2014 // Music

It took a surprisingly long time to wade through the songs that not only provided that soundtrack to my year but also came out this year. I tend to find it hard to keep with music of my time and gravitate towards romanticised notions of the past. While there's nothing wrong with appreciating what has come before, I don't want to be a person so stuck in the past that they miss the present.

This playlist of twenty tracks has a lot of the things I've felt and thought this year infused into it. It's a playlist of growth and change, of realisation of how lucky I am - for the love of those around me me, for the comforts I take for granted, the opportunities many never will have and for the potential yet realised and possibly unlimited.

There's also a lot of women in this playlist, as well as some undiluted, unapologetic pop. It shows the growth of someone in their understanding of their personal relationship to feminism and their realisation that liking what you like is something to be celebrated. The song you dance to might not be the song that makes you realise that everything will eventually be okay - but that's fine. Everything has it's place in this world. I'm old enough to embrace even the less cool parts of me. Which, ironically, I think are pretty damn cool in their own way. Being an obscure music-loving automaton has to become monotonous. And music should be anything but. And the ladies? They're my ongoing mission to put more female creators in my life. In art history, they're often willfully forgotten. In many other contemporary fields they're often given less serious consideration. And in the music that marked the beginning of my aural love affair, they were rarely visibly present. After years of listening almost exclusively to men's voices, I wanted to even the playing field.

Lykke Li and Sharon Van Etten managed to break and reform my heart this year while S made me smile through painful teenaged injuries still present deep down. Keaton Henson and Asgeir soothed me with the pure beauty of their music. Meg Myers and Yasmine Hamdan made me blush. Florrie, Marina, Iggy and Ariana made me dance. Perfume Genius made me full-on weep. The artists on here have all affected my life in one way or another and I think that's all an artist can really hope for, that in such an over-saturated world, you make someone pause and listen.

2014 was a beautiful year in many, many ways - let's hope for an even more moving 2015.

Hope you all had a safe and mostly happy year! What jams got to you?

November Favourites

It's now well into December but I still wanted to do a "favourites" post for November. It's something I've done sporadically so far and without connection to particular months. While I think categorising things by set time periods is a bit redundant (don't get me started on using centuries as umbrella terms for styles or cultural movements), I also think it's a useful way of organising the posts and encouraging me to make them more coherent and regular.

The underlining note to my blog is echoed in the format of these favourites. Rather than exploring things merely related to fashion or beauty (not that there's anything wrong with those sorts of favourites), I group all the cultural, creative and design things that I've been vibing in one place because, to me, they all feed into each other. The music I'm listening to can affect how I dress or the book I'm reading will decide how I do my hair. It's all connected and to separate them seems unnatural.


Chanel Coco Rouge Shine in Bohéme

I blog about make-up and beauty but I don't wear make-up every day or anything near it. This may seem odd but make-up is something I like to wear but don't feel obliged to use. However, if I feel like I should, or want to, dress up for something yet can't be arsed to do the whole routine, I'll fill in my eyebrows, do a wee bit of concealing and pop on some lip colour. This lipstick has become my go-to. It's not matte so it doesn't catch on dry patches and goes on smoothly. It's hydrating. It's a gorgeous shade and doesn't look like you're trying too hard. But it still adds a bit of polish to your look. It's not at all high-maintenance - Basically it's everything I could ask for from a lipstick.


Akatsuki no Yona

Finding a new anime is a bit of a miracle. So many are filled with unbearable clichés or unlikeable female characters. When I find a good one that happens to also be a grand, sweeping adventure, filled with amazing art, funny, historical, with a great female lead, scored well...I am overjoyed. This anime recounts the adventures of Princess Yona after her father is killed, a childhood friend and love betrays her and her country is thrown into upheaval. Yona has to deal with the real world and difficulties for the first time which is a relateable parallel for anyone in their twenties. Plus, it's funny as hell. And the opening and closing themes are great.

Keaton Henson

Keaton Henson has been the soundtrack to my November. Especially his latest instrumental album. There's something old world about the talented bastard that's both frustratingly idealised and wonderfully romantic. I love the subjects that he gravitates towards, his expression as an artist all around and his voice. Plus, his latest EP came out on my birthday. That has to be fate, right?

Keats

Another Englishman with a similar name. Another love of late. I'm a sucker for the Romantics yet, for some reason, Keats was new to me. But thank God! What a discovery, a revelation. There's something so beyond and of his time about his work. It's the ideals of that era with form more modern, titillation and flirtation not in keeping with his peers. A particular favourite du moment:

 

Alexander Wang x H&M

You all know how excited I was for the collection and now I have it in my hands, I wear it on the reg. Most often I wear my cropped black pants but the iconic Wang jumper has a rather special place in my heart. It hangs in my room where it's almost a piece of art.

Paul Costelloe Living for Dunnes Stores Candle in Fig and Vanilla

This is my absolute favourite smell at the moment. I'm feeling all things Romantic and the past at the moment so candle-light is an absolute necessity and this candle is the perfect one. From the simple design to the smell to the packaging, everything about it is great. And, at twelve quid, it's much more affordable than most luxury scented candles without compromise on the quality.

Christmas

Christmas is my favourite time of year and I've been going crazy for it. I've been doing so for the last month and a bit. November is when I stock up on stocking fillers for my family, begin to hoard decorations and start planning meetings with friends. Now the countdown is on and I can't wait.

Heatons Coat

This coat featured in a post recently and I'm so in love with it! It breaks up the almost entirely black outfits I wear on the daily and it's so sweet without being twee. It's also one of those pieces that people stop you to compliment - which is always nice.

Winter

I have a whole photo post about winter coming soon but suffice to say that I love winter. I love the freshness of the cold air, I love warm drinks and cosy clothes and huddling by fires with loved ones. I love layering outfits. I love the light (when there is any). I love the look of bare trees against setting suns.

So, what have you been loving?

Gift Guide 2014 - Records

In this year's series of gift guides, I've tried to give a bit more variation of kinds of presents and also multi-tasking items. Up this time are ten records I recommend from this year. The links may be one particular format or another but, in most cases, it's the record itself and not the format that I'm suggesting.

There are three soundtracks on the list. The first is Hans Zimmer's soundtrack for Interstellar. The movies was enjoyable, well-made and beautiful to look at (if a little too well-rounded in the plot department) but the real star of the show was the soundtrack. Atmospheric, epic and emotional - exactly what you would expect of Zimmer. This record would be a good idea for Zimmer fans, Nolan fans, fans of the movie or anyone interested in soundtracks. Another fantastic score is Dev Hynes' work for Palo Alto, directed by Gia Coppola and based on a book by James Franco. I have yet to actually see the movie but the score is perfection. Dreamy teenage melancholy and restlessness. Again suitable for people of multiple fandoms or someone who wants some seriously chill listening. The final soundtrack is the Awesome Mix Vol I from Guardians of the Galaxy which is jam-packed with eighties and seventies gold. Very much an awesome mix - one of those collections of songs that has you saying, "Aw, damn, I forgot how much I love this song!"

The next record is a bit of a cheat as it was actually released at the end of 2013 but I've been vibing on it so much, I had to include it. It's the second appearance of Dev Hynes on this list, this time as part of his musical project, Blood Orange, and the album Cupid Deluxe. This is one of those albums so jammed with perfect, danceable songs that you could easily listen to on a loop. I can't actually count the amount of times someone has walked in on me dancing like a lunatic to this album - the utter shame. But it's that good. A little R&B + a lotta electronica = goodness.

Funnily enough, Iceland's really hot right now, isn't it? The beer, the scenery, the aesthetic...and the music. Asgeir (Trausti) is one of those exceptionally young, exceptionally gifted humans that makes you feel bad about yourself but you forgive him with releases like his deluxe edition of In The Silence. The folksy, electronic, singer-songwriter blend in both English and his native tongue produces a record with great emotional swells, atmospheric noise and catchy pop songs all wonderfully placed together.

Keaton Henson's Romantic Works with Ren Ford is an entirely instrumental departure for the artist, but a genius one. It seems he can make anything and everything work. This album is lovely, makes creative use of sounds and drags me into the author's own pining for a time and romanticism long lost to us.

Four of the records are from female creators that I worship and whose releases I was blown away by this year. The first is the uber-limited physical cassette E.P. by Irish Feminist garage rock band, Sissy (who are fantastic live, by the by) not only are the songs witty, funny and pointed but they're damn catchy too. I actually have number one of a hundred run of the cassettes which can be purchased online and come with a download code. Cannot recommend more for anyone with a person in their life who likes Irish music, feminism and abortion-related, Enya-sampling songs. Similar in a lot of ways is S' Cool Choices but with a little more in the way of numbers of tracks. It's poignant at times, exuberant at others, music unafraid of voicing an opinion and exceptionally beautiful. I can't remember how I stumbled across it during the summer but it's an album I obsessed over and listened to on a loop for probably a solid week - which isn't something I do much anymore. A good choice for someone looking for new music as most are unlikely to have heard of this little gem. Plus, it's a cool choice (geddit?)

The Lykke Li and Sharon Van Etten records are two that profoundly affected me this year. They put a lot of my thoughts and feelings into words and music in a rather cathartic way. Both are similar in lots of ways - emotional, full of loss and love and questions. Li and Van Etten's voices and words will shatter your heart in the best possible way and both albums are true works of art. These are for the romantics in your life, the people that are a wee bit maudlin but okay with that. Also, those covers.

So, those are my picks - what do y'all think? Any 2014 favourites of your own in there?