The Symington Collection Flossing Sampler

The Symington collection, housed in Leicestershire, UK, is primarily a collection of corsets made by R W H Symington and Co Ltd from 1860 to 1990. It gives an amazing overview of styles, techniques and decoration used throughout these periods in this factory.

Oh man, this is probably going to be boring because I’ve for sure posted all of these over the year, but it’s what I’ve got! I feel like I’ve gotten very bad at finding new music. These days I mostly let Spotify rec me things, or I pick up on something in a movie or recced by a person I trust and then just claim it as my own. Maybe I should make one of my new year resolutions to make a more concerted effort to find new music.

 Anyway, here are some songs, which are not new! And some whys, which might be!

I Need Never Get Old – Nathaniel Rateliff & the Shapeshifters

I think this is one of the ones that Spotify recced me. I sometimes just put on Roots Rock or Southern Gothic playlists in the background if I’m feeling aimless (a habit I picked up when I was living in Massachusetts and missing the South) and then Spotify will pick up on that general vibe and spiral out from there. Which, I guess is the whole point of it. You don’t need me to explain that. Anyway! This came from there and it is A JAM. Like, talk about a barnstormer. This shakes the whole damn house. There are ways in which it reminds me of the Three Dog Night and Blood, Sweat, and Tears albums I grew up with, and also ways in which it is thoroughly modern in sensibility. Also it just makes me want to MOVE.

This ended up on the Summer in Ascenvallee playlist, which is the playlist I made to go with the Steampunk novel I work on off and on with a friend. But of course, it also got attached to Crowley in my head, because everything gets attached to Crowley these days.

I needed to tryNeeded to fallI needed your love I’m burning awayI need never get old

Let This Remain – Alana Henderson

I think I found this the same way I found the previous song, but on the first listen I identified it so strongly with one of the characters in the Steampunk that I immediately just started playing it on a loop. (Because let’s be real, also, cello. I’m so weak for them!) The character, Amelia, is a young woman growing up in a time just before huge change and she’s sort of struggling with the future she wants for herself and her country. She had been betrothed to a young man she grew up with. And she does love him, but she’s not in love with him, so at the point where the story picks up she’s acting this out by being a bit of a gadfly and hanging out with bad influences and falling in love with the owner of the opera house who grew up In Society but is in a bit of disgrace for his choices. She’s uh, got some decisions to make about which parts of herself she takes with her and which parts she lets die in the inevitable fire.

But you could be the only one I don’t regret yetBe the only one I don’t regret yetAnd even if we don’tThe idea and the will just grow into a greater wantAnd it will manifest in waysLet tonight be a stutter midst the eloquence of days

Jenny – Erin McKeown (The Mountain Goats cover)

So, confession, outside of my tradition of singing This Year with @anachronistique every New Years (very poorly, on my end, Naomi sings fine), I’ve never really listened to The Mountain Goats. I knew of them, and I’d always hear a song here or there and think ‘ah yeah, I get the devotion’, but I never let myself fall into it. You know what I will let myself fall into though? A podcast about how creative work gets done. So I started listening to I Only Listen to the Mountain Goats even though I do not, in fact, even sporadically listen to The Mountain Goats.

Friends, it’s a Real Good Podcast. The first season is more structured than the second, and in that first season they had folks do covers of every song off All Hail West Texas and well, I fell in love with this one. It’s such a vivid slice of that character’s life. It’s fun to sing while speeding down the highway with your windows down imagining you are on the back of a motorcycle with your girl. Also, Erin McKeown’s voice is downright lovely and even though I’d never heard of her before I now also listen to her stuff all the time. Do recommend!

I hopped on the back of the bikeWrapped my arms around youAnd I sank my face into your hairAnd then I inhaled as deeply as I possibly couldYou were as sweet and delicious as the warm desert airAnd you pointed your headlamp toward the horizonWe were the one thing in the galaxyGod didn’t have his eyes on

Meticulous Bird – Thao & the Get Down Stay Down

I have also been sleeping on Thao Nguyen, but like, YOU GUYS. SHE’S GREAT. EVERY ONE OF THESE ALBUMS IS SOLID. I’M SORRY I’M SO SLOW. A couple months ago I was bored and looking for something to listen to while brushing my teeth, so I queued up a few episodes of Song Exploder for unfamiliar artists and the ep for “Astonished Man” was one of them. The song is about her estranged father, so I could relate to the difficult relationship there, but also it just has a sound I really respond to. It’s a little pop, a little dirty in the mix, a little electronic, a nice solid bass line. Anyway, from there I realized that I’d been hearing “Holy Roller” all over the place lately and then I just listened to only her for like, three days.

This song in particular has been attached to some of the Apres Moi Le Deluge characters in my head. Most importantly Ana, who is supposed to be a cleaned consciousness that was placed into an android body to be used as a thief by some Not Great Guys, but because she’s been rebooted more than the other consciousnesses—who are usually just tossed away after tbh—she’s starting to crack and remember her life from before. She starts the novel in opposition to our protagonists, but teams up with them pretty quick when she finds out the scope of what’s been done to her.

I, I resent the inventionListen, listen pay attentionI know the science of the fictionOf conviction of the henchmenI am here for the mastermindsThey told us that you sold usOh my oh my oh my godWe didn’t know you’d get ferocious

Manifest - Andrew Bird

Look, I don’t know if this latest album is actually Andrew’s finest work yet, but it’s pretty good. I love Andrew Bird’s music a great deal, have done since I experienced the Sonic Arboretum showing at the ICA, which is the extent of the importance for this one. Some days you just need a fiddle and a story. Or a fiddle and a canyon. One of the two.

I can hear your tendrils still diggingFor everything that’s walked this Earth once livingThen to be exhumed and burned to vaporCan you save her?Now she’s in the airRadical and freeNeither here nor thereShe’s obliged to no one 

Uh, and those are some songs! I hope someone gets a dance out of one of them. Or enjoys my rambling. Or something!

High Hopes // Panic! at the Disco

The Stand // Mother Mother 

Hey (hey, hey) Tell me your weakness Oh I keep it a secret Oh come on just one vice Okay, it's vodka on ice But then there's women on bikes Or just the women who straddle Oh now you are a handful I forgot about handfuls

Heretics // Andrew Bird

We’re talking about our steampunk novel again, which means I’m back on my bullshit with my stabby sons and their uber romantic friendship. It feels great to be home, tbh.