Toxemia: The Playlist

Toxemia: The Playlist is here!

Christine McNair has curated a playlist of songs that are in conversation with her latest collection Toxemia. She has also written a little introduction for the playlist. Take it away Christine!

“I can’t listen to music when I write. Or rather, I can’t listen to anything with words in it. I’ll only magpie them and I mention that preference in Toxemia. I reference songs in Toxemia: songs from the Le Mystere des Voix Bulgares, “The Flight of the Bumblebee”, and “Coward” by Holly McNarland. I reference singing “Dona Nobis Pacem” with others in a church for the acoustics. There’s a portion of the book that talks about using the tv program The Voice to cry. I mention an old artist book project where I layered songs over Edison clips from the late 19^th to early 20^th century.

I think I had a lullaby in my head when I wrote Toxemia but it’s buried underneath all the other words.

I tried to make a playlist that reminded me of my various moods in Toxemia. Simultaneously combative, absurd, quiet, sad, fearful, angry and wry. I tried to it oscillate between simple and more layered sounds, between sad and defiant, between meaning and meaninglessness. I had to pull out anything too elegiac though some melodrama lingers. It isn’t despairing though it is dark in parts. I think there’s love in parallel. I want flexibility. My first list was unending.

The book could be a playlist. A series of songs instead of memories.” – Christine McNair

Toxemia Playlist

1. Paper Bag – Fiona Apple
2. Somedays – Neneh Cherry
3. Universal Heartbeat – Juliana Hatfield
4. Nervous System – Naviger
5. Don’t Be Afraid (from Happy Endings) – Mary Margaret O’Hara
6. Caribou – Tanya Tagaq
7. Babies – Colleen
8. It’s Not the Liquor I Miss – Luke Doucet
9. Mad World, Outlive Me – Amelia Curran
10. Die Die Die – The Avett Brothers
11. Bulimic Beats – Catatonia
12. Take to the Sky – Tori Amos
13. This Woman’s Work – Kate Bush
14. Bros – Panda Bear
15. Body’s In Trouble – Mary Margaret O’Hara
16. Unglued – Mo Kenney
17. Road to Nowhere – Talking Heads
18. What Makes the Cherry Red – Christine Fellowes
19. People Are Like Suns – Crowded House
20. Blindness – Metric

Find the full Spotify playlist here.