Every stage of a breakup

In “Music that Makes You Feel,” columnist Sam Waddoups ’23 recommends albums that take listeners on specific emotional journeys. This week he farewell: Julia Jacklin’s ‘Crushing’ and Laura Marling’s ‘Song for Our Daughter’.

There is nothing worse than taking a math exam after a breakup.

But freshman autumn found me. After my first Math 19 midterm, I wandered the dark, empty campus back to my dorm. My body was overwhelmed with post-exam tension and pre-college breakup pain. As my friends say, I was still upset and healing. I plugged in my earphones.

In that moment, walking through an abandoned engineering quad and remembering lost love, I knew exactly what album I needed. It was “Crushing” by Julia Jacklin.

Jacklin sang a heartbreak lullaby over a gently strumming guitar and whispered in my ear.

Jaclyn’s sophomore album contains songs that come alive with every breakup moment. The song explores deep conflicts and desires to escape (“Head Alone” and “Don’t Know How to Keep Loving You”), moments of breakup (“Turn Me Down”), and attempts to bounce back from emotional crises. Immediate attempts (“Head Alone” and “Don’t Know How to Keep Loving You”) are recorded. “Pressure to Party” and “When The Family Flies In”) and a long period of quiet melancholy (“Body” and “Comfort”). Whatever emotional situation you’re in at the end of a tumultuous relationship, there’s a song for you.

Every song is written frankly and gently, and the relaxed expression puts the listener at ease. On the uptempo “Pressure to Party,” Jacqueline explains his temptation to get back together with his ex in a deadpan, heartbreaking way: I live there too. ”

The song’s lyrics and anguished yet uptempo tone capture the frenetic spirit of a heartbreak night out as she sings, “Right open the door and try to love again/Right to love again.” catch. Jaclyn is torn between her urges to party, to take time for herself, to get back together with her ex, and to find someone new, and the particularity of this feeling makes the song heartbreaking. It is a rare case of fast songs.

Jaclyn’s voice is unique yet adaptable, always delivering exactly what the track needs. “Turn Me Down”‘s striking high-register riff turns into screaming, and folky patterns like “You Were Right” and “Pressure to Party.” Her way of speaking makes her well-written lines even clearer with a perceptive but frustrating and broken tone.

For all the broken emotions on the album, Jacklin concludes with “Comfort,” a lullaby he heard on the dark road back to his dorm. It offers the real-world comfort of ‘I’m going outside and sunbathing/I’ll ​​be seeing you all soon’. You may not know where your ex is now, but they are fine, and so are you.

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Laura Marling’s “Song for Our Daughter” is another album about love loss. While not as central to the theme as Julia Jacklin’s “Crushing,” the song gazes at love at arm’s length, giving even her sweetest feelings a melancholy sigh. ing. “Love is a disease that time heals,” she sings on “Only the Strong.”

Marling writes in a similar indie-folk singer-songwriter style to Jacklin’s, but she follows the traditions of her famous ancestors more classically. Her style imitates and is in line with the greatest songwriters of the last century, with Joni Mitchell (throughout, especially “Blow by Blow” and “The End of the Affair” in) and Bob Dylan (in “Alexandra” and “Strange Girl”). ). She’s as easily a groovy chorus or lyrical joke (she’s a socialist because she’s got something to protect in Strange Girl) as easily as her tender melodies and subversive scenes. I made up the line “I declared that there was”).

The album’s standout track, “The End Of The Affair,” would be a feel-good acoustic tune if it weren’t for the tragedy. The song depicts the quiet final moments of a relationship, where two people sit together and are sad to leave at the end, knowing it’s over. Marling’s voice brings comfort and compassion even as she sings the heartbreaking final lines.

Thankfully, for Marling’s little moments of regret and grief, she finishes the album sweet and loving, ending with a reassuring song like Jacqueline. The album’s final song, “For You,” is an ode to her lifelong love, platonic, familial, and romantic.

“Love is not the answer, it is the line that marks the beginning,” sings Marling. “For You” offers solace to all those who are heartbroken. Love may not be all you want, but it’s there in the end. One day it will return to mark the beginning of a new era in your life.

If I could go back to those cold nights after my math exams and walking home in turmoil, I would tell myself so. Love will always come back and you will hug it again.

Editor’s Note: This article is a review and contains subjective thoughts, opinions and criticisms.