Staff Pix 10/9: Looooong Songs

“Green Eyes” by Erykah Badu

“Green Eyes” by Erykah Badu is one of my favorite songs by her. This 10 minute jazz and soul inspired song is about the different stages of emotions that come after a devastating heartbreak. Much like our emotions, this song has different sections and phases. We follow Erykah Badu through her stages of denial, pain, embarrassment, growth, and finally acceptance. The song starts off with a Billie Holiday inspired sound, and then eventually transitions to the heart of the song where she expresses her complicated emotions surrounding her breakup. This song is the last on the album “Mama’s gun” and serves as the conclusion of a story about internal reflection and growth that stems from hardship. — Makayla Markus

“Musician” by Kinoko Teikoku

If you’re reading/listening to this, you’re probably familiar with the genre of shoegaze. And chances are that if you know it, you like it, too. The fuzzy textures, the sensation of noisy bliss, and above all the feeling of sweet, sweet melancholy — the pedalboard-centric style has a strong appeal, and that’s before you throw in the pop song structure and impeccable melodic sensibility which has consistently defined the genre’s stalwart acts since the 1990s. But in 2013, then up-and-coming Japanese shoegaze troubadours Kinoko Teikoku (“Mushroom Empire”) dared to ask: what if we took it up a notch, or three? The eight and a half minute “ミュージシャン” (“Musician”) is the result. Where most shoegaze dabbles in hazy, ambiguous feelings of longing and huge walls of sound, Kinoko Teikoku flip the script, opting instead for a steady, pulsating guitar drone and an ever-flowing stream of blissful despondency. And the feelings are more than just a vague dissociation or yearning — they’re suffocating. The melancholy is deep, all-consuming, a shroud of impossibly heavy fog pocked intermittently by the diluted light of the stars outside. Lead singer Chiaki Sato’s performance may well be one of the most authentically heart-wrenching in all the shoegaze canon, every high note its own tiny emotional explosion. You know exactly how she feels, whether you understand Japanese or not. It builds, and builds, and builds. And finally, right at the emotional zenith, the band abruptly vanishes into thin air, then, the 1-2-3-4 of sticks clicking, and then…a mammoth breakdown, all that pent-up kinetic energy dispersing in a luminescent tidal wave of feeling, engulfing everything in its path in a torrent of seemingly interminable catharsis. One for the real shoegazers. — Lucca Swain

“With Crippled Wings” by Lift to Experience

“With Crippled Wings” is the fourth track on Lift to Experience’s first and only album, The Texas-Jerusalem Crossroads, a 2001 concept album about the Second Coming of Christ, casting Texas as the new holy land. The titles of every track on the album together read out the prophecy of this return, the ‘crippled wings’ belonging to the angels raining down on Texas, now amalgamated with Jordan, Palestine, and Jerusalem. “With Crippled Wings” beautifully and skilfully captures many of the central messages of the album within its 10-minute run time. I remember when I first heard this song; I think I just immediately stopped what I was doing to lie on my bed and close my eyes, insisting that it deserved its own, undivided attention independent of whatever mundane chore I was doing at the time for me to even begin to feel what it was telling me. Each line drips with metaphors and references to politics, geography, historical and current issues, and of course a slew of acute references to the Bible and the apocalypse itself. The song breaks away from the album’s narrative and instead is positioned as a prescient telling of what’s to come, opening with reverbed guitar and drums taking the place of the seven trumpets, punching in saturated intervals of sound. But this time around, the Second Coming is met with what seems like a feeling of ambivalence and acceptance, the chaos from the opening quickly dies down into a slow, blues-like lullaby made to comfort. In the album’s world, many of the Texans feel they will be spared through their belief and safe with their unwavering faith: “And when the bough does break / Under the Bible Belt we’re safe.” The music doesn’t explode again until the second Exodus, which highlights contemporary injustices in “A crippled, angry, new America.” After, the song fades away into melancholic uncertainty, leaving nothing safe or familiar under the parousia. — Julia Schramm

“The Gun Song (No Trigger Version)” by Car Seat Headrest

The synthesis of Will Toledo at his wittiest and most vulnerable, “The Gun Song – No Trigger Version” is the embodiment of the emotional turmoil outlined in his early discography of poetic pleas of desperation. With a dense 16-minute runtime consisting of 13 verses and 3 distinct sections outlining the inevitable “suicide” that follows the greatest of love stories. The song confesses this closely, “And I want you to fuck me in your sleep / It’s the only way I’ll know if you love me”, and simply, “I spend half the day exhaling / And the other half holding my breath.” Through fluctuating love and impossibility, Toledo examines not only his catastrophically failing relationship but himself as an agent of such calculated chaos. “If I’m not getting fucked over, I’m not getting fucked at all.” Yet, despite the devastation of such romantic shortcomings, Toledo spares himself from the cyclical spiral towards his own demise as he urges the inevitable suicide of the long-lived toxicity. “All I know is, one of us was supposed to kill the other / Isn’t that what they mean when they say ‘lovers?’ / But murder is dirty, and peace comes cheap / So here’s my new number, tell me when you’re free (703).” — Sophie Parrish

“Death of a Ladies’ Man” by Leonard Cohen

“Death of a Ladies Man” is one of the saddest songs I’ve ever had the pleasure of listening to. The song follows Cohen’s iconic narrative style of songwriting as he tells the story of old lovers reconnecting at the “ladies’ man’s” deathbed. Cohen walks the audience through the story of how the relationship and intimacy eventually ruined him, left him in isolation and stripped him of his charm and confidence. Listening to this song is like watching someone wither away in real time. Its lyricism is poignant, and as Cohen’s narration ends, the song closes with a droning wall of sound that feels like a funeral procession. It ends with the assertion that “I guess you go for nothing if you really want to go that far.” Ouch! Five stars. — Isha Savi

“Sister Ray” by The Velvet Underground

I’m a sucker for a long song, fifteen – twenty – thirty minutes? Count me in! Everything from Animal Collective’s Visiting Friends to Natural Snow Buildings’ Daughter of Darkness, I have heard it and loved it all. The thing is, most of these songs’ purposes for being long are to build tension, change and keep on expanding itself but sometimes you just need a song that is long for lengths sake. Ever since they started playing it live, Sister Ray became the Velvet Underground’s biggest form of creative release. With the record version being almost 18 minutes long and their live jams extending to usually almost 40, Sister Ray was recorded in a singular take with no engineer due to their impatience and annoyance. But that doesn’t matter because all 17 minutes rock, counting mistakes. SHE’S BUSY SUCKING ON MY DING-DONG!!! — Mario Sierra

“Vacillator” by Ethel Cain

When Perverts first came out in January, 2025, I was incredibly lukewarm to the ambient-focused album, even resistant. But something changed in the autumn and I came around to the beautiful concept, stunning vocals, and powerful sound. Ethel Cain is definitely no stranger to long songs. With what I believe to be one of the most perfect songs ever, “Waco, Texas”, clocking in at a little over 15 minutes, Cain has solidified herself as the queen of long songs. “Vacillator” is one of my favorites on Perverts, though far from the longest, at an easy 7 minutes 34 seconds. The suspenseful use of drum, the background vocals, and the feeling of isolation that this song provides envelops you for all 7 beautiful minutes. The song itself shuts out other people, saying “If you love me, keep it to yourself”, and shoving the listener further into that desperate self-isolation. — Andy Brown

“Misunderstood” by Wilco

Starting off their second studio album Being There, Wilco’s “Misunderstood” is kind of the perfect precursor to their later indie-rock sound that defined the scene in the early 2000s. The simple chord progression mixed with the muddy distortion on the guitar and underlying percussion eventually swells into a grandiose, messy yet beautiful ending; it’s everything I love about this band in one song. Mixed with Jeff Tweedy’s ability to write devastatingly simple yet poignant lyrics, it makes this a real all timer in their discography. It’s been entering my rotation quite frequently over the past couple of years, as reflections on your small town hit harder the farther you are away from it, but I also think the conversational style of Tweedy’s lyricism is something that I’ve begun to gravitate towards. He’s able to perfectly capture the feeling of returning home, both the good and the bad; the following of dreams but the warmth of a childhood bed. It’s kind of the perfect song for a college student! — Nick Hendrickson

“No Ordinary Love” by Sade

When I saw The Invite this summer, and they had a “By Your Side” needle drop with Seth Rogen and Penelope Cruz dancing to it, it reminded me how much I love Sade. “No Ordinary Love” is over six minutes long for a reason, and honestly, it could be ten minutes longer, and I’d still be SAT. Sade, I believe, has mastered the art of making heartbreaking music sound luxurious and classy. Every bassline, guitar riff, and breathy vocal feels like being underwater. The music video literally shows Sade as a majestic mermaid underwater, and that’s how the song feels, in the best way. The song is slow, hypnotic, and melancholic, building an atmosphere that makes you forget what’s going on around you. It’s the kind of song you put on when you want to romanticize your life or stare out the window at night at a skyline. There’s something so addictive about the way the song makes longing feel glamorous. Sade sings about giving someone everything you have, and somehow makes heartbreak sound like the most beautiful thing you’ve ever heard. The 7-minute, 20-second runtime only adds to what makes this song so perfect: just when you think you’ve settled in, she pulls you back in even deeper. “No Ordinary Love” is hot, devastating, cinematic, and timeless all at once. If I have to be heartbroken, I might as well be heartbroken with Sade. — Oona Schulweis

“Maggot Brain” by Funkadelic

The first time I heard “Maggot Brain,” the title track off the third studio album from American funk rock band Funkadelic, I was in the car on a long, late-night drive home with my dad. I laughed at George Clinton’s bizarre spoken-word opening, but the moment Eddie Hazel’s first note rang out, I fell deep into an expanse of emotion and sound created by Hazel’s brilliant playing. The track is a 10-minute, 20-second guitar solo performed by guitarist Eddie Hazel, while he was under the influence of LSD. Clinton, the band’s leader, opens with a spoken-word poem about “the maggots in the mind of the universe,” and his booming delivery makes for a hauntingly calm, eerie, even humorous prologue. It’s a strange, almost playful warm-up for what comes next. Before recording, Clinton told Hazel to play with great emotional range, instructing him to imagine just learning his mother had died, and then the relief of learning she was alive after all, and to let the grief, confusion and joy pour out through his guitar. Hazel’s performance is mind-bending. He took Clinton’s prompt and turned it into a masterpiece of sound and soul. Without a single word, he voiced the fears and hopes of a generation reeling from social change, pulling sounds out of his Fender Stratocaster that I didn’t know were possible. It is the rare solo that says everything without saying anything. The result is both devastating and inspiring, and a testament to the band’s seemingly boundless artistic range. “Mother Earth is pregnant for the third time / for y’all have knocked her up / I have tasted the maggots in the mind of the universe / I was not offended / for I knew I had to rise above it all / or drown in my own shit.” — Liam Reader

“Blue Monday” by New Order

“Blue Monday” was introduced to me at a time in my life when my music taste was essentially non-existent. It was middle school and I was stuck in the loop of listening to whatever music was on the radio and the same handful of pop artists everyone else was listening to. I was just starting to warm up to the idea of listening to “old” music and finally found my gateway drug to music made before the 90s and, more importantly, New Order. I had it all wrong and “Blue Monday” radicalized me. That synth sound, the one that I had always avoided and associated with the cheesy ballads of the 80s, was suddenly the most futuristic thing I had ever heard. It’s one of those songs that encapsulates multiple moods at once. It’s retro and futuristic at the same time. The rhythm and beat are mechanical and repetitive but not at all boring. Hypnotic? Yes. Boring? Absolutely not. Something in the deadpan, pessimistic lyrics, the neverending electronic drum beat, and the iconic bassline just makes you want to hit the dancefloor. Though, younger me would be disappointed to discover that this song is not playing at every party and club in the world. “Blue Monday” is 7 minutes and 29 seconds I will never get sick of. — Fiona Cunningham

“Well Met (Fingers Through the Fence)” by Squid

A song about a shrinking coast, swallowed up by a rising sea. About impermanence, and ignorance, and eyes shut on a world in crisis. Anxious, freezing, but not without a sense of playfulness. In March of 2025, I’d listened to Squid maybe once or twice, and never very closely. My buddy introduced me to their 2025 release Cowards with a lyric from “Well Met (Fingers Through The Fence)” and it’s been in frequent rotation since. This track is easily one of my favorites. It starts out atmospheric, with the turning of a bicycle wheel and a long, slow horn, followed by featured artist Clarissa Connelly’s indelible voice. It’s eerie, almost, like a fog rolling in. The streetlamps come on, the road is wet, the air is salty. Connelly sets the scene. Overtop a richly layered arrangement, she tells of urban decay, “rows of bricks and boring homes.” She asks what’s to become of this place she’s delivered you to. Is she demanding an answer, or is she searching? The layers are stripped away as she finishes her questioning. There’s a moment of quiet, then a jaunty little synth and a moment to catch your breath. She gets close and whispers in your ear, conspiratorial, “What are you reading?” and the flood begins! Joined by drummer Ollie Judge in the second half, Connelly begins a rhythmic recitation. There’s a shiver in their chant, a sense of unease that pierces deep and settles in. There’s a dread that weighs you down. The waves lap at your toes. They rise to meet your ankles, climb up your calves while you’re stood still on the shore. What is here is overwhelming. It will not be denied. It builds and it builds and it builds. As voice gives way once more to synth, and as synth is met with horn, and as the drone-slash-twinkle reaches a peak, dies out, and leaves you again with the click of the bicycle pawls, you find yourself with your clothes soaked through, knocked on your ass at the edge of a cliff. — Francis Mertes

“Calvary Scars LI / Aux. Out” – Deerhunter

This song is a monster of nostalgia, encapsulating the best of what Deerhunter has to offer in a dynamic 10-minute parable that slowly builds tension with reverberating guitar pluckings, along with sparkling ambient background chimes and enveloping, soaring vocals. At around four and a half minutes in, the song reaches a climax, the guitar quickening its tempo and flooding the speakers with noise in the spirit of an energetic slacker rock song. At this point the background chimes seamlessly weave their way into a beautifully imperfect harmony with the guitar, evoking the feeling of jetting down a fuzzy highway through a violent blizzard, your mind and heart beginning to race. Even with the sparing lyrics in this very lengthy track, singing “Crucified on a cross / In front of all of my closest friends,” Deerhunter is once again delivering some incredibly surreal and striking imagery as they do best, but never revealing too much and allowing the listener to paint the rest of the picture. That’s the thing about Deerhunter; as skilled as they are at producing some of the most evocative and imaginative writing possible, they never reveal enough to tell a completely finished or explainable story. They like to leave it up to the listener to draw their own interpretations, but never skimp on emotional impact and commanding depictions of surrealism. “Calvary Scars LI / Aux. Out” is an ethereal, idiosyncratic and grandiose listening experience, and also a strong example of some of Deerhunter’s best work. — Diego Gonzalez