I will be closing out the series with the first entry I received from my friend Derin, I have really enjoyed this series, getting to know people through music, I am sure you have too.
Thank you to everyone that participated and special shout out to Mr Johnson for helping with the name for the series.
Leave comments below on series you will like to see on the blog!
I’m sorry Ore, you can’t ask me to pick songs and tell me to select just five. I promise I tried really hard to stick to just five but I couldn’t. I may have been able to pick just five, if only I had more time.
Music is the only thing that is nearly as important to me as books (and friends and family). Here are twelve songs that have made me cry, smile, feel hopeful among a thousand other emotions. I hope you find at least one, that speaks to you as much as it has to me
Rhye – Open
This vocals for this song are by Milosh, a man who sounds so much like Sade, listeners were shocked to find out it’s a he.You don’t listen to Milosh, you allow his voice make love to your ears. When he croons “I’m a fool for that sound in your sigh”, you realise only a voice as beautiful as his can sexualize a sigh, and it just feels right. I still haven’t made love to this song yet, but it’s a matter of when, not if.
Wild Beasts – Palace
In detail you are, even more beautiful than, from afar
I could learn you, like the blinded would do, feeling a way through the dark
You remind me, Of the person I wanted to be, before I forgot.
This song begins with a line that I can relate with on a personal level. I fell in love in 2015, waking up and staring into her face, I understood what exactly what that line means.
Wild Beasts – Mecca
All we want is to feel that feeling again, Just a drop on the lip
This song evokes nostalgia. Whatever that feeling is to you, you can relate to this feeling of wanting just another drop. For me, it’s the love I spoke about in the previous paragraph, we ended things in 2016. And I can’t help the feeling of wanting just one more drop.
Somi – Ginger Me Slowly
Ginger me by candle light and long walks by the lagoon
Ginger me with intellect and wine
Ginger me boy with kindness and cool
This song is exactly how I assume it feels to a girl, when I’m toasting her
Asa – Eye Adaba
This song makes me feel so peaceful. I’m not exactly the most religious person. But, Asa puts me in a mood with this song. This song makes me feel relaxed, safe and grateful.
Asa – Jailer
I’m in chains, you’re in chains too
I wear uniforms, you wear uniforms too
I’m a prisoner, you’re a prisoner too Mr Jailer
Man, there’s bare many potential jailers and oppressors in this world yuno. But Asa flips the script here and let’s me know that a lot of the time, the oppressor and the oppressed are just two sides of the same coin. And that more than anything, our jailers need our sympathy.
London Grammar – Wasting All My Years
I’m wasting my young years, It doesn’t matter here
I’m chasing on ideas, It doesn’t matter here
As a twenty something year old that frequently feels like I’m making a lot of motion and little movement in life. This song speaks to me. When the familiar pangs of doubt appear, I turn on this song and let Hannah Reid’s vocals take me away. It doesn’t remove my doubts, it only articulates them beautifully and let’s me know, I’m not alone.
Autre Ne Vuet – Counting
I’m counting on the idea that you’ll stay right here
I need you for a little while
This song is very raw and feels uncut. The artist Arthur Ashin is singing about a period where he was scared of calling his Grandma cause he felt every call may be his last. The rawness of this song makes it feel very cathartic, and it’s a song I’m prone to belting out in my room when I’m alone and thinking of something I’m really counting on to happen, or to not happen
Bon Iver – Holocene
And at once I knew, I was not magnificent
Justin Vernon sings about the beauty of the universe and how insignificant a single human being is in comparison. This song makes me really humble and at the same time when I feel like I have really big problems, it helps me take a step back and see how small my issues are in the grand scheme of things.
Benjamin Leftwich – 1904
All of our friends survived
When a plane crashed their minds
And in 1904, I found
Some real real strength in my ground
2016 was a tough year in many ways for me. This song was probably my song of the year. It talks about finding your inner strength during turbulent times. It’s a song I turn to regularly when I’m feeling overwhelmed.
Phosporecent – Song of Zula
Some say love is a burning thing, that it makes a fiery ring
Oh but I know love as a fading being
Just fickle as a feather in a stream
See honey, I saw love, you see it came to me
It put its face up to my face so I could see
Yeah, then I saw love disfigure me
Into something I am not recognizing
You will not see me fall, Or see me struggle to stand
To be acknowledged by some touch from his gnawed hands
I heard this song as the closing credits were showing after a movie my room mate just finished watching. Houck’s voice caught my attention and I downloaded the song and fell in love instantly. The song gained new meaning after the end of my last relationship, I did a few things I never though I would do and I literally saw love disfigure me. But likeHouck sings “You will not see me fall or see me struggle to stand”
Sufjan Stevens – Fourth of July
This song is about the conversation Sufjan wishes he had with his mom before she died. It’s a song anyone who has lost a loved one can relate to. I lost a mentor in 2016 and a friend in 2015 and this song is what I turn to when I think about them.
In the end Sufjan just wants to light up the sky in tribute to his mum.
And I hope I’m here being a light for Mr Laide and Bolu.
