Light, Dark, Light Again
A Two-Hour Gift for You
Two years ago I wrote a piece for Romper that included a playlist I made as digestif to feel your feelings this time of year. “This time of year.” Insert whatever you like. Christmas for some of us, Chanukah, Festivus, Kwanzaa, maybe a little bit of everything or nothing at all. Maybe it’s your first holiday season without someone. I see you, especially. We all live through school breaks, limited business hours, losing track of what day it is. Winter Solstice and the turning over of a new year.
Increasingly, November kicks in, the Christmas music starts playing and I’m gobsmacked by that we-were-just-here, time-speeding-up feeling. I like most Christmas music more for what it conjures than what it actually is - flash memories, smells, movie scenes, car rides, exhaustion, glee, cookies, anticipation, traffic, grumpy people everywhere, cheerful people too. Most of the music makes me sad, but not in a way that I mind. Sad like wistful, like we’re all collectively building up to something that is going to come and go in a blink. Which of course, we are. In the micro and macro.
What I love even more than overt holiday music are songs that are holiday-adjacent. Music about beginnings and endings, lost feelings, lost people, pining, bruising, loneliness, seasons resetting. Music that *feels* cold in your bones, feels like wintering, hibernating, reflecting. Even if it’s warm where you are - music to carry you through the dark, short days of December, January, February.
And so, a fresh playlist to walk you through the end of this year and into the next one: A Pine on Fire
In living and tweaking this collection the past week, I realized the songs fall roughly into one of two camps:
A plea (Merry Christmas, Please Don’t Call / Pray to Me / Please won’t you hurry? / Make Believe You Love Me / So I beg on knees / What do I do with this terrible feeling? / Reply to my message and pick up my calls / Will you love me like you loved me in the January rain? / Are you coming back? Are you coming back? I’m waiting)
An elegy, a goodbye, an acknowledgement of endings (Every time I think about him now, Lord, I just can't keep from cryin'1 / Time is time and time again / You are family and that means loss to me often / Everything ends, that’s the sweetest thing I’ll ever hear again / How sad, how lovely, how short, how sweet)
If you only have time for a couple right now, go with the first track (a plea) and the last one (a goodbye).
Dijon’s “Scratching” is a song I’ve listened to countless times this year. It’s a short little guy, but one that begs to be put on repeat. A whole life in under two minutes. Dijon made a short film of a live taping of his 2021 album Absolutely. Do yourself a favor and skip to minute 7:22 to watch this version of “Scratching.” (And that’s Mk.gee on keys!) Why is this song so good? I don’t fully know. Maybe it’s why I keep coming back to it. (Write me back and tell me what you think.) His voice sounds desperate, almost too vulnerable for public consumption. Like you’re eavesdropping on a private implosion that transforms to an explosion and back again. I love in the live version how he sounds even more strained and exhausted, his vocals crackle and break.
Angie McMahon’s “Making It Through” is just the whole enchilada. “I'm celebrating, making it through / Just making it through / I know now, at the end of the ending / That just making it through is the lesson / Just making it through is okay” You made it through another year, the light and the dark spots.
Time is supposed to run out, time is supposed to
Sun is supposed to go down, sun is supposed to
Like your mood, like your power, like your battery
Rise, fall, rise, life, death, life again
Sky, ground, sky, day, night, day again
Rise, fall, rise, life, death, life again
Sky, ground, sky, light, dark, light againLight, dark, light again, light, dark, light again
Light, dark, light, again, light, dark, light, again
Light, dark, light again, light, dark, light again
Light, dark, light again, light, dark, light again
Light, dark, light again, light, dark, light again
Light, dark, light again, light, dark, light again
I hope whatever this time is, it’s gentle on you. See you in 2025.
xo,
Kate
Thanks Liz, for this version
Gorgeous. Thanks, Kate!