This is my mixtape to you. It comes in at 62 minutes and 24 seconds, so you may have to get a 90 minute tape. You may even have to buy a cassette player, or just get one of these gadgets. Maybe, this is a way to convince you to go to my junior year Ring Dance, or maybe even the Senior Prom. We’ll have cases of Becks beer, Peach Schnapps and Wine Coolers for the ladies, and whatever else we need to make the night memorable. I’ll give it to you at Burger King, the place to drive to in between classes, and meet the girls from the sister school. And if I get caught for leaving campus, and get detention, it’ll be worth it. I’ll clean the toilets, tap the kegs for the jesuits, get on my knees…..to pray.
I hope you like the tape. It’s probably best if you go to a quiet place, and listen to it through your headphones. I think these things come together better when you don’t have too much time to think about it. Take a mood here, a lyric there, and you have this entirely new thing that’s made up from the smaller parts, to help to capture a feeling that may be difficult to express through words, in our adolescence. How a song can take you to a place, this mixtape will take you to all of the places, experiencing all of the unexpected, and help you to remember this small moment, in our time together.
SMS Text: Food Court MixTape (Download)
Milosh – You Make Me Feel - a simple message of how “it” can make you feel. the music has that dream-like, delirious quality, just like “it”. “you, beautiful moment in my life, a sweet wrinkle in time, so let’s stretch this thing out”
Joseph Arthur – Honey And The Moon - maybe it’s about a past love, but the melody has such optimism. “if you weren’t real, i would make you up, now”. “and right now, all your dreams are waking up”
Jeff Buckley – Morning Theft (Live) – “a heart that beats as both siphon and reservoir”
Björk – Headphones (Live) – the power of music to convey emotion. how music may be the most powerful language. “these abstract wordless movements”. “i like this resonance, it elevates me”
Sigur Rós – Med Sud I Eyrum (With A Buzz In Our Ears) – we’re traveling on a train and looking out the window into a vast open space of the future, and it doesn’t matter where we end up, it’s all about the journey and adventure to get there, together.
Hanne Hukkelberg – Ease – whimsical, yet painful. change can happen.
New Order – Every Little Counts – the laughter, for being stupid, together. not the greatest lyrics, but every little does count, like making a bed. “every second counts”.
Damien Rice – The Blower’s Daughter (Live) - “i can’t take my mind off of you”
The Cinematic Orchestra – To Build A Home (featuring Patrick Watson) – home is not necessarily a place. is it a state of mind, or another person ? “Out in the garden where we planted the seeds. There is a tree as old as me. Branches were sewn by the color of green. Ground had arose and passed it’s knees”
Daft Punk – Digital Love – so sappy, but such a great pop song about happiness and hope.
Cat Stevens – The Wind – when you least expect it, your soul will guide you in the right direction, or to the food court at the mall.
Iron & Wine – The Trapeze Swinger – a song about purgatory which I have often felt that I was trapped in as well. all of the beautiful haunting imagery in one of the most beautiful songs ever recorded. it has that sort-of sad optimism feeling to it. happy sad.
Bloc Party – Tulips (Original Version) – “this could be an opportunity”. the drumming helps to convey the mood of urgency, and trying to convince someone that this is special, that this is real……
Radiohead – Go Slowly - i love how his voice flows through, and acts out the lyrics, “come slowly to me”, “patiently”.
There’s a great site, Song Meanings which lists lyrics as well as user interpretations of each song, and it helped with the lyrics stated above.
