Playlist of the Week: Sensory Escape
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Lifestyle
This week Callie’s helping you get pumped for the day with a “Sensory Escape” playlist. In her own words, this playlist is full of “music to take you away; music to get lost inside; music to remind you that our individual scopes are limited and there’s so much to explore.” Let’s go on an adventure together below.
- “Spaceship” – Kesha. “Spaceship” delights in contradiction. This slow-burning folk song combines the otherworldly aura of Ke$ha from Cannibal with the more mature, transformative Kesha that’s on display throughout Rainbow. It also manages to be both sad and hopeful, plumbing the ups and downs of our collective, inherited, deep existentialism. And for a song that’s literally about abduction — an inherently alien event — it is also a reminder that everyone belongs to the cosmos, anyway.
- “Out Of Body (feat. Kilo Kish, Zebra Katz, & Imani Vonshà)” – Gorillaz. This song is vaguely off-putting, but intriguing enough to still be enjoyable. It’s wholly unpredictable and doesn’t seem to adhere to any typical structure or flow, even while Kilo is sing-rapping literal instructions. The dial tones at the beginning almost lull you into a false sense of familiarity or nostalgia, but the sounds only get weirder and weirder. It’s a song unlike any other, with a futuristic, cult-like vibe that somehow remains inviting.
- “I Follow Rivers” – Lykke Li. Although this song is begging rather than beckoning — its singer being the one who asks someone else, “can I follow?” — it takes you on a journey that feels impossibly luring. It makes you want to chase its “dark doom honey” down an unruly, rushing river, even though you have no idea where it leads. You may even have an inclination that its destination its vaguely dangerous. That is the magic of Lykke Li. She always makes you feel like you’re getting yourself into something both risky and romantic.
- “Malibuu (feat. Lani Renaldo)” – Matt DiMona. If Miley Cyrus’ vision of Malibu is (in Lorde’s words, via Twitter) a “utopia” or “somewhere we hope we’re headed,” then this Malibu (with a gratuitous “u” tacked onto the end) is its hungover, bed-headed, still-high sister. Not quite reckless or shoddy, but not quite mature. I mean, the song is still named after a dreamy California destination. It’s still mellow and washed in sunlight. But this duet calls to mind a kind of quiet desperation, a longing for the peace that Miley has found in her Malibu. Matt and Lani haven’t quite arrived yet.
- “10,000 Emerald Pools” – BØRNS. The title of this song alone is enough to make you feel mythic and otherworldly. Then BØRNS’ characteristically ethereal voice arises and you feel truly transported — like the song actually exists on another planet, or within caverns of the ocean previously unseen.
- “GLOWED UP” – KAYTRANADA. Just the first few notes — which carry on throughout the song, and could have been extracted directly from a Twilight Zone episode — should clue you in as to why “GLOWED UP” is included here. It sounds like a mash-up of dreams and reality. With references to pharaohs and Andy Warhol, Anderson .Paak evokes visuals that deal directly with myth, illusion, and our abilities to construct meaning where it may not have existed previously.
- “Boy” – Willow. Even though it’s always a questionable practice to romanticize anxiety attacks, Willow’s heart-wrenching authenticity and sense of wonder save the song from being either cliché or problematic. The emotion and marvel in her lyricism feels so genuine, it’s hard not to empathize with feeling trapped by fascination — when love feels like a place that you can’t escape. Plus, acknowledging that her true home is among “a cluster of super bright stars” gives Willow a redemptive, hopeful arc.
- “Perfect Places” – Lorde. Seldom does an artist manage to craft an impeccable pop song that doubles as a cavernous, philosophical question: “what the fuck are perfect places anyway?” Do we somehow achieve a more honest, pure existence when we distort reality — by partying, drinking, hooking up, blowing the speakers, dancing mindlessly? Is it all a form of religion, or therapy, or heaven — or is it simply a distraction from the “real world,” a sort of purgatory that is unsustainable? I don’t have the answers. And neither does Lorde. Does anybody? That’s what makes it fun.
- “Loud Places” – Jamie xx. Interestingly, I think this song engages in a similarly philosophical meditation, just in a much more implicit way. Both Lorde and Jamie xx seem to exploring methods of healing (or, at least, dealing) after heartbreak. But the question posed here (“didn’t I take you to higher places you can’t reach without me?”) wonders whether love is the only perfect place (or higher place). Can we only travel there when we feel in love and loved in return? Or is the ability to reach this height simply a figment of our own imagination, a destination that we conjure in loud places where we look for people to keep us company? What’s really the difference between a high place and a loud place? I don’t know, but it’s fun when a song makes you think while also making your eardrums happy.
- “Home” – LCD Soundsystem. LCD Soundsystem is the only band that could take a concept so familiar and mundane, like home, and make it sound so distorted and alien — in the best way. It’s rare that a song lasts for almost seven minutes but never collapses into dullness or disinterest. If anything, it stretches the exposition so that you’re constantly on your toes, waiting for the beat to drop or the rhythm to switch or the octave to rise. Somehow, it makes consistency sound enticing — and while “Home” builds in a very subtle way, it still feels satisfying by the end, like you’ve returned from a long journey.