Playlist Postscript: June 2020
"Riot SZN"
Welcome to Playlist Postscript. Every month I revisit an old playlist of mine and provide my present day thoughts on my past selections.
This month we return to June 2020, which began a summer marked by high temperatures and higher tensions. After two and a half months cooped up and cut off from each other, New Yorkers poured back out into the streets. They were galvanized by footage of a man’s murder at the hands of the police, and subsequent footage of Minnesotans taking to their own streets in protest. Maybe some were motivated less righteously to simply get out of the house. Maybe. As a rule I try not to make any sweeping statements about what happened during the nationwide BLM protests of 2020. Any movement that large and multifaceted defies easy summary, and you should be skeptical of anyone that claims to have a singular precise analysis. Typically they are trying to sell you something. All I can say is that I too poured out of my apartment into the streets, rode the eerie, spotless subways, and marched alongside my neighbors, chanting (sometimes too fervently…) and raising hell. Some of the marches were cathartic and ran right up to the edge of real danger. Others were family-friendly. Some were disconcerting in their toothlessness. All of them ate into time that I otherwise would have spent home listening to music. Hence, we’ve got a short one this month.
As always, I’ve marked the songs that hold up best with The Lamniformes Shark Emoji of Approval (🦈). Songs that will eventually factor into Drumming Upstream will bear The Drum Emoji of Destiny (🥁). ~*My Fiancée*~ has also marked her favorite songs from the playlist with The Cherry Blossom Emoji of Excellence (🌸). Exactly one of these eleven songs also earned the rare Dog Emoji of Distinction (🐶) for eliciting a response from our loyal four legged friend.
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