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jere-me--oh-my · 2 years

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This Is Home - a Jeremy Johnson Playlist

The idea of this playlist is that these are all songs that Jeremy listened to while on his way back from Australia (obviously that journey is a lot longer than a 10 song playlist, but these are the songs he actively sought out to listen to during his shuffle time). Enjoy!

Tracklist and explainers under the cut

Track 1: Homeward Bound - Simon & Garfunkel

“Home, where my thought’s escapin’ / Home, where my music’s playing / Home, where my love lies waiting...”

A classic! A masterpiece! Absolutely the song that Jeremy put over the instagram story of him at the airport and then he had it stuck in his head, so naturally he listened to it a couple of times over while waiting to board! While the storyteller in the song may not be on the way home, everyone connects this song with the process of travelling home.

Track 2: I Missed You (acoustic) - Joshua Radin

“I’ve been around the way, been around but not ok, ‘cause I missed you so / just to let you know that I missed you.”

Jeremy actually sent a video home to his parents to show to Suzie of him singing along to this song to prove that he was actually coming home and soon she was going to get her big brother back! She was one of the things he missed most while he was away, and it just killed him to see her feeling like he wasn’t actually coming back, so he had to sing to her to make her smile!

Track 3: The Parting Glass - Trad. (Peter Hollens)

“Of all the comrades that e’er I had, are sorry for my going away / and all the sweethearts that e’er I had would wish me one more day to stay / but since it falls unto my lot, that I should rise and you should not / I’ll gently rise and I’ll softly call goodnight and joy be to you all.”

This song was a new find for him. But in the last week he was in Australia he went for drinks with his friends at a bar they loved. There, one of the older guys insisted that they had to send Jeremy off properly, which meant singing The Parting Glass. In a moment he’ll probably remember forever, he, his friends, and a whole bunch of acquaintances sang the song. Probably a little off key, stumbling over the words and the melody, but he felt so wonderfully loved in that moment he simply had to put it on to hold that feeling with him as the plane began to leave.

Track 4: Songbird - Fleetwood Mac

“And I wish you all the love in the world, but most of all, I wish it from myself.”

“Oh Stevie, we’re really in it now.” Half way through the flight to Dubai, and feeling sad, Jeremy put this on to try and comfort himself. While not exactly a happy and upbeat kind of song, he’s always found some comfort in it, the soft tender expressions of love, the simplicity of the piano and guitar and how they only add to the intimacy of the song. Its a happy kind of sad.

Track 5: Waiting For My Real Life To Begin - Colin Hay

“Any minute now, my ship is coming in, and I’ll keep checking the horizon / and I’ll check my machine, there’s sure to be that call / it’s gonna happen soon...”

Here beginneth the emotional spiral. Listen this song is just such a wonderful and beautiful song about uncertainty and in a way hopes and dreams for the future, and love and how love doesn’t always line up with what we have dreamt about. This song cuts deep for Jeremy. His gap year was the most wonderful year, but in many ways he knew it was avoiding reality, the reality of the life his parents have planned for him. The end of that is bittersweet for so many reasons, but not least because he has to put away so many of his dreams, or is expected to. But which is his real life? The life where he sang and played and people clapped and cheered and he brought them smiles and tears? Or the one where he finished his degree and puts on a suit and tie and walks straight into the next 50 years of his life? They both feel so real to him.

Track 6: Orpheus - Sara Bareilles

“Don’t stop, trying to find me here amidst the chaos / though I know its blinding there’s a way out / say out loud / we will not give up on love now...”

Much like with Songbird, he’s listening to this because despite being quite a sad song, it brings him comfort. He can lose himself in how much he enjoys the musicality of it, the comforting, inviting tone of Sara’s voice and how it sounds so perfectly like she’s singing directly to a lover. Certain fragments always jumped out at him, like “You miss the world, the one you knew, the one where everything made sense because you didn’t know the truth,” which always feels like growing up to him. Or “I’ll show you good, restore your faith, I’ll try and somehow make a meaning of the poison in this place.” which feels like an artists mission statement. “If the bottom drops out, I hope my love was someone else’s solid ground.” When he loves, he loves so very solidly and patiently, he always hopes that he can give that solid platform to people by believing in them, by being patient and kind, and loving them.

Track 7: The Weakness In Me - Joan Armatrading

“Why do you come here, when you know I’ve got troubles enough / Why do you call me when you know I can’t answer the phone / make me lie when I don’t want to / and make someone else some kind of unknowing fool / you make me stay when I should not / Are you so strong or is all the weakness in me?”

Switching his wifi back on, Jeremy quickly turned off his music. A message from Sophie, commenting “Fly safe xx” in reply to his insta story. This is not new. He never talks about it but all the while he was in Australia she would reply to his stories, or send him messages. She even video-called him sometimes. Usually when it was late in the UK and nobody else would answer, or when she was walking home from nights out, or when she was sulking with her new boyfriend... who she never once warned him about, for the record, she simply announced to the world and let him find out that way. She never stopped. She still keeps him half stuck in this holding pattern, expecting him to be there for her no matter how she treats him, or that they’re not together anymore. And he always answers. So yeah. Sometimes it is his god-given right to be dramatic about it and have a good power-ballad.

Track 8: Angel Of Small Death & The Codeine Scene - Hozier

“I watch the work of my kin bold and boyful / toying somewhere between love and abuse / calling to join them the wretched and joyful / shaking the wings of their terrible youths.”

Determined to pick himself up, Jere resorts to something bringing happier memories. Out there on the internet is a video of him taking the lead on this song with a house band at the bar in Australia. Its one of the things he sees when he closes his eyes, the way the lights sparked off his bandmates, how they all joined together on the choruses, dancing about like idiots on the stage. It’s got an infectious drum line, beautiful syncopation in the guitar, clear gospel influences, and an absolutely dutty guitar solo that lets a baritone singing guitarist have an absolute moment in the sun singing this song.

Track 9: These Hands - Samm Henshaw

“This fate is not my destiny, so I’m shaping it with these hands / Oh well I giving and giving it all / Oh and I give ‘till I can’t give no more / I’m working on my masterpiece, and I’m making it with these hands.

These hands are only made of flesh and bone / And I’ll stand not ready to give up on hope.”

Having a main character moment, this is the sort of song Jeremy just needs to hear sometimes. In a particular moment of rebellion, he resolved that he wasn’t going to lose music. He was going to find a way to make it work so that he could keep pleasing his parents and himself, but he resolved that he was never going to give it up. Sure, music might be a lot of hard work that could never pay off. But there is nothing he’d rather put the hours in for.

Track 10: This Is Home - Switchfoot

“This is home, now I’m finally where I belong (where I belong) / Yeah this is home, I’ve been searching for a place of my own / now I’ve found it, maybe this is home.

After all my searching / after all my questions / I’m gonna call it home / I’ve got a brand new mindset / I can finally see the sunset / I’m gonna call it home...”

I think this track best sums up Jeremy’s really complicated feelings about being back in Swynlake that he literally just will not talk about. Because the ‘home’ that the song speaks about is actually two places for him. There’s the home that is Swynlake. The place he was raised, that his family lives in, that holds all his memories, the place he was literally going home to. But the place of his own? The place he felt like he was able to belong? That wasn’t Swynlake. And it’s not so much about the place as it is about the expectations and who he was in either place.

But well. Will he go back to the way it was? Or will he be brave enough to fight to make it his own? Certainly in that moment he felt brave enough.

“I’ve come too far, and I won’t go back... yeah this is home.”

#jtunes #swyntask #when I say that music is the only time he shows his emotions... this is meta this is me doing it too #I felt like I got to know him so well by doing this though <3 #so many things in his head that he literally will just never talk about #it was like writing little diary entries for him #and yes I did indeed include a song from the narnia soundtrack its a banger and inspired the whole thing #hence saving the title track for the end

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