A Playlist Series

American Crisis Playlist #36

How do you spell L-O-V-E?

I keep saying that next Tuesday will feel like Christmas again…because I’m getting my first vaccine shot. My wife has both; our older daughter has both; and like me, our younger daughter will get her first dose this coming week. Love in a vaccine — a year ago, all I was thinking of was seeing Sturgill Simpson live in Charlotte with my girls and son-in-law in tow. Little did we know all that would happen, and that Sturgill himself would contract Covid a few days after this show.

I’ll write more about the concert at another time, but yes, it has been a year, and loss would go on to underscore our days, numbering out into more grief. Yet, what we experienced then is barely a candle’s glow compared to the experiences of so many others and their relative nightmares.

With over 500,000 dead from the virus, it’s hardly a celebratory time. And then, there’s the CPAC from last week where the OP once again embraced the American flag as if he loves that piece of cloth and the country it represents so much better than he loves himself. As Jimmy Kimmel shouted last week,

“He doesn’t love any of you!”

Why is that so hard to understand? Love is a four-letter word, and it has nothing to do with crowd size, walls, or the massive ego of a petty little man who will always be a scar on our nation’s history with his brand of bullshit.

So, what happened to my Christmas again?

Here at The Riff, we believe in music and its power to heal, to bless, to inspire, and to challenge us to find our way out of this and any other crisis that comes our way. I love the stories being generated on the site by Gary Chapin, Jeff Goodwin, Steven Hale, and Reuben Salsa, among so many others, and always feel better once I’ve read about even such forgotten odes as Neil Diamond’s “Jonathan Livingston Seagull.”

So, with all due homage, respect, and inspiration, I offer these gems to get you through your night, week, and windy month.

Have fun, and as always, play them LOUD.

AMERICAN CRISIS PLAYLIST #36

1. “Private Idaho,” The B-52’s, from Wild Planet (1980). It was B-52’s week around here, self-proclaimed, and I kept seeing visions of older men at dance parties trying to figure out how to move to these sounds. Who wears a tie and business suit to a student party, and what do you do with your coat once this song begins playing? Is this the state song of potato land? It should be, because Idaho isn’t honored every day, or year, with such a testament to partying out of bounds. Dance dance dance to you’re dead.
2. “Fly Robin Fly,” Silver Convention, 1975, from their self-titled first album. Did they have a second? I went to college with two sisters, Millie and Robyn Rushing. I wonder where they are now? Millie once gave a dramatic reading of one of the more S/M parts of Judith Rossner’s Looking for Mr. Goodbar in our Oral Interpretation (I swear) class during my sophomore year. You can never forget your own, or your professor’s, face when a frank and open — and beautiful — young woman intones the “F” word over and over for a grade. Her sister Robyn once danced solo to this song at a friend’s pre-wedding party. Certain images linger.
3. “Smile Like You Mean It,” The Killers, from 2004’s Hot Fuss. My older daughter used to play this song on our way to her high school back in those days when I drove her everywhere. I kept wondering how she found a band like this and why I didn’t find them first. It didn’t matter so much except I understood how life was changing so quickly, almost imperceptibly. She, finding her way to adulthood, and I, trying to let her do it without too much aid. I found that some of my college students loved this song, too, and that cinched it for me. Still sounds worthy of all of us, too.
4. “Everybody’s Changing,” Keane, from Hopes and Fears (2003). This CD I actually swiped from my daughter and put it in my to-go carry case, and left it in my car, so that I could listen to it whenever I wanted, which was at least twice daily as I made the 90-mile round trip to my college. I think she was okay with that once she learned what I had done and why. I’m sure she remembers this song, a pop hit from her thirteenth year and my 47th. Listen to the lyrics please. “So little time, try to understand that I’m trying to make a move just to stay in the game, I try to stay awake and remember my name, but everybody’s changing and I don’t feel the same.” I so love the ambiguity.
5. “Black-Hearted Love,” PJ Harvey and John Parish, from A Woman A Man Walked By (2009). You know how I love PJ, and I remember hearing this song the first time somewhere somehow someway standing in our den with the TV on and PJ making me feel wrapped up inside. I also remember a critic from that time reminding everyone that PJ just wasn’t to everyone’s tastes. Got that right. I wouldn’t want her to be, either, though I will say that when I was grading AP Lit exams in Louisville a few years back, I met two diehard PJ fans, also grading. The essays were about a Vicar in one of Thomas Hardy’s novels. How many AP students, we wondered, know what a Vicar is? How many knew what a PJ Harvey is? Or a black-heart? Is that the OP crying? Watch the linked video, too. Oh Dave.
6. “Do You Wanna Dance?” Bette Midler from The Divine Miss M (1972). Were we really this innocent back when I was sixteen? This sensitive? All of my close friends in Bessemer, Alabama, swooned to this song, or at least I like to think we did. Back then, no one knew how to pronounce her name, but that would change. I think of my friend Jimbo’s car, the lake near his house where we swam and tried to avoid touching the gooey bottom, and still Bette could stop us cold in our Schlitz beer when this song came on the radio. True true true.
7. “House of Cards,” Radiohead, from In Rainbows (2007). This one’s for you Noah (Noah Levy). I loved Radiohead before I heard this song. After? Have you ever watched that last second of light melt away, from your own back porch as you try to figure who on earth will understand it, you, them, all of us? In these moments, understanding merges with love. And the whole record resounds, but not as much as the moments here. One of my math colleagues at school digs Radiohead, too, and in different moments, we both were affiliated with the University of Montevallo. Strange days.
8. “Hearts Content,” Brandi Carlile (2012) on Bear Creek. Last week, my younger daughter was preparing her sourdough starter while I finished up the pasta carbonara for her mom’s birthday, and she put on her own playlist. This is the song that grabbed me, and of course, I couldn’t name the artist. Another learning moment. The sourdough crusted perfectly; the carbonara found the right blend of pancetta and cheese, and Brandi sang us to red wine bliss. My daughter selected the vintage, too.
9. “Hold Yourself,” Tune-Yards, from their forthcoming album sketchy. It’s the vocals that always get me with this band, and I’m struggling to remember who they remind me of. Kind of like Blood, Sweat, and Tears in that brassy/bluesy vibe, but I know that isn’t it either. Phoebe Snow? Colbert had them on a few weeks ago, and they amused him in what I hope was a good way, but you can check that out for yourself. Lot of promises still to come. “Parents are children, all of the time,” indeed.
10. “Punisher,” Phoebe Bridgers from 2020’s Punisher. I seem to recall that someone wrote about her attempts to smash her guitar on SNL a month or so ago. Seems like David Crosby was upset at her. Wild, right? I record SNL every week, but we had an unexpected snowstorm that night and our satellite dish didn’t care for those conditions and so blacked out, and so I missed Phoebe and have to take everybody’s word about her supposed transgression. I feel punished for sure, but not as much as Crosby’s been for his particular views. We should remind him of his own absurdities, but let’s listen to Phoebe instead.

Thanks for reading, listening, indulging, and applauding…and, I hope, responding. Please read and follow these other Riff legends; Mike Marolla, Rob Janicke, Kevin Alexander, Jessica Lee McMillan, Kathryn Dillon, Oliver Norris, Frank Mastropolo, Kathy Gerstorff, and Nia Simone McLeod.

Last week’s playlist is here:

https://readmedium.com/american-crisis-playlist-35-1da15144bf31?sk=8762ac43776b8e3f97c65477279aa5c0