Mike Audette draws The Force Awakens musical connections to songs he enjoys.
Be warned: The following contains spoilers for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Go see the movie now and come back afterwards.
By Mike Audette // The Force has been awakened within us all. Rey, Finn, Poe and Kylo have already made their mark on us. I always seem to find a way to connect my love of heavy metal music to my love of Star Wars in one way or another. The biggest is finding connections in song lyrics to describe characters. In the days after seeing the film I already have made these connections to some of the new characters and one of our old favorites.
Rey:
Throughout the film, we see countless examples of Rey encountering different things and situations she has never been in before. After being introduced to Han Solo, even for only a brief time, you can see she has developed a strong admiration for him. When the climax of the film hits and Han is killed by his son Kylo we get the Lightsaber duel we knew would be inevitable.
Constantly incomplete.
With my back against the wall, I stack brick by brick by brick by brick.
I will rise above them all like this, like this.….
Move me, choose me. Please before you lose me
Find me, drive me. End the things that pride me.
Move me, improve me. Ignite the flame that ruled me.
Guide me, collide me. I need something to survive me.
The song “Move Me” by the band The Ghost Inside really hit me as being like Rey’s theme. We know almost nothing of her history, why she was abandoned on Jakku, and what her calling is in the Galaxy. After witnessing the death of Han Solo, and seeing Finn severely injured by Kylo, she does what she was always meant to do. Take control of that lightsaber and accept her destiny. These lyrics almost perfectly describe her at that point. Her back is figuratively against the wall in her fight against Kylo but she refuses to quit, refuses to subside. Her Force has awakened.
Kylo:
Kylo Ren is evil. We can certainly tell this just from the beginning scene on Jakku, ordering all the villagers to be massacred. We learn that this was not always the case, and still isn’t. Kylo is being torn apart from both sides. The light and the dark. His heritage is what is his burden. Son of Han Solo and Leia Organa, grandson of Darth Vader, Anakin Skywalker.
All you are to me is a faded memory
Trust me when I say
I’m alone in these dreams.…
Find me screaming goodbye (goodbye)
Find me where the light dies.
These lyrics from Carnifex’s “Where The Light Dies” couldn’t have been a better descriptor for Kylo’s struggle with the light, his father Han, during our fateful scene. The idea of the light being still alive inside of Kylo is a major theme that is shared between Han and Leia through the film. The scene with Han confronting Ben, Kylo’s birth name, is all about trying to get him to come back and accept the light inside of him. Kylo truly shows his weakness, in killing his own father, allowing himself to succumb to the dark.
Finn:
FN-2187 ceases to be and is transformed into Finn. A stormtrooper who abandons his life as nothing but a number to become his own man. Throughout the film we see him always struggling with what his calling is. His natural instinct is to help others even though it flies in the face of everything he’s ever known.
Hey, hey, I’m living for today.
Forgetting things I can’t change unwinds me.
Hey, hey, nothing stands in my way.
Time stopped when I broke the chains that bound me.Count the clock till the overhaul.
You built a bomb inside my walls.
Count the clock till we’re out of hand.
You build, build now we’re caught in the avalanche.Reset, rebuild. You wrecked this city but not my will.
Another song from The Ghost Inside seems to fit one of our The Force Awakens characters. These lyrics from “Avalanche” really connect to Finn for me. That moment Finn decides to break out Poe and escape from the First Order is the beginning of his life. He is breaking the chains of servitude and accepting that there is much more potential to be unlocked inside of himself. He knows none of it is going to be easy but he accepts what he needs to do because it is right.
Luke:
Here’s the big one. Luke. Luke has been absent for years. Secluded away after an unspeakable tragedy. What sort of events have transpired to cause this change to the famous Jedi hero. In the film we only see Luke for a brief scene at the end when he is found by Rey and she presents him with his and his father’s long lost Lightsaber. The same one she used in her duel against Kylo Ren.
I’m so sorry
That I missed your lives
While I was on the road
Learning to survive
You deserved so much more
Than I could provide
Thank you for loving me
And bringing light to my eyes
All we love we leave behind
You deserved so much more
Than I could provide
Thank you for loving me
And bringing light to my eyes
All we love we leave behind.
Listening to “All We Love We Leave Behind” by Converge truly gives weight to what we see when we first find Luke at the end of the film. He’s been out of Galactic events for a long time, feeling responsible for something terrible that has happened. We don’t know what it is that caused his exile yet, but he feels strongly enough that this is what he needed to do. He left a lot of loved ones behind plagued by guilt.