Metaphorical queued songs
An announcement and some recommendations.
I was recently at a dinner party where my friend served up two pastas. One was pesto, the other some kind of prawn bisque. She is the type of person who throws something together that is ‘low key’ and ‘casual’, but ends up restaurant worthy. My mother has that ability. So does my sister. I do not.
What I remember more than the meal, though, is the game we played after it. It was accidental. One person queued a song on Spotify, and handed it to the next person, who did the same and passed it on.
We went round after round. Then the rounds escalated into themes. The song that signified your youth, your festival era, your childhood. Your road trip song, the song you play when you’re really feeling yourself.
It revealed so much about one’s life and age and selfhood. And you could always tell whose song was playing because they would have their hands in the air, vibing out to their own recommendation. Which brings me to Side Note.
I have been longing to start this newsletter again, but didn’t want to pull the trigger unless I could commit to it fully. Essay writing takes time and work. And I have another job. So, going forward, this newsletter will arrive in your inbox once a fortnight - every second Friday, for now - and the format will be slightly different.
There will be a personal essay or cultural critique sent to you occasionally, but there will be more recommendations — of books and films that interest me; of articles and podcasts that have captured my attention; and music I am drawn to.
There is something special about sharing the things you love. So, here are my metaphorical queued songs. Take them or leave them. Regardless, you’ll find me here, hands in the air.
Recommendations:
Cha Cha Real Smooth is my favourite film of the last year, so I didn’t want to send out this edition without recommending it. It’s a coming of age film about a college graduate who returns home to look for work and ends up becoming an unofficial party-starter at local bar mitzvahs. As he navigates adulthood, he falls in love with the mother of an autistic girl who attends the bar mitzvahs. Dakota Johnson plays the mother and, in one scene, says: “Giving your heart to somebody is the scariest, most dangerous, most perplexing thing.” The director, Cooper Raiff, who wrote the film and stars in it told GQ that in all of his work he tries to get at “joyful sadness”. I couldn’t sum this film up better.
Joey Badda$$’ album, 1999, has been on high rotation this month. It’s an oldie-but-a-goodie and it reminds me of my sister’s friend who is the only person I know that has managed to get it on vinyl. Waves, Hardknock, Funky Ho’$, and Snakes are some of my favourites on the record.
I’ve been obsessed with Melissa Broder for the last six months. She writes about love, death, sex and obsession in a way that traverses the dark and the funny. Her books include an essay collection and two novels (with a third novel, Death Valley, coming out later this year). I recommend starting with The Pisces. It’s about a woman who falls in love with an attractive swimmer in Venice Beach while on a self-imposed dating ban. The book flips the traditional man-falls-in-love-with-mermaid story on its head to become a modern day Los Angeles love story. I couldn’t put it down.
I adored - and continue returning to - this Paris Review essay, titled ‘The Unravelers’, where Stephanie Danler writes about the two kinds of women in this world: those who knit and those who unravel. If you’re interested in writing or living a creative life, listen to her conversation with Emily Ratajkowski on Ratajkowski’s High Low podcast. Danler also has a newsletter called Write What which I read religiously.
John Mulaney’s new comedy special, ‘Baby J’ which is out on Netflix is hilarious and gorgeous. I’ve watched it three times. In the set, he lets the audience in on his drug addiction, intervention and stints in rehab. Stories include pawning Rolex watches, dodgy doctors, breaking up with drug dealers, and a GQ interview he has no recollection giving.
If you didn’t catch this Harper’s feature on the Goop cruise by the author and critic Lauren Oyler, add it to your weekend reading list. It’s one of the best pieces of writing to come out this year. Oyler is the author of Fake Accounts, a work of fiction that I loved a couple of years ago. It’s about a woman living in New York who discovers her boyfriend is a conspiracy theorist.
In honour of my friend’s dinner party, here’s the song she queued for the ‘feeling yourself’ round: Feeling Good by Nina Simone. Her fiancé had also queued the same song, in a tiny moment that expanded into infinity and confirmed what a good pairing they are.
