Hi listeners and readers! Welcome to the newest edition of Lightning 100’s Intern Picks of the Week. This semester there’s three of us helping out the team remotely: Ayden Eilmus, Taylor Lomax, and Lindsay Mackintosh. We’re doing things a little bit differently this time around with the Intern Picks, so instead of selecting a favorite new release, each of us will pick a song based on a certain theme. To kick off the series and introduce ourselves to you, this week’s theme is: main character syndrome.
Ayden’s Pick: Lorde – Perfect Places
Lorde is THE main character. Her discography embodies coming of age like no other, and Melodrama closer “Perfect Places” is a textbook example of this. The song was written about that nagging sense that there must be something better out there, somewhere, and if that isn’t the angsty epitome of adolescence I don’t know what is. Lorde has a knack for making you feel like her only listener– as if you were the exact intended audience of her songs and she is singing them just for you. When “I hate the headlines and the weather / I’m nineteen and I’m on fire” played from the car stereo my freshman year of college nothing could have been more relatable.
Taylor’s Pick: SOPHIE – It’s Okay to Cry
Admittedly, I wasn’t originally going to go this route. But ever since SOPHIE’s sudden passing last weekend, I’ve been thinking a lot about her work and how it’s soundtracked my life to this point. “It’s Okay to Cry,” off her masterpiece Oil of Every Pearl’s Un-Insides, is one of the electronic pioneer’s more accessible songs but still feels like trademark SOPHIE. It’s hard not to feel like the main character when this song, distortion and all, is on. Bonus points for the music video, in which the producer showed her face for the first time in her career.
Lindsay’s Pick: Bleachers – Rollercoaster
I would have to pick “Rollercoaster” by Bleachers to be my main character syndrome song. Whether I’m driving at night in the rain or going on a morning walk, this upbeat, indie-pop classic never fails to make me feel alive. When creating the song released in 2014, Jack Antonoff admitted that he was looking for a way to channel his inner Springsteen. The music video features the band performing on top of a moving ice cream truck and if that doesn’t make you feel excited for life, I don’t know what will.
