Math, music make me merry

I have this general impression that people think I'm weird, strange or just plain out there. All the journalism majors think I'm nuts for being a mathematics major, and the math majors can't figure out what I'm doing in the journalism school. I spend all my time between Ernie Pyle Hall and Swain East and West. My life, for the past year, has been consumed by words and numbers. What amazes me is that more people don't readily see the correlation between the two. \nSince my freshman year, I've dedicated myself to the analysis of popular music. Music critiques, rock star interviews, concert write-ups -- this is what I love to do. At the same time, I'm fascinated by the fact that there are an infinite number of primes and by Fermat's Last Theorem. But music is math, and math is music, they are both art forms that coexist no matter how many second-rate pop stars can't even do basic Algebra, let alone form a complete, intelligent sentence. (That may be a gross exaggeration, but I'm graduating, I'm allowed one once in a while.) Their music is the result of computer-generated rhythms, the programming for which was born out of mathematical logic.\nListen to any Mozart piece, or a Tool song, even creeped-out, unintelligible Swedish rock bands like Meshuggah. The math is there, hidden underneath swift piano work or crunching guitars. The best music in our age involves more than just a lucky combination of chords. I'm not saying that the best musicians in history are math geniuses, far from it, but the music I love I respect not only musically, but mathematically as well.\nI can't remember the last time I used the Pythagorean Theorem in an article I wrote, but math is still so involved that I can jump from writing a review to calculus without transition. They both involve analyzing, developing propositions, following those propositions to their logical end and finally making a conclusion and praying it's the right one. If only all journalists followed this pattern, maybe we'd have more unbiased coverage on cable news networks.\nMath is completely free of bias. The only way to disprove a mathematical statement is with a stronger one. No one can say 2 + 2 = 5. In there lies the true beauty of mathematics. Few things in this crazy illogical world have the simplicity of fact that is found in mathematics. Decades have been wasted arguing over what makes "good music," but I don't remember the last time someone tried to dispute the formula for calculating the area of a square.\nEven basic corporate consumerism thrives on mathematical logic. Look at Lou Pearlman. He recognizes a formula for success in boy bands and repeats it. Its proven. It works. But what separates Pearlman's formula from a mathematical theorem is that there was a flaw. It's called the If You Rip People Off They'll Sue You Theorem. That doesn't exist in math; there are few ways to rip anyone off through math.\nSo now I reach the end of my undergraduate career with two degrees that as of yet have failed to garner me a job. Maybe there used to be a high demand for journalists who could understand the true beauty of mathematics, but there sure isn't one now. I've spent my undergraduate career listening to the best and worst of what popular music has to offer. I've become cynical and nostalgic. And I'm still waiting for rock music to return with a truly original band, someone who reinvents the genre.\nThe Weekend has been my lifeblood and saving grace. It's given me an outlet to speak my mind and explore my ideas. It kills me when I meet people who don't know about it or don't care. We're the best entertainment magazine in Bloomington, and it's amazing the small, dedicated staff we have. I'll miss the magazine, the one thing that actually lets me explore my weird journalism-mathematics conjecture. \nNow it's time for something new. I'll have to spend the next couple of months critiquing music on the Web to absolutely no one, but if logic and reason prevail, I'll be back. Some day. Some way. You just watch. Math always triumphs.