Self-Reflection: Ana Tijoux and "1977"

In today's random song, French-Chilean musician Ana Tijoux takes a reminiscent look back at her life and what influenced her in her life's path. We often have to look at those events and occurrences in our lives that may have had a big effect on what we have become to understand why we are the people we are. I have done a lot of this type of reflection out of necessity. I came from a dysfunctional family, and without self-reflection and examination, I would still be flailing about in the shadows of uncertainty and doubt. Luckily, while I sometimes still find myself struggling in the deep end of the pool of life, weighed down by guilt and at times a poor self image, my examination of my life through counseling and therapy, through creative outlets such as writing and music, and through the loving attentions of my wife, close family and friends, I am a better and more self-aware person today than I have ever been in my life. I am also more at peace with myself.

That's the place that I perceive Ana Tijoux is coming from in 1977. The lyrics tell her story in the first person, starting in 1977 in the Year of the Snake. She remarks that she is like an open book to others, but also that there is small text in the margins, that she learns that some people want damage (to self, to others?), and that she learns by watching her father and others and learns both her own competence and impotence. She then tells about her adolescence, framed by her awareness of the military domination of her home country of Chile (her parents were Chilean exiles in France) and how she learned to channel her adolescent anger ("a girl who only sizes swords" and who is "looking pissed") until she found her "first rhyme that sounded and wrapped me up." At least that is what I pick out of the words - there is more that I am still trying to understand in her song but I can hear the self-reflection and, as a critic argued, the maturity in a person who is looking backwards to understand and interpret what is now.

Ana Tijoux is a French-Chilean musician who was indeed born in 1977 in France, just as she raps. She first traveled to Chile in 1983 and moved there for good in 1993. She then became involved in the country's nascent rap and hip hop scene. In the late 1990s she became famous across Latin America as the female MC of the rap group Makiza. After a successful eight years, the group broke up in 2006 over creative differences. Tijoux went solo and began to move away from rap and hip hop and more toward the Chilean pop scene, and did some work in that genre that was well received. In 2009, she returned to her rap roots with her album 1977. Thom Yorke of Radiohead urged his listeners to listen to the title song 1977 and listed Tijoux and the song on a list of artists and songs that were his favorites. 1977 was also featured on the award winnning TV series Breaking Bad in its fourth season.