1. "Nice For What" by Drake
I keep lettin' you back in. How can I, explain myself? Is it possible to keep making these excuses for you? I can't help myself. I can't help it. But you're nothing good for me. And you've never been.
2. "Old Pine" by Ben Howard
Hot sand on toes, cold sand in sleeping bags, I've come to know that memories were the best things you ever had. Like water rushing up over my ears, cold like spring rain as I sink further. Settling down for a day, sun beating down, this slow then constant burn into oblivion. And a sailboat, soaring by on the blue horizon, people standing and waving and jumping into the waves.
3. "Perfect Places" by Lorde
Every night, I live and die, feel the party to my bones, watch the wasters blow the speakers, spill my guts beneath the outdoor light: It's just another graceless night. We're sitting cross legged on the bathroom floor of some party, and we've lost our friends, and talking about our feeling, how they're something we couldn't fathom until now. These feelings, like bullets, like quicksand, weigh on my mind as it begins to twist the room around me until I realize the other thing making me sick is thinking about leaving this bathroom without kissing you.
4. "Quicksand" by Tim Legend
Lips on my neck, fresh on that high, I said I'd never leave. But I did. And I think back to that moment we said goodbye every time I hear that song we'd always play or when the wind whistles and moans in the trees or when the sun shines or when the bird chirp. It takes me back to that summer when we never talked about what we needed to talk about, say what we needed to say, tell each other that we could make whatever happens in the future turn around for the better. But I turn away, the result of months of insufficiency and emotional unavailability, and I broke your heart. I said I’d never leave, but I left. I left.
5. "Rivers and Roads" by The Head and the Heart
A year from now, we'll all be gone, all our friends will move away. They’re going to California, Colorado, Delaware, and Rhode Island, or maybe they’re going to Europe. Bathing in hot spring baths and other languages, eating fruits and vegetables right from their trees. Maybe they’re going to live in the middle of the ocean, sunk deep into oblivion, creating a home from seaweed and uncertainty. Or maybe they’ll be in New York, living as we do, families not too far and familiarity half a block away.
6. "She Lays Down" by The 1975
She lays down on her bedroom floor. The chemicals that make her laugh don't seem to be working anymore. She’s trying them all, maybe too much at a time, but she’s willing to find what works even if it shortens her breaths and makes her hands shake.
7. "Timshel" by Mumford and Sons
Death is at your doorstep, and it will steal your innocence, but it will not steal your substance. Can you feel the atmosphere change when it’s around, like all the stars turned dark, like God is turning down the dials of the earth’s thermostat. That’s what it feels like to lose part of yourself, or someone else, but then the sun comes out, a shroud being pulled away from our eyes, and you’re whole again. Or partly whole. You will always be there, even if someone else is not.
8. "Us" by Regina Spektor
They'll name a city after us and later say it's all our fault. But what did we do but tear down the buildings with our voices, call for a song of justice to be played throughout the city, and rip apart those who told us to be quieter?
9. "Viva La Vida" by Coldplay
I used to rule the world, seas would rise when I gave the word. I was prince, I was princess, I was king, I was queen, and I was God. The flowers bloomed in my name, and the sun spoke to me each morning it rose and each night it kissed the horizon. I was elemental, and I could feel the very hum of nature vibrating against my skin. Then the sky began to fall, the castled collapsed, and I was nothing but the very people I had governed. No longer the sea, God, the flowers, the sun. No longer nature itself. No longer a king.
10. "What's Good" by Fenne Lily
You take the words right out of me, but it feels alright to let this be. It’s to have someone else’s lips be mine, and be mine, even when the sun comes up the next morning, when we both can’t remember the number of times we kissed and laughed and fell asleep before waking up again.
11. "XO" by Fall Out Boy
Mymouthmovestoofastforyoutofigureitout.Iwon’tslowitdownforyou.CanyoufiguremeoutDon’ttryto.Wewon’thelpyou,Iwon’thelpyou.You’retoosmallforthat,toosimplemindedtocomprehendhowquicklyIcouldturnmyselfandthiswholeworldaround,andyoucan’tevenseewhatI’mtryingtosay.It’stooeasy,butyouwillnevergetit.
12. "Young Blood" by The Naked and Famous
The bittersweet between my teeth, trying to find the in-betweens. I’m trying to find the little moments at your beach house, when we all spent hours in the water cooling oof and hours on the beach looking for sand crabs. We played games and flirted with each other, in that way devoid of romantic feelings, in which we acted like lovers but played like friends — that mutual understanding of respect and love and care brought forth by platonic conversations and days spent at the beach.
13. "Zebra" by Beach House
You know you're gold, you don't gotta worry none, Oasis child, born and so wild. You’re the most incredible thing, sitting there with your headphones in, sunglasses on, leaning back on the grass like you were erected there for others to emulate. You’ve pulled your shirt up to expose your stomach, elbow pointing toward the sun, hand holding a book small enough to open it with your left thumb and fifth finger. It smells like sunscreen and sweat in the grass near you, and the sun singes gold onto your skin.
