Well! It’s been awhile. Let’s warm up the blog by talking about music.
Every year, I make a list of songs that are new to me in that year. (In some cases, there’s some older songs that come back because they’re suddenly more important, but this year all the songs were new to me.) Then I have all of these little memory capsules I can revisit later in case I need a blast of nostalgia. (Or to remember how 2016 felt bad too. For no reason.)
Blogging about it makes me like it all more, and learn how to better recognize what I like. (I have two drafts sitting in this blog right here. each are trying to help me restart my blogging practice! heh.) If you listen to any of these, please comment and let me know.
(also, if you really like any of these tracks, please join me in supporting the artists directly on sites like Bandcamp, because the $0.004 they get per stream on Spotify is pretty inexcusable)
Worth It. – RAYE
[if my body was a boat, could you steer that, sailor? / make it feel like it’s a 1960s Hollywood trailer]
This jazzy, funky ray of sunshine was playing on the day I got my tattoo in June. Her voice is so light and bubbly, and the orchestra in the intro reminds me of classic movie tracks. But then, wham, a funk beat? So catchy and fun.
Murder on the Dancefloor – Sophie Ellis-Bextor
[It’s murder on the dance floor / but you better not kill the groove]
Yeah, I totally missed this song the first time. This is the first of the songs I discovered through playing Just Dance.
Did you know that Just Dance has a story mode? It’s campy and strange, and exactly my thing. You too can fight back against the shackles of perfectionism through dancing! Also, the length of one story mode playlist was a challenging but not impossible amount of exercise for me early in 2024 when I was regrowing my atrophied circulatory system after a year of fighting long COVID. So I spent a lot of time playing these levels.
There’s a lot of dreamy, happy dance tracks on here and I think it makes a nice change from moody, pissy 2023.
Can’t Tame Her – Zara Larsson
[don’t need no one, she can dance on her own]
I’ve really been enjoying the trend of 80s electronica in current pop. This song feels like Flashdance or Footloose, full of energy and longing to just get out there. Just Dance made it into a hard map, but for some reason I can reliably score well on it? so it’s an early confidence-builder on my workout playlist.
Bang Bang – K’NAAN, Adam Levine
[what is love without the pain to go along? and what is pain if not the reason for me to sing this song]
Picked this one up from Aloe, missed it the first time. Damn, the energy on this one. I cannot sit still while it’s playing.
A QUEDA – Gloria Groove
[come see the mistakes I’m gonna make / come see the friends I’m gonna lose / I’m not charging for the tickets, come and see the show for free / today is open bar day to see my disgrace]
Gloria Groove is a Brazilian rapper and drag performer. You can see this delightfully creepy music video with English subs on YouTube. Just Dance also leaned into the haunted circus aesthetic; I’m terrible at this map but I do love it.
Hai Yorokonde – Kocchi no Kento
[gimme your heartbeat ringing like . . . – – – . . .]
Translates to “Yes, I’d be glad to”. The music video is a goofy animation (also with English subs) where you can see the speakers very plainly are NOT glad to help, but forcing themselves to do it anyway, to great distress. As somebody who’s made herself very sick people-pleasing in the past, I feel that.
This was on a lot in Aloe’s car. It’s a late addition to the playlist based on how easily the chorus gets lodged in my head. GET IT GET IT DONE, GET IT GET IT DONE…
Broken – Alfie Templeman
[Sometimes I think that I might be broken / Don’t you feel like you’re broken?]
Love that glittering keyboard riff over the chorus, like hanging fairy lights on your anxiety.
Good Luck Babe! – Chappell Roan
[good luck babe! / You’d have to stop the world just to stop the feeling]
Here she is! I listened to a lot of Chappell Roan this summer. Rise & Fall of a Midwest Princess was definitely my go-to album this year for keeping mood up while cleaning, but if I had to pick just one song, it’s this single.
When We Were Stars – Guster
[which one is that lullabye where everything’s gonna be alright? / I cross my heart and hope to die, take a trip to another life]
happy new-Guster-album year! 25 years after finding them they’re still my favorite band. So it gets repetitive to say “I like Guster because their music is chill, pensive, playful, and ultimately optimistic” but I kind of have to be their evangelist because of how much their music has kept me company all these years. If you like this, let me know because I have so much more to recommend.
mad girl’s love song – Under The Rug
[i think i made you up inside my head / shut my eyes, love, and all the world it drops dead]
Under The Rug took out ads on Instagram to get people listening to a live acoustic version of this song, and it was the only IG ad I’ve ever hoped I’d get. (The comments there are full of people saying the same thing.) A faithful-feeling adaptation of a Sylvia Plath villanelle + bluegrass rock reminding me of Nickel Creek, how could this not be tailored to me specifically?
Troublemaker – Devon Gilfillian
[maybe I’ll drown, I’ll be delivered / I don’t care as long as I’m drowning with you]
He opened up for Guster when we saw them this summer, and it was such a groovy and chill set, perfect for a late summer picnic concert. Really recommend his latest album Love You Anyway for working, if lyrics don’t distract you and you want some Prince-flavored soul jams.
This blues roots song he played from a couple years ago, though, is the one that got instantly added to my everyday playlist. Hoping to listen to more of him going forward.
A Bar Song (Tipsy) – Shaboozey
[Two-steppin’ on the table, she don’t need a dance floor / oh my, good lord]
It’s fun, it’s catchy, maybe it would have been overplayed if I listened to more country, but every time I caught him singing this on TV I sat and enjoyed it, so here it is. That fiddle part just soars over the bassy drums with the percussive guitar, and it all works so well together.
Ferryman – Shayfer James & Will Wood
[people want each other, but they want themselves more]
sneaking some Will Wood vocals on here, oops
Shayfer James is a close friend and touring partner of his, though his music tends more towards dark musical theatre rather than the Haunted Cabaret. This song’s a perfect blend of both.
Online – TWRP, Tom Cardy & Montaigne
[I’ll see you online / you can catch me in cyber-space / girl I miss your interface]
Hey, welcome to the blatantly funk segment of my playlist! If you ever get a chance to see TWRP, they put on a fun show. Their whole gimmick is they perform in space alien costume, so please let that enhance your experience for this nerdy song.
Tom Cardy is one of my favorite musical comedians lately, and if you haven’t already seen this very silly mustached man on TikTok, please go enjoy, like, all of his stuff.
Sweet Escape (Jafunk Remix) – Tokimeki Records feat. Hikari
I do not know how so much J-pop ended up on here this year; I just get all this from Spotify’s discovery algorithm, and their “Nu-Funk” playlist. Not complaining though! This has such a classic roller rink feel to it, like early Madonna, particularly those little electronica riffs. Feels nostalgic, but it’s only 2 years old.
Couldn’t find a reliable lyrics translation, but…
…auto-translate seems to also make it into an early Madonna song.
LOVEなシーン [Lovely Scene] – Seiya Matsumuro feat. BRADIO
Look, just have more happy funk. I can’t tell you why I like this other than it makes me happy to listen to it. Again, no reliable translation available, though there is a lyric video?
Locked out of Heaven – Bruno Mars
[swimmin’ in your water’s something spiritual / I’m born again every time you spend the night]
My favorite track in the Just Dance 2023 story playlist is this one. The dance is flowy and fun, and the coach character – the son of the villain! – is a cutie. Though, because the lyrics are censored (E rated game), it’s an open question what one-syllable word takes this feathery theater man to paradise:
(I think it’s cloak.)
Don’t buy Just Dance 2025. I know I’ve been talking it up, and I really wish I could play this game with others, but it’s been so mismanaged by Ubisoft’s usual routine that I can’t recommend anyone else buy into this. Not only did they change in 2023 to a streaming-only model, so you don’t really own anything anymore and they can take songs you purchased away from you whenever they feel like it, but the woman who was writing all the cool lore left the company, and Ubisoft just didn’t care to replace her. 2025 shipped without a story mode playlist after 2024 left this man on a cliffhanger, needing to rescue his friends. Guess we’ll never find out how he danced their way to freedom! Fuck you Ubisoft.
…Excuse me! Anyway. To actually talk about the music: I haven’t found a Bruno Mars track I didn’t like. He’s been on here like 3 times now and I have no apology for that; this stuff is so catchy and lushly engineered.
Plant the Garden – Melt
[remember while you’re driving nails into the ground / that it doesn’t mean a thing if you’re gonna burn it down]
I love, love, the lead singer’s effortless belt, as well as the percussive effect they’ve put on the keys to make them ring like an acoustic guitar. This band was also on my annual mix back in 2017, and if you like this, go find their track “Sour Candy” which is just as good.
Unsweetened Lemonade – Amelie Farren
[I fucked the reaper cause I knew my time was coming, can’t you see? / I was either going to die at 12 or 90 fucking 3]
…okay, that’s flippant. But I can’t think about any other guy listening to this. Inserting this song’s bitter lament right after the Stolen Century arc, in his utter despair just before he [spoiler spoiler spoiler]. (Read the Adventure Zone comics, y’all: they’re a perfect adaptation of the podcast, and I just weep my way through them.)
I love how this feels like an Irish ballad, but then the surprise beat kicks in? Very nice.
Don’t Forget Me – Maggie Rogers
[maybe I’m dead wrong / maybe I was bitter from the winter all along]
Maggie Rogers makes music you need to sing along with, but then you realize you don’t have a competent belt so you need to learn how to do that. Maybe that’s just me.
This track in particular doesn’t need much explanation because it fits right in with all the moody indie folk rock I usually post here.
…Long COVID was real rough on me, y’all. Forcing myself to put away a year’s worth of anger and bitterness at the isolation, so I’d finally be able to participate in the world again…yeah, it definitely was difficult and sometimes still is.
November – Sparkbird
[not only is it thicker, blood is stickier than water / maybe that’s relevant somehow / can I explode now?]
Another indie style I love is when the song changes genres multiple times, and every style is something you would listen to 4 full minutes of. This song is on a journey, and it’s also kind of what November felt like this year. Sigh.
Keep Going – Guster
[well the world brought us here / if we let it now, all good things reappear]
Closing this out is kind of my vibe going into 2025: longing for a calmer time but still moving forward anyway.
I don’t want to get caught up in toxic positivity or pretending things are good for everyone when we’re entering another age of extreme hatred being mainstreamed. It’s just that there’s a balance to be found, and I can’t always live in rage or dread. It’s why I wanted to post music today.
Thanks for reading, thanks for listening if you listened, and I hope to post more again soon. For now, you can see me more regularly posting my comic at HOPE TANTRUM, or at Bluesky. (I am trying to remember to x-post to Mastodon too, when it’s important.)