Some folks are religious about the seasonal elements of music, for example, spring is the only appropriate time to listen to Pavement’s Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain. This topic is subjective and personal, but sometimes it becomes universal. The same way smells transport you to specific times, music can do this. The following selections may or may not be universally autumn. To me, however, they shout foliage, school back in session, the silent and vapid transition of hot to cold.
———————
ohia
Magnolia Electric Co.
[Secretly Canadian, 2003]
The tunes of this album are organic in the obvious sense-natural, bare-bone, unhampered. Jason Molina’s songwriting is strong; sweet; somewhere between the light and dark of Neil Young’s shadow.
———————–
Deerhoof
Milkman
[Kill Rock Stars, 2004]
This is the feeling of passing a strange woman on the street. She is walking an unleashed dog and smiling to you with a bloody banana in one hand and a bursting bag of raked leaves in the other.
————————
Bob Dylan
Desire
[Columbia, 1976]
This is the sound of fall in the city. “One More Cup of Coffee” in particular, with its sneering violins and Arabian vocal flairs show me someone hiding out in a moderately busy New York diner, far from the valley he sings of, knowing that soon enough he’ll be back at the bottom of it.
————————-
Wilco
Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
[Nonesuch, 2002]
It is likely that Yankee Hotel Foxtrot will forever be the magnum opus of Wilco. The fall of 2003 is when this album took me by storm, just like a September hurricane should.
————————–
Deerhunter
Cryptograms
[Kranky, 2007]
This album is a journey, a vibrant wilderness jaunt. Its cover is pink, blue and silver-three very non-foliate colors. But the sound is everything you could imagine in the dry Maine woods of October-innumerable variations of brown and powerfully bright.
————————–
Guided By Voices
Bee Thousand
[Scat, 1994]
“Sitting out on your house/watching hardcore UFOs/drawing pictures/playing solos till ten.” These are the opening lines of the album, and to me, this could only happen in October or November. It sounds like a scene from Pete and Pete or Freaks and Geeks-when it is always fall. Bee Thousand is a revolutionary album which deserves play year round, as these all do. Especially this time of year.
—————————-
Sunset Rubdown
Random Spirit Lover
[Jagjaguwar, 2007]
This album embodies the dark and cold feelings of autumn; the ones you dread, when pumpkins start to frost and rot. Something very beastly and Halloweeny is here, and it isn’t pretty.
—————————–
My Bloody Valentine
Loveless
[Creation, 1991]
I’ve never been to Europe-not in fall, winter or any other season. But when I imagine going, it is autumn. I hear this music and it is good-looking.
—————————–
The Velvet Underground
White Light / White Heat
[Verve, 1968]
Something about the fall is very much White Light and White Heat. Being out in the sun all day, you feel less likely to get sunburned. Really, though, your chances are the same as if it were July. It could be the temperature or perhaps the breeze that sways you from the fear, but driving home at the end of the day, through the winding paths of yellow maple leaves with your face red hot, you feel as though you’ve been had.