"MIXTAPE LINER NOTES VAR. VII"
Frog
from 1000 Variations on the Same Song
2025
What I'm interested in is the idea of the music you listen to defining you in some way. Can you describe yourself with a playlist? There are a few ways of answering that question. The way I'm choosing to answer it today is by thinking of it as a synonymous question to another important one: What kind of music do you listen to?
I have attempted to answer the latter question many times, and I always end up confusing myself. The most accurate and least helpful answer I could give is "everything." It's accurate because I really do believe that I am at the point in my life that I can handle listening to and processing and reflecting on any example of music that could possibly cross through my ears at any point (the blog has helped me immensely in that regard). But that's not a helpful answer to someone who is asking, because they aren't asking about your brain and how it works, and they aren't asking in order to gauge how open-minded of a person you are. They are asking because they are looking for a connection. If you listen to a certain type of music and so do they, then that's something to bond over. If the answer is "everything," then the connection is there, but it's too weak. Either that, or the answer of "everything" gets misinterpreted as "anything," which is a completely different answer, and the worst answer there is. If you're the type of person who says "I listen to anything," then that means you don't actually listen to music, at least not actively, and furthermore you probably don't give a shit.
The answer that is still unhelpful, but perhaps a little less so, is "I listen to indie rock." That's helpful because, if you know what I'm talking about, then you instantly know where I'm coming from, and we can find common ground. But it's not entirely helpful because the genre tag of "indie rock" is basically undefinable at this point, if it ever even was at all. What the fuck is indie rock? Most of the time, I can't say. It's just easier to name bands, but even that is sort of pathetic, because I'm just naming my indie rock bands, and the genre, if it even exists, is infinitely wider than that, beyond my own personal scope of what I know and love.
I read a book over the past couple weeks that attempted to answer that corollary question of "what is indie rock?" It's called Such Great Heights, written by Stereogum editor Chris DeVille, and it attempts to answer that question by tracing the history of "indie rock" from its '90s origins into the near-present. The bedrock of this lineage is that it began as an off-shoot of alt-rock that was playing on college radio and was largely released on independent labels, and as it gained traction and cred, it was consumed by capitalism, basically, and turned inside out, i.e. turned back into the very pop music is originally attempted to counter. That's the most basic outline I can give you. The way the book fleshes out this central argument is by... well, basically just naming and describing a bunch of bands. I'm not knocking the book, that's literally the only way to do it, and I enjoyed the narrative immensely. But it's tough to describe the genre that you primarily live in when that genre is so inclusive that the meaning was lost even before you attempted to describe it.
I think this is actually a solution for me, not a problem. If indie rock at one point meant something, then at another point it opened up so wide that it doesn't mean anything anymore. And that process of opening up accurately mirrors my own personal journey. I started out within the confines of indie rock, listening to the bands of this genre almost exclusively, and then gradually opened myself up to new genres and new artists and new sounds, to the point where my own personal answer to "what do you listen to?" can't possibly mean anything at all.
What I'd like to do today, despite everything I've said about the impossibility of the task, is to attempt it anyway. I want to describe what I listen to accurately, and I want to do so through a playlist. Did you know that this is something people are doing? It's not hard to imagine. "Describing yourself with a playlist" is not a new concept. It's probably been done at least since the advent of cassette culture, if not earlier. But I've run into a few real-world examples of this recently, as I take my own mysterious journey through the weeds of non-monogamy (this post is about music, though, don't worry). In the race to get to know someone as quickly as a janky dating app will allow, a playlist can now be used as shorthand for describing oneself. "This is what I listen to" is another way of saying "This is who I am."
The first time I was presented with such a playlist from an ostensible stranger, I was sincerely disappointed. Our brief conversation prior to that had showed promise, with mention of Frightened Rabbit (one of my all-timers), Tango in the Night (recently written about on this blog), and Motown (fucking duh). But then she dropped the link to her 50-song playlist subtitled "get to know me by my favorite music," and I had a tough time with it. Lots of B-team stomp-and-holler tunes, lots of pop rock songs that were clearly pushed up with the help of algorithms on TikTok and elsewhere, plenty of songs that exist firmly in the post-commercialization of indie rock, and a big handful of songs that I like but that don't scan as cool or hip or anything that I'd use to describe me as a person, even in combination with other similar songs.
You can see the problem. Well, first, the problem is me because I'm a snob (snobbery justified, I'm doing the fucking work to get to know music intimately enough to accurate judge it). But the other main problem is that it is clearly very hard to describe yourself via a single playlist. If my takeaway is negative, then it's either that we don't have compatible views on what is "good music," or the playlist made it easy to misinterpret the type of person that swiped-right pal is (or wants to present herself to be). And neither of those achieve the stated purpose of making a connection via the music.
There were plenty of other scenarios that would have played worse, I think. A step lower than the playlist she had would have been a playlist filled with basic pop music, like 50 songs comprised of Taylor Swift and Bruno Mars and Ella Langley (I had to look that last one up). A step lower than that would be pop music but pop-country, a playlist full of Morgan Wallen and Jelly Roll and Charley Crocket. A step lower than that would be, I dunno, a playlist full of artists I don't listen to anymore because they are sexually abusive? (The playlist that I checked out did indeed have Ryan Adams and Lizzo, but I'm trying to be sensitive and forgiving here, it's tough to share a part of yourself like that.) And then the bottom rung would probably be no playlist at all, because you don't listen to music.
A step above it, however, would probably be artists I've never heard of, but who are operating in niche genres that I am aware of and enjoy (like maybe a playlist full of hyperpop artists or something), shit that's cool and I know it's cool even though I don't know this song specifically. A step above that would be a narrow range of artists, but a depth of knowledge about those artists. For example, if I got a playlist full of Paul McCartney tunes, both the hits and the ultra-deep cuts, then I'd like that a lot, even if Sir Paul, whose music I love deeply, isn't necessarily my number-one favorite artist of all time. And then, of course, the top rung would be a playlist from a stranger full of music that I know and love and appreciate and feels like a mirror for my own musical soul. Doesn't happen too often.
Okay, so I'm going to create my own playlist. That's what I'm leading up to here. But I want to be clear about the what and the why. (I also want to make it clear that I'm not trying to shit on my once-and-probably-former friend, who made a good faith effort to make herself known, which I appreciate so much, even if it's not gonna work out, for reasons related and not related to music. I believe that you take a little something from everyone you've ever met, including in this specific and too-hot-for-the-blog context, and so why not the concept of a Playlist Describing You from this random person I might never talk to again.)
I don't want this be misinterpreted as an attempt at the Top 50 Songs of All Time. If you want a(n already outdated) copy of that, you just read this 2024 blog post (might take you a couple hours). I can love a song without letting it define me. In fact, many of the songs I love have extra gravity in my life because they were found outside of my comfort zone. I don't think "Welcome to the Black Parade" defines me at all, or means anything to me, besides the fact that it's one of the best songs of all time. To think that I am anything like the typical person who grew up with My Chemical Romance would be a gross misunderstanding of who I am and where I've come from.
On the other end of the spectrum, I also don't want this to be misinterpreted as a cool list of 50 random but certified cool songs that I've been listening to lately that you can chill with and "vibe" with or whatever the fuck. I can type a list of 200 good songs in about five minutes while blindfolded right now if you need me to, but the music I put down there would not give an accurate or full picture of who I am. Obviously you're going to find good music on my playlist, but it's been specifically curated for a singular purpose. I chose these songs because they accurately reflect what I like to listen to and what that might say about me.
If I'm going to make the claim that "I listen to everything," then I'm forced to admit that a 50-song playlist is not going to reflect that claim. There's no way I can cover every facet of my musical interests on such a playlist. So instead of trying, I'm going the opposite way. I'm narrowing the scope. The other claim of "I listen to indie rock" would be the shortest and easiest path to pursue. And more importantly, it wouldn't give anyone the wrong impression of what I "typically" listen to, or who I'm trying to describe myself as. Think about what you would believe about me if I said a song to describe me is "betty" by Taylor Swift. It's a fantastic song. If you ask me, it's the only Taylor Swift song that actually matters. But is that who I am? Do I want people thinking I'm a Swiftie? Do I want people to think I gave a single shit about what asshole jock she married or what private jet she's taking to buy a cup of coffee? Do you see how just adding the best songs would be counterintuitive to the purpose of today's mission?
There are countless other examples of music that were left off this playlist for similar, but far less cynical, reasons. You'll note, for example, that there is no hip hop on this list, even though I have grown in the past five years or so to deeply appreciate the genre and all its many facets, and consider a few rappers some of my favorite musicians of all time. I think it's more about knowing something, and wanting someone to assume what you know and what you don't know based on that song.
If I were to put Kendrick Lamar's "Swimming Pools (Drank)" on this playlist, this would be an excellent encapsulation of a piece of music that I love. Great fucking song. That second verse is bonkers. And I know it well, and think about it a lot. Being an alcoholic, it actually means a lot to me to hear a song that's questioning whether drinking is worth it in the long run, and speaks to the struggles we all have with substance abuse. I also recall walking home from McNally's somewhere one night drunk as shit and listening to this song and feeling the impact within me, years before I knew why. But if you saw this song on a playlist, would you be able to pull any of this out of the playlist? No. You would have to make assumptions. Which is okay, that's kinda what you're gonna need to do if you're checking out 50 songs from a guy trying to make himself known through the songs. I'm just saying that the assumptions have a greater chance of being wrong with a song that I know well from a genre I know less well.
There's a difference, in other words, between listening to something that you enjoy, and knowing something and the context from which it came fully and completely. If someone is going to be asking me about a song, I want to be speaking intelligently about it and the world in which it exists. I want to expound upon it. I could try to speak to "Swimming Pools (Drank)," but anything I have to say about it collapses inward. I don't know context, I just know what it sounds like (to me). It's all important when it comes to explaining "what you listen to."
But I want to be clear that this is not a playlist of the best songs. I'm not saying that I have "better taste" then you. That would be an obscene thing to say. Music is so fucking subjective, and I am continually humbled by how vast musical tastes can be. I'm not asking anyone to love every song on this list, because that's not the point. If I was going to make a playlist like that, I could. I took "Rock Me Gently" by Andy Kim off the playlist below at the last minute. I fucking love that song. It's better than most of the songs on here. If you're looking for a great song, start there. But it doesn't answer the question we're answering today. It says nothing about what I listen to typically. It is one exception out of many, many, many exceptions. It's some hokey '60s pop song made by a goober without another hit in one thousand years. That's not what I usually listen to. I listen to "Rock Me Gently," basically every day of my life, but that says nothing about me.
This playlist does say something about me. I think. I actually don't care, you should know that too. Care about someone knowing me, I mean. It's cool when someone does know me, or care to know me, like that feels good, but I'm not trying to make a habit of seeking that out. There's too much of that in the world. We are a society obsessed with trying to make ourselves understood by any means necessary. This blog has perpetuated that mindset way too often, and I'm trying to cut it out. I don't need you to understand me.
If you wanted to, though, you can start here.
- "Fear and Trembling" by Gang of Youths
- "Massive Nights" by the Hold Steady
- "Don't Shake Me Lucifer" by Roky Erickson & the Aliens
- "Turn On Your Love Light" by Grateful Dead
- "Your English Is Good" by Tokyo Police Club
- "Hazey Jane II" by Nick Drake
- "I Lost My Mind (DJ)" by Titus Andronicus
- "Custard Pie" by Led Zeppelin
- "Hideaway" by the Olivia Tremor Control
- "Sister Cities" by Hop Along
- "Better" by Caracara
- "One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later)" by Bob Dylan
- "BLOOD IN THE MILK" by Fireworks
- "Drown" by Teenage Halloween
- "The Legend of Chavo Guerrero" by the Mountain Goats
- "Work Til I Die" by 2nd Grade
- "everyday feels like 9/11" by Home Is Where
- "Like Dylan in the Movies" by Belle & Sebastian
- "Younger Us" by Japandroids
- "Ghosts" by Bruce Springsteen
- "Lit Up" by the National
- "Come On! Feel the Illinoise! (Part I: "The World's Columbian Exposition / Part II: Carl Sandburg Visits Me in a Dream)" by Sufjan Stevens
- "Ice Cold" by Waxahatchee
- "Cut My Hair" by the Who
- "Attn MOVE" by Algernon Cadwallader
- "Sympathy is a knife" by Charli XCX
- "Cave-o-Sapien" by Wolf Parade
- "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd
- "My Slumbering Heart" by Rilo Kiley
- "Life During Wartime" by Talking Heads
- "Under Cover of Darkness" by the Strokes
- "Drunk II" by Mannequin Pussy
- "Hanky Panky" by Tommy James and the Shondells
- "Every Time the Sun Comes Up" by Sharon Van Etten
- "Raise Your Voice Joyce" by Fucked Up
- "Cadmium" by Pinegrove
- "The Sporting Life" by the Decemberists
- "Hard to Love" by Bully
- "Narrator" by Squid
- "On My Way" by Alex Lahey
- "Scentless Apprentice" by Nirvana
- "Steel Claw" by Tina Turner
- "Two Deliverances" by the Hotelier
- "Paprika" by Japanese Breakfast
- "Cops and robbers" by underscores
- "Used Up" by Kill Lincoln
- "Hard Times" by Paramore
- "Robbery, Assault and Battery" by Genesis
- "Heimdalsgate like a Promethean Curse" by Of Montreal
- "I Must Belong Somewhere" by Bright Eyes
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