Mixtapemotions

  • “Letter to Myself” by Furthermore, Saturday, January 14, 2023 (repost)













    One of the often forgotten RadioU minor groups, Furthermore  was another group that only released two records, 1999’s  Fluorescent Jellyfish and 2003’s She and I. Furthermore was a trio consisting of vocalists Daniel Fisher and Lee Jester and DJ Jason Jester. The group arrived on the precipice of Tooth & Nail Records‘ golden age and left the roster shortly after releasing She and I. Fisher went on to play in several bands, and apparently released several other projects under Furthermore after the group’s Tooth & Nail run, including a single in 2020 and several singles earlier this year. 

    BEFORE YOU SAY GOODBYE. Furthermore is a vestige of when Tooth & Nail signed artists without thinking about the financial consequences. Christian Rap was a burgeoning market for Christian audiences, but rock, punk, and hard music eventually became much of the label’s focus. Christian Rap tended to be more evangelistic, whereas many of the rock bands tended to less focused on evangelism. Furthermore certainly wasn’t to everyone’s taste; Christian labels pushed far too many Eminem-influenced groups and far too few black Christian rappers in the early ’00s. Like many of Tooth & Nail’s odd-ball-out musical acts, Furthermore was sent on tour to open for punk bands like All Wound Up and The Dingees. Furthermore clearly has rock influences–guitar and keys lay the backdrop for Fisher’s rapping as does Lee’s singing. The tracks on Fluorescent Jellyfish aren’t too serious. Their standout track “Are You the Walrus?” which has a video illustrating the song is a humorous song about going to grocery store and the speaker being mistaken for a Beatles-esque guru. She and I, though, while also containing light-hearted lyrics, deals more with serious relationships, domestic violence, and mental health. 

    A RELATIONSHIP MAY SAVE YOU, OR ENSLAVE YOU. COUNT ON BOTH TO HAPPEN. “Letter to Myself” is a bit clunky as a rap track at the beginning, but there is something about this pre-Emo rap track that brings me back to 2003. It sounds like a modified English class assignment: to write a letter to yourself to read when you are XX age. The lyrics of the song deal with falling in love and dealing with depression, and the lyrics read as a reminder for the speaker to stay grounded. The lyrics could even be read as a suicide prevention note. But listening back to the lyrics, it’s interesting that as a Christian Rock hit how the focus of the song is about the speaker grounding himself and watching out for himself, rather than reaching out to a higher power, and I completely missed that as a 14-year-old. I think back to the letters to myself, the embarrassing composition notebooks of half-written poems and song lyrics and guitar chords. I think about how important my faith was to those letters and how different everything is now. I don’t have those notebooks anymore because they’re not something I brought with me to Korea. However, I would like to look over them this winter when I go in a few weeks. I wonder how shocked 14-year-old Tyler would think of 35-year-old Tyler.

    Read “Letter to Myself” by Furthermore on Genius.


  • "Tell Me How" by Paramore, Friday, January 13, 2023 (Updated Repost)

     2017’s After Laughter is arguably the best Paramore record both lyrically and musically. Musically, it’s a pop album borrowing synths from the ’80s, interesting drum arrangement, and some pensive guitars here and there. And although most songs are in major keys, lead singer and lyricist Haley Williams masterfully disguises some of the band’s darkest lyrics with smiles and summertime vibes. The name of the album itself is telling. Haley Williams explains that the meaning is the expression the faces of a room full of people stop laughing. Smiles start to fade, maybe some tears are wiped away. While you may debate whether this band fits into their emo punk rock sound, the lyrics are an unadulterated emotional roller coaster.

    I CAN’T CALL YOU A STRANGER, BUT I CAN’T CALL YOU.  Winter days are the time for last tracks of the album. Cold days indoors with instrumentals make you reflect on life and relationships. As a piano ballad, “Tell Me How” doesn’t pretend to be happy, like most of the rest of the album. While other telling tracks like “Rose-Colored Boy,” “Fake Happy” and Pool” show this beautiful confusion between being the life of the party and dealing with other things inside, “Tell Me How” is a reflective track that drops the pretense of the party. It’s the song for sweeping up the broken bottles and weeping about the fact that the party didn’t solve any of the problems–just hid them for an evening. With lyrics that reference the lawsuits and turmoil that the band had been through as well as the personal cost of losing friendships over differences of opinions, Williams speaks her truth, and it’s a story that’s all too relatable. I wrote about the Paramore controversy several time, but the song that I had chosen was before the great disagreement and the lawsuits took place. This song is the last song on the latest Paramore record, which is basically a war story. The contributors at Genius Lyrics do a great job breaking down the lyrics of this song with quotes from both parties. When a relationship sours, there’s no real healing.

    YOU MAY HATE ME, BUT I CAN’T HATE YOU. “Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you,  leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift” (Matthew 5:23-23). This song reminds me of a sermon I heard growing up based on this passage. The pastor said that if you can’t settle your disagreement, you are not ready for heaven. This bothered me to the core. What was even more disturbing was that the people who agreed this message the most had a blindspot for resenting a neighbor or family member. I want to live as a peacemaker, but sides in a disagreement can’t always be glossed over. Sometimes the reconciliation with a brother or sister takes years and the sacrifice sits at the altar for years. “I’ve got my convictions, [and you’ve got yours]… and no one’s winning. Tell me how I’m supposed to feel about you now?” The outro ends the song with some hope, as if Williams comes to a moment of realization that friends don’t have to make up, but that letting go of the hard feeling is freeing. 



  • "Everybody Wants to Rule the World" by Tears for Fears, Thursday, January 12, 2023

    I’ve talked about “Shout” and “Head over Heels,” but neither of those massive hits is the most remembered song from the post-punk band Tears for Fears. You’re unlikely to hear a track from their follow-up to Songs from the Big Chair in the grocery store, not the album’s title track that is subtly about ejaculation, “Sowing the Seeds of Love.” Nor would you hear the later Gary Jules–covered “Mad World” for the film Donnie Darko and featured on every nighttime drama from Tears for Fears’ first album. “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” is Tears for Fears’ biggest song, yet the lyrics seem to contradict the easy melody of the song, making it slightly misunderstood. 
     

    ONE HEADLINE, WHY BELIEVE IT?  The syncopated guitar riff, the airy keys, and the somewhat chill vocals of “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” act as a siren song, distracting listeners from the truly sinister theme of the song. Lyrics that sound like they could have been lifted from George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four wrap around the repeated title hook: “Everybody wants to rule the world.” But if you are my age or younger, the doomsday theme of the song failed to sink in as we were listening to the song while choosing a coffee in aisle 13. I loved maps and the globe when I was growing up, but in the late ’80s and early ’90s, the boundaries changed significantly. The Soviet Union was no more. Germany was reunited. Zaire became the Democratic Republic of Congo. Czechoslovakia split. Communism was crushed by American democracy and all was peaceful and right with the world. Until 9/11. But those ten years between the end of the Soviet Union and 9/11 gave my generation ten years of a childhood free of the fear of nuclear war–something my parents’ generation and grandparents’ generation lived with. Nuclear war seemed theoretical, but it seems that generations before me saw it as a real threat. 

    THERE’S A ROOM A ROOM WHERE THE LIGHT WON’T FIND YOU. But today, nuclear war seems more and more likely with Russia’s revived interest in getting the old gang back together. But perhaps this fear of nuclear war comes from more provocative world leaders playing to the voyeuristic urges of the public that views news as entertainment. Who hasn’t written about the antigens in the blood of democracy after shocking election outcomes in the mid-’10s? But the heart of “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” is just that everyone thinks that they could do a better job. Everybody thinks that they will be the leader who gets a different outcome. And today, in America and other countries, elected officials have shed the belief in self-governance by the people. Instead, there should be a list of rules to micromanage the public. Maybe you see this at work, too. If you have a work ethic and know your job fairly well–fully trained–you can find something to do and maybe do it well. A supervisor can share a vision, take feedback from well-trained constituents, and hold meetings to discuss the progress of the product. But sometimes, the supervisor has another agenda and would rather tell you exactly what to do, step by step. The product you are creating is being dictated to you and you are in no way part of that product, just a machine in its assembly. Which situation breeds better workers? The supervisor who holds the information uses it as a weapon against the workers. And that’s how you get a work environment where you say, “I could do her job, only better!” Indeed everybody wants to rule. 

  • "Brand New Day" (acoustic) by Kodaline ft. Nina Nesbitt, Wednesday, January 11, 2023 (updated repost)

    I was in a 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 WORLD, 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 form new patterns and figure out who I was. 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 establishing 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. My best years may be behind me. I mourn every day for the experiences I never had as a teenager or young adult. But that’s not to say that life has a limit on awesome experiences. Recently, I got on a plane for the first time in three years to go to Jeju, the Korean vacation destination. In ten years it’s been on my bucket list, but the barrier of getting on a plane and making a plan inhibited me from actually doing it. And I think about the opportunities I’ve missed because I was thinking about the logistics of them–an awesome layover in Seattle or San Francisco and most recently Munich or Frankfort. I’m so done with being ruled by the fear of enjoying myself. I’m so done with the guilt that I feel when I start to let myself go. I hope for a future in which I find myself drinking Rioja in Spain, admiring the sartorial aesthetics in Austria, nervously attending a fetish party in Germany if nothing more to engage in some voyeurism. Life is a series of brand-new days. It’s time not to waste them. 

    Album version Music Video: 

    Acoustic version featuring Nina Nesbitt:


    Read the lyrics on Genius.

     

  • "I Am For You" by Waking Ashland, Tuesday, January 10, 2023

     

    Waking Ashland was a band signed first to Tooth & Nail Records then Immortal Records. The band release two records, Composure in 2005 and The Well in 2007 before disbanding. Lead singer Jonathan Jones went on to form the band We Shot the Moon with two members from Sherwood, Dan Koch and Joe Greenetz, who also played in Waking Ashland. As for Waking Ashland, Composure was a sleeper hit on Tooth & Nail Records similar to Watashi Wa‘s music. The two bands both relied on calmer, often organic sounds that failed to garner the audience to compete with the harder bands the label steered toward in the mid-’00s. 

    TO PROVE WE’RE SOMETHING, BUT WE’RE STARVING. Another comparison between Waking Ashland and Watashi Wa is that both bands went on to form other bands, moving from Tooth & Nail Records to the now defunct, often calmer emo label The Militia Group. In Watashi Wa’s case, the band formed first Eager Seas and then Lakes. Interestingly Tooth & Nail became the home of one of The Militia Group’s most successful indie bands despite them not being the pop-punk or hardcore sound that most succeeded on Tooth & Nail Records. That band was Copeland, and perhaps it was underdog releases by Watashi Wa and Wasking Ashland that had softened the ears of the label for Copeland to release their 2008 masterpiece, You Are My Sunshine. Perhaps it was the forgotten indie record of singable melodies and piano rock on tracks like “Shades of Grey” or the propensity on songs like “Rumors” or the colorful perennial favorite  “October Skies” that prepared Tooth & Nail for Copeland.  This of course is in no way to diminish the accomplishments or talents of Copeland, but it is interesting to see how it took Copeland to bring the scene to soft music, though they weren’t the only ones playing it.

    DON’T GIVE UP, JUST KEEP SEEKING. “I Am For You,” has a musical comparison with the next track “Rumors,” and perhaps they are lyrically related. Whereas “I Am For You” has a driving piano melody, “Rumors” starts out with a frantic piano line. “I Am For You” is a kind of dying of passion, like Romeo and Juliet overcame their familial conflict, but in defeating the conflict they lost the spark in their marriage. “Rumors,” on the other hand, is all spark and conflict too. The songs in similar keys and similar musical textures seem to tell two conflicts in a romance: “your heart is frozen over” and “I’ve heard all of rumors; they all were true.” The joys and sorrows of relationships come in ebbs and flows. It’s unrealistic to be euphoric all the time. Not every day is main stage at Lollapalooza; some days are just about sitting on the tour bus. What causes our hearts to lose desire? Maybe we think that we can do better–that maybe we are entitled to better. I think I deserve arugula, but it turns out that I’m really just day old iceberg. I’m glad 2018 is over. 

  • “Good Morning Fire Eater” by Copeland, Monday, January 9, 2023 (updated repost)

     

    It’s difficult to pick a single track from You Are My Sunshine to represent a specific feeling. Although Copeland released the record in the fall of 2008, my first year off at college, it was really the dead of winter of 2009 that has burned this record into my memory. The winter of 2009 was particularly cold, even for East Tennessee. There were lots of gray days which had nothing particularly special but Easy Mac and fresh laundry. Saturday nights or Sundays some friends would drive into Chattanooga for dinner and then we’d just go back to the dorm to do our homework. Rather mundane stuff. This album was a soundtrack to those gray days. Songs like “Should You Return” was a song of hope that spring would finally come. “The Grey Man” was a song about wallowing in the uncertainty of things ever looking up. “Chin Up” was a melancholic song about the futility of trying too hard–though the song never actually makes you want to give up. 

    I’M AFRAID YOU STOPPED TO LICK YOUR WOUNDS. Then the flu struck in the middle of sixteen credit hours. A high fever. I couldn’t get out of bed for a couple of days. A couple of missed classes and a bunch of homework to catch up on, a nagging cough that lasted for at least a month. Songs like “The Day I Lost My Voice” and some other songs from the second half of the album really resonate with that time. And yet, I don’t hold any grudges to this album. I can still listen to it and fondly think of the time that I could be sick in bed, comforted by Aaron Marsh‘s voice and the collaboration with Aaron Sprinkle.

    THE KINDEST LOVE IS STILL BLEEDING FROM THE LAST SHOT. So, today’s song is “Good Morning Fire Eater.” Rather than the You Are My Sunshine version, I chose the remake from last year’s Revolving Doors, a ten-track reimagined Copeland album complete with orchestration. The original version was illustrated through the music video: a mundane day in the office transformed into a pseudo-medieval battle. The Revolving Doors version starts out akin to the original version, relying on programming but slowly adds orchestration. Today’s song celebrates the slow feeling of simple days. For me today, it’s my last day of a trip to Jeju and the weather is moody. It’s a great day to sit inside a cafe, and “Good Morning Fire Eater” could be the soundtrack. Tomorrow it’s back to work, back to writing for me. 

    You Are My Sunshine version:

    Revolving Doors version:

  • “Don’t Want to Feel It All” by White Lies, Sunday, January 8, 2023 (updated repost)

     Following up their 2013 album Big TV, West-London-based post-punk band White Lies released their fourth album Friends in 2016. The album continues on the band’s homage to the ’80s, though the synths are not always as prominent as their first and third albums. Lyrical themes deal with friendship deterioration, alienation, and loneliness, yet the ebullience of the music often disguises the sadness in the lyrics.

    NO, I’M NOT GOING TO BREAK YOUR HEART. White Lies started their career on a high note in the UK, but never really crossed over to the American market. The band formed in 2007 after ending an indie rock band called Fear of Flying the three member members of White Lies played in high school. In high school, the boys enjoyed listening to groups like Talking Heads and Franz Ferdinand, but with the inception of White Lies, the band claimed musical influence from Joy Division, Echo & the Bunnymen, and The Killers. The band decided to take a gap year between high school and university in order to focus on their new band. After recording their first album, To Lose My Life… the band scored a UK radio single, and the band took off on tours with Snow Patrol and Coldplay. The band also played festivals in the United States including Coachella and Lollapalooza, and performed on Late night shows on Letterman and Carson Daly. The band’s only U.S. hit comes from their first album. “Death” hit number 4 on the Billboard Dance chart. Last year, White Lies released their sixth studio album, As I Try Not to Fall Apart. 

    BUT I MIGHT USE IT. “Don’t  Want to Feel It All” is the fourth track on Friends and was the fifth and final single released from the album. The opening synth riff instantly reminds me of the chorus of Twisted Sister‘s “We’re Not Gonna Take It,” and the chorus uses a kind of steel drum effect. The song seems to be about personal problems that get in the way when loving someone. The speaker is asking the listener to understand him, to bear with the “daydreaming.” He doesn’t want to feel the full weight of his relationship. He wants to be slightly divested. Perhaps, he thinks, if he feels it all, he will become unstable. Maybe numbing himself to what could make him feel the strongest emotions is a way of protecting himself from spiraling if he were to lose it all. Or perhaps, the speaker is just too self-absorbed. After all, if you can’t “feel it all” with a friend or significant other, that person might not be as important to you as you think they are, and they might start to think the same about you. But, maybe we’re just talking about a season. Just as “Winter is taking ages” so can a dark season take a while with our relationships. 

    Read “Don’t Want to Feel It All” by White Lies on Genius.

  • “Run Away with Me” by Carly Rae Jepsen, Saturday, January 7, 2023 (partial repost)

    When your first American hit is the second biggest song of the year, how do you follow that up? When your signature song has been called bubblegum and immature, how do you change your image to show that you’re an adult with adult relationships, without getting X-rated? These were two questions Carly Rae Jepsen answered in her follow up to Kiss in E-MO-TION. If those two questions were on the interview, Jespsen would have the job on the merits of her 2015 effort. And as I enter the fifth year of my playlists and the third year of the blog, there are certain perennial favorites that show up maybe too often for some. I chose “Run Away with Me” at the beginning of the year for four of those years because of the fresh renewal this song gives me as my winter vacation begins.

    YOU’RE STUCK IN MY HEAD, STUCK IN MY HEART, STUCK IN MY BODY. Sure, if your introduction to E-MO-TION was the first single “I Really Like You” turned you off as another “Call Me Maybe” so you never clicked “Add to Library” on the rest of the album, that’s an understandable mistake. The meme-able first single arguably is less dynamic in the wake of its massive hit predecessor “Call Me Maybe.” But while critics were divided on “I Really Like You,” E-MO-TION as a whole received mostly favorable reviews, holding a 77% on Metacritic and a 9.0, or “universal acclaim,” according to user reviews. Unfortunately, “I Really Like You” was the most successful single from the album, and that track failed to reach #1 as “Call Me Maybe” had. The album’s other singles didn’t do well on radio. “Run Away with Me”didn’t make the Top 40 in America, though it did better in Europe, and “Your Type” only charted in Canada. Still, critics praised the album, and though “Run Away with Me” didn’t chart well, it made many pop critics year-end lists and even end-of-decade lists. 

    OVER THE WEEKEND, WE COULD TURN THE WORLD TO GOLD. “Run Away with Me” is on my short list of songs–perhaps an upcoming playlist–that the moment I hear it, I know I’m going to have a good day. It’s particularly effective when my bags are packed, and I’m expecting something good to happen. E-MO-TION was the album I listened to in 2016 and 2017 when I was in need of an adventure. When I needed to get away from my on-campus housing and explore or figure out how to do something in Korea. The pandemic, of course, has taken that joy–the unexpected shopping trips or checking out a new cafe or restaurant. So what’s exciting about today? I’m on vacation in Jeju, the southernmost part of South Korea. It was the first time I’ve been on a plane since return to Korea at the end of January 2020. In a few weeks, I’ll be back in America for a few weeks, reconnecting with friends and family. In fact it was a shopping trip in that January that I heard “Run Away with Me” that made me chose this song early every year. It’s that feeling that bags are packed, we’re leaving tonight, and the weekend makes us feel young and alive. Covid restrictions are over, unless you’ve been to China recently. There will certainly be dark times this year, but let’s not think of them yet.

    Behind the scenes: 

    Simlish version from The Sims 4: Get Together:


    Mic The Snare’s musical analysis: 

  • “Ditto” by NewJeans (뉴진스), Friday, January 6, 2023 & 2023+ Playlist

    It’s a new year, time for NewJeans. Girl groups are killing it in South Korea right now, and NewJeans, formed by former visual director for SM Entertainment Min Heejin (민희진). the visual director of some of SHINEE’s biggest albums including Lucifer and View and most notably f(x)’s Pink Tape. NewJeans, Min’s latest effort are everywhere in Korea and making a splash outside of Korea as well. Maybe we’ll get into their story another day. Instead, I want to introduce my 2023+ playlist. This year, I’ll be including songs both from my blog and some bonus tracks not featured in my blog. Those bonus tracks will be new tracks by artists whom I cover an older track. Again, I will be focusing on tracks released or popular within the years of 2021-2023.  Let’s enjoy some new music!


  • "Play" by Jax Jones & Years & Years, Thursday, January 5, 2023 (repost)

     Coming off the heels of Years & Years‘ second album, Palo Santo, the group collaborated with British House DJ and producer Jax Jones for his debut album Snacks. The song “Play” was released as a single in November of 2018 and would find a place on deluxe editions of Palo Santo like “Up in Flames.” The two songs don’t fit into the story of the futuristic queer/ religious concept album. Instead, “Play” follows Jones’s concept. A colorful music video with  nostalgic goodies, the sweets and toys of a millennial’s childhood, along with the single’s artwork, clearly inspired by Play-Doh, remind listeners of playtime and all of the goodness of a childhood full of sugary cereal, matchbox cars, and action figures. The disco beat and Olly Alexander‘s vocals take that childhood playtime nostalgia to a late-night dance hall.

    MY PHILOSOPHY DON’T LET NOBODY COME TOO CLOSE. The status quo of the song is defensiveness. The singer talks about guarding his heart. The emotional power is so strong in the singer’s heart that he fears that another person will either not be able to understand him or will hurt him. Many people find themselves in this situation. Past traumas from parents’ relationships, taunting by schoolmates, rejection when a middle school boy expresses his love to a girl in his class, realization that one is different from the others, repression of one’s sexual identity all build a wall around the young person. If you look closer at that wall, each brick is an individual situation where fear triumphed over autonomy. For years, I wondered why dating didn’t work out for me. At that time, many of the girls my age were reading I Kissed Dating Goodbye, Joshua Harris‘ book that messed up a generation of millennials, so much so that the author eventually pulled the publication and renounced his beliefs in everything it stood for. The premise, though, at the time was for young Christians to commit themselves to purity and abstinence until marriage. Younger teens had no business dating in the worldly sense. Dating, while it could be as innocent as calling each other up on the phone every night, talking at school, or even going to a movie, was a chance for ungodly lust to fester in the body. When teens got closer to an age when they could legally marry, they could begin courting, which was like what worldly preteen/early teen dating looks like, but with spiritual ramifications. But in a quest for holiness, Harris and the other proponents of early marriage failed to take in the statistical truth that early marriages result in more divorces. While eighteen to twenty-nine-year-olds are adults, their educational and life experiences can render two halves of a married couple incompatible. The late teens who are flooded with hormones often don’t make clear decisions about their future.

    I WANT IT TO BE YOU, DIVING INTO MY OCEAN, A BRAND NEW EMOTION.  I didn’t completely buy into the I Kissed Dating Goodbye ideas, but they certainly took a lot of Christian girls off the market. If you wanted to date in Christian high school, you had to be particularly aggressive. So I built a wall of excuses. But Alexander isn’t writing “Another Brick in the Wall.” Instead, he’s singing about the time when someone broke through his wall. It’s the moment when the song plays and he realizes that he wants to dance with this person all night. In his other songs, Olly Alexander explores the link between human sexual connection and spirituality. Palo Santo was an album that explored the spiritual experiences in the gay dance halls. Dance is a spiritual awakening for the singer, and the muse of the singer shatters the wall. I, however, built my walls thicker before they ultimately shattered. In college, I no longer had the excuse of I  Kissed Dating Goodbye. I thought everything would fall into place, but it turned out that I didn’t actually like girls, but I couldn’t admit it to myself. So I built the walls thicker, choosing to attend a religious college, choosing to go into Christian education, choosing to become a missionary, choosing to fit in with the conservative missionaries. Every brick I added made me feel safer, until I realized that it was a prison. Until I came out to myself, I thought that I was broken and unlovable. But coming out made me realize that what’s true for other people may not be true for me. A brand new emotion entered my vocabulary–freedom to be myself. 

    Official Video:

    Visualizer: 

    Live session:
    Jingle Ball Live: