Life is a Playlist
I am quite sure that our squidgy little brains could be mapped as one big groovy playlist. A living, breathing rendition of a life all played by a 32-piece orchestra with a twitchy conductor swaying in the breeze. Like a writhing grey coil of songs and sounds and limitless memories fused together in an enchanting dance of being. And within all this sit metallic lock-boxes each which hold darkened shadows of our pain, spring-laden jumping-jacks of joy, and the crumbs of our own lingering remorse.
Little boxes that can be easily opened with the vibrations of a few significant songs. Not significant to all, but significant to you. Songs that make the locks pop like a toddler's lunchbox on the ringing of the bell for recess.
This is my little story of how music held my hand while I moved across the globe with a single bag filled with clothes, toiletries, and a few nervous dreams.
I made the big move to London from sleepy Cape Town, which is a strange little hollow carved out on the edge of the African cultural clay pot. I am not unique in my migration. There are many like me, many who came before me and there will be many that come after me. But I am the only one with my playlist of experience, and that has to count for something.
So this is my mixtape. Classic cassette, of course.
I moved over with very little money, not many warm clothes and no planned accommodation (sssshhh don’t tell those dabbling swines at Immigration). I had expected a tough transition period, so I was mentally prepared to sleep on cheaply-laminated floors, eat crunchy peanut butter sandwiches for dinner, and trudge long distances through the heart of the grunting engine that is London.
One thing I didn’t take into account though, was the amount of mental free space I suddenly had to deal with. I’d come from being immersed in full days of work, glowing evenings full of sport, weekends dosed with irresponsible fun-in-the-sun, and any other leftover mental airtime filled up with the natterings of the latest seasonal girlfriend.
But now: Silence. A grinding, abject silence. Just me and my head while I set up a new life. I was suddenly aware of awakened cognitions making themselves visible like a startled octopus on a tropical reef. Thoughts filled my head looking for a way out, trying to be put to task but had nowhere to go, nothing to latch onto in my conscious output. Like a slippery ladder with the bars too far apart. These thoughts lived short flickering lives, like dying fireflies that fell to the bottom of my mind and were turned into unusable cerebral compost. It was a split-second ecosystem of birth, life, growth and honourable harakiri within my consciousness.
So I turned to music more than ever, and dived into a journey that helped me successfully merge the Kodak ribbons of my past and present. I found fleeting meaning as stepping stones among the blooming lily garden of my new life.
The first song which I found meaning in was called “Apply Some Pressure’ by a band called Maximo Park. It is not a particularly special song or universally beloved, but it struck a chord in me during the tough times. It hit the part inside of me that said just keep going. That little voice we all have that acts as a hairy-legged cheerleader when we need it most. It implored me to keep pushing through the ample job rejections, to keep resolute through the lonely nights, to tolerate the bizarre roommates I had found myself with, to stay warm at heart when I was cold and trudging through the snow in a thin jacket, or to keep chewing on that 4th dry peanut butter sandwich of the day.
Four a day. Imagine.
That song, for whatever reason, turned that little voice inside my head into a dragon. At every turn of esteem-deep doubt it hissed with fangs out, and at every misplaced hint of self-pity it raged with a glorious column of flame. The dragon’s scaled hide became my own. I must have listened to the song at least five times a day in those first few months. Five times a day to keep the dragon fed. Roar.
Settling down in a new place like London is different to what I expected. It’s fairly easy to get stuck into the groove of everyday life and ghost between the smokey combustions of the people-machine. You learn that the Marmite is in a different place of the supermarket, that the cyclists are still greedy tarmac-grabbing degenerates, and that people are all just different degrees of oblivious to each other. But it is tough to make friends in London. People are purring around life at the speed of 1000 seagulls chasing a chip seller on a bicycle, and are not exactly friendly. I’m sure most people moving here would say the same.
I do understand though. chips are delicious. Extra salt & vinegar please.
The next songs to land with me were the ones I had attached to the good times with my friends. The songs that make you sticky just thinking about those clueless, sweaty odysseys through nightclubs and alleyways. The songs you made up lyrics to while you slung your car around the warping coastline on a holiday roadtrip. The Avicii bangers, the Linkin Park clangers and all the dirty remixes that made you feel like the hubris of eternal youth. These were the songs that connected me to the ramshackling reprobates I called of friends back home. It wasn’t just for the memories of the past, but a reminder that we still have a lot to come in the future. The pirate ship will sail again and music helped define the tattered flag we flew under as we crashed through the rising waves of youth. (Author Note: I have now made many great new friends here, so your pity is not needed)
Music can truly colour our lives with the delicate strokes of a dangling Michelangelo, and leave a deep set impressionist imprint on the core of our being. Our brains are wired for melodic-memory adoption, like a weird sort of time-travelling synesthesia. Most of us are more paint-by-numbers than the Sistine Chapel, but you know what I’m getting at.
Sometimes we have a spill though, and something special is needed to turn to for a comfortable catharsis. To open the tap and drain the sludge. Something that only makes sense to us. Only small parts of the world we warm to that can open the metal lockbox slowly and replace the personal pain with joy and acceptance. So here is an example of mine, note by note.
Death is a curious thing when it is so, so far away. The death of someone who raised you on weekends, who let you rent Return of the Jedi on VHS twice a week, who bought you unlimited chocolate ice cream, and who taught you everything about tennis over a few Agassi vs Sampras classics. I said my last proper goodbye to my grandmother about a year before she passed away. The hug I gave her before leaving for the airport would prove to be the very last one before I moved abroad, but I must say it was a magnificent one. Yes it was tough being so far away. But at least music was close, closer than ever.
I leaned on the muscular shoulder of “My Way” by Frank Sinatra and it all made a bit more sense. It was the song my grandparents loved. A song I could reach them through. Four minutes of beautiful, memory-fuelled connection. Call it a simple man’s seance. It was the one that soothed a valued part of my life, and harmonized with the breathing of my heart.
It also made me realise that life is a lot more beautiful when you have death to quantify it. The head must eat the tail. Over, and over, and over again.
So where am I now on my big playlist of life? Well I’m somewhere between Blink 182’s First Date and Hooked on a Feeling by Blue Suede. I’m there because life is fun and wild and full of all the good things. Even with this pandemic, the riffs are strong and the subwoofer is in great peril of imploding under the heavy baseline. Stand back folks.
Sure there are the tough days, but I’ve got the history of music in my phone to explore and subconsciously tie to my individual perception of life. Memories, expectations, dreams and imaginings. It’s all there.
I’m lucky enough to have made sense of a lot of things during my big move, and I am sure there are many similar who have found their solace in song which is a special thing in itself.
Not everything makes sense to everyone, and neither should it. We all have our own crazy thing going on, our own bizarre path cut through the mangrove of our existence. Music is just another way to frame our little world while we crawl around this hurtling orb of rock and lava.
But hell, it’s a wonderful way to map every part of your being. Fire up that Spotify, and I’m sure you’ll soon hear a few parts of yourself on that next suggested playlist.
