Today is not the day I write an essay about the distance that often comes from being an artist. From being a musician. Or the way that the intense emotions that seem so prevalent in artists can make it hard to get enough distance. And how it’s all a blessing and a curse. But it is the day I make you a playlist about distance.
This last year, I’ve been thinking about distance quite a bit (the positive, the negative, or just the neutral facts). Being close, being far, wanting things to be other than they are or thinking they are just right, the physical/mental/emotional, distance from/closeness to self and others. I made myself multiple playlists about that during the year (because I do so love to make playlists). So I thought I’d make a short, moody distance playlist for you as well (with a made-up-ish word* for its title). After all, distance is something we have in common…
(Yes, I left out some good songs to keep this shorter. The first draft was enormous. I was trying to fit in all my distance thoughts… And some of the distance is in the way the song feels when I listen. So just close your eyes and feel it with me.)
in-equidistance
1. SQÃœRL- Spooky Action at a Distance
2. I Am Kloot – Even the Stars
3. He Is A Pegasus – Fin
4. Radiohead – A Reminder
5. His Name Is Alive – Are You Coming Down This Weekend?
6. Placebo – Drink You Pretty
7. The National – I Need My Girl
8. Ash – Lost In You
9. Emmy the Great – Paper Forest (Birds)
10. James Dean Bradfield – Don’t Look Back
11. Death Cab for Cutie – Transatlanticism
12. Baxter – I Can’t See Why
13. Bj̦rk РUnravel
14. Shriekback – (Open Up Your) Filthy Heart (To Me)
15. Editors – Let Your Good Heart Lead You Home
16. David Bowie – Where Are We Now?
17. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – The Ship Song
18. Manic Street Preachers – Solitude Sometimes Is
19. The Joy Formidable – Silent Treatment
20. Placebo – H.K. Farewell
EDIT 2014-12-29: After yesterday’s all audio playlist, I got an itch to make a video playlist. I love video, and I love what it can add to the experience of the music. For this playlist, the only real theme is that I thought of a video and could find that video online. Honestly, I was baffled at how hard it was to find certain videos…Anyway, I gave myself a very short while to brainstorm and add videos to a list, and then I went through and kept the ones that felt somehow coherent, narrowing it down from about a billion… (Not sure why most are older…) This time, don’t close your eyes.
Stars in Your Eyes
1. Daphne Guinness: Evening in Space
2. David Bowie: Life on Mars?
3. Placebo: This Picture
4. Ash: Shining Light
5. Siouxsie and the Banshees: The Passenger
6. Placebo: Slave to the Wage
7.Manic Street Preachers: Love’s Sweet Exile
8. Duran Duran: Electric Barbarella
9. David Bowie: Ashes to Ashes
10. Placebo: Taste In Men
11. IAMX: Missile
12. Garbage: Androgyny
13. Ash: Girl From Mars (UK vid)
14. Siouxsie and the Banshees: Face to Face
15. Björk: All Is Full of Love
16. Manic Street Preachers: Stay Beautiful
17. Placebo: Bruise Pristine
18. David Bowie: The Stars (Are Out Tonight)
*Things that are equidistant are the same distance from a common point. Equidistance is that equal distance. “Equi†means equal. And you know what distance is, what it is to be distance. “In†is either a preposition concerning location or is a negating prefix. All of this comes together in my head, suggesting many possible meanings to the title…Art is one of the few places I can enjoy ambiguity…