"This Band Saved My Life." - Comments

ok so I just came across this today and I feel a bit strange posting a comment on something that is years old but whatever.
I agree with you on the fact that a lot of the time they can not be there to physically save your life. That does not however mean a band can not save your life. With a lot of people you are right, they were just given what they needed to save their own lives by that particular band. However that is not the case for everyone. I am not really happy that you just generalized everyone who has ever said that but I am just going to give you an example.
I have suffered from depression for a very long time. About six or seven years now. I have struggled with self harm and eating disorders. I have contemplated killing myself many times. Once I was very near doing it. Last year I basically hit rock bottom. Everything was shit and everything was at its worst for me. I was going to kill myself and there was no doubt about it. I had however recently won backstage passes to a Marinanas Trench concert which included me getting to meet them. I figured after that because I did really want to meet the band that had given me something to smile about when it felt like everything was horrible.
When I got to meet them I was so happy and did not really care about anything and had without really noticing pulled the sleeves of my shirt up revealing all the scars on my wrist. Josh noticed them and I will never forget what he told me "You need to make a promise to me right now that you will stop doing this ok. I never want to hear about you hurting yourself again. If I hear that you have died or something I will be heartbroken. Promise me you will never hurt yourself again." And I promised him. I met them again earlier this year and Josh was very happy to see I had kept my promise.
I would have killed myself later that night after my first time meeting them if it had not been for Josh Ramsay. I think that yes most of the time a band can not physically save your life but sometimes they can.

Who cares? I think that in at least 80% of these cases, yeah, it's complete bullshit when someone says, "This band saved my life!" so I'm willing to admit that. But if by thinking that a band has saved their life, it improves the quality of said person's life by making them happier and more well-adjusted, then what the hell is the problem with that? Let them have their beliefs. Oftentimes, they do less harm than good, in cases like this.

okay, so you have a very good point and as i'm taking a leaf out of matthew lush's book, i'm not going to insult youfor it because it's your opinion but my chemical romance honestly did change my life.
the things is, i was watching life on the murder scene. i was feeling particulalry depressed and i was alone in my house so I went and i took a razor and cut my arms for what must have been the 6th time in two days. I cleaned myself up and went back to watching life on the murder scene (ooh, just realised, that's my chem's dvd incase you don't know) and gerard way said,"If you, ro anybody you know is severely depressed, I want you to f*cking talkt o somebody. Your best friend, your mom, I don't give a f*ck, because pissing away your life on suicide is f*cking bullsh*t," Then it hit me. I was wasting my life. Since I was 10 I had been wasting my life by being depressed instead of standing up for myself and telling someone. So on monday, I went to school and I told my friends that I intended to go to the school nurse (who is really a sort of therapist) and talk to her. A few weeks and a few sessions later, my parents knew, everyone was really supportive bar a few tears and a few months later I was sitting at the computer and I realised that my life as totally different. I no longer cried every night or wanted to be dead, therefore, I was no longer depressed.
In those few words that Gerard Way had said on a DVD, he changed my life and stopped me from ruining it and I know I said that My Chem changed my life bu tthe thing is, they'd already done that, even if I was depressed, they'd given me something special. When I listened to their songs, I could escape for a little while and bury myself in the lyrics and music.
They changed my life and I hope that this has made you see that although bands can't physically save your life, things that they do or say can make your life a hell of a lot better.

Reality is subjective and for every person alive there's probably a subtle difference between their definitions of being "saved".

Define yourself and don't let other people tell you if you've been saved by a band or not. That's up to you to choose........ Or (to quote Incubus) "Make yourself"!

You cannot say what applies to you applies to the rest of the human race. We are all different. What is true for you might not be for another person.

You don't have the right to tell someone who saved their life. That's for them to decide on their own.

A lot of people say the same exact thing in other journals.

No band can physcally save a life. Someone give me a call when Gerard comes to your house and takes the gun out of your hand. KTHXBAI

Haha!
Nice one!
Good to see somebody agrees with me on that point.

only oneself can turn one's life around. i mean a band may inspire it, but they didn't put one in therapy and don't even know this person.

EVERYONE is diffrent. and you'r just ONE person.
I say drop it. this is a sticky topic and you have to think about everyones point of view ASWELL as your own.

sorry if that sounded mean. It wasn't meant to.

How can you tell someone you don't even know, have never met, and probably will never meet that their saviors didn't save them?

I just did a speech on this today D:

Hm. Maybe in a way the band saved your life by inspiring you to live it?

I always used to say MCR saved my life because I was following the trend but changed it after a while that MCR changed my life

I agree with both of you. Music can be/is a therapy, a very good one, I might add. And, yes, a band's songs can help you through tough times, trust me, I know, but the band itself isn't saving you.

Like I said, did the songs urge you to take a different route ("...made it to where suicide wasn't even an option.")? Yes, but they didn't save you. You saved you through the strength they gave you.

Anyway, I'll not start all kinds of drama because that wasn't the point of this, I was just giving my point of view and opinion, and that's what I've done. So, with that being said, agree with me or not, I still firmly back what I said.

xox--Jess

hmm...technically...there are different ways to "save a life". So as "they saved my life" like pulled the gun away from my head? No...that's not what happens here...it's more of "they saved my life" as in "I was going through a VERY tough time and listening to them helped me see all that I really had that was good in life and it made it to where suicide wasn't even an option." So...technically, honey, they CAN save your life.

I think some people are referring to the fact that they were very depressed/suicidal when they met x band, and listening to their music did turn their life around. And the part I think you're missing is that they used the band's music as a therapy, and if they hadn't then they might've given up the will to live. Of course the band didn't tell them to not commit suicide (although with MCR, they could've listened to Gerard saying on stage or in an interview to not kill themselves and to go and get help... in which case, he sorta has saved their life in the way that you're referring to).

But there are many ways that a band could save someone's life. Sometimes, people aren't living in the best of situations. They feel alone, and they feel like the music is speaking out to them, and they understand the lyrics, and feel like the band has gone through something similar to them, and have looked up to the band as an inspiration... without the band, they might feel like they'd be still in that bad place which is why they will say that the band has saved their life.

I listen to music for therapy, but I can't say one particular band has saved my life. I can say that they've made me feel better during some difficult times, but not that they have saved my life. Just let people feel what they want to feel. Obviously everyone is different, and if they believe that a band has saved their life, don't tell them that they're wrong, just accept them for who they are.