My next for @fanartfrenzy this month! I’ve never made a playlist for a fic before, so when I saw the bingo square with that prompt, I didn’t want to waste the opportunity! @the-darkestminds’ fic Autumn’s Shadow simply too iconic not to have its own playlist. I have a pretty eclectic and varied music taste tho, so it was hard to choose!
The final cut ended up being 15 songs long, evening out to exactly 1 hour and nothing more! I’ll put the tracklist below, along with the lines that I feel like evoke the fic the most, some explanations, etc etc. Warning for spoilers!
So I tried to give some sort of flow to the song order, both in terms of theme and musicality. Because this fic is such an epic and is so detailed, I couldn’t really fit the whole plot in, if that makes sense, so I take this as starting around when everything starts to really go wrong with Beron, and it sort of travels through Azriel and Eris finding their footing again, and I cut it off before everything started to go wrong again cause I simply could not handle putting more sad songs after giving the playlist kind of a happy ending LOL.
Some songs are more reflective of Azriel’s issues with his shadows and his connection to Koschei, others have to do with Azriel and Eris’ more toxic moments, Azriel’s doubts about his place in their relationship (and especially how he relates himself to Beron through his violent actions, whether they were intentional or not) or their codependency, and some songs have to do more with their romantic and sexual relationship. I tried to kinda pick songs that reflected all major aspects of the fic: The impact of Beron, the impact of Koschei, the ups and downs of Azriel and Eris’ relationship, and, of course, their enduring love. I’m sure you probably have your own songs that you associate with your work, but I hope you like my choices (as unconventional as they may be)!
Tracklist:
No. 1: Garbage - Radical
(Note: this doubles as a quintessential Tamsand song for me, but I associate it HEAVILY the whole High Lord Ascension sequence in Autumn’s Shadow)
“No more riding on the high-line / No more standing on the side lines / All you gotta do is save a life, save a life”
“It’s hard to cry, it’s hard to sleep / Nothing good is ever easy to keep”
“Grief is love turned inside out / Grief is an honor, grief is our right / But we need language for the small things”
No. 2: Nine Inch Nails - Piggy
(Note: this one is just soooo Azriel to me in general, but also kind of Eris to me in the context of the fic. And I firmly believe that in a modern world Azriel’d be into NIN, if not like…trap and house and EDM)
“Hey pig piggy pig pig pig / All of my fears came true / Black and blue and broken bones / You left me here, I’m all alone / My little piggy needed something new”
“Hey pig / Nothing’s turning out the way I planned / Hey pig / There’s a lot of things I hoped you could help me understand”
“Nothing can stop me now, ‘cause I don’t care anymore”
No. 3: Santigold - My Superman
(Note: Rahhhhh favorite Santigold song fr fr. I’m not sure if my interpretation is right but I see it as deifying and idolizing your partner even while the relationship grows unstable, which, like, come on)
“Hey hey, you got to live, you got to live, you got to live”
“Make it fly, bless your soul / You get by, take me along / But all the static here it’s tearing you a-part / You can’t stay the way you, you, you, you, you are”
No. 4: Shiny Toy Guns - Don’t Cry Out
(Note: this is another one that kinda reminds me of the whole Beron sequence when I listen to it, but when I really pay attention to the lyrics, it definitely is more accurate as a representative of Azriel and Eris’ emotional disconnect from each other after Everything.)
“I can’t forget what you’ve forgotten / All along, I’ve never been so alone / Don’t cry out / Cease fire”
“Your fascination / with naked walls of silk and skin / With no conditions / I needed you to notice / That’s all I wanted”
No. 5: The Submarines - 1940
(Note: the version in the YouTube playlist is the original, the one in the Spotify playlist is the AmpLive remix….i love both and couldn’t choose lol. I’m also not so sure about its placement in the tracklist, but it’s a jam so I don’t think it really matters)
“Something’s wrong when you regret / Things that haven’t happened yet / but it’s a glorious day when the morning comes / Without the feeling of alarm”
“You couldn’t sleep for the awful fright / That kept you up in bed last night / But while curious shapes shift in the dark / They vanish with the sunrise spark”
No. 6: Portishead - Sour Sour Times
(Note: The Codepency Anthem imo. At least when I ascribe it to Azriel and Eris in the context of ur fic)
“Who am I, what and why / ‘Cause all I have left is my memories of yesterday / Oh these sour times”
“Scattered seeds, buried lives / Mysteries of our disguise revolve / Circumstances will decide / ‘Cause nobody loves me, it’s true / Not like you do”
No. 7: Radiohead - There There
(Note: If I could put all the lyrics here, I could. This is THE song that represents Azriel’s doubts and low self-esteem, this is HIM in Autumn’s Shadow as a song)
“There’s always a siren / Singing you to shipwreck (don’t reach out, don’t reach out) / Steer away from these rocks / We’d be a walking disaster”
“Just ‘cause you feel it, doesn’t mean it’s there”
“Heaven sent you / to me, to me, to me / We are accidents waiting, waiting, to happen”
No. 8: Bent Knee - Little Specks of Calcium
(Note: Quintessential Azris song for me, even outside of the context of Autumn’s Shadow)
“Invade, you invade me / Piercing radiance, I have no defense / I can’t stand to see / Deep within myself, I am nothing else”
“I would give you anything, but you tear it all away / You can keep that part of me, I hate it anyways”
“But you are cold, frozen, cold, frozen, cold, frozen, cold, frozen / And you are burning me alive, you are burning me alive, you are burning me alive”
No. 9: Moby and Mimi Goese - When It’s Cold I’d Like To Die
(Note: No I did not get this from Stranger Things, I put this shit in a playlist I made based on Frankenstein’s Creature in my freshman year of HS, I KNOW BALL OKAY TRUST)
“Where were you when I was lonesome? / Locked away in freezing cold / Someone flying, only stolen / I can’t tell, this night’s so old’
“What was that, my sweet, sweet nothing? / I can’t hear you through the fog / If I holler, let me go / If I falter, let me know”
No. 10: Fear of Men - Sane
(Note: I imagine this as an Eris-addressing-Azriel song)
“I’m a monument to myself / I see you drowning, half flesh half stone / With ambitions that drain your health”
“You recreate me / Cast off my power / I was willing to be weak for you / But you’re unholy / You’re not yourself / You know, you know, you know”
No. 11: Pixies - All I Think About Now
(Note: One of my favorite songs of all time)
“If I could go to the beginning / Then for sure I would be another way / Make it better for today”
“Remember when we were happy? / If I’m late, can I thank you now? / I’m gonna try anyhow”
No. 12: Franz Ferdinand - Build It Up
(Note: Frankly I don’t know if this song is a little out of place musically, but I like the beat and the message so much that I simply had to leave it in)
“I see no truth as mythical / No vast unbridgeable / Give me strength to overcome / Give me strength, I’m not gonna run”
“Listen to the echo of the hunger of our silences or / To the sound of each other’s heart”
No. 13: Superorganism - It’s All Good
(Note: Also might be a little out of place, but this is like THEE Azriel-getting-out-of-his-depression-but-while-still-kinda-being-in-it song for me)
“We know you feel the world is too heavy / But you can turn it all around if you want”
“Oh yes, you’re in charge of what you feel / And when your life is looking real grim, it’s time to scream it out”
No. 14: Siouxsie and the Banshees - Kiss Them For Me
(Note: I knew I wanted another more romantic song, and I just loved how this one is sort of about glitz and glamor, like Eris, but also has kind of a melancholic quality to it when you factor in the meaning)
“Transfixed by the inner sound / Of your promise to be found, oh / Nothing or no one / Will ever make me let you down”
“In the fountain’s pink champaign/ Someone carving their devotion / In the heart-shaped pool of fame, oh”
No. 15: Alt-J - Every Other Freckle
(Note: Another quintessential Azris song for me, don’t be surprised if you catch me using it for a fic title)
“You’re the first and last of your kind (pull me like an animal out of a hole) / I want to be every lever you pull / And all showers that shower you”
“Oh, devour me (hey-hey!) / Oh, if you really think that you can stomach me (hey-hey!) / I want every other freckle, I want every other freckle”
Whew! If you read all that, thank you!! Here’s my updated bingo card too lol
listened to this on repeat the month it took to finish headlock, i'm extremely music motivated so this playlist is entirely responsible for that fic getting done lol
these are the playlists i use while writing for anyone that's interested! feel free to give me feedback on whether or not this is enjoyable, as i tend to make playlists for everything i write and would be happy to continue sharing them with you guys :)
this isn't lyric based whatsoever, just the vibes i get from the song while writing and i'll often gravitate to a certain song depending on a specific scene so pls don't read into it too deeply lol
if this is helpful for u guys while reading i'll probably continue adding to this as i go
IZUKU MIDORIYA .˚
fly - djo
distant lover - marvin gaye
champagne coast - blood orange
(we'll be) united - the intruders
surrender ('88 version) - suicide
coming up roses - harry styles
come home soon - the intruders
R.E.M - ariana grande
nasty - ariana grande
sweet - lana del rey
slow dance - clairo
steeeam - shelly
jonny - faye webster
north - clairo
cross your mind - shelly
she won't go away - faye webster
.˚ KATSUKI BAKUGOU
i'm on fire - bruce springsteen (basically his theme song hello)
my moon my man - feist
human nature - madonna
damned - miguel
hearing damage - thom yorke
i'll believe in anything - wolf parade
back of the club - kwn
worst behaviour - kwn (ft. kehlani)
knockin' on heavens door - bob dylan
routine rouge - PARTYNEXTDOOR (unreleased)
everybody here wants you - jeff buckley
master of none - beach house
i want someone badly - jeff buckley
your girl - lana del rey (unreleased)
PUBLICIST!READER .˚ ( A LOT of blood orange - sorry i'm the number 1 blood orange glazer round these parts)