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Introduction

This playlist is based off the short-story by Sherman Alexie’s “Flight Patterns”. The playlist’s songs go more in time to the mood and visual aspects of the story if it were to be a film. To find songs to match the deep and complex concept of “Flight Patterns” would be very difficult. Though, I imagine not impossible. To give some background into this story, I will give a brief summary. We’re introduced to Willy, a Spokane Indian, who lives in an upper-class suburban neighborhood in Seattle and works as a traveling salesman. Willy is in a constant battle with his thoughts and his own preconceptions and judgements, but he strives to be a good person and make thoughtful decisions. On his way to take a business flight, he meets cabbie, Fekadu, and this is where the story takes off. Fekadu’s life story is incredible and so far removed from what Willy had first conceived of the cabbie. Both of these strangers share a connection and teach each other that lives are too complex to slap a clean, neat label on. I hope you enjoy my playlist like I’ve enjoyed the story, “Flight Patterns”. 

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Reflection

The moment I first read Sherman Alexie’s “Flight Patterns” I was drawn to the concept and the incredible voice of its delivery. I was excited to have the chance of constructing a playlist for this story since it’s often something I do for my own written novels. I create massive playlists for super cool fighting scenes, kissing scenes, and fill-in scenes. I figured it would be a piece of cake. I love music. I’m a music connoisseur. Of course, I was incredibly mistaken. Sure, Sherman Alexie gave me two freebies when he mentions my first two songs in his opening paragraph, but the rest took hefty digging through YouTube, Spotify, and Soundcloud. I also read a ton of different lyrics that just didn’t work, and had to learn how to use Tumblr for the presentation. It was challenging but still really fun to look up songs and imagine what would make the perfect scene. I was searching for songs that would match the ambience, the setting, and if the lyrics coincided even better. In many cases, though, the lyrics have nothing to do with what’s going on, but it still works. The main concept of the story is humanity’s preconceptions and biases about other cultures and how far some of us are removed from our own culture. I wasn’t sure what songs would fit this concept, but I wanted to stay attuned with the main character’s mood and the settings. Hopefully, this playlist serves the audience in immersing themselves even deeper into Sherman’s world where we get to know Willy, a Spokane Indian, and his journey to discovering how different people really are from their labels.

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I had completely forgotten that in the beginning of “Flight Patterns” Sherman Alexie mentions two songs that are playing on his alarm clock radio: “I Fall to Pieces” by Patsy Cline and “The Happiest Girl in the Whole USA” by Donna Fargo. I couldn’t miss the opportunity to include these two tracks in the playlist. Not because it makes the assignment easier, but because it fits perfectly with the theme and this particular morning setting. For this song, I can picture the opening credits playing out over various neighborhoods, taking us through the city of Seattle where the story takes place. Kind of a bird’s eye-view of the city before zeroing in on the quintessential, upper-middle-class neighborhood where our protagonist, Willy, lives. The 1960′s song has a dream-like quality that I think pairs well with an early scene, while everyone’s asleep. It also works in putting the audience in a relaxed, unwinded mood and getting a true sense of how safe Willy’s home environment is.

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This is the second song mentioned in the story, right before Willy turns off his alarm clock from restless sleep. Directing this music, I’d only have this song play for a few seconds. As in the story, I think the purpose of mentioning these all-American songs and singers are to really make the reader/audience understand how “Americanized” Willy is despite being a Native American. The suburbs, the songs, even his thought process is to show how distant he’s become from his roots, to the point that Willy himself makes jokes about Native Americans. “Who cares about fishing and hunting rights? Who cares about uranium mines and nuclear-waste-dump sites on sacred land? Who cares about the recovery of tribal languages? Give me Freddy Fender singing to 206 Spoke Indians, William thought, and I will be a happy man.” He goes on to mention many other American singers who all played in Indian casinos and what he jokingly says added to the “tribal economic sovereignty.”  

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I thought this would be funny to add. Willy was not having cheerful Donna Fargo’s singing about being the happiest girl in the whole USA while he was sleep-deprived and cranky, so he quickly changes the radio and I picture in my head a disk scratch when I think of this. 

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The beginning of “Flight Patterns” made this assignment a lot easier for me, though that quickly changed when more dialgoue came into play. But after the two songs of country singers blasted on Willy’s alarm clock, setting him off on a inner monologued tangent about American singers and Indian casinos, he mentions lowering the radio to some blues music. I ran into this song by pure chance, searching for blues music on YouTube I found “Insomnia”. Willy’s character is depicted as a work-a-holic, traveling salesman who suffers from insomnia because of his obsessive-compulsiveness. After waking up from restless sleep, having slept downstairs as to not disturb his family, Willy begins his daily, up-beat ritual of stretches, push-ups, and crunches. I thought this bluesy, yet up-beat rhythm would go great with this active scene while the lyrics describe his situation perfectly. 

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I’m just going to have to pretend that this movie and music soundtrack will be an oldie because I kept coming back to these 60′s and 70′s songs. It could also be that Willy has a fascination with these types of songs because he mentions them a few times in the opening paragraphs. Anyway, this song would go so nicely for the scene where he goes to kiss his wife goodbye and she pulls him back. It’s a sweet, romantic rhythm and lyrics for a scene that makes obvious how much he loves his wife. There’s also plenty of sexual attraction between the couple and the flirtation makes this slow, sensual song a perfect fit.  

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After Willy says goodbye to his wife, already feeling like a bad husband for leaving, he goes into his daughter’s room. The mood of the story turns sad at this point. This melancholic melody would make great background music while he assures his daughter that he’ll be back soon, that he’ll be safe. This story was written shorty after 9/11 and the fear of airports and terrorists was still very thick in the air. “However, no matter how much he tried to laugh his fear away, William always scanned the airports and airplanes for little brown guys who reeked of fundamentalism.” This songs talks about a mad world, with listless people and that’s the main character’s mood as his guilt mounts for leaving and saying goodbye to his daughter as she cries.

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Another Patsy Cline song. I just discovered her music, thanks to this story, and I love her songs. But I chose this one for the scene in which Willy’s finally stepping out of his house to head to the airport. This keeps the melancholic mood of the previous song but with a more inspiring tone. He’s psyching himself up to go on this trip, already missing his family but still determined. Like the song suggests, he’s a wayward wind, a restless wind. Here Willy begins to imagine his life without his family. What it’d be like to have married a white woman and had “half-white children who complain and brag about their biracial identities.” Willy makes many references to sexism, racism, and generalizations, and is aware of his own judgmental thoughts he tries very hard to curb. He’s showing that everyone, to a certain point, makes generalizations but he strives to not let it affect his outward behavior. Even when the cabbie picks him up in this scene, he insists on carrying his own bags to the trunk as to “not look down on anyone”. 

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(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tXOLqnjSg8) Finding music for a scene with a lot of dialogue is tricky. So I researched music played through documentaries or as the title states “Cinematic background music.” I listened to so many, and I generally do listen to background music while I’m writing. This song has one of those rare abilities to have you at the edge of your seat and still fade eerily into the background during a scene heavy in dialogue. I would have this playing out in the taxi cab, during Willy and the cabbie, Fekadu’s, exchange. More specifically in the part where Fekadu goes into telling his story about being a jet pilot for his country of Ethiopia. This is where Willy becomes completely submerged into this stranger’s life. He doesn’t know whether to believe Fekadu or not, but finds the story awe-inspiring nonetheless. I think this song has that awe quality that would make the scene really stand out.

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“My Own Strange Path” is another background instrumental that’s more pensive. It’s the point in which both Fekadu and Willy speak about where they’re from and their own preconceived perceptions on the other’s culture. Their both surprised by each other and feel an instant connection as they try to find “their own strange path” in the world. There’s a point where even Willy makes fun of who he is, “No, not jewel-on-the-forehead Indian. I’m a bows-and-arrows Indian.” It’s as if Willy has come to accept this about how people view him. “We’re all trapped by other people’s ideas, aren’t we?” This, I believe, is the message Sherman Alexie is trying to drive home with “Flight Patterns.” This song is meant to go before the more suspenseful cinematic music above, but I think they both work well together. 

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I’m a big fan of bringing themes back around in books or movies. I like the idea of ending the story with the same type of music we started with, so we’re traveling back in time. This is the point in which Willy is completely awe-struck and a bit horrified by Fekadu’s wild story. He gets a bubbling of fear that his family is suffering like he imagines Fekadu’s family is suffering back in his native country. I really enjoy the contrast between this light-hearted song and the deep anxiety of the main character. I can picture this song playing while Willy tears through the airport in search of a payphone to call his wife. “Let a luggage porter think his bags were dangerous! Let an airport manager shut down the airport and search every possible traveler! Let the American skies be empty of everything with wings!” 

There’s a sense of finality with this song. John Denver is saying goodbye with his lyrics, and William is wanting the reassurance the song begs for.