Something I am occasionally bothered by while living in Indonesia is that, although it is generally hot here, it almost never actually feels like summer. This is mostly due to the fact that because the island of Java is so close to the equator, the sun rises at 6am and sets at 6pm every single day, all year round. Another reason is that the city of Bandung, laid low in a valley surrounded by mountains, is surprisingly cool in the mornings and evenings. Where I'm from, high temperatures are met with 9pm sunsets followed by long, hot nights. And fireflies.
This past June, I went back to New York for the fist time in a year and a half. I had never been away from New York for that long in my entire life. You would think I would have wanted to wait for Christmas before I returned stateside but months prior to my 'homecoming,' I had begun to develop an insatiable lust for summer--American summer, with days that feel like they'll never end: Humid mornings, scorching afternoons, late sunsets, and sweaty, sultry witching hours.
In my heightening anticipation, I started compiling songs I wanted to accompany me as I once again walked the streets of New York for a long-missed summer in the City. The list started with nostalgia tracks of summers past, but swiftly morphed into a sort of mood itinerary, a conscious commitment to fulfill this prophetic mix I was making for my upcoming travels. I was developing a soundtrack for a movie that hadn't been made yet, but once the soundtrack had been completed, it of its own accord determined what the movie would look like, where I would go, what the plot would contain, and what character I would be. This was the theme music for my summer shenanigans not because these songs happened to fit them perfectly, but because I chose what adventures I would have when I chose this music as my base.
Small Black: Intro Friends: Friend Crush Foster the People: Pumped Up Kicks* Sublime: Summertime Black Moth Super Rainbow: Twin of Myself Lushlife: The Romance of the Telescope (featuring Andrew Cedermark) LEN: Steal My Sunshine TV Girl: I Wonder Who She's Kissing Now Quetzal: On a Sunny Day Mayer Hawthorne: I Need You Sean Broadway: Sean Broadway's Theme Simian Mobile Disco: I Got This Down Lil B: Real Life (Pictureplane's True Reality Re-edit) Santogold: I'm a Lady (Diplo Mix featuring Amanda Blank) "Secretsss" Toro y Moi: Talamak Thieves Like Us: Never Known Love Friends: Feelin' Dank B. Lewis: Good Riddance
*I battled for a long time whether or not I should put "Pumped Up Kicks" on here, so as not to lose any cred with the cool kids, but in the end, I felt I had special circumstances for putting the summer of 2011's most apparently over-played jam on a summer of 2012 playlist: I was in Indonesia last year and didn't get to enjoy it as a part of a wet, hot American summer like you did. So there.
Once again, I would like to thank DJ Simon Patardo and DJ Vondu for mixing the transitions between LEN & TV Girl, and Lil B & Santogold, respectively. You guys really captured exactly what I was trying to communicate. Thanks for all of your help and support.
