Pity Party of One? Your Music's Ready!

This morning blew. I'm dealing with health (and health insurance) issues, as well as job and home issues. The three individually can feel like a minor bitch slap from which you can quickly recover, square your shoulders and walk on with dignity still intact. The three together? Well, that's just a straight up punch to the face from which you get knocked to the ground and emerge with a black eye or a broken nose. I think I'm genetically predisposed to fall into bouts of self-pity and wallowing, but I actually hate that about myself so I fight it whenever I can. This morning was not one of those times. The metaphorical punch to the face was what I was dealing with when I decided to allow myself to give into it. I threw myself a little pity party (with a time limit, of course. No point in dwelling) and a party is not a party without some good music and maybe a hat- but of course, the hat is optional. In any case, I hastily put my little pity party playlist together and allowed myself a good cry.

The criteria for the playlist was simply that it have that sound that equates musically with what I felt. Lyrically, the songs may not fit, but I didn't want to spend too much time on lyrics, I just needed it to sound like my mood. So, some of these (if not most) are about love or lack of it, which is fine. So long as we're all depressed about one thing or another, we can all attend the same party. Stressing that it was a quick overview of my music, and not at all a comprehensive compilation, here's my list in absolutely no order (except the order in which it appears on shuffle on my (iTunes):

Wonderwall- Ryan Adams
Gray Room- Damien Rice

Good Enough- Sarah McLachlan
Breaking My Heart- Aqualung
Just Breathe- Pearl Jam
Blackout- Muse 
Slow Life- Grizzly Bear
Breathe Me- Sia
Duet- Rachael Yamagata
Cold Water- Damien Rice
The End- Pearl Jam
Do You Want to Come With? - Stephen Fretwell
Cheers Darlin'- Damien Rice
Diggin' A Ditch- Dave Matthews Band
Stay Or Leave- Dave Matthews
Better Days- Amos Lee
Untitled- Stephen Fretwell
Reason Why- Rachael Yamagata
Some Devil- Dave Matthews
Possibility- Likke Li
Come Pick Me Up- Ryan Adams
Lost Cause- Beck
I'll Back You Up- Dave Matthews Band
Lonesome Tears- Beck
Burn- Ray LaMontagne
It's All In Your Mind- Beck
Another Little Hole- Aqualung
Don't Bring Me Down- Sia
This Year's Love- David Gray

And the daddy of all sad, pity party songs, without which, it would really not be a pity part at all: Everybody Hurts by R.E.M.


* Note- Beck's Sea Change, Damien Rice's O, Aqualung's Strange & Beautiful, Stephen Fretwell's Magpie, and arguably Dave Matthews's Some Devil would all do individually as albums for some sad/mellow kind of music. I know those albums so well, that I don't ever think of them as "depressing" but I know people who refer to them that way, so there's that.