Happy birthday, darlin’
About An Hour
About An Hour : August 2021
About An Hour : May 2021
Listen to About An Hour for May on Spotify.
About An Hour : April 2021
Listen to About An Hour for April.
About An Hour : March 2021
Listen to About An Hour 03 : 2021 on Spotify
About An Hour : February 2021
Well well well, look who it is just making it under the self-imposed deadline?
February’s About An Hour playlist is decidedly a personal one. I thought I had it all figured out earlier this month until the emotional exhaustion of where I’m at just hit me and I realized I wanted to reshuffle things for my imaginary audience (with me sitting in the front row) and make it absolutely just right. Now, with hours to go before we hit March 2021 I think it is.
I love listening to the moodiness of “Cold” because it’s both cheeky and breathy. My standout this month is Son Little’s “about her. again”. I played this over and over again, just like his lyrics said, because it’s one of those songs that seem to describe your specific life. His voice, the guitar riff in the second verse, those damn lyrics. I dare you to listen to this and not think about someone you’ve loved for the longest time of your life. This song is a hard hitting, 20/20 Barbara Walters, more at 11pm testament to the pretty little moments in a relationship that just fucking kill you. The intimate moments that make it lovely, the wonderful ups, and the critical downs that make or break it.
Since this playlist is about the loves of my life or what not there’s a song in here about my mom. It’s in spanish. It’s awesome.
Anyway, moving on, I am a huge Sufjan Steven’s fan and this song is a continuation of the above but with a different almost angry intensity: “My love, I feel myself unraveling — tell me you love me anyway.” Enough said. (The video is gorgeous, too.)
Little known fact: I have been trying to teach myself Agnes Obels September song for a long time now. Does it make it more difficult not having a piano? Jajaja…YES. Anyway, it’s a lovely instrumental song and it’s made an appearance in my playlist before, but I don’t care. It’s my life, it’s my blog, it’s my silly playlist project.
Rostam’s “These Kids We Knew” is just a great transition to one of my favorite song from the 90s “Yellow Ledbetter.” I mean, if you didn’t grow up to the sound of Eddie Vedder’s distinct and amazing vocals then I don’t even know how to relate to you, Gen Z.
Then you get some Led Zeppelin, because why not, and then a little Radiohead “Karma Police” because it’s got to be one of my hands down favorite songs of all time. Thom Yorke’s singing “Phew, for a minute there I lost myself” is about me more and more these freaking days.
Do you remember Mazzy Star? I don’t. But I do remember her breathy “Fade Into You” which is just the kind of thing you want to say to the one you choose to dedicate February’s made up holiday to.
Then, oh then!, you get to the other loves of your life: your friends. Specifically for me it’s my pal Julia. She’s lovely, I love her, and I feel that she loves me no matter what. That, my friends, its called a Galentine and Mariah Carey was singing all about them in the 90s with the incredible album Music Box. Listen to it. Love it. Tell your friend you love her.
Then finally why not end the 90s with another 90s pool jam. Nick remembers life guarding to this on the radio. I can see the scene in my head: my super blonde buzz-cut future husband with his lithe competitive swimmer body sitting in one of those elevated lifeguard chairs by the community pool in Northern California. He is likely squinting his pretty eyes because he probably doesn’t have a hat on, because he’s going to have to wait about 20 years for me to come into his life to harass him about sun damage every time the sun peeks past a cloud. (This is love, folks). In this scene he is yelling at kids in this lifeguard voice (WALK!) and even saving a few dumb dumbs who manage to roughhouse too much in the deep end. I love him in that vignette in my brain and I love him every day now. So this playlist is mostly about him.
Click me to go to Spotify. Follow About An Hour and play it straight through when you want to burn through an hour of time.
About An Hour : January 2021
Well well well, what do we have here. It’s a the end of the first month of the year and it felt like it zipped right past. The year started off with a doozy, ready to put 2020 in it’s place with a some incredible violence, and then a party, and now the return of information and regular old American divisiveness and exceptionalism.
Cool!
About An Hour for January is about first and foremost celebrating. I love watching the Rose Parade in the wee morning of a brand new year, but this year the pretty little floats made of natural plants, seeds, and thousands of hours from volunteers (like me when I was in high school in Eagle Rock) were not a thing. So I start the playlist jamming to a drumline, part of Beyoncé’s ‘Homecoming’ Netflix special and album. She actually has zero singing parts in this, so it’s all about instrumental band and drumline. I like how it flows into Ivy Lab’s dark party in “Gopher.” The background vocals strike the same tone as the “The Buzzz Drumline” interlude so it’s a straight up dance party for about 15 minutes.
Everything winds down from there with some acoustic jazzy vocal-driven songs. The amazing “Sound & Color” by the Alabama Shakes is a song I forget about all the time and then out of nowhere get really excited when I rediscover it again because you feel the feels in the bouncy lyrics. I figured now that it’s top of mind why not actually cement it into a playlist, FFS. What I did discover net new was the Black Pumas while I was watching the inauguration party program. Their performance of “Colors” was incredible, and the lead vocals reminds me of the insanely cool nonchalance of Stevie Wonder, so they are forever hardwired in my brain and this playlist as back to back buddies.
Skip, skip, skip, and we get a couple more guitar songs from there and we’re right back into synth land. I like to end the playlists with something a little dramatic and it’s only fitting that the month of January 2021 deserves to end with the intense/odd/cool/Haha-I-Like-This of Imogen Heaps “Hide and Seek.” Why not? Who cares? Not me. Do you?
Anyway, TLDR: January is a happy one because I choose it to be.
Cheers to February being just the same.
About An Hour : December 2020
We made it, y’all. The end of the damn year. And what a bitch it was. I hope we 2021 is better in all the ways 2020 has disappointed me so far. I know that despite it all I still have plenty to be grateful for: my family is healthy, every single one. We’ve been inside for about 10 months now, and even then this new virus wave is bigger and faster. Yikes.
So enjoy the last playlist of the year, the last hour of the year clocking in just at 57 minutes.
I like listening to my own playlists more than anyone because they’re a big fat diary of what went down that month. Even now, I can listen to one of my playlists from years back and know exactly where I was, how I was feeling, and what I hoped for.
This month is a mix of upbeat, downbeats, angry, dancey, cheesy, and sad. So just for fun, here’s the entire year in a grid. You can click on them to listen to the individual playlist. Or not, it’s your life. Do you.
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About An Hour : November 2020
Listen to About An Hour : November 2020
This month’s playlist is one of my favorite’s this entire year, clocking it at 59 minutes exactly, it’s a true embodiment of just about an hour of music to pass the time. I like how all the songs flow together and also very accurately reflect my mood this time around.
I wanted to start it off with the collective sigh we all took at the beginning of the month after a longer-than-we’re-used-to count with Kool & The Gang’s “Celebration.” I cannot hear this song without dancing like a loser. And while this is usually a New Year’s song for me, exceptions can and will be made for a momentous good news moment like the one we had.
From there it’s a happy landslide into the the bouncy “Bootylicious” with a sample from Stevie Nicks as an intro to her taking over in the next song with her bold raspy voice. Then, it’s on to some ambient, matchy moody electronic tunes before transitioning to heavier beats, thanks to Janet Jackson’s naughty 8-second interlude. From “Freak” to Megan Thee Stallion, I love how this month finishes with pop songs, specifically MGMT’s peculiar brand of alternative warbley sounds instead of the usual slow and low love songs. It’s the right amount of bounce to celebrate Nick’s birthday, and then in a week my own birthday. 35. I’m ready for it. I’m cool with it. I feel different — I am different.
By this time last year, my December playlist was moody and one of my favorites of 2019, so we shall see where we net out in a few weeks.
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Listen to About An Hour : November 2020
Listen to my archived monthly playlists on Spotify here.