Thea: A comparison between "Home" and "My Love"

Home
http://nz.youtube.com/watch?v=fDQnkYwfNfk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KLH0_IV6jnk
My Love
http://nz.youtube.com/watch?v=-tRHCXGAP6I
http://nz.youtube.com/watch?v=5VG0Vi9JKQE

Songs are very much part of our lives. We cannot live without them. Songs come in many different forms of musical traditions such as rock, pop, classical, blues, regae and many others. Generally, I enjoy the blues but two songs that speak to me most at this current moment is "Home" by Michael Buble and "My Love" by Westlife. Both songs speak of someone who misses their love and are also separated from their life at home and feel alone. However, there are some obvious differences in the songs as well, such as the tone and specified goals of the song.

The songs are similiar in theme. They speak of someone who misses their love. It is the voice of someone who is far away and misses their boyfriend or girlfriend because they are caught in a long distance relationship. In "My Love" this theme is obvious in the chorus. The songs states "Oh my love, I'm holding on forever. Reaching for a love that seems so far"..."To see you once again, my love." Similiarly in "Home" the singer talks about writing letters that he never sends to his "Baby". He is unable to express himself adequately to his girlfriend who "deserves more than that".

Both songs speak of being separated from a life that they are hanker for and they feel alone. This feeling of loneliness is expressed in "My Love" in the words "I'm all alone, the room is getting smaller." In "Home", the song goes, " Maybe surrounded by a million people, I, still feel all alone, I just wanna go home".

Yet, the songs strikes different tones. "My Love" is often implicit in meaning. Metaphors like "a hole inside my heart", "the rooms are getting smaller" are vivid images of a feeling rather than specific events or thoughts. Love is personified in the lines: "love that seems so far." "Home" has explicit meaning and is easier to understand. Lines such as , "I just wanna go home, I miss you, you know"; "I've been keeping all the letters that I wrote to you." The song speaks of specific seasons passing, "another summer day has come and gone away" and specific geographical locations such as "Paris and Rome." Unlike, "My Home" that is more general and unspecific moving "overseas from coast to coast."

The other difference is that the songs seems to desire different solutions to their loneliness. "My Love" is happy to hope that "dreams" bring back the images of "blue sky", "green fields" and the "love" one again. Throughout the song there is a strong separation between the physical, and the emotional and mental. The person carries on normal activities but is really wanting to be somewhere else. This leads to this dream, a completely mental image, of being back with his love. "Home" is a more physical and purposeful song in attempting to get home. The song expresses desire "I wanna go home" and a plea to "let me go home", and a determination, "I've gotta go home." This song is not content with a dream-like return home.

We do need songs in our lives. Some songs may help us express the condition of our hearts, a temporary cure or teach us another perspective to problems. For me, these songs express how much I miss home.