Halloween is all sublimation: we give our base instincts permission to emerge, we indulge in our ancient taste for spirits and specters, we put our real fears aside as we focus on the imaginary—the things that could never actually hurt us, but help us let off some screams.

Now I'm in a perilous position, having a weekly mixtape platform that also doubles as what is essentially a diary, the perfect storm for a broken heart to make a complete ass of itself.

This week's playlist was made to put on when you're cleaning the house. The whole thing revolves around a driving pulse, a specific BPM that rhymes with your work. It's a metronome made to match with your broom and a back-up chorus to keep you pushing along.

It's Friday the 13th, and it's the weekend of the Harvest Moon. Those two things haven't aligned since the start of the millennium, and they won't align again until 2049. It's the night to believe in magic once again.

I'm on vacation and on a budget, which of course means I've been playing hours and hours of The Legend of Zelda (write what you know).

Orphaned tracks are songs that never made it on a proper album, lost gems or throwaway cuts that never made it to a band’s long-form releases. These are your b-sides, rarities, demo sessions, soundtrack contributions, etc.

The Chattahoochee is Atlanta's resident river, and they call it the Hooch, a name as appropriate as any for our 69th issue. It's no Mississippi: it's only about 500 ft. across instead of 2,000.

I had to write a check earlier this week, and while digging through my drawers I came across my old iPod(s)—three black Classics, because each, at one point, I thought I had lost.

I've been reading Communion by Whitley Strieber, which is by now a famous alien abduction narrative and an alleged true story. Movies don't really keep me up at night anymore, but certain books do.

We all need ways to feel less like minions in the everyday corporate slog of modern America. Ways that do not involve waking up earlier.

These are songs that paint an impressionist's portrait of the big city, something I've been living in a lot lately and can't stop thinking about. I could die any day on these streets, mainly because of these cars everyone’s always driving around (and me, I’m one of the worst culprits).

Meow!

I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling a little heat-madness from this summer sun. Like if I slip I might float away, you know the feeling? If not, these songs will explain.

Here are my twenty favorite songs of the year so far, in reverse order to build suspense. Hold on tight!

You know the longest case of the hiccups lasted for sixty-eight years? I imagine at first it was like any other case. Only grew abnormal when he went to bed and woke up still burpin’. But still, he thought, any day now. Just a mighty long case.

It's the longest day of the year, and I'm breaking my one rule—this playlist will be long to match. These songs are the playlist breakers, the ones you can never include because they're too damn tangential. But now they’re all in one place at long last. Nothing under seven minutes.

A big part of being alive is having to get out of bed when you don't want to. One of the worst parts, actually. So I wanted to make another playlist to help anyone who might be needing to calm down on the way home from a bad day at work, or, god forbid, stave off a panic attack (a bit of a riff off my first playlist).

The songs are like a white noise machine, but instead of rain it's the sound of a summer under the fairy lights. It's a nice vibe to return to on long drives or lonely nights. This playlist has my own version of things; some songs that I think are synonyms. Consider it my thesaurus for the soundtrack.

It's a playlist of what we dub Record Store Songs. These are things I would play if I were ever lucky enough to work the counter at Record Collector, one of Iowa's best and brightest businesses. Almost every record I own is from there. I tried to stop there every time I walked home from class.

Your move came just in time for a housewarming party on Memorial Day weekend. It's no penthouse, but you can see the Rockies, and there's a pool. Happiness, after years of dormancy, has awakened at last.