Playlist No. 3 - Fall Colors

As we talked about while putting together Medley’s first playlist for our launch party (which we just so happened to hold at the height of summer on the longest day of the year, when everyone was feeling good about the weather and upcoming vacations while soaking up the late glow of twilight), music is absolutely the perfect medium to enhance any experience; it doesn’t need to be the centerpiece but it should definitely be the heartbeat. Now that school is in full swing, the days are getting subtly shorter, the evening breeze brings a touch of shiver with it, and the cool mornings seem to take just a little bit longer to get moving, we are starting to write the story of what’s ahead moreso than of what is coming to and end. The end of summer blues are transitioning to the beginning of fall reds, yellows, and oranges. There’s a faint but distinct Purple Haze in the early evenings which is unlike the light you see at any other time of year, which transitions to that unmistakably bright Pink Moon just before dark sets in. It can be pretty magical.

So, that got us thinking. While we should be talking about something really important this week, like managing all of the to-dos and to-don’ts of moving out of your old and into your new office space (which we will get to next week to wrap up our ongoing Space Installment series), what’s more important than taking a moment now and then to appreciate what’s happening around you? And what better way is there to enhance that appreciation than putting together a carefully curated playlist?

With the intro and exit songs of said playlist already essentially selected for us (see above for clues), it became pretty clear what the theme should be. Nothing can beat the colors of fall. Nothing. It’s nature’s little fury of brilliant design before taking a break and replenishing its creative energy. 

We started out with the only rule being that songs had to have a color in the title. As planners and designers we value establishing guidelines and sticking to timelines. While there are a lot of great songs that fit within the original ground rules, turns out that we could not come up with quite enough to fill a decent length playlist without sacrificing quality, so we took the next natural step - sometimes, when planning, you’ve just got to be willing to let inspiration take you where it really wants you to go. Remain open to new ideas at all times. Since there are some pretty incredible band names (and even some solo artists) out there that fit the criteria we had established for the songs (more cowbell, anyone?), we would be doing the playlist an injustice if we didn’t include at least some of them here.

Now we were really getting somewhere. So much so that we almost lost complete sight started down the White Rabbit hole of including songs about autumn as well, color or no color in the title or band name. Sometimes, though, you need to tell inspiration to go Back to Black and come back another day. We did sneak a few songs in here that, well, fit the mood and the cadence and speak directly to the type of sensation we were trying to create when - we couldn’t resist).

So, without further ado or description, go ahead and put on your Autumn Sweater and your Blue Suede Shoes, say Goodbye Yellowbrick Road, Good Riddance to summer, hop in a Big Yellow Taxi (some of you out there remember what those are, right?) and grab a drink at the Hotel Yorba beneath an Orange Colored Sky.

Excuse me, while I kiss the sky...