alternative
Alternative music from the underground, straight to your listening device.
The Splashback. Top Story - December 2024.
A Sandwich Short of a Picnic My ears ring. Alarm in perpetuity. The hammer and pluck of too many questions. A fighting chime of chords made from clashing notes of doom and discombobulation. They flow along staves of shady tidal waves, scouring open wounds with salt as they bite down to chew on the rot of my grey matter. Above and below, the moon swims limp and flat, leached of purpose and offering no destination. I howl into its mirror as my gilt- edged tears slosh down my cheeks in rivers of orange. Ironclad life rusting out of me in heavy metal groans—a tinman of brittle bones and weight. My mouth is dumb, filled with a pink marshmallow tongue that has spent too long licking saccharine walls, ceilings, and floors. Searching for doors. My teeth have melted in the constancy of the candyfloss storm clouds that spin, unending, in my lipstick-stained walk of shame sky. Once, I was one note in the dark beating a solitary and expectant rhythm—an incubated womb dweller dreaming of life—reverberating with diastolic and systolic ebb and flow. Harmony, my primal beat, my yin and yang. Then, the orchestra of joy and fear began. As the conductor tapped the baton, I screamed. Will humanity ever fill its void? The auditorium has grown so big, globalised and homogenised. It hums with white noise and hankers for syncopated beats. I cannot find my feet. The light fantastic has tripped out, and I keep falling over in the dark. It has a lot to do with this beige straight jacket of civility. It isn't me. I may drown in the sweat that pours as I try to wriggle free. It's either that, or I will throttle myself trying. Choke holds where blood should flow. Pedal to the metal. A hyperventilated state. Hope has anarchised into a four-letter word. I have tattooed it on my head because no matter how much I pack it with ice into my heart, it thaws its way out of me. A dose of salts seeping from my pores, leaking from my eyes, crusting on my lips. Bittersweet and antiseptic. My heartstrings are soggy. They play loopy tunes that nobody can sing along to, and my picnics are always one sandwich short. I used to know how to make a meal of it. One day, I will have a gathering where everyone laughs at themselves. I shall attend, and I shall arrive naked.
By Caroline Janeabout a year ago in Beat
2024: The Saga Continues Pt. 2. Content Warning.
2024 has been a year of roller coaster emotions, and that's putting it lightly. Music has been there through every moment... the beauty and the horror. There are always two sides to every story, including mine for 2024. The first side covered the darkest moments, the failures, the despair, the pain and the heartbreak. It becomes easy to allow the moments of hopelessness to reign and overshadow the moments of light... but what good does that bring? The moments of joy, relief, calm and love may be few and far between... but they exist and that is what makes the music of them so much sweeter as 2024 concludes.
By Luna Verityabout a year ago in Beat
2024: The Saga Continues. Content Warning.
As midnight hit and 2024 began, the struggle to leave the sorrow and pain of 2023 behind was an all too familiar challenge these days. January 1, 2024 was here and I was still here... but how much of me was there left at this point? Year after year of fighting challenge after challenge without any breaks; 2024 found me with barely anything left to give. My soundtrack of the year began with me feeling like I was "Breaking Inside".
By Luna Verityabout a year ago in Beat
The Darkest Playlist
[I apologize ahead of time for commercial ads present in the links] It comes to no surprise that my Spotify Wrapped for 2024 contains many songs from my “Let’s Get Scared, Barb” playlist. To me, Halloween is a year-round treat like pumpkin spice lattes or hot apple cider. I have dozens of playlists, each with its own goal: workout, chill, Christmas, Latin, yard work, hurricane season – you name it, I most likely have a playlist for it. One of my playlists is entitled “YOU DISRESPECTED ME?” and meant to be played after a frustrating day of substituting a class of impudent students. Every few months or so, I revisit my playlists, add or subtract from, or rearrange the songs depending on my mood at the time. If not, I tend to memorize the order and expect the same songs. The songs in my Halloween playlist, otherwise known as spooky $hit, show up across different playlists as well. 2024 was another year in darkness, sparked by occurrences of grief in the past decade, and because of that, I prefer to write about death, terror, ghosts, ghouls, or witches. This fear of the unknown is a common theme in my writing.
By Barb Dukemanabout a year ago in Beat
