“Earworm” is an English term that indicates a song that gets into the head and haunts for a prolonged time – as if the music physically crawled into our ears and decided to stay there.
This new column, each time, will gather a few songs evoked by some key words: in this first episode I will talk about 10 songs that remind me of everything that is delicate and ethereal, just like dreams.
- Cigarettes After Sex, Apocalypse
I believe that Cigarettes After Sex are the undisputed masters when it comes to making songs that feel like daydreams. Music for sleepless romantics and sensitive souls, which cradles, envelops and swallows in a sea of healthy sadness and bliss, like a lullaby.
- Suki Waterhouse, Good Looking
To quote a comment under the videoclip on youtube, “this song got me blushing over the boyfriend I don’t have”. This song, with its graceful pace and the intensity of the chorus, perfectly conveys the feeling (not necessarily experienced) of being young and in love: a spontaneous feeling of mutual knowledge, without demands or pressures, suspended in a time that seems infinite.
- Emerson Snowe, If I Die, Then I Die
From the first listening, I knew that I had made a great discovery. Emerson Snowe is everything an independent artist should be: enthusiastic, curious, fearless, humble and eclectic. If I Die, Then I Die is a little pop hit born from the union between the evanescent romanticism of the 80s and a poetic and evocative text. This song, with its overwhelming pastel drama, is perhaps still the one that best represents Snowe’s unique sound.
- Mazzy Star, Fade Into You
A classic of the 90s dreampop genre. A sweet and sleepy ballad, with the guitars, the piano and the languid voice of Hope Sandoval that drag us into a nocturnal and dreamy dimension. The structure of the song is very simple – three chords that are repeated throughout its duration – but it’s enough to create an atmosphere full of bitterness and nostalgia, a knot in the throat. A small emotional masterpiece.
- Fontaines D.C., Oh Such a Spring
Poetry in the form of music: a weeping guitar accompanies Grian Chatten in the description of a melancholy Dublin, belonging to a distant and indefinite time. Those evoked are sad and decadent images; a world of suffering and sacrifice in which life passes slowly, in the continuous hope of the return of a lost spring, made of youth, light and carefreeness.
- Mars Argo, Runaway Runaway
Often songs are able to convey feelings totally opposite to those that are the original intentions and message. This delicate song had a genesis that was anything but sweet: Mars Argo describes her thoughts with disarming sincerity after having been through an abusive relationship that compromised her mental health and her artistic career, managing to turn pain into a moving lightness, the one you need to fly away and leave everything behind. Sublime.
- Declan McKenna, I Am Everyone Else
The image that I have always had in mind while listening to this song is of a deserted beach, bathed in the sunset’s golden light, and the sound of the waves breaking on the shore: yet I Am Everyone Else speaks neither of beaches nor of nature, but it’s rather a reflection on politics and on wanting to appear as in reality one is not to win the benevolence of others. Since his debut album, Declan McKenna has shown that he’s able to observe and tell the world with his ironic, clear and acute style, in a way that is always stimulating and multifaceted, never predictable.
- Sorry, As the Sun Sets
A huge lawn and the irrepressible longing to run towards the setting sun: this is the desire expressed in one of the most beautiful and evocative songs ever written by Sorry. Altered moods and tormented emotions have always been at the centre of their production: in As the Sun Sets, meeting a person you would rather not see triggers a paralysing sense of embarrassment, which ultimately finds a solution in the contemplation of nature and in the fusion with it; an invitation to seek beauty in everything and take refuge in it so as not to be overwhelmed by the darkness.
- Alex Turner, Stuck on the Puzzle
Certainly the most famous track from the soundtrack created for the film adaptation of Submarine, iconic right from the opening lines: “I’m not the kind of fool who’s gonna sit and sing to you about stars”. A declaration of intent by the Arctic Monkeys frontman, who has always been an attentive observer of society and feelings, capable of writing deep and acute love songs without falling into the usual cloying clichés. Strategically placed during the final credits, Stuck on the Puzzle keeps the attention of us viewers alive until the very end as we reflect on Submarine‘s bizarre series of events, making us wonder if what we saw through the eyes of protagonist Oliver Tate actually wasn’t all a dream.
- Gorillaz, Souk Eye
When Humanz was released in 2017, several critics and fans complained about the almost excessive presence of featuring in all the tracks as if, instead of a Gorillaz album, Damon Albarn wanted to make a collaborative compilation in which each song was created ad hoc for the guests, often sacrificing witty and sincere writing in favour of a more choral and generalised one. The next record, 2018’s The Now Now, marked a decisive change of course: featuring reduced to the bone and Albarn back at the helm. Souk Eye is the perfect conclusion to an album that is ironically more human than Humanz: the good old theme of love and remembrance slips on the delicate notes of a simple guitar riff, coming to an exciting crescendo of sharp violins, chimes and a captivating rhythm. A memorable ending.
DISCORDANCE 