few LeeSsang songs that was both penned and composed by Kang Gary. This is also one of the few where he both rap and sing. Rightfully so, it's a very personal song. It is his ode to an important milestone in his life, that stage when he finally realizes that he has achieved his goals and he did so without compromising his principles and integrity.

It's not a song of victory or celebration, it's a song of realization, a pause in time. It's one of the few moments in life when one is forced to stop, look back at what he has done in order to know where he is headed.

For someone who never studied music formally, it is nothing short of a genius how KG was able to perfectly match the instrument to the message of the song.

First, he did away with the excess of instruments. He stuck to the basics, a piano and bass as his base. However, he stripped it down further by using only one instrument per note most of the time except during chorus. Keeping only one instrument most of the time, he is able to keep it simple and focused. He is also able to emphasize that he is in that stage of thought when he seems to be collecting facts and observations about his life, building some sort of a foundation for something in his future.

It only feels as if there are multiple instruments playing at a time because each note lingers and the lingering part is when the next instrument plays the next note.

For every note that is played, it is allowed to linger, echo, rest... as if every note is being sucked in to its deepest.

The way KG delivers also feels as if he is standing still in the middle of a crossroad or walking through the scenes of life. He sounds spontaneous, as if he is rediscovering the life he has live. He sounds as if he is seeing things from a third person perspective, noticing details he missed, remember important milestones he didn't put importance to.

It's as if he was saying, "Oh yeah, that was a dream I had... oh yeah, that happened at some point.... oh yeah, I was able to get that... that's cool."

This is his song to himself, an ode to the life he lived.

In that journey he took, music was the center. He talked about music being his passion and catharsis. It was the reason he did everything he did. Music was the reason for sacrifices, his tears, his pains, his integrity, his dignity and the very reason he lived. It was as if music was the end and the beginning for him. He sacrificed everything for music and he created music for his sacrifices.

It was when he finally realized that both his sacrifices and his music achieved him the success that was once his dream.

Here, at this moment when he was writing, he was realizing he has completed the journey. He got to the end that he set for himself.

He could stop, enjoy the success he has. He can turn away from the bruises that the sharp lingering beats throw at him. But he chooses not to.

To him, music remains the reason for everything. He goes on because music is making him go on. He knows "pain will find him" and give him all sorts of trials but he knows that is what his life is all about "never ending bouts". All he has to do is take his poison gas, that thing that kills him and keeps him going at the same time, the end and the beginning - his music.

His music is where he finds his happiness and misery, his love and his loneliness, his life and his death.