Revisiting My High School Playlists
This issue of Align’s theme, Infrared, brings up the interesting idea of things that we can’t see, but can feel. Things that are hidden, but still incredibly powerful and influential. To me, this is what music is. Music brings up emotions and evokes memories like nothing else in the world. Thinking about this issue, I started to wonder how I could put this idea to the test. What would happen if I revisited music from a substantial time in my life?
I should start this by saying I was probably (definitely) not okay my freshman year of high school. This was the year I felt like I finally found myself, but realized I didn’t fit into the norms. I was/am a bisexual punk rocker who went to a very sports and football driven high school. The head football coach was my honors geography teacher, and that class went exactly as you might imagine.
Fuelled by my rage, anxiety, and depression, I drowned myself in music. There was rarely a time at school that you wouldn’t see me wearing my teal Skullcandy earbuds. Looking through my Apple Music profile today, I made more playlists that year than I can count. I had a playlist for every occasion of every term: music to listen to when I skipped class to cry in the bathroom or park behind the school, music I blasted after picking a fight with my teacher after he made a joke about women being kidnapped, music I listened to as I picked up my morning cup of noodles and blended strawberry lemonade that made me late to geometry class every day of spring term.
I haven’t listened to any of these playlists since that year. I was struggling with so much anxiety and depression that year that I’ve worried that hearing those playlists would resurface those feelings and memories. Today, however, I’m facing the music and revisiting my playlists.
The three playlists I’ll be listening to:
rainy day
[callbacks to my depression. lunch on the track with ari, knives in printmaking, sitting on the bench in the rain instead of going to class. heart flutters and panic attacks]
As the World Falls Down - David Bowie
The Weakness in Me - Joan Armatrading
Linger- The Cranberries
Up - Sing Street
Underground - David Bowie
Only Happy When It Rains - Garbage
Here and Now - Letters to Cleo
Growing Up - The Linda Lindas
Prom Queen - Beach Bunny
There She Goes - The La’s
Co-Pilot - Letters to Cleo
Like the description, this brings me right back to sitting on the bench in the park behind the school. Normally it was cold when I would sit out there alone. I feel those crisp foggy Oregon days and suddenly I’m 14 again. These songs were genuinely the pinnacle of my depression and panic attacks, but today I notice that the real underlying theme of these songs was how lonely I was. The Weakness in Me slows me down all over again. I cried many times to this song. Funny how today it still elicits the same response.
society sucks
[music to rage to with an innocent smile :P]
F.N.T - Semisonic
Here and Now - Letters to Cleo
Cruel To Be Kind - Letters to Cleo
Underground - David Bowie
I Want You To Want Me - Letters to Cleo
Love Stinks - The J. Geils Band
Only Happy When It Rains - Garbage
Come As You Are - Nirvana
Mother Mary - Foxboro Hottubs
Weird Girl - Mommy Long Legs
Teacher’s Pet - The Quick
I Got a Right - The Stooges
Rough - VIAL
She’s A Rebel - Green Day
Ha Ha Ha Armageddon - The Julie Ruin
Getting Nowhere Fast - Girls At Our Best
Teenager - My Chemical Romance
F**k You - Bad Religion
Hyporite - Jack Off Jill
Roadkill - VIAL
American Idiot - Green Day
I Wanna Be Your Dog - The Stooges
Not In Dog Years - Bratmobile
Oh! - The Linda Lindas
Oh Bondage Up Yours - X-Ray Spex
White Rabbit - Jefferson Airplane
Get Free - The Vines
Ultimate - Lindsay Lohan
Co-Pilot - Letters to Cleo
This is STILL the shit!! This was my strut to class playlist. The ultimate confidence booster. I’m currently bobbing my head around singing the lyrics that I haven’t heard in four years. I definitely will start listening to this playlist regularly again, it’s just as effective as it was all those years ago. The cover to this playlist is my favorite part. It’s a picture of a trash can I saw in Portland that says “be the riot.” This playlist was my permission slip to be unapologetically me; angry, excited, confident; and damn does this still make me feel myself.
f*ck the government
[f*ck capitalism, f*ck consumerism, but please don’t make me f*ck men :)]
American Idiot - Green Day
American Society - L7
The Hand That Feeds - Nine Inch Nails
Teenagers - My Chemical Romance
Liar - Bikini Kill
We’re Not Gonna Take It - Twisted Sister
Bad Reputation - Joan Jett
White Boy - Bikini Kill
Just a Girl - No Doubt
Hypocrite - Jack Off Jill
I Got A Right - The Stooges
Another Brick In the Wall - Pink Floyd
I Wanna Be Your Dog - The Stooges
F**k You - Bad Religion
Shitlist - L7
Oh Bondage Up Yours - X-Ray Spex
Bad Ass Bitch - Lunachicks
Violet - Hole
Where Is My Mind? - Pixies
Say What You Mean - Lunachicks
Master of Puppets - Metallica
War Pigs - Black Sabbath
So Weird - Veruca Salt
I take it back. THIS playlist is the shit. What I blasted when I first started making zines on my bedroom floor. What I blasted after arguing with sexist teachers. What I blasted as I organized school walkouts at 14 years old. I was fearless then. I can only hope that I’m doing high school me proud today, and that I’m still at least half the badass I was that year. Music is funny the way it inspires, empowers, and fuels our souls. This playlist makes me want to find a sexist boy to pick a fight with. Bring back out my chunky ugly eyeliner that I didn’t know how to apply.
You know what? I was pretty cool freshman-year of high school. I may have been clumsy and insecure, but I was headstrong and pretty fearless. These playlists reminded me the angry, proud, joyful butterflies I got after fighting the system, and the way I unapologetically felt my feelings. I was a dramatic teen, but who isn’t? I was afraid these playlists would resurface the worst feelings of that year; instead they remind me of how much that year shaped me and my morals in ways I’m very proud of.