Desert island discs

organised autobiographically, of course.

One of my favourite things I’ve ever written, back in my student journalism days before I became disillusioned with the ‘man’ of the Edinburgh literary scene (read as: stopped writing because advancing the evils of the Tab became my own personal whale and it felt necessary to rebel against the system) was a piece on music, and the connection I had drawn between specific songs, and my childhood memories. Much like Mark from High Fidelity (great movie, even better book) I find joy in cataloguing my life in reference to music. I am an avid Spotify playlist creator, with the peace I find from curating the perfect playlist doing a lot of heavy lifting in terms of my mental health. My personal style of organisation is two-fold: as a base level, I ‘playlist’ chronologically, with one playlist for every ‘term’ of my life. This started as months but has stretched out to less definite periods; basically, I’ll keep going until I tire of whatever I have been listening to. The second prong of my attack is ‘vibe’ based, this being both thematic vibes but also the more general aura of each song. I have playlists for songs that remind me of certain places or people, songs that centre on similar themes in terms of their lyrics, or playlists that contain songs that evoke a specific feeling, allowing me to feel said feeling in a concentrated burst. I am most proud of the vibe-based playlists, particular hits being my dinner party series (different playlists for different types of dinner parties) as well as my Sunday morning playlist, a long-time classic which (if I dare say so myself) perfectly evokes the mood of a gentle Sunday morning.

To cut a long story short then, I really bloody love music. I like the way songs can make me feel, and I think that being able to capture emotion through specific songs as well as wider playlists, is a powerful tool of interpretation. Having limited musical talent myself, I have incredible admiration for people who are able to properly express themselves through sound, even more so for those amongst us who are able to capture feelings with such potency that it resonates with others. I am one of those people who is almost constantly listening to music. My house growing up was always full of sound, whether that was my Mum’s massive Apple Mac desktop computer that was quite literally older than me, blasting out iMusic (cause it used to be called that) on shuffle, or my dad strumming one of the handful of the Arctic Monkey’s songs he used to play on his guitars. It is rare that I go a day, if not a few hours without having some form of music playing, much to the behest of my flatmates, but it feels important to me that my outside matches my inside in terms of mood, and personally, I feel as though a well-curated song selection is the best way to achieve this synergy.

Because of all this then, I have come to form a strong reverse connection between moments of import in my life, and specific songs. There are songs I can’t listen to anymore because they have become irrevocably tied to specific people or memories in my past. But on the other hand, there are songs that stir such joy and excitement within me that it is impossible for me to feel in a bad mood when listening to them. These are the songs that either came to me at the right moment in time resulting in their crystallisation into my psyche and spurring on my development as a musically minded adult, or that take me back to a time in the past that I still feel strongly about. I think that music is a grand unifier, and can bring people together in an incredibly unique way. Finding someone who likes the same things you like, or is willing to debate with you is a real treasure of the human experience. Talking about why a song works for you, or why it doesn’t, or what it means to you is a conversation I will never tire of having, and I know that many of you feel the same.

So, here is my conclusive list of Desert Island Discs. They aren’t actual discs fucking obviously, because it’s not 2002, but I have collated them into a handy Spotify playlist if you’d like to listen along. It is collaborative too, so if there are songs you think are worthy of being added onto the desert island collection, please add them in. I will use them as a judgement point for how I will treat you if ever we are stranded on a desert island together, so add wisely.

Kiss Off – Violent Femmes

The Violent Femmes were a band that were played pretty constantly in my house growing up. They, for a long time, fell into the category of music I associated with my parents, and therefore that I had very little time for. I don’t think I actually listened to them properly, despite the frequency with which they were played, as I wrote them off as ‘old people’ music and thus of no interest to me. However, when I gained sentience at 16, and began to understand that music did actually exist, and that some of it was actually pretty good, did I properly hear this song for the first time. I remember being in France with one of the long-standing platonic loves of my life on a language exchange. I fell a bit in love with a horrible, awful boy when we were there, and in a bid to impress him, I showed him this song. His response to it filled my young foolish heart with delight, as he cried ‘now THIS is music!” and I learnt the time-honoured lesson that if you meet the right boy (a wanker) having a ‘good’ taste in music can help you seem really impressive and cool. This experience was validated when I was with the same aforementioned love of my life (not that horrible boy, I did not speak to him for very long after that holiday, surprisingly) in a car road-tripping with her family across Canada. They asked me to put on some music, and I very nervously queued some songs, this one included. To my utter surprise, her parents began singing along, as unbeknownst to me, they’d seen the Femmes live several times when they were young, as they were rather big on the rock scene in Seattle back in the day. What joy I felt to cross that generational boundary, validated by my best mates parents, that my taste in music was cool, not just in a trendy ephemeral way, but in a lasting sense. I have my parents to thank for so much in my life, naturally, but a solid musical foundation possibly most of all.

Mardy Bum – Arctic Monkeys

Another one of the bands that was forced upon me from far too young an age were the Arctic Monkeys, but unlike the Femmes, I was able to see the appeal of the wizardry of Alex Turner almost immediately. I’ve no idea how my parents stumbled across the Arctic Monkeys from suburban Melbourne, at the time they were only becoming famous because of their passed around burned CD’s, but somehow they did, and “Whatever you Say I am, That’s what I’m not” became the soundtrack to my early childhood. I remember mentioning this to a teacher in high-school, who was in his early 30s at the time, and he genuinely shivered at the thought that I’d been listening to the same music that had scored his college experience at 6. Anyway, this song has had the greatest impact in my mind for the simple fact that my father, possibly my greatest musical influence, is called Marty, and he has on occasion a bit of a grumpy old bugger. I say this from a place of love, and with the hopes that it is not taken the wrong way, as my father is a lovely man, but this song has a special place in our family unit, with the power to bring any of us down from a strop (depending of course on the magnitude of the anger at hand). My dad plays it often on the guitar still, and it always reminds me of my first childhood home. I think Alex Turner’s ability as a lyricist to capture such relatable human feelings, with such poetic yet down to earth turns of phrase is not spoken about enough, and while the most recent albums he has spearheaded have perhaps overshot by way of concept, his early songs will always have a special place in my heart.

These Words – The Lemon Twigs

This is one of the songs I can still remember hearing for the first time. Aged 15, my dad called me into the living room and told me he’d recorded a clip from the Jimmy Fallon show of this band of young kids from the US that he wanted me to see. I was hesitant, as it felt to me that anything Jimmy Fallon deemed important was less than likely to be of interest to me. How bloody wrong I was. The Lemon Twigs are a band of two brothers who are both, to put it lightly, musical prodigies. Although I feel they overshot the mark with the production of their rock opera in 2018, their first album, ‘Do Hollywood’ is a marvel, and manages to blend styles and elements from almost every genre mind-blowingly well. I remember sitting down in front of the tv watching them live all those years ago and being genuinely awestruck; another ‘come to Jesus’ moment of realisation that there was MUSIC out there, music worth listening to, music that could make me FEEL something and make the experience of living all that more rich. Don’t get me wrong, the Lemon Twigs are fucking WEIRD, but their commitment to their craft, their musical bit, does make me want to get weird myself. I got to see them in person a few years later, and halfway through the gig, the brothers swapped instruments, trading lead guitar for drums, as seamlessly as humanly possible, and returned to the rest of the set as though nothing had happened. If you’re not familiar with the band, I URGE you to listen to this song, as the blend of jazz and rock and funk is pretty indescribable but sparks such raw delight in me even now. I never would have thought a xylophone solo could go so hard, but the Twigs manage it. Beautiful gifted little freaks.

B Side – San Cisco

San Cisco is a funky band from Melbourne, that rose to fame with their song “Awkward” back in the early noughties. It was one of those tunes that was abused by the TV networks in ads for sitcoms, and by car companies trying to appeal to younger markets. However, one of my favourites of theirs is this single that was released back in 2016 to little attention. B-side is the perfect metaphor I feel, to the feeling of loving someone who doesn’t quite love you back in the right way, but for whom you are happy to accept feeling second best for. It has a funky little riff combined with perfectly humble yet catchy lyrics. The music video features one of the band members on holiday, presumably with their partner, and perfectly mirrors the slightly melancholic, slightly lovesick feeling of a ‘situationship’. It’s delightful, and reminds me both of home, and of being young and wanting things to work out differently. The band has since gone into slightly more dubby-indie fusion stuff, but their indie roots will always have a place on my list.

After Hours – The Velvet Underground

I stand by this as one of the greatest love songs of all time. It’s not really a love song, I guess, but about the feeling of love beginning, of the potential of love. Of not having it but wanting it to be yours, or seeing it brewing on the horizon. It is a song about wanting to be a part of something that you aren’t yet, with it described in introduction by the band as “for people who like to drink around 6in the morning at after hours bars” and it is beautiful. It was sung by Mo Tucker, the band’s drummer, as in a rare moment of self-awareness, Lou Reed felt he wasn’t innocent nor gentle enough to do the song justice. It is short and sweet, and makes me feel as though I am reminiscing on love that has gone, with the knowledge that love will come again.

Once I had a love AKA The Disco Song – Blondie

One of the high points of my life was seeing Blondie live back last summer. I have never felt willing to submit myself to the groupie lifestyle more than that day, and after getting a wave from Debbie Harry, literally made me feel like I was going to die. My favourite from the band’s is actually a demo version of what is their most well-known song, ‘Heart of Glass’. This version, dubbed ‘The Disco Song’, is a stripped back recording of what the song would become in its final form, centring much more on a rather groovy guitar riff that didn’t make the end cut. While many feel that the final version of the tune is the best, something about the almost lazy feel that emerges from this slightly slower, slightly simpler version works for me; the lyrics and feeling of the song shine through. It’s another love song about the bits around the love rather than the love itself; the falling in and out, and the fact that sometimes, despite it all, love can really just be a pain in the ass.

Security – Amyl and the Sniffers

Amyl and the Sniffers are one of the bands that featured in the original article that inspired this collection. I discovered the Australian punk rock band after the wave of hysteria created by The Chat’s ‘Smoko’ gave way to a new wave of specifically Australian pub rock. It is borderline impossible for me to pick a favourite tune from the band, as practically every one of their songs is just as strong as the next. Seeing them live back last September was a musical highlight for me, as their front-woman Amy Taylor is a 5’foot nothing force-of-nature. She absolutely carries the band and is quickly becoming the female face of modern punk. The bands songs focus on a wide range of experiences, from the desire to rent a car and drive to the country, to responding to unwelcome feedback from critics. Regardless, the Sniffers seem to prioritise self-expression and sticking it to the man. This tune in particular features a bloody excellent guitar riff throughout, and centres on the experience of being kicked back by a bouncer for not looking like a ‘normie’ as Taylor terms it. The band is high energy and to me, makes punk feel a lot more accessible; the work they seem to be doing to make what can be a fortress of a music scene more welcoming is not something to be laughed at. Their songs centre on themes of being yourself, of not taking shit from others, but in a way that feels somehow non-confrontational if that is possible from a punk group? There is force behind their lyrics, but not threat. Taylor presents a version of femininity in her songs and performances that is wholly its own; it refuses to be stamped on but does not attempt to stamp on others. She is bloody cool, as is her music, especially Security.

Powerful women – Pitbull feat. Dolly Parton

I stand by the fact that this song was the only thing that enabled me to stay at my previous job for as long as I did (minus my fantastic and very good friends that also worked there, but for dramatic effect I’m going to say it was purely Pitbull). Hearing Pitbull serenade me about the struggles of the single mom whilst I strutted down the road to my minimum wage bar job (usually hungover whilst doing so) really made me feel not only seen, but also supported. I am a full-on closet Pitbull fan, I mean how could you not love the mastermind between the greatest line of all time: “I saw I came I conquered, or should I say, I saw I conquered I came”. The combo of his powerful words with the undeniable genius that is Dolly Parton makes this song something truly special, both uplifting and inspiring. Pitbull, ultimately is the feminist ally we all need.

And so there we have it, the songs that have had the greatest impact on my life and musical taste as a young adult. Thank you for reading, and I hope you give some of them a listen too.