What I'm Listening To in September 2020
This Sad Girl September, SZA made us want to get a little reckless, James Blake was as nostalgic for Blonde as the rest of us, and Spillage Village showed us a light at the end of the tunnel.
Every month, I keep an ongoing playlist of songs that I want to keep in my listening rotation. These could be singles, loosies, album standouts, or just songs I can’t get out of my head, but they often have some significance to my own life or the state of the world. This month was a classic Sad Girl September, causing us (okay, maybe just me) to get into the spirit of the season and think about times gone by. If you want to get monthly updates on music and other (non-scheduled) things that I’m writing, subscribe to my newsletter.
Here’s what I’m listening to:
Jazmine Sullivan
Lost One
If you have an iPhone, then you’re probably aware that the iOS14 update has introduced widget features, one of which is a constantly-rotating photo album. Because I am a nostalgic idiot, I sprung for this, allowing my phone to sift through my photos to find specific memories. Of course, amongst photos of friends and food, Mr. Tim Apple also pulled memories from past relationships, memories that, today, sting a bit. The last thing you need to see on a misty fall afternoon is the remnant of time-soured love staring at you right next to your reminders app. Funny.
Sometimes, especially in the quickly-chilling, encroaching sunset of September, you need to wallow. I don’t know why I feel the need to be sadder in the fall—maybe it’s the lack of sunlight activating my SAD, maybe it’s waving goodbye to the summer (which isn’t as much of a problem this year), maybe wearing tucked-in sweaters puts me in the mindset of the person in your poetry workshop that takes it really seriously. Regardless, Jazmine Sullivan is meeting my needs.
“Lost One” is self-pity at its finest:
I know I’m a selfish bitch
But I want you to know I’ve been working on that.
I know it don’t matter.
I know it don’t help you heal no fucking faster
Yeah, I know
I know I’ve been nothing short of a disaster.
The song doesn’t have have much going on beyond muffled acoustic guitar and Sullivan’s voice. That’s all there needs to be; the layered vocals fill the space of the song, and when they fall away, you’re left with one single Jazmine Sullivan singing her ass off: “Just don’t have too much fun without me.” If you’re wondering, I have changed the settings for that widget. I’m sappy, not masochistic.
SZA
Hit Different (feat. Ty Dolla $ign)
Sad Girl September continues with the newest side-girl SZA single, “Hit Different,” with possibly the worst Ty Dolla feature in recent memory and yet another underwhelming Neptunes performance. SZA’s showing is great, though—every time the prechorus hits, I can’t help but sing along: “All that I know is/ mirrors inside me.”
“Hit Different” is the other side of the coin from Jazmine Sullivan’s “Lost One.” SZA sings of the beginnings of a potentially fraught relationship, something she knows is not in her self-interest—but that fact entices her more. One could imagine that this is the inception of the same situation that Jazmine Sullivan laments. “Hit Different” is an anthem for the reckless careen into imminent heartbreak; you can see disaster coming from a mile away, but sometimes it’s that knowledge that propels you even faster.
The Avalanches
Music Makes Me High
We can’t always feel melancholy. Most of September is still summer (it certainly felt like it this year), and the Avalanches remind us of that with “Music Makes Me High.” This feels more like the plunderphonics group’s previous output than their recent singles; layered vocal samples and a clear nod to disco harken back to Wildflower. Simpler times.
JPEGMAFIA
Call Me Maybe
Speaking of simpler times—this moody 2013 JPEGMAFIA cover of Carly Rae Jepsen’s seminal 2012 hit “Call Me Maybe,” recently released onto streaming platforms, somehow sounds both like a throwback and completely modern. Originally part of JPEG’s Ghost~Pop Tape under the name Devon Hendryx, the song is just as catchy when it sounds slightly haunted and is underscored by professional wrestling commentary (?). I was surprised by how good the song was; the Carly Rae content and hyping-up from internet fanboys had me thinking this would be gimmicky, but the cover’s dreamy synths and low-key presentation feel right for a rainy afternoon.
Blood Orange and 박혜진 Park Hye Jin
Call Me (Freestyle)
The transition from “Call Me Maybe” to “Call Me (Freestyle)” is about as easy as the names suggest. This collaboration between my personal hero Dev Hynes and Seoul/LA producer/rapper 박혜진 Park Hye Jin is another looking-forlornly-out-the-window song, this time combining the classical talents of Hynes (is that plucked cello at the beginning?) with Park’s more futuristic sound. Hynes takes us on a nighttime drive through the city, obviously one of those drives when one needs to just drive. Or, as the single cover might suggest, bike. Ultimately, this song feels a bit thrown together, as the “(Freestyle)” descriptor would imply. While I would love more of a substantive effort from Mister Hynes and Miss Park, this will have to suffice in our trying and troubled times.
Tony Velour
Euro Plug
This playlist would not be complete without at least one PC Music song on it. Featured this month is Tony Velour’s most recent collaboration with Dylan Brady, “Euro Plug.” What is most interesting about this is, of course, the production; the melody sounds like something out of an arena-thumping fütbol game with the over-the-top bass and dancy synths familiar to Dylan Brady’s sound. Tony Velour performs fine on this track; #realones might remember him from “gecgecgec (Remix)” on my July playlist, but his performance here is more run-of-the-mill than his earnest autotune performance on the gecs remix album. Regardless, this is a fun song. Fun is in spare enough supply nowadays, especially amongst the self-flagellatingly morose songs in this September 2020 playlist. Speaking of…
James Blake
Godspeed
It’s hard seeing your favorite artists become lame, but it’s inevitable. James Blake is, as I regret to report, not super cool anymore, for whatever reason. He’s not making splashes in the Indie scene like he used to. Instead, he’s bleaching his hair blond(e) and releasing covers of years-old Frank Ocean songs like he’s a BROCKHAMPTON member or something. Despite this (and the fact that he is chained to the eternally-uncool Jameela Jamil), we cannot forget one fact: he’s still making pretty good music. Case in point is said Frank Ocean cover, if you can even call it that, as Blake is a credited co-writer on the original. The song starts off nice enough; as a 22-year-old, I am naturally drawn to Godspeed by Frank Ocean, and James Blake does it more than justice with his honey-sweet voice.
The last minute, though, is when the song comes alive. Blake changes keys, leaning into the gospel influence and then launching into what, in the original song, were washed-out background vocals:
Glory, glory
Glory, glory
This love will keep us from blinding of the eyes
Silence in the ears, darkness of the mind
He brings these forward in such an evocative way. After writing “Always,” which then influenced “Godspeed,” which then led to this cover, Blake somehow manages to milk more tears out of this song. I respect that and I hate him for it.
Slowthai
Feel Away (feat. James Blake and Mount Kimbie)
Boy, I’ve really been on my James Blake shit lately. ‘Tis the season, I guess. This latest cut from Slowthai veers from the (slightly unconvincing) edgy sound of his latest singles, instead using James Blake and Mount Kimbie as set-pieces for an ~emotional song~, one which he wrote on Instagram was dedicated to his late younger brother. The song itself is about dedication and mistakes in a relationship, but the message is muddled and inconsistent between Slowthai’s and James Blake’s verses. The two do sound good together, though, and Mount Kimbie’s production, especially in the outro, is compelling enough to drive the song.
Chris Keys and Quelle Chris
Graphic Bleed Outs
Now this is how you write a sad song. Well, it’s not really a sad song; “Graphic Bleed Outs” is bittersweet, a resignation to, as Quelle Chris says, “Let it out and, if need be, let it be.” I’ve arrived a bit late to this latest collaborative album between producer Chris Keys and rapper Quelle Chris, but I’ve really latched onto it, especially “Graphic Bleed Outs.”
The title of the song alludes to its overall motif of cuts and bleeding, one that the Innocent Country duo, along with the devastatingly beautiful vocals from Merill Garbus, use to illustrate the wounds and healing that come from betrayal and bygone friendships. Instead of juxtaposing beauty and sadness, the song sews them together, positing that both are not only coexistent but codependent. Garbus sings, accompanied by tranquil flute (slight content warning):
You knew me best and so you hurt me the worst.
You slid the knife inside my lungs until they burst.
You cut me like a knife, cut me like a knife.
Oh, what happened to us? (2x)
Oh my love, what a cut, what a cut, what a cut.
Quelle Chris’s rapping is deft, too, packed with complex rhyme schemes without sounding rappity-rappy and nostalgic without sounding dewy-eyed.
More than anything, “Graphic Bleed Outs” is a moving-on song, one that allows for the wallowing that I write about above while also providing the support of the friend who might say, “Fuck that guy, he wasn’t any good for you anyway.” Moving on is a difficult, complex process, but often one has to confront and embrace the fact that, after a wound, there will always be a scar, one that might even remind you of happier times.
Spillage Village
Hapi
As Sad Girl September comes to an end, it’s always important to remember that there are, despite what we might see around us, good things to come. In general, I’m not a huge fan of the folk-rap sound that the Spillage Village collective has laced throughout their latest album, Spilligion, but there is something undeniable about this, the last song on the album. It sounds like a lifting of voices during a sunrise service; the group’s many moving parts, which often end up sounding like too many cooks are in the proverbial kitchen, actually work here: “Hapi” is a little cobbled-together, but there’s a value in that. Mereba and Benji both bring great verses to the table, complete with different instrumentation during each, and EARTHGANG’s Olu adds his usual ambitious gospel flavor.
The highlight, at least for me, in this track is Big Rube’s spoken word at the end of the song. If you include the poet and Dungeon Family member on a track, I’m almost guaranteed to like it; “13th Floor/Growing Old” is one of my favorite songs of all time, and Big Rube’s introduction in “13th Floor” is undeniably one of the best incorporations of spoken word in any rap song.
His “benediction,” which is truly what the verse feels like, leaves the listener with a message to go and be free. It’s an insistence that there is a light of hope in dark times, that we have inherent freedom inside of us. Big Rube looks back on his own work, reminding us that progress towards freedom is a marathon, not a sprint:
So I write life's lines,
Correction, my lines write life,
Correction, my life lines right up
When serving' my purpose to write and recite what touches
And sights ignite that unites us
So we can finally stop runnin'
from freedom.
You can listen to the entire playlist for September 2020 here: