i really have nothing better to do but rec music

I've talked about how I have to do mandatory playlist updates to avoid the most terrible of all problems for someone who uses music like recreational drugs to get a good high; too long, my ear and taste harden and it gets hard to get into anything new.

The first and best way is going on a vid-watching kick in any fandom I'm vaguely conversant with or involves hot people and if possible, leather. Fanvidders are revolutionaries when it comes to this; they can and have taken a song I thought I hated, created a visual storyline and theme for it, and suddenly it works for me; I understand it. This also has the benefit of expanding that liking into all music like it, which is why I have an Amazon Unlimited Subscription to avoid dying in poverty surrounded by terabyte of music files.

The second and chancier way is to use TV shows that have someone on staff who has at least a vague inkling--not understanding, they're not fanvidders and so I have to lower my expectations appropriately, just an inkling--that it's just not just combining music with pretty moving pictures.

(I mean, you're not going to get a sisabet level piece of masterclass art here. I don't expect them to be able to vid Brian Kinney and the cast of Queer as Folk's season three plotline to "Whiskey for my men and beer for my horses" and convince you it's the only song that could possibly fit plotline and theme. If you haven't seen season three Queer as Folk or know who Brian Kinney is, you cannot appreciate how terrifyingly sincere I am when I say that.

Unrelated: is there a word that encompasses the concept of 'stockholm syndrome' but with vidders? Just curious.)

However. It does work. Sometimes. So the playlist below is mostly the result of multiple Bones marathons, the latest season of Lucifer and Another Life. Oh, and apparently Hawaii 5-0.



Current Playlist Name: Uncertain Melody

Jupiter 4, Sharon Van Atten - Another Life, Katee being angsty is my jam.
Wiseblood (Johnny Jewel Remix), Zola Jesus & Johnny Jewel - Another Life, and this one makes me want to check out the artist.
Ashes, Claire Guerreso - Lucifer, aka the song we watched Charlotte die to and I cried during three separate watches of that scene (and downloaded a youtube clip of the entire end sequence so I could get straight to the agony without having to fast forward. Jesus, something is wrong with me).
Keep the Streets Empty For Me, Fever Ray

Okay, yeah, this requires an explanation.

This song is played season sixish on Bones when we're waiting to see who will be shot by the sniper and we scroll through the cast all happy living their lives so yeah, I was hooked on the song (and sad when Vincent died). That does not in any way imply I had any idea what the song was about, and this is where I explain something.

Apparently, about three to five listens is all it takes for me to memorize lyrics but only under this condition: I cannot be actively listening to the song aka I'm writing, coding, etc, but my attention has to be somewhere else. This is an automatic function I can't control; if I want to consciously do it and remember it, it takes time and reading the lyrics a lot and I won't retain them unless I listen regularly while auto seem to keep them for quite a bit longer.

More importantly, for reasons brain, all automemorized lyrics are stored fuck knows where but can be accessed under the following conditions: a.) i'm not actively listening to the song aka I'm doing something else and b.) I start singing along, which apparently I do way more often that I used to think. I can't do it on purpose or think about it; it kind of just happens if the song comes on and I feel like singing.

(This can be super awkward, especially if you're at work, wearing headphones, and have Adam Lambert's For Your Entertainment on repeat. Or go through a really questionable Rob Zombie/Pucifer phase. Or Divinyls, fuck my life.)

Now, about two or three weeks after downloading this song, I was on break and writing outside and for once I did realize I was singing--at which time all lyrics vanished because what the fuck is wrong with my brain?--and I switched into active listening around the time she talked about licking her fur after eating snow.

I keep thinking I should maybe actively look up the lyrics and realize what I'm probably singing for passing coworkers when I'm on break one day but truthfully, I don't want to know what this song is about. I will sing it again, and honestly, better not to know.

The Gilded Hand, Radical Face - actually, I have no idea why this is on this playlist (or any memory of downloading it), but here we are. Fuck it, Sweets' body brought back to the Jeffersonian for autopsy. Now I'm rewatching on youtube because I am an idiot. Oh Sweets.
In the Air Tonight, Natalie Taylor - Lucifer driving frantically looking angsty.
Unsteady, X Ambassadors - this song is proof of something I didn't realize was possible. I loved it, it was overplayed and I learned to hate it, X Ambassadors, and all their works forever. Apparently, all can be made new again if you play it while watching Amenadiel standing bravely at a hospital door and fighting off security and Lucifer is frantically dashing through the halls. This has never happened to me before. Yay?
Possibility Days, Counting Crows - I am like ninety percent sure my roommate had this album because I caught myself singing along right after I downloading it because my brain forgets where my phone is (in my hand) but a song I last heard twenty something years ago, that shit I keep.

Comments

[out_there]

Sometimes I imprint heavily on a heard song. The first song we hear on Lucifer caught my attention and I ended up listening to it on repeat for days. (Cage the Elephant - Aint no rest for the wicked)