Brick by Ben Folds Five

I really liked “Brick” without ever knowing it was about abortion.

I was in high school when Ben Folds Five hit the music scene, I remember people making a big deal about the band’s unique instrumentation, a piano, upright bass and drums. People were comparing Ben Folds to other rock artists like Elton John and Billy Joel who utilized the piano as a central instrument in rock music. As a pianist, I thought it was awesome that there was band out there that was centered on my favorite instrument.

Then I started hearing about how their breakout single “Brick” was about abortion.

In my early years in high school, I knew what abortion was but I had no clue the relevance of Roe vs. Wade and what the pro-life vs. pro-choice debate was really about. When you are young, being political doesn’t come from researched, well-thought out platforms but rather repeating slogans and arguments you overhear your parents and people on television say. My parents have their political opinions but to this day, I’m not even sure where they stand on this issue.

Abortion never came up in dinner table discussions, in high school I never knew of any of my family or friends who had to deal with the abortion. To this day, I’ve never talked to anyone who has faced this issue, though with all the people I’ve met in my life there is probably someone I know who has dealt with this issue on a personal level.

I probably saw newspaper stories about abortion or heard things on the television about the abortion debate but it didn’t seem like something that meant anything to me because I couldn’t relate to what it meant on an emotional level.

The first couple times I heard “Brick,” I thought it was really different and interesting musically. The piano is constant throughout the song and feels like a driving down an empty road on a winter morning. Though the rhythm is steady, Ben Folds varies the way he rolls through the chords creating a feeling of motion. The sound of the bowed upright bass, which is rarely heard in popular music, added a dark sustained color, which contrasted the brighter shorter notes on the piano. The drums lay back in the verse adding colors and a rhythmic undercurrent. The interaction between drums, upright bass and piano changes in the chorus as the bass and drums provide the rhythmic drive as the lyrics change from telling the story in the verse to expressing how the experience felt in the chorus.

Then I realized the song was about someone having an abortion. At first, this overwhelmed little teenage mind. It’s one thing to hear a song that elaborates on sexual exploits in an unrealistic way but it’s another thing to hear a song that deals with the consequences on not only sexual behavior. The subject matter scared me away. I didn’t want to listen to a song that preached to me about an issue. So it wasn’t until college that I took another look at this song. Then I realized something that Ben Folds about “Brick.” The subject of this song is abortion but that’s not what it’s really about, what it’s means. Ben Folds when asked about “Brick” reflected:

"People ask me what this song's about... I was asked about it a lot, and I didn't really wanna make a big hairy deal out of it, because I just wanted the song to speak for itself. But the song is about when I was in high school, me and my girlfriend had to get an abortion, and it was a very sad thing. And, I didn't really want to write this song from any kind of political standpoint, or make a statement. I just wanted to reflect what it feels like. So, anyone who's gone through that before, then you'll know what the song's about.”

“Brick” doesn’t intend to make an argument pro-life or pro-choice. If you really experience “Brick” for what it is, you don’t walk about thinking “abortion,” you are left with a feeling of an innocence that is lost. I don’t think that anyone on either side of the debate will argue the emotional challenges of getting an abortion which “Brick” so beautifully expresses.

If you want to take this song as many have to make arguments for either side of the issue, that’s your prerogative. I don’t agree that a piece of art that isn’t indented to be used as part of a political debate should be used as such but if you want that I respect people’s right to discuss their views in any way that they see fit. I do believe it is essential to try to understand the emotional side of the abortion issue to inform the debate with the human dimension which is sometimes ignored.

Art like “Brick” connects us the emotions behind the debate and reminds us that behind the debate there are two teenagers waking up early on a cold winter morning.