take everything. - a fanmix for the hunger games
ready to die - andrew w. k.
This is your time to pay/This is your judgement day/We made a sacrifice/And now we get to take your life.
kind of silly, i know, but this song is just so epic. it's midterms and i am pretty much just listening to andrew wk and jay-z in an effort to keep myself awake. it's lyrically relevenat in kind of a superficial way too, but whatever.
sing sing death house - the distillers
I believe that I will open up/And all my rage will surely come undone.
i have always loved and will always love everything that brody dalle/armstrong does. she's basically the boss. it is always awesome to hear songs from women that express a strong emotion other than love, and the anger in this song is tangible. katniss, when she isn't totally numb from 40 lifetimes worth of PTSD, is basically an angry girl, and justified in her anger.
dorothy at forty - cursive
Dorothy, it seems you'll never understand/This here land is everything we have/Every sweat stained collar, every dollar, every bent and bloodied spur/We're not the kids that we once were/We can't be the adults we want to be
this, to me, is scene-setting. the entire theme of cursive's happy hollow is, well, disillusionment. not to get weirdly sentimental/cynically patriotic, but a large part of this book is realizing that it panem is just a couple aspects of current american culture exxagerated - i'm not going to say that this is the logical conclusion if we keep on the path we're on now, but it's a deeply frightening dystopia just because one can recognize things we already do in it.
violet - hole
go on, take everything, take everything, i want you to
if you don't like women screaming, like, i am sorry. i was this close to putting on some bikini kill! but yeah, another angry girl song - i have a deep love for hole, which makes it hard to seperate courtney love as a member of hole from courtney love the solo artist who will probably never be as good as hole - but this one is less about unfocused, all consuming, righteous rage and more about feel like everything has been taken from you. also it's about bill corgan! fun fact!
get seduced - the faint
How rad is it living in a microscope?/Broadcast into every single living room/Hot lights on your love life/It's not love that's sex on the first night
i am a huge fan of the faint, so let my just say that fasciination blows as an album and if this song makes you want to listen to them PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DOWNLOAD WET FROM BIRTH OR SOMETHING. this is really the only good song from fasciination, and a strange outlier from the rest of the transhumanism-y theme of that album. the faint have always been mildly political, and it's not a suprise that they would write a song that is explicitely critical of tabloid culture and reality television.
help i'm alive - metric
Help, Im alive, my heart keeps beating like a hammer/Hard to be soft, tough to be tender/Come take my pulse, the pace is on a runaway train
i love the shit out of metric and this song just fits. their lyrics really speak to a specifically female experiences of frustration. this track is a lot more subdued than say, violet, but it's essentially in the same vain.
c.y.o.a. - heartsrevolution
foxes and bunnies, fire and snow/we're all just lost, don't know which way to go
heartsrevolution is not all that great, but this track is just a total banger. there's not much else to say - it's one of those songs that really shows their whole hand in the first 30 seconds.
pull up the people - m.i.a.
You can bring me the reaper/Bring me the lawyer/I'm a fighter, i'll take em on/You treat me like a killer/I ain't hate ya.
♥M.I.A.♥ What else is there to say, really? I just fucking love her.
many moons - janelle monáe
I keep my feet on solid ground/And use my wings when storms come around/I keep my feet on solid ground for freedom
i think it is telling that i put this song on basically EVERY fanmix i make. it is both beautiful and is about something that i find personally very affecting: freedom from bondage
cannibal resource - dirty projectors
Can it ask a question?/Can it sing a a melody?/Can it be interpreted?/Or is it more than what the eye can see?
A bit of a stretch, i know, but it is a beautiful song, and there is so much beauty in a lot of the hunger games - especially in the descriptions of nature - that i felt i should include it.
wild sage - the mountain goats
and along the highway, where unlucky stray dogs bleed, wild sage growing in the weeds.
i feel bad putting mountain goats songs on fanmixes sometimes, because i know how deeply personal some of his lyrics are (this is from his album that is all about his girlfriend breaking up with him), but this song is both lyrically and thematically way too similar to the part of the hunger games where katniss realizes her family will never have to go hungry again that, well, i had to.
rise up with fists!!! - jenny lewis with the watson twins
But I still believe/And I will rise up with fists /And I will take what's mine mine mine/There but for the grace of God, go I
katniss is so determined - even in moments where she thinks she has given up, she is still willing to go through hell for her family and the people she loves. most of jenny lewis's songs are about that, being strong even when you feel you have nothing, and they are all so beautiful, this one especially.
some one has to die - maritime
Southbound birds and winter bees are soldiers in the army/all good souls they do surround me/And our lives
the only song on here from peeta's point of view. although i recognize how much he loves katniss, i will probably be disapointed if they end up together, just because the books have been very clear about katniss's ambivalence towards loving him, and her feelings for gale. just because he loves her doesn't mean she should love him.
june gloom - the like
Words don't change a thing/Sun disguises darkness/Wish that I could save you/Wish that I could stop this
but the fact that she doesn't love him doesn't mean she wouldn't save him, or go to the ends of the earth for him. what she feels for him is almost deeper than romantic love. she is willing to repay him for saving her life untl the day she dies.
what's a girl to do - bat for lashes
He said he'd take me away/That we'd work things out/And I didn't want to tell him /But it was then I had to say/Over the times we've shared/It's all blackened out/And my bat lightning heart/Wants to fly away
but, you know, she still doesn't love him.
8 full hours of sleep - against me!
And tomorrow America just might fall apart/Tomorrow, tell me, Where will you wake up?/Beyond title, beyond these careers and laws/Something more than borders on a map
i wish i could just quote this whole song. okay, so i am kind of a socialist, and it feels very 15-year-old me to say this, but this song still really touches me just in terms in what i would like the world to be like.
lust for life - girls
Oh, I wish I had a suntan/I wish I had a pizza and a bottle of wine/I wish I had a beach house/where we could make a big fire everynight
this is my favorite song. and in the context of the hunger games, i read it as both katniss wishing her life could ever be the same, and everyone wishing they had any of the simple, wonderful things that makes life worth living. maybe if i really tried with all of my heart.
get it here.