Mixtapemotions

  • "Brand New Day" by Kodaline, Thursday, January 6, 2021

    I was in coffee shop in Sinsa, a neighborhood near Gangnam in Seoul, when I first heard Kodaline. The Irish band’s debut album, In a Perfect World and the EPs containing different versions of songs from around that time were perfect for a cup of coffee. Subsequent albums have made the band sound like they were striving to be another Coldplay, but they got it right the first time on their debut. I’m recommending the acoustic version of “Brand New Day,” featuring Nina Nesbitt.


    I WANNA TRAVEL THE WOLD, BUT I JUST CAN’T DO IT ALONE. The lyrics of “Brand New Day” talk about “outgrowing your hometown” and wanting to “travel the world” with someone. As someone who could be said to be (still) on that journey, I remember the feelings of travel thirst. I got to the end of my bachelor’s degree and thought about the constraints of going back home to North Carolina. I thought about how it would be a few years of struggle in a career before buying a house. I thought about my very few trips overseas and how I wanted to get out of America and experience other cultures. I wanted to get away from the people I knew and form new patterns and figure out who I am. So many friends who were older than me told me to do it. “When you settle you get roots, and it’s much harder to leave when you have the responsibilities of a mortgage and kids.” So I went to South Korea. And I started building roots here. It’s not exactly what I had in mind, but I’m enjoying life and learning something new every day that my younger self would never foresee myself doing.

    WE COULD BE BIG IN JAPAN. While it’s nice to be nostalgic, this song also pushes me forward, but not in a way that makes me question my life decisions (have you really quenched your travel thirst?). It’s a brand new year full of possibilities. I felt that way last year and was off to a good start around this time. What’s different? I know how crappy things can get. We’re still in the middle of a pandemic. There’s hope of a vaccine, but anything else could go wrong. But I start to think about the things that I have control over. I may not be able to go home to America for a while or travel to other countries, but I have my teaching skills. I can work on my goals. I can truly embrace my introverted nature and be creative (at home!). I’m waiting on a brand new day, but I’ve got a plan b until it stops raining.

    Album version Music Video/ Acoustic version featuring Nina Nesbitt:

  • Believer by Cyn, January 5, 2021

     “Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!”

    Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.’” (John 20:28, 29)

    MISSIONARY POSITIONS: Before work, I listened to this song and then I overheard a conversation at work. I work with two very different coworkers. I will call them Philosopher and Church Lady. They normally are civil to each other, but there are times that they can be slightly antagonistic about their beliefs. Today was one of those days. The discussion somehow came upon similarities between Buddhism and Jesus’s teachings. The Philosopher said, “There’s talk that Jesus spent some of his years in India.” To which, Church Lady said flatly, “No, the Bible doesn’t say that.” “But some people believe this…” “They’re wrong. The Bible is clear.” “No, it’s not. What happened during the missing years?” “Jesus went to the temple. He ‘grew in wisdom, stature, and in favor with God and men.’” Back and forth and back and forth. 

    MAKE ME A BELIEVER: This song is not about faith in God, but about faith in love. But the metaphor bated me. I thought about the evangelist’s dream of an agnostic who doesn’t believe but could be persuaded. Church folks “hungry for souls” would descend upon this person and make her a believer. I grew up evangelistic series after series pulling in lots of people for usually a short time. Usually these people 1) were of some similar religious background 2) had some kind of need that they found was satisfied with the church 3) and didn’t examine nuanced issues about science, race, politics, sexuality, or gender, and when they did, they didn’t stick around. 

    THE HERESY OF QUESTIONING: Jesus told Thomas, blessed are those who believe who have not seen, and I wonder more and more what that means. I once heard that Jesus didn’t actually scold Thomas for wanting proof. In many ways we all need proof for whatever we believe. I believe that people truly have faith in nothing. I was raised as a Christian and I believe many of the tenants and have shed others, but a large part of that is having grown up in a faith tradition. I’m not sure if I’m part of the blessed who believe without seeing because in many ways I have experience God. But I tend to side more with Philosopher than Church Lady because I can’t answer the question, nor do I think it’s relevant to say that someone else’s experience in another faith tradition is invalid.

    LIVE YOUR TRUTH: Ultimately, I want to live in a way that is positive for myself. I want to support others in their believe or non-belief. Whatever puts more love out into the universe is what I believe in. 

    But seriously, isn’t this song a banger?

  • “Futures” by Jimmy Eat World, Monday, January 4, 2021

    Let’s call this part two of yesterday’s post. I’d like to quote a few lines and dissect them. This is my view imposed on the song. “Why is it so hard to find the balance/ between the cold and real?” I started to think of this song as the futures contract market. I don’t really have a mind for economics, but as far as I can tell the futures contracts are bid on in hopes that the venture will make money and that the economy will be good. But it doesn’t always work out, like the housing crisis in 2008 or the current pandemic. Future markets bid on the fact that the economy is going to be as good as it is as the time the venture starts. Throw in a few misguided or bad actors who have access to our pension and retirement funds (Enron?) and we get ourselves into a real problem. 

    HOPE FOR BETTER, IN NOVEMBER. I get very depressed whenever I think about money. My generation is pretty screwed and all I can rely on is keeping a job and making the payments to pay off my student loans. I’m thankful for my job teaching English overseas, but it seems so unlikely that I will be able to teach middle or high school in America and have the nice things I have here. The American system is broken, and it’s left my generation broke. This song is political. At the time of its release, The Bush administration was allowing big business to screw with our futures, cut our jobs, and give themselves a raise. Three years later the housing crisis happened. Change hands with Obama, and now there’s Trump. Nothing changes. The middle class gets smaller and smaller. 

    SAY HELLO TO GOOD TIMES. Jimmy Eat World is a pop-punk band with a political message. Peaking in 2001 with their album Bleed American ( which was omitted from the cover post-9/11) and followed up with Futures, Jim Atkins talk politics without being preachy–unlike me in the first few paragraphs. Many say that rock is dead. Generation Z is killing rock. That may be true, but the breeding for punk (and literature for that matter) is stronger than ever. Income disparity will keep punk rock alive.

  • Age -From the Airport January 3, 2021

    From the Airport is a South Korean electronic rock duo, consisting of vocalist Milo and guitarist Zee. About 90% of their songs are in English. They have two full-length records and they seemed to have disappeared after the release of 2017’s The Boy Who Jumped.  Drawing a comparison of this band is difficult. They definitely have pop influences. The keys and the guitar production is atmospheric, causing a pensive nature in the songs, yet Milo’s lyrics, while often simple, are positive and combined with his vocal pattern and high-range vocals keep the songs light and optimistic. It’s like if Falling Up were less moody and poppier. 

    WISDOM SHALL SHOW. I picked this song for a few reasons. First, it struck me as I was walking home today. I like to pick a song for the day that I listened to authentically, like it came up naturally on shuffle; however, that doesn’t always happen. Another reason was that I wanted to write about this band and introduce them. But the biggest reason was the opening lyrics. “Was it just yesterday? Has it been a season’s turn?” In South Korea, New Years Day is important because it’s one of your birthdays. I don’t really want to explain the system, so I’ll refer you to a video by Talk To Me In Korean.  Koreans celebrate the New Year as the year you will turn your age. Age is important in Korea because with age comes more  respect from younger people. This doesn’t always work out, but it’s Confucian ideal taught in school. There’s often a camaraderie between strangers of the same age. There’s nothing quite like it, but I think of it like you went to a huge high school and you bump into an alumnus who says they also went to your school. It’s much easier to say the age you born in South Korea than to say your age. 

    ABOUT TIME. In the most concrete way, January 1st marks the beginning of the year. We are now in the third day of the new year, and that year is 2021. If I were to say that number when I was a kid, I would say, “the world will probably have ended by then,” or I would imagine myself unrealistically rich and maybe famous for something. When I was a kid, big numbers didn’t seem to register. Just last year, I started to feel a sense of urgency to do something with my life as the calendar turned to 2020. Just to think 21 years ago we thought that all of the computers would crash and we would be living in some apocalyptic zombie-less film. 

    A BLOG ABOUT NOSTALGIA.  I chose not to write very much about this song today. I’d rather react to it. Now my thoughts turn to my age. At 33, or 35? (1987). I’d say I’m pretty happy with my life choices, but I’m still shocked to be here in the future. I’m worried to think about the next 33 years. NASA’s always finding more near earth objects getting uncomfortably close to Earth. Climate change is really starting to become a thing. Who would have thought that the world’s travel industries would have shut down for almost a year? Still, I believe there’s hope. There’s so many good people I know and love and I hope to be with them in 33 years as we wonder where the time went.

    https://music.apple.com/us/album/age/1493346356?i=1493346576

     

  • "I Will Rest in You"-Jaci Valesquez January 2, 2021

     

    Streams is a unique Contemporary Christian concept album from 1999. Featuring nine songs with some of the Christian music industry’s forefront artists at the time and a couple of head-scratchers from Classic rock including Michael MacDonald (The Doobie Brothers), Jon Anderson (Yes), and a song written by Peter Gabriel. I bought this album for my mom, who loved the Jon Anderson/4Him duet. There are few songs from this album I still listen to, even though my musical diet only consists of CCM when I listen to Good Christian Fun. The production of this album is amazing. It seems that this kind of album is a pause in the so-called culture war. Evil rock musicians laid down their Satanic lyrics of anarchy and the heavenly choir of saints,  in a lapse of judgement, succumbed to the the New Age message of unity and created an album to deceive the very elect…no, I don’t actually believe any other that, but it’s something I may have heard from the crazy church people growing up. 

    I WILL REST IN YOU is a song performed by Jaci Velazquez, who was at the peak of her career. Velazquez was young and pretty. Her music was very churchy and rarely upbeat, except for when she brought Latin into the CCM realm. MUSICAL NOTES: This song is a piano ballad which starts out with Velazquez singing in an almost childlike calm, but builds up to some powerful vocals by the last chorus. THE LYRICS of this song talk about a transition from a childlike faith to a deeper understanding. When I started re-listening to this album last year, I was struck by the “God/boyfriend” comparisons that often corrupt pure-intentioned songs. God watches over you when you’re a little child and you mature into the “greater faith prepared for [you].” 

    WHY I CHOSE THIS SONG: After the most turbulent year in most of our lives, everyone is welcoming in the new year. Every month seemed to pile on something new and terrible for the world, as if we were all stuck on a treadmill that raised it’s speed every month. I’m not so naive to believe that it’s over, but what I’ve found is that it’s important to value the rest whenever you can. Personally, I’m hesitant to call myself a Christian, but I do believe that God can give us rest. We have to seek it. In the first Sabbath of 2021, I’m reminded to take that rest because the treadmill will probably decide to level up pretty soon.

  • "New Year's Day" by U2, Friday, January 1, 2021

    U2’s third album, War, brought the band a number 1 album in the UK, dethroning the King of Pop’s Thriller. Previously the band wrote songs about growing up and spirituality, but, according to lead singer Bono, “War seemed the be the motif in 1982.” Hence, the band released War on February 28, 1983. Many of the tracks on the album were inspired by the socio-political issues in the band’s home country of Ireland, namely The Troubles, the conflict between Catholics and Protestants physically dividing the island. However, the album delves into other political subjects in a time when the world seemed divided during the Cold War. And this ’80s zeitgeist album seems all the more relevant today.

    I WILL BE WITH YOU AGAIN.  Prior to the album’s release, U2 issued their first single on January 1, 1983, what would be the third track on their breakthrough album. The Post-Punk, New Wave keyboards meeting the now signature delayed, clicky guitars of David Howell Evans, better known by his stage name, The Edge set a backdrop for Paul David Hewson, a.k.a. Bono, to lay his the visceral imagery of something happening. A newly wed, Bono started writing the song about his wife as a love song; however, the song took a political turn when he was inspired by the news of Polish Solidarity Movement, the organization of a labor union that helped lead to the end of Communism in Poland. Even among their vast discography, “New Year’s Day” was, as of 2019, the band’s seventh most performed track. “New Year’s Day” was the band’s first international hit, paving the way for “Sunday, Bloody Sunday,” a song about The Troubles that would be the album’s third single, and an even bigger hit, as well as the band’s biggest fifth album, Joshua Tree in 1987. Though the band would go on and refine their sound with the legendary producer Brian Eno, it’s the raw War album that is my favorite portrait of a band as young revolutionaries. 

    NOTHING CHANGES ON NEW YEAR’S DAY.  We expect change to happen at the turn of a calendar, but the fact is that minute changes are happening constantly, so small that we can’t even sense them. Coming out of the most unprecedented year in my lifetime, we could look very hard to see that something was coming, but most of us were just living our lives. Another line that seems particularly true is the opener “All is quiet on New Year’s Day.” New Year’s Day is anticlimactic. In a good year, I would have eaten too much, starting from Halloween. I would have spent time with friends. In Korea, good friends have end-of-year meet ups where they go out drinking and remembering the good times. However, after staying up and watching the ball drop or the bell ring, or in Korea, watch the sunrise, the holiday season comes to a close. Unless of course if you call Valentine’s Day part of the holiday season. My memories of New Year’s Day: dishes on the table from the night before and a messy house to clean up. Eating leftovers from Christmas and New Year’s Eve. New Year’s Day is the time when we finalize our goals that we will likely abandon in 3 weeks. 


    Let’s hope for a better 2021 starting with a quiet New Year’s Day.

  • 2019-2020

     Before we start the 2021 NewYearsDay Project, you may want to see the playlists for the last two years. 2019 doesn’t have playlists for all months as the project failed that year. All playlists are in Apple Music and some of the songs may not be on Apple Music because I found the songs on YouTube instead.

    2019                                                                   2020            

    January   (AppleMusic)                    January    (<a href="”>AppleMusic) 

    February (<a href="”>AppleMusic)                  February    (<a href="”>AppleMusic)

    March     (<a href="”>AppleMusic)                   March        (<a href="”>AppleMusic) 

    April                                                 April        (<a href="”>AppleMusic) 

    May                                                  May        (<a href="”>AppleMusic) 

    June       (AppleMusic)                     June        (<a href="”>AppleMusic) 

    July                                                  July        (<a href="”>AppleMusic) 

    August   (<a href="”>AppleMusic)                    August     (<a href="”>AppleMusic) 

    September                                        September    (AppleMusic)

    October      (<a href="”>AppleMusic)               October        (AppleMusic) 

    November  (<a href="”>AppleMusic)                November    (AppleMusic) 

    December   (<a href="”>AppleMusic)              December    (AppleMusic) 

  • What is the NewYearsDay Project?

    I am setting out for the year of 2021 to create a 365 song playlist. I’m currently experimenting in the year 2020 with formats and genres. The songs are based on my feeling for the day, commemorating a day based on the lyrics, songs fitting into a particular season, or simply the most notable song I listened to that day.

    My blog NewYearsDay Project comes from the first song of every year, “New Years Day” by U2. The idea was to make a playlist of songs that puts the listener in the mood for the month. I’ll leave links for my general monthly playlist and the specific playlists from last year.  You can expect to see an eclectic mix of music. You’ll hear everything from folk to hardcore to pop. My goal is not to be up on the latest releases; however, sometimes they may make to my list.

    Before I start the NewYearsProject I should lay down a few confines I’ll try to adhere to. 

    1) One main artist per month. For example one anberlin song per month.

    2) An artist may appear multiple times as a guest/featured artist with another main artists. For example Troye Sivan’s “Dance to This” ft. Ariana Grande doesn’t disqualify Ariana Grande’s “No Tears Left to Cry” from appearing later that month. 

    3) Songs must contain lyrics.

    4) I will try to provide and English translation for Kpop (or Spanish, German, etc) songs that appear on the list. 

    5) I will try to leave readers with useful links to music videos, news articles, podcasts, etc.

    6) I’ll try to stick to about 500 words on each blog post. 

    7) I’ll write about myself and my history with the song/artist/album, etc. So please bear with the personal stories.

    8) I’ll try to link you to my YouTube and Apple Music playlist. Some songs may be available only on YouTube, particularly if it’s a cover that really struck me. I don’t have Spotify, but I’d welcome any reader to start a list.

    Now some disclaimers for my haters–this is me pretending like I’ll have readers 🙂

    1) My musical taste is eclectic. Feel free to disagree respectfully.  

    2) Things may get personal. I need to be able to write about anything on my mind without censoring to my audience. I want to reveal myself and my beliefs organically as the writing prompts me. I try to write respectfully toward others. I will not use the real names of people, places, or institutions unrelated to the music. 

    3) Big disclaimer: My views do not necessarily reflect the views of the artists I write about.  There’s going to be some problematic songs on this list and they will have been catchy enough for me to write about them. I fully disagree with them, but the song still has relevance to the day.