I knew about The Weakerthans for “Sun in an empty room” from the intro of Jonathan Goldstein’s incredible podcast Heavyweight. I had Reunion Tour on my Library for a while, but it’s in the last few months that I’ve been coming back to it. I find their sound nostalgic, but very pleasing and relaxing. There’s an inherent sadness in the delivery of even the joyful melodies and lyrics. And that’s my shit.

Civil Twilight is incredible.

I’ve always hated, to varying degrees throughout my life, that most songs in the world are about love or romantic loss. I still consider it lazy and unnecessary, but this kind of song is the exception.

Civil Twilight is a song about grieving an old relationship, yes, but it’s told from the point of view of a bus driver that constantly (every hour) has to drive by an old house where their partner broke up with them.

Reading further about this song, I learned that some people think it's about a past commuter that no longer takes the bus. I personally think it's too much of a stretch, but that would actually make it even more poetic.

Regardless, how John K. Samson comes up with these ideas, I don’t know. But I’m glad he does. It’s poetry, from the title to the guts, and I love it so much.

There are a lot of love songs out in the world, but very few hate songs. And between those few, this one is king.

Take the most intense and passionate love song you know, make it its opposite version, and you’re not even close to this.

I don’t personally identify with the lyrics, but they give me chills regardless. John Darnielle says it’s a song about having it really bad and staying in the moment, feeling and embracing the pain.

I am drowning, there is no sign of land. You are coming down with me, hand in unlovable hand. And I hope you die, I hope we both die.

That’s not even the worst part.

Enjoy!

When I was 19 I worked at a tiny graphic design studio, and one of the owners/bosses had one wall-sized rack filled with compact discs. Hundreds of CDs.

The first time I saw that wall I was in awe, and asked the guy if I could borrow some albums to listen back home. His answer was: “yes, of course, with three conditions:"

1. You borrow one at a time and play the whole thing
2. You bring it back
3. You borrow this one first

He handed me Songs of Leonard Cohen and I happily went home.

I’m sure Suzanne was the first Cohen song I listened to, because it was the first track on that album. I was immediately captivated by the poetry, the voice, and the chill and relaxed melody that somehow gave hints of angst and desperation.

I have so much love for this song, not only because of the anecdote, but because it was the one song that led me to dig more into Leonard Cohen’s body of work.

I've never heard this Café Tacvba album in full, just random songs that appear here and there, and this song had somehow escaped that serendipity until now. I stumbled upon an interview with Meme del Real on YouTube, and they were talking about a very specific, extremely emotional rendition of this song on a concert. I searched for it and listened, and I cried for the better part of an hour.

I love how Meme's lyrics are always very simple but super expressive. The subject of this song, the love for a child and the fears of parenthood are already touching, and the melody completes an emotional bomb that obliterates me. It's a happy sadness what I get from these kind of songs.

Right now I'm specially sensitive for father-kid songs, and this one is, so far, the best I've encountered.

Andrés Calamaro covers this song a dirty, sad, very raw way. I imagine him half-drunk at 4am recording in the kitchen, and the resulting song is so much better, at least in emotionally, than the original from The Beatles.

It makes me tear up. It reminds me of my youngest son and his constant fears, his struggles with making sense of it all. Every time I listen to the song I feel the urge to go to him, hold him and tell them that everything's gonna be fine. And I often do.

Sleep, pretty darling, do not cry. I will sing you a lullaby.