Magic 106.9 Playlist
Sofía Goldthwait
The series as a whole is incredibly vivid and evocative. The characters are so fleshed-out and genuine. For that reason, I decided to fragment up the playlist by characters. Each one has their own story to tell, and I tried to reflect that in their individual mixes.
Alucard simply disappeared on Rhy one day. Their relationship was super uncertain, and when Alucard reappeared in the events of the second book, they had a lot of soul-searching to do. This song is all about belonging to someone else and questioning that reality.
Rhy is so vulnerable, sensitive, and sensual, so this song from the Burlesque movie really represented his love for Alucard. And not gonna lie: I can definitely picture them getting down to this song, if you know what I mean.
This first song is less of a battle cry, but when I pictured Lila realizing Red London exists and that she has a place in it, these lyrics came immediately to mind. She felt so out of place in Grey London, like she was breathing underwater.
Of course it starts off with some relaxing tunes to get you all centered for your practice, to connect to the body and breath. Then a bit of Vancouver Sleep Clinic and Beauvois dreaminess to warm us up to before getting a little bit more funky as we flow with Aron Can (representing Iceland of course, how could I possibly make a playlist without an Icelandic song!) and Slenderbodies. After which we wind it back down with a bit of Haux and August Wilhelmsson before settling into my favourite Savasana tune. Pretty much the perfect 60 minute yoga flow playlist if you ask me ?
Music seemed to offer a certain kind of magic for our family. Listening to, and playing music, has always been soothing to me, and I trusted Dr. Neufeld knew what he was speaking about when he mentioned the power of music to soothe small children, too.
On Friday, Obama presented a playlist that's "filled with incredible new artists and a whole lot of #BlackGirlMagic," as she put it in a Spotify release. "I hope you'll give it a listen and follow some of these terrific musicians."
The music in the curated 41-track "Michelle Obama Playlist" ranges from R&B to neo-soul, hip hop, electronic, funk and synth-pop, and primarily features Black female performers. The songs go from Mereba's "Black Truck," all the way to Chloe x Halle's "Do It," with singers including Teyana Taylor, Jhene Aiko, Jill Scott and, of course, Beyonc in between.
The music is inspired by Michelle Obama's new podcast, which recently aired its second episode. On the show, Obama opened up about experiencing "low-grade depression," and followed up with concerned listeners in an Instagram post.
After Marathon Weekend 2016 ended, I wanted to keep the Disney magic alive at home, so I created a new running playlist, consisting only of Disney songs! I love my running playlist now, because every song takes me straight to the theme parks in my mind, or into one of my favorite TV shows or movies. I hope my runDisney playlist contains a few songs that you can add to your own running playlist.
This playlist supported the psychedelic experiences of those who participated in a new study published Nov. 4 in JAMA Psychiatry that found that psilocybin may show promise as a treatment for adults with major depression. A version of the playlist is available on Spotify.
The research center, which launched in September 2019, is believed to be the first such center in the country and the largest of its kind in the world. Its research focuses on how psychedelics can impact brain function and mood in healthy individuals and in patient populations, including conditions such as tobacco addiction and anorexia nervosa as well as anxiety and depression in people with life-threatening cancer.
The playlist, which Johns Hopkins has used since it began its psychedelic research 20 years ago, dates back to 1967. At the time, Richards was involved in similar research at the Spring Grove Hospital Center in Catonsville, which is now part of the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center. There, he and other researchers investigated LSD, psilocybin and other psychedelics for treating substance use disorder, depression and the psychological distress associated with terminal cancer. The drugs were also studied for their effects on the professional lives of religious and mental health professionals.
A decade later, former study participant Jacobs says his experience with psilocybin showed him that life is a fundamentally spiritual experience. It made him less frightened of death, more centered and more committed to a spiritual path.
"Looking for the Magic" is a killer 70's toe-tapper from Dwight Twilley Band. It's the type of song that would work incredibly well during a montage sequence about a third of the way into a quirky, coming-of-age indie flick. You should totally seek it out, I think you'll dig it. Anyway, that's a lot of information about a song that isn't on the playlist that I'm supposed to be inspiring you to listen to. Lemme start over...
Up here in Seattle, the days are getting shorter and shorter. Clouds and low light obscure the beautiful landscapes that surround the city. We can no longer rely on the world outside our offices and homes for inspiration and escape. But, that's ok. Art, culture, and creativity from this city has made it around the world. So many of these fragile ideas formed not when the curtains were open and the sun came through but in dark, stinky basement, lonely corners of the library, and late night studio sessions.
Recently listening to Henryk Gorecki's Symphony No. 3 brought Rob Jacobs back to a life-changing experience that happened a decade ago. After ingesting a psychedelic drug as part of a formal study at Johns Hopkins, he was lying on a couch at the research center, wearing eyeshades and feeling a deep emotional connection to the music playing through his headphones.
Gorecki's 27-minute composition, also known as "Symphony of Sorrowful Songs," is one of a collection of mostly classical pieces that help unlock elevated states of consciousness for study participants at the Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research. The seven-hour and 40-minute playlist, developed by researchers at Johns Hopkins, seeks to express the sweeping arc of the typical medium- or high-dose psilocybin session. (There is extra time built into the playlist, as session length can vary.)
Psychologist Bill Richards, whose involvement in psychedelic research dates back to 1963, masterminded the playlist. As a researcher at the center, he emphasizes that the music is chosen for its ability to guide and support the participant's experience.
"We're exploring the human psyche, which might take you through some painful things in childhood. It may take you into some archetypal or visionary realms that you never knew were possible. It might take you beyond usual consciousness into a realm that feels eternal," says Richards.
Richards' reasoning for choosing classical music, as well as the structure of the Johns Hopkins playlist, inspired Usona's playlist, which uses seven pieces from the Hopkins list. Usona added Spanish guitar, non-Western classical music and modern works with some classical structure.
"We were striving to create a blend of resonance with the music and emotional/psychological challenge that are thought to be beneficial," says Malynn Utzinger, co-founder and director of integrative medicine at Usona. "We paid attention to the structure and tone of each section of the Hopkins list, and while we did not use quite as much strictly classical music, we wanted to create a list with a relatively high amount of 'structured' music versus ambient."
The late music therapist Helen Bonny, who also worked at the center, devised a number of cassette tape playlists with names such as "peak experience" for her doctoral thesis. When Richards joined center Director Roland Griffiths to initiate psilocybin research at Johns Hopkins in 1999, he created a formal playlist that drew partly from Bonny's tapes as well as from music he had used. His son Brian, who worked at the Johns Hopkins center as a postdoctoral research fellow, contributed in particular to what Richards calls the "welcome back to Earth music."
The playlist is divided into segments: background music that plays as the participant arrives for his or her session; music that plays when the drug is starting to take effect, at which point he or she is lying down and wearing eyeshades and headphones; the ascent; the peak; the post-peak; and the "welcome back" music. There are usually two researchers in the room, referred to as guides, who simultaneously listen to the playlist through speakers.
The music in each section is deliberately chosen to accompany a particular part of the psychedelic journey. For example, Richards finds that Samuel Barber's iconic "Adagio for Strings" works well as participants approach the peak, when the effects of the psilocybin are steadily intensifying.
"It's going somewhere, it's picking you up and carrying you. It's got some force, some substance," he says. "It doesn't have very unpredictable changes of rhythm or something that's going to startle or frighten you. So, it's a net of reassurance, almost, and of leadership."
The majority of the music is either instrumental or choral with non-English text, and purposefully so. In order to keep participants "inside" the experience, only the last section of the playlist uses selections with recognizable words.
"It's the structure, the harmonic design, the richness, the unfolding, the harmonies, the dissonance, that really matters," he says. "If you're truly trying to shift consciousness beyond the level of the everyday self, you have to get beyond language."
Jacobs, an adjunct instructor in English and literature at the Community College of Baltimore County and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Johns Hopkins University, wasn't familiar with most of the music he heard during his sessions. Because of that, he felt that it didn't "preload any experience" and was more supportive than directive.
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