day89 - music
dear luci,
today I was asked by a dear friend, “what's been keeping you sane lately?”
before I could answer, she put forward a suggestion. “X-Men?”
that was really cute.
yes, that's one of the things.
but another is music.
normally I don't listen to new albums out of nowhere— and I don't tend to relisten to old ones that I've maybe only heard once all the way through. but at work I've found myself just throwing on an album I've never heard and listening the whole way through. occasionally they're recommendations. but often they're just artists whose music I kinda like, and want to explore more of.
but, in the last month I've listened to:
- You Forgot It In People by Broken Social Scene
- Census Designated by Jane Remover
- Failed At Math(s) by Panchiko
- BIPOLAR by Tatsuya Kitani
- Yumeno Garden by Last Dinosaurs
- Stop Making Sense by Talking Heads
- Sweet Home by No Buses
- saoirse dream by saoirse dream
- Birds of Tokyo by Birds of Tokyo
- System Of A Down by System Of A Down
- Tidal by Fiona Apple
- When the Pawn… by Fiona Apple
- I Got Heaven by Mannequin Pussy
- How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful by Florence + The Machine
- Blurryface by Twenty One Pilots
- Make Yourself by Incubus
- Ginkgo by Panchiko
- Twin Fantasy (Mirror to Mirror) by Car Seat Headrest
- Making A Door Less Open by Car Seat Headrest
- The Overload by Yard Act
- Hesitant Allen by Gerard Way
- Hybrid Theory by Linkin Park
- Evergreen by Soccer Mommy
- Sometimes, Forever by Soccer Mommy
- Toxicity by System Of A Down
Holy fuck.
many of these were recommendations and relistens, but the Soccer Mommy albums were just pure whim. and I discovered a song on Evergreen that I fell in love with instantly.
it's called Salt In Wound. I was mesmerised by the layered guitar. the dreaminess of it, the comfortable yet melancholic tone. I spent the twenty-minute drive home from work that day learning how to sing it. Playing it over and over again until the lyrics, the phrasings, the flourishes were burnt into my brain.
I've been getting more obsessive about music. I've been experimenting with guitar. Training my undisciplined, clumsy bassist fretting to be more precise. It feels like dancing, and I've never been light on my feet.
Tonight I even started to play piano again after trying half-heartedly to learn at 16. I begun learning ‘I Know’ by Fiona Apple, another song which has completely mesmerised me albeit for different reasons. That's another song I spent a recent drive home trying to learn. But Fiona's vibrato doesn't come naturally to me and she has a looser, free form approach to phrasing. I don't even know if I'm using these words correctly.
Point being:
Music has kept me sane. Music has pulled me back into my fondest memories and helped the tears flow when I’ve felt impossibly confused.
I look forward to playing music with others again. I want to sing harmonies with another, I want to be part of the rhythm section I've always dreamt of, I want to perform some of my favourite songs onstage.
here is an unfathomably disorganised playlist of some of the songs that have been on my mind lately. I hope some of them bring you joy like they've brought me.
I've lost the plot here. I've always felt like when I talk about music I'm grasping for words that I don't know, but I understand. I don't want to plunder the depths of this art form, to learn it all until there's no mystery or wonder behind the chords and arrangements that can make the hair on my arms stand on end. I just want to get closer, to speak the language. Just enough so that I can describe the particular things I love in music, and just maybe create some of my own. to be in conversation with artists whose work will live on far longer than I. to send a few words in reply.
my love to all of you. sweet dreams luci <3