By Lauren Schwab

I don’t think everyone feels the same connection to music. It can mean something different to you than it does to me. There are many ways to experience a song. A good artist makes the experience for you. They can control the sound, the lighting, their mood on stage. The only thing they can’t control is your imagination, or can they?

When I hear a song before I watch the music video the artist has made for it, I create my own music video in my mind. When I first heard “Dirt On My Boots” by Jon Pardi, I imagined myself working hard all day on the farm. Covered in dirt, dust and pig poop. Despite having a rough day, I rush into the house and get cleaned up then glammed up real quick so I can hit the town. I imagine dancing the night away in a honky tonk, having worked hard and ready to play hard.

When I watched Jon Pardi’s music video to the song, I found myself lost in trying to figure out the story. I expected him to show a guy working hard in the field, picking up a hot girl in his pickup truck and whisking her away to a honky tonk for some “dirty dancing and blue collar romancing.” Instead he showed himself getting cleaned up ready to sing to a rowdy crowd interchanging with a beautiful girl riding on her horse. I felt lost in the video trying to figure out the connection with the girl. It didn’t make sense to me until the end of the video when she got cleaned up and glammed up then made her way into the same scene as Jon. She walked away with him when he finished the song. It was a good twist to the story and now I will probably imagine this scene when I hear the song.

An artist should take their music videos seriously. They are powerful in storytelling and creating the scenes that play in a person’s imagination when they hear the song. There have been times, I like a song more after seeing the music video and times I don’t. Your imagination is a wonderful thing. It can take you away and show you a preview of life’s coming attractions if you choose to believe in it. Music can be an escape and while life isn’t always as glamours as a music video, you can find happiness being lost in your imagination and then experiencing the artist perform in real life.