Songs for the Storm: A Rainy Day Playlist
Beck, “Wave”
One of the best things about a rainy day is the way that it basically encourages a type of meditation, the slowing down of our typically fast-moving minds as we spend hours staring out the window at the rush of rain. Beck’s “Wave” (off his excellent latest album, Morning Phase) has its own meditative qualities, enhanced by both the music’s orchestral swells and Beck’s haunting incantation of the word “isolation.”
Sharon von Etten, “Tornado”
Von Etten’s voice is as clear and pure as water here, but the force of what she’s saying is as strong and relentless as a storm. “I’m a tornado. You are the dust/ You’re all around and you’re inside./You are the nature I’m the roar that comes from you.” This is the perfect song for a rainy day, but also for a break-up. Which, don’t those always seem to go hand-in-hand anyway? Yes. Yes, they do.
CocoRosie, “Tahiti Rain Song”
At times, the instrumentals in this song sound exactly like rain spattering on the tin roof of a hut somewhere on a tropical beach. Which, let’s face it, is probably the intended effect considering the whole “Tahiti Rain Song” thing. But, you know, mission accomplished! The sounds of this song will compete with the sounds of the actual rain falling on your roof (and hopefully not dripping from your ceiling!) in the best possible way.
The War On Drugs, “Black Water Falls”
“Remember me when you dissolve in the rain”—those words never fail to strike right through me each and every time I listen to this song. Everything about “Black Water Falls” evokes the craziness of wild weather—its insistence, its driving strength, its anger, its inevitability. The only problem is that this isn’t the kind of song you want to listen to inside, while watching the rain roll down your street. Instead, you want to be out in it, arms up, singing along.
Leonard Cohen, “Famous Blue Raincoat”
Rainy days are a time for reflection, and something I think about a lot (too much?) is the way I sign off my correspondence. It’s one of the plagues of my professional life, it really is. “Best” seems so perfunctory, but even worse, it also seems to mock the fact that my emails are almost never my “best” of anything. They’re inevitably the worst of everything. And obviously “xo” is somewhat fraught, as is, I’ve found, “yours,” even though I do use it sometimes. All of which is to say, maybe I should take a tip from one L. Cohen, and start using “sincerely.” Just a thought.
John Cale, “Barracuda”
Listening to this song (and really the whole album, Fear) has become something of a compulsion for me, its melody is so infectious. And it’s ridiculously easy to sing along. (Is any word more fun to say than “barracuda”?) But it’s while you’re singing along that you realize how dark and perfect the lyrics are: “Cold cost is the death of nothing/slipping just like nothing did.” Cale sweeps you away with “Barracuda,” and so even though you’re singing along, you know that, pretty soon, the ocean will have you too.