THE PARTING
These are the 23 songs that kept me company most reliably on my nine-month trip throughout the U.S. and Europe.
Among these ditties are old songs that have accompanied me for a decade or more, and new songs that have revealed themselves in the last nine months.
A third of the songs are from my cross country road trip playlist — I love this fucking country — a third from my New Orleans playlist — The Golden Notebook: New Orleans — and my Italy playlist — OLD DOG.
We have love songs, sad songs, country songs, blues songs, gospel songs, rap songs, hard-bitten songs, tongue-in-cheek songs, earnest songs, rap songs, rock songs, Italian songs. I love every one. I loved them most when I was alone on the roadside, in my car, at the cabin, in the kayak, in the sea, overseas, on the bayou.
La Despedida (The Parting) — Terry Allen
Terry Allen the type to woefully take off his ranch-hand hat and place it atop the piano before launching into this tale. He wisely makes us wait for catharsis, the rising refrain first appearing halfway through the song. La Despedida reentered my lexicon because I knew my boy Carl would like it while we lounged on the dock at Duck Lake. At the time it seemed a precursor to my first visit to the American Southwest and its “Texican sky.”
La Despedida
It’s all gonna leave ya
Just singing along
Life’s Gone Down Low — The Lijadu Sisters
Here we have the coolest song ever.
Swinging organ and aggressive drums access that strange feeling of flux between being happier than I’ve ever been, and doing what I want to do, in the process losing money and stability. It sounds jubilant yet realistic.
It’s not too late for me and you if we hurry
I’m Writing a Novel — Father John Misty
Too funny and self-aware a song to hate. I’m being made fun of. Poked at. He’s trying to get a rise out of me. Whatever. It’s true. I am. I did.
Surrounded on all sides
By people writing novels
And living on amusement rides
Am I the one who’s surrounded by the fakers, or am I one of the fake novelists? My sabbatical did have me treating trains, planes, buses, and cars like all-you-can-ride roller coasters.
Little Green Apples — Cleveland Francis
This luminous take on The Temptations’ classic grounds me. I suggest waking up to it in the early morning with rain falling hard outside your open window. We love the mentions of Indianapolis and Minneapolis, our proud Midwestern American cities. The song makes me proud of my countrymen, that we could create something so lasting. And it makes me miss the people I love.
If that’s not loving me
Then all I gotta say
God didn’t make
Little green apples
It don’t snow in Minneapolis
In the wintertime
Come on up to the House — Tom Waits
Mr. Waits and his gravelly gospel have taken me in again; his singular voice capable of holding together plodding yet powerful drum and piano parts.
The house he speaks of could be the Chester house, it could be the Minnesota cabin, it could be your home, it could be your grandparents’, it could be your lover’s, the point is, it is a place of shelter from the trying world out there. It’s a strong reminder of home when you’re on the road.
The world is not my home
I’m just a passing through
Quik Stop — J. Cole
Yes, J. Cole. It pisses me off how the battle overshadowed his very solid album this year, though I do think it is his fault. Far from the talk shows, far from the people who don’t really listen to rap like that but call him mid, far from concerns about his retiring and so on, is the music. And if it is his last album, which I don’t think it is, he was able to, one more time, find the magic that built his stanbase.
Cole fans who have been here since 2009 or earlier have grown alongside him. This song in particular he was thanking all of us. He was reflecting on the musician and fan relationship, what it brings out in him. It’s a heartfelt, vulnerable song, which is his historical wheelhouse, but his vocal performance on this song was immaculate, starting casually until he’s yelling with passion. That’s an aspect of his rapping that has really improved since 2009.
I swear I feel like you was wit me in my loneliest phase
The love you shown me was so strong it damn near blowed me away
See even I be needing reminders on my lowliest day
That I should live in my purpose
If I deliver my verses
And get the fuck out my way
I’ll figure out what to say
Sparring Partner — Paolo Conte
My favorite find of the trip. A perfect song with incredibly poetic lyrics and a catchy but moving arrangement. Catchy but moving is Paolo Conte in a nutshell. His songs sound like you heard them before in an old movie, like he’s a grizzled alcoholic performing at his family reunion and covering himself. An incredible knack for the heart of the matter, the metaphysical of it all, that center and that crux of human expression that music at its best embodies.
I’ve looked through the game all the way
That’s all, but you know
I’m an old sparring partner
And I have never seen
A more tiger-like quietness
More of a secret than this
Catch the first bus, come on
What’s left is poetry already
He must be over forty
And some cheers by now
Are owed due to love
Never get to meet him
I Want to Know, Part ii — Adriano Celentano
Celentano teaches Italian with a statement of “I want to know,” echoed by his back-up singers as “vorrei sapere.” A smooth bass invites you in, then a funky horn groove that may as well be Motown hits you in the middle of the song. The singing is ponderous, tired, perhaps of not knowing.
My instincts of connecting it to my journalism background rang true when I found out the song functioned as a bitter indictment of Italian housing policy. The invective “I want to know” rings more like a near-hopeless demand than a desire.
How come people
Have conceived
Being able to live
In houses of today
Canned like the anchovies
Giving birth to babies that are already wrinkled
Why do people I want to know
Don’t say anything I want to know
About mister Hyde
About doctor Jekyll
The creators of such horrors
Who make the houses without a facade
Where the cavities are already infected
Imagining my Man — Alduous Harding
I was put on to a number of songs at the end of my trip that were previously lingering just outside my comfort zone. This is one of them.
Harding tells an exceedingly mature story of love, an imperfect love, as all loves are. The lyrics are devastating if you listen to them wrong:
It’s not what I thought
And it’s not what I pictured
When I was imagining my man
Moments of ecstasy, vocal flourishes, and three hard and quick notes represent the steadiness and occasional highs of an adult relationship.
Don’t Delete the Kisses — Wolf Alice
Sort of a reimagining of the prior song; it’s the questioning by a young woman of whether a real relationship is possible; something everyone asks when they’re single. As you listen you realize she is indeed in love but afraid to admit it. The towering, anthemic chorus switches from, “What if it’s not meant for me, love” to, “Me and you were meant to be in love” on the last go-round.
Vivo — Andrea Laszlo De Simone
A dreamy reinterpretation of classic Italian pop music. I could hear it from an opera singer as easily as I could from Simone’s lean and lanky pipes. He asserts his clear vocals and phrasing effortlessly in this song, the kind you roll the credits with, my favorite kind of song.
It is about the passage of time, as so many in this collection are. And the song stops time, or elongates it, with its expansive strings, as the singer implores you to cherish the moment.
I know it well
Life is short and also tight
But your mind is a great seamstress
Who sews quickly
In the time of a cigarette
Which feels good
To those cursed by the moon
And who expect nothing from life
Not perfеction
They enjoy what they’rе owed
Because we die too quickly
Hit the Ground Running — Smog
A song of hope from a voice of sorrow, and a warning to some, they know who they are, that “a bitter man rots from within.” The rolling guitar is almost grunge. The children’s choir on supporting vocals represents the hope in the lyrics, which had that special something of describing exactly what I was doing when I listened to it.
I had to leave the country
Though there was some nice folk there
And now I don’t now where I’m going
All I know is I’ll hit the ground running
Still the Same — Bob Seger
This one could be about anyone in your life. Doesn’t have to be romantic. It could be a parent, dependent on who your parent is, and especially if they’re a gambling addict.
To me it’s a song about old friends. You meet up with one for a drink and they give you their embellished version of their life over the last however many months and years. You can still see through them, right through to who you think they are.
You always won
Every time you placed a bet
You’re still damn good
No one’s gotten to you yet
Turning on the charm
Long enough to get you by
You’re still the same
You still aim high
No Downtime — Ka
This thumping blues loop grabs me every time as Ka offers a literary depiction of growing up in poverty. “We never had to use no downtime” reminded me to work while I wasn’t working, to get the book done and write the newsletter now that, for once, I had the time.
I’m the hustle, you the running man
Don’t respect the shepherd, you another lamb
From where it’s hard, man stressin’
Either starve, or pull a transgression
3D Country — Geese
Carl put me on. Still the only Geese song I know because the toxic discourse around them is making me take my time. But the shit goes hard. So I will get to them. Cameron Winter’s voice is arresting and sometimes shocking in its iterations, but I would stop short of calling it weird. There is plenty of precedent for it. Elements of country, blues, soul, r&b, competent background vocalists, and original writing make this song impossible to skip. Pick a couple Geese lyrics out of the bunch and suddenly it’s a delightful abstraction for something happening in your life.
Used to tear em’ up
I used to cut it down
Double it back I’m turning around
I’m going home
It ain’t easy livin’ on my own (a cowboy with a one track mind)
It ain’t easy living all alone (he drank a cup of the devil’s moonshine)
Feel Like Home — Fousheé
This whole album inspired me for a while, but this song took the longest to hit. While I was traveling, I liked songs that reminded me of home. A bright, guitar-led composition with unexpected synth progressions and background vocals on the chorus.
Remember when I had butterflies?
Swat em’ away and roll my eyes
But I can’t roll the dice forever
I’m grasping onto the only thing
That feels like something, anything
Let’s bite the bullet, fight this war together
Israelites — Desmond Dekker & The Aces
A song about Jamaican Rastafarians “slaving for bread”, and hoping not to succumb to a life of “Bonnie and Clyde.” The song doesn’t have anything to do with Middle East conflict. A bouncy bassline and a booming baritone comprise the foundation for one of the most popular jams in Jamaican reggae.
Get up in the morning slaving for bread
So that every mouth can be fed
Poor me, Israelites
Conservative Christian, Right-wing Republican — Todd Snyder
Shoutout WWOZ for putting me on while I was in New Orleans. This clever song about “hippies like me” provides a moment of clarity.
Diamonds and dogs
Boys and girls
We’re living together
In two separate worlds
We’re following leaders up mountains of shame
Looking for someone to blame
I know who I like to blame
Conservative Christian
Right-wing Republican
Straight white American male
Gay-bashing Black-fearing war-fighting tree-killing
Regional leaders of sales
Deep River — Sabine McCalla and Leyla McCalla
It’s not just because I went to school in Deep River. The McCalla sisters are transcendent vocalists who, like Paolo Conte and Tom Waits, share that mainline to the emotional machinery of the universe. Sabine was a major part of my time in New Orleans because she put out her debut album my first week there.
The sisters harmonize on an aching folk tune. Whenever they go high I get chills. I’m reminded of how badly I need Sabine’s live performance of “Ain’t no Weight” on wax.
Don’t you want to go?
To that gospel feast
To that promised land
Where all is peace?
Ain’t a Day Goes By — Melissa Carper
Carper’s sensational voice, high, nasally, and still strong, is the star of the song despite the notable soul arrangement. Capable piano playing, simple lyrics, straight church blues between the organ and piano, almost distract you from the impossibly sad subject matter about the death of a loved one. That sort of missing and longing can only be transmuted through a work of pure emotion like this one. I felt the presence of those who’d gone by everywhere I went, starting in Minnesota.
And oh, how I wait
For that sweet day
When your face
Again I will see
When we meet in the great eternity
And there ain’t a day
Goes by
That I don’t think of you
Francis Forever — Mitski
Mitski is another blind spot of mine, again because the online discourse about her is annoying, so I’ve been missing out until recently. I didn’t know she had this kind of juice, this kind of punky garage-rock simplicity with quick verses spilling into a sturdy chorus. I MISS YOU MORE THAN ANYTHINGGG…
I don’t need the world to see
That I’ve been the best I can be but
I dont think I could stand to be
Where you don’t see me
Don’t Wait Too Long — Madeleine Peyroux
Like Vivo, Peyroux hits us with some hard-won knowledge about time. This song came with me when I visited places like the West Coast and saw things like a moose charging across an open field and the Pacific Northwest and the Columbia River Gorge and the Golden Gate Bridge. It’s jazzy, a kind of innocence and openness like Corine Bailey Rae and other early 2000s acts. Feels like this kind of song isn’t possible anymore because everything needs to have an edge now.
If you think that time will change your ways
Don’t wait too long
Sometimes you gotta lose it all before you find your way
What You Were Lookin’ For — Apollo Brown, Oddisee
This joint has been following me everywhere since 2016. I first heard it on my original visit to Italy, and it’s one of the last songs I heard on the way out this time, my third time. You could direct the song title at yourself, your enemy, your ex, your loved ones. Anything works over this hypnotic beat from Apollo Brown and thought-provoking lyrics (as always) from Oddisee.
This ain’t the city where your dreams are conceived (nah)
This ain’t the place where you’ll be fine at your pace (nah)
This ain’t the city where you come to breathe
This is the place where you can learn from mistakes, and leave