JCC The JCC Mixtape V: Here To Save 2025 ( - New Playlist - Now Playing: cubman987!)

I just completed my list

 

It's always interesting to me how much this varies person to person.

I personally am the opposite, I'm all about lyrics even when I need to translate them from another language. But there's no right or wrong way to go about music appreciation.

 

*googles 'How Not to Auto Vote for Johnny Cash*


Hm, no results.



But seriously that's a song of his from one of my top 5 albums of all time. I will definitely give the playlist a fair shot but ....

 

Honestly I’m pretty pumped about this one, got a lot of more obscure country/blue/folk stuff on there that I’ve been listening to recently. Devil Makes Three is absolutely fire, I’m actually going to see them in concert this year. New Game Now by Kris is probably my favorite love song ever written, and then yeah I’ve got Cash who is probably going to tear through the whole thing but I have to put him on here.

 

@mnjedi Will listen either after work tomorrow, or during work on Sunday!




Hmmm, the George Harrison cover won?

 

Wait

Where's the Gordon Lightfoot on this playlist?

 

i've been on a huge country, or "americana" (i love how we started calling pop music country so we had to call country music something else) kick since i re-watched ken burns' country music a few months ago, so most of this playlist matched that current vibe. really enjoyed it. voting "native son" for now, but i'll definitely give this one another spin at some point.

 

My original plan was to do a write in vote for Gordon. After initial listen, I wanted to split my vote eight ways. After two more listen throughs, I think I have it down to three. Need another listen to be sure, but for now I'm going with New Game Now

 

I tried but I still had to vote for Johnny when all was said and done

 

Of course but I believe in Johnny Cash just a teensy bit more and so would Kris ha.

 

Samwise would believe in Frodo just a Teensy bit more too.

 

One day I’m going to figure out YouTube just to put Hard Charger by Dale Earnhardt on one of these.

 

@mnjedi Apologies for getting to this so late! Niiiiice mix of punk/rock & country; tough call between ‘The American Dream is Killing Me’ and ‘Every Saturday Night’, but went with Green Day. Musically, really enjoyed the drums towards the end, and with all that’s going on nationwide & personally (morale at my Target has never been lower), lyrically it was spot-on.

 

Thanks @heels1785

Long time listener, first time caller .. err ... first time playlist submitter.

I thought for a good, long while about what I wanted to do here. I debated a fully themed single genre of music ... all classic country ... all showtunes ... all polka ... but realized none of that was true to me, and true to what these boards have meant and been to/for me.

And, for those of you who know me, you know that I've been diagnosed with depression for about a decade now. And that one of my missions in life is to help to normalize talking about mental health of all kinds. And so, my decision was to make this playlist about me, and my mental health journey, and my depression.

So here is my entirely too long winded explanation of ...

Inty, You Ignorant Slut (A Playlist About Depression)

Silver Bells - Jim Nabors

I can't tell the story of my depression without playing and sharing this song. My apologies to those of you who hate Christmas Music and who especially hate hearing Christmas Music any time of the year except for the actual Christmas season. But, I will never forget where I was on November 20th, 2014 ... sitting in my car, in a parking garage at Denver's Cherry Creek Mall ... when this song, and this version of it came on my radio. And as I sat along and parodied the lyrics, realized that I actually did need help. And I called to talk to someone and got referred to a therapist for the first time in my adult life. And began my path towards realizing I was living with depression, I would always live with depression ... but I could do something about that.

Anna - Ellery

I first ran into this song a few years before I was diagnosed with depression, and I fell in love with it on first listen. But, it was a few years later, listening to it again that the power of the lyrics, the emotion of the music really resonated with me. The idea that just holding on - despite knowing there would be worse times coming, despite feeling like the world is crashing in on you, despite knowing that everyone was looking at you, judging - would be a form of winning. It was suddenly resonate in ways I could never have imagined prior.

For Good - Wicked Original Broadway Cast Recording (Kristin Chenoweth and Idina Menzel)

I really wanted to do an entire list of Broadway. But ... lacking that, I still had to include at least one Broadway tune on this list, and the decision to do so was really a no brainer (even though there are many strong contenders that all fight for second place). Beyond having a good therapist, having good friends is what really gets me through. And what a duet this is to celebrate friendship. "Because I knew you ... I have been changed for good" and "Who can say if I have been changed for the better ... I do believe I have been changed for the better". This one goes out to a good number of you who have changed me, for good.

Float On - Modest Mouse

Speaking of friends getting me through ... this one was first shared with me by my best friend (h/t @LMTShawn even though you don't go in any threads except the Baseball Draft) when I was going through what I knew was going to be a difficult stretch of life, and it's one I listen to at every moment when there's a hint of a difficult stretch coming up. The story of this song - someone wanting to write a song that could counter how dark everything is - makes it all the more powerful.

The Night I Punched Russel Crowe - Gaelic Storm

Another one introduced to me by a dear friend (no tag this time) as I prepared to go through what I knew would be a difficult stretch, this one has blossomed to be a dear reminder that there are people in my life and whenever I listen to not just this song, but to anything by Gaelic Storm - the band has become (among other things) a serious connection point with that friend - it helps to fight through depressive thoughts such as "nobody cares" or "I'm alone". That it's so damn catchy and fun is just a bonus. And that it was a gateway drug into the rest of Gaelic Storm is an even bigger bonus.

Summer, Highland Falls - Billy Joel

Billy Joel is probably my favorite artist of all time. I could probably have done an entire list of Billy Joel songs that are none of his most popular songs. But this one just hits different. While Billy can get lazy with his lyrics sometimes, the opening of this one is just a lyrical masterpiece that speaks to a methodology of getting through depression - They say that these are not the best of times, but they're the only ones I've ever known. And then the recurring line of "it's either sadness of euphoria". It helps that Billy has talked openly about his own depression and how it influenced much of his work, including this song. But even when life is ****ing me over, remembering that it may not be the best of times, but it's still the only times I'll ever know ... I find power in that. I really do.

Seek & Destroy - Metallica

I will never forget where I was, what I was doing, and who I was standing next to the first time I heard this song during the year 2024, which proved to be the most difficult and challenging year of my life in many ways, including with my mental health. On what would ultimately prove to be my mother's last birthday, I heard the opening notes to this song, I heard a sold out arena crowd around me go nuts and I knew - I knew - in that moment I was creating a core memory that I could take myself back to by listening to this song. And as deep as the depression gets, I can put this song on, be transported to Greensboro, NC, and remember where I was, what I was doing, and who I was with - and suddenly remember that incredibly high moment in a year of incredible lows.

Beer Never Broke My Heart - Luke Combs

Another core memory created in 2024, this one ... I might not remember the exact date, but the location (Cedar Point, baby) the who I was with (my children) and what made it a core memory - a giant ass smile on my youngest kid's face as he saw live music and had a musician come up to him and dance with him for the first time, all at a place that has been crucial to my mental health and giving me a shared memory with my youngest kid that I could never have with anyone else. Again, I can turn this on, close my eyes ... and be in my happy place with the people I love the most.

Two Story House - George Jones and Tammy Wynette

My first therapist traced the origin of my depression to the dual deaths of my grandfather and a dear classmate that happened days apart, and my inability to process those. As such, I couldn't not include a song that I listened to every summer with my Grandfather, and the undertones and messaging of this particular song made it the choice among those. The reminder that chasing what everyone says you should want at the cost of the things dear to you ... the use of clever language with dual meanings ... I just love this song. And I really did need to have at least one "classic" Country entry on my initial JC Playlist.

In Heaven There Is No Beer - Frankie Yankovic and his Yanks

No, really. I could have done an entire Polka Playlist. Maybe next time. But for now, just this one. A song that takes me back to Oktoberfest at Geauga Lake. Laughing with my entire family, before we would know strife and pain, loss, death, grief, turmoil. Back when ... naivety would let me. There's a hint of irony in the role death and religion and alcoholism have played in my depression through the years and this song being one that brings me unbridled joy and invokes specific yet non specific memories.

Changes - Tupac

I needed some 90s hip hop on my list and this song hits me in a place where sorrow, anger, and hope are tangled together—where my depression doesn’t just feel like sadness, but like a response to a world that feels broken, to losses that came too soon, and to the weight of trying to survive in a life shaped by mourning. This song doesn't erase pain. Doesn't try to pretend like it can be escaped. It names it. And that makes it resonate to me.

Vivaldi, Spring - Black Violin

As I prepared for my mother to die last year, I was encouraged to find ways to bring the personification of death into my life as a way of wrapping my arms around it and readying myself for it was immensely helpful. I mention that because similarly, bringing a personification of "hope in darkness" and "change" into my life has also been immensely helpful. And Vivaldi's Spring is a part of that personification. A musical reminder that no matter how dark the world becomes, light will always return; That every change can be navigated; that no situation has to be permanent.



Thanks for going on that journey with me. It means a lot to me that this community exists and transcends anything any of us ever thought it could be.

 

@DarthIntegral Don’t know how I’ll vote yet, because I never make up my mind until I listen to a particular playlist (when exactly I’ll listen to yours I’m not sure), but as I’ve shared with you before elsewhere, I more than understand the Christmas music selection here/listening to it off-season, as I’ve done that myself since April of 2020 (Holiday Traditions on SiriusXM has been one of my presets ever since) for a slew of different mental health reasons.