By: Andrea Renney, Arts Editor
Even though it feels like the semester just started, there’s no avoiding the fact that it is, unfortunately, midterm season. While I personally spend more time crying over boys than crying over schoolwork, I am sympathetic to the plight of other, more scholarly students. When I’m feeling hopeless and forlorn, I turn to laying on my bedroom floor while listening to moody, depressing music so I can at least feel something. I’m fine. Everything’s fine.
The following three songs span the sadness spectrum and touch on themes of growing up, loss, love, and death. Look to them when you’re hunched over a textbook, reading the same paragraph for the seventh time. Misery loves company.
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Rather than focusing on love and relationships, “Of Age” is about the realities of growing up and entering adulthood, and the responsibilities that come along with that. As the closing track on 2016’s You Are Going to Hate This, the personal lyrics of the song were perhaps an inkling of what was to come on the Frights’ newest record, Hypochondriac. While “Of Age” may not be as classically poetic as the next two songs on this list, it remains a song that resonates with me as a twenty-something and elicits some tears if I’m feeling particularly fragile. Easter egg: the sounds of a skateboard rolling across the pavement can be heard in the background of the first two verses.
“The greatest” — Lana Del Rey:
It’s me, Lana Del Rey’s newest fan. Norman Fucking Rockwell! was the first LDR record I ever listened to, and I was shocked to learn that her earlier work is quite a bit different from her latest release. “The greatest” is a dreamy, nostalgic anthem with lyrics about lost loves and lost cities. It’s slow and raw and stripped down, without all the glamour and drama of a record like Born to Die. Even if it’s different from her old stuff, the song (and the entire record) still retains Del Rey’s vintage, Americana vibe. Swap out “Long Beach” and “New York” with your favorite city, and you’ve got an ode to all your past Tinder flames from your year abroad. Or so I’d imagine.
“I Went To the Store One Day” – Father John Misty:
Oof. All at once heartfelt and tragic, yet still dripping with Josh Tillman’s signature humour (“‘Insert here’ / a sentiment re: our golden years”), “I Went To the Store One Day” is Father John Misty at perhaps his most genuine. As the closing track on his critically-acclaimed sophomore record I Love You, Honeybear, this song packs an entire love story into only four and a half minutes. Couple it with the album’s second track, “Chateau Lobby #4 (in C for Two Virgins),” and you’ll know everything you need to know about true love. That might sound a little naïve, but what can I say? I’m a hopeless romantic, and Daddy Misty only adds fuel to that fire.
