WILT_2021-24

A playlist of songs that intrigued me from Sunday to Saturday. Week of 13 Jun 2021 to 19 Jun 2021.

1. Howler – Martin Gore
2. Everything is Different (To Me) – quickly, quickly
3. Op – Bremer, McCoy
4. My Own Soul’s Warning – The Killers
5. Pedas – Wany Hasrita, Sophia Liana
6. Hyper Worm Tamer (Remix) – Grinderman
7. Blue Splinter View – Me And My Drummer
8. Echolocation – LITE
9. Hunter – LITE
10. Moya – Godspeed You! Black Emperor
11. Seven Nation Army – Scary Pockets, Elise Trouw, originally performed by The White Stripes
12. Mutantes – Fermín Echeveste, Juana Aguirre
13. Algo de Lo Que Me Pueda Quejar – Doble Pletina
14. Slipping Away – LEISURE
15. El secret més ben guardat del pop – Nyandú
16. Lovertaker – Gary Wright, Wonderwheel
17. Chicha Nola – Gitkin
18. Dream (Arr. M. Leng Tan) – John Cage, Margaret Leng Tan

Hyperlink to Spotify playlist: WILT_2021-24

Notes

I remember starting this playlist with a certain fear of judgement by observers, about what they might think about the choices I made on what to highlight. If I am being honest, this thought does come into my mind every now and then, especially when I consider the representation of what I have been listening to, as well as what I have been choosing to feature. To a degree, some level of bias already exists.

I truly believe that music is a beautiful language that allows human beings to connect across cultures and traditions, that if we do not allow music to define our egos, that it is a way forward beyond our prejudices and biases. Why? Because music has the ability to speak without words. It allows you to feel emotions. But it is our preconceived notions that colour our perception when we hear something different, or not to our taste. But if we recognise that this is a taste for another person, or another culture, we are in no positions to judge someone else’s choices. We are each on this earth for a finite amount of time, our egos have no place in trying to convince any culture, longstanding or emerging, that their preferences are wrong or tasteless. We listen at the place we are at. We enjoy music at the place we are at. We are moved by music at the place we are at. Many times they are miniscule specks in a grand canvas of egos, and I have found that the smaller the ego, and the more open-minded, have the ability to connect across more individuals, rather than remain closed to one particular sound, one particular generation, or one particular bias.

I suppose this is why I feel slightly unnerved whenever I come across a comment of people claiming a particular culture or history as theirs, when it should be the opposite. Your culture and your history is what you choose to contribute to it. Culture and history is not for you to take, it is what you give.

Back to the actual notes of this playlist. I thought it would be a journey into experimental drone projects, music and ideas that I would somehow gravitate towards when I need to concentrate, yet provide enough dimension and hiss to push through creative and motivational barriers. But that all changed early on in the week when Jenna let me listen to The Killers’ anthemic My Soul’s Own Warning, which is not the best Killer’s song, but the newest one that I listened to after a very long time. It brought a sort of nostalgia, yet enough growth in their songwriting and arrangement to make me curious about rock music again, or rather, interested in the energy that comes from rock music. I decided on listening to more music by LITE, which scratched an itch for more progressive music, and also came across some video recordings of Godspeed You! Black Emperor, which back in the day, were extremely elusive. They still are extremely elusive, but thanks to the Internet, I can now experience some of their live performances to a degree.

But even that did not last very long as there were some interesting forks in the road as I got exposed to Spotify’s Borderless playlist and was exposed to more non-English indie pop sounds. The energy and the sounds were new and interesting enough to my ears and I greatly appreciated the injection of their local flavours into music.

We are close to the end of with a bangin’ track that I got introduced to from this extremely fun mix by Krishna Villar. Chicha Nola by Gitkin made me sit up with its cheeky and fun percussion, as well as its cinematic guitar runs and instrumentation.

And finally we end off with a piano and toy piano arrangement and performance of John Cage’s Dream, by Margaret Leng Tan. Margaret is a Singaporean treasure and she recently performed this track, as well as others in response to beautiful works by some of Singapore’s pioneering artists like Kim Lim and Eng Tow. You should watch the video performance by National Gallery Singapore’s programming team here for aural delights and art education and appreciation.