2018 In Concerts

Hiya! I'm back—and hopefully for a while, this time. 

For the past few years, my blogging has been reduced to an annual post recounting my favorite albums from the year. Moving into 2019, though, I hope to get back into blogging more frequently—and I'm starting now. I might be a little rusty at this, but I'm making a major effort this time around, so I hope you'll join me on this ride!

Instead of wrapping up my favorite albums of 2018 like I do every year (because, honestly, I couldn't think of that many. I listened to a lot of old music this year), I thought it would be a fun change of pace to instead wrap up my favorite concerts of 2018. 

I don't keep a list of every concert I attend—although I very much wish I did, but it's too late at this point—and I definitely don't remember every single show I went to this year. But I do remember the ones that stood out, and quite a few stood out this year. 

So, here we go: my top 4 concerts of 2018.

Favorite Albums of 2017

Remember this time last year when I rounded up my four favorite albums of 2016 and then proceeded to never post on my blog again for 365 days? It's time to do that exact same thing once again!

2017 was a wild year. Here are the albums that stuck through it with me.

Favorite Albums of 2016

Hi, hello. It has been a hot minute since I've been around here. 

I don't really have an excuse or a reason for my prolonged absence from my own blog - school work, my capstone, writer's block, not really caring, no one really reading - and I don't really feel that I need to explain myself, but I do want to come back. I hadn't really had any ideas for posts until just about 20 minutes ago, sitting on my bed watching the ten thousand "best beauty products of 2016" videos that had popped up in my Youtube subscription box. I was thinking about how boring and repetitive those videos have gotten, especially considering the fact that most of them include the same products, and wondering what content creators could do to make them more interesting when I had the thought of making my own. Bored of makeup lists, though, I thought about the things that really narrated my 2016 and landed, instead, on music. 

Music, obviously, has defined my entire life for as long as I can remember. I can't make it, but I love it with my entire being. I started off my writing career wanting to be a music writer, and most of the passion and excitement in my life extends, in some way, from my love for music and the people who make it. The music I listen to defines my life, so I thought it would be worthwhile to look back at 2016 through my favorite albums. Thus, what follows is a list of my favorite albums of 2016, and how they've fit into my life. 

I've chosen to list albums that were released in 2016, rather than just compile a list of my most listened to of 2016, because that one would be much too long. Honestly, almost all my favorite bands released albums in 2015 (see: Sounds Good Feels Good, Future Hearts, Life's Not Out to Get You, 25, etc), so I spent most of the year listening to music from the year before. This hopefully means that I have a lot to look forward to musically in 2017. Until then, though, here are my top 4 favorite albums from 2016, with a song of choice for each one. Happy listening, and happy 2017.

April Favorites

Hiya! So, I've been wanting - and attempting - to make a favorites post since February, but I just haven't been able to until now. Monthly favorites are some of my favorite posts to read and videos to watch from the bloggers and vloggers I follow, so I decided it's about time I sit down and make my own.

April was a particularly unique month for me because I was traveling for the majority weeks of it, which is more than I've ever travelled before in my life. On March 31, I left Edinburgh for Paris - from there, I went to Lisbon, Madrid, briefly back to Edinburgh, and then up to the Isle of Skye. Less than a week later I left Edinburgh for Brighton, then Cardiff, then Swansea, and finally Cheshire. Oh, and there was a quick day-trip to Glasgow somewhere in there as well. I returned to Edinburgh for good on April 27th - just shy of a month after I left. 

I'm not going to lie about it - all that traveling honestly drove me a little crazy and took a toll on my sanity. As I'm very much a homebody, I spent quite a bit of this past month feeling overwhelmed and out of place. This was frustrating because I knew how lucky I was to be seeing such incredible places - but I just couldn't get my emotions to agree with my brain. The latter half of the month was better than the first because I was in hotels, not hostels, and with my dad and brother, who I trust to travel with. Doubtless, though, I saw so many incredibly beautiful places this past month and learned so many new things. In addition, all that packing and unpacking (and only having a tiny bag to carry everything in) taught me a lot about what products I really, actually use every day - making April the perfect time for me to start compiling monthly favorites. So, without further ado, let's get into it!

life's a tangled web (of cellphone calls and hashtag, 'i don't know's)

Travel posts are turning out to be much more intimidating and harder to complete than I had anticipated. While I work on them, I thought I'd put together a quick post about the 5 Seconds of Summer concert I went to last night in Glasgow. 

Plane Playlist

Pretty much every fibre of my being wishes I could strut through the airport like Karlie Kloss on a good day - actually, even Karlie Kloss on a bad day. But, reality tells me that airport-Gwen will not suddenly grow ten inches in height, shrink like six sixes in jeans, and make $15 million overnight. So, while airport-Karlie can make her way through every terminal in the world glowing and stress-free and first class, airport-Gwen is likely going to be sweaty, stressed out, and showing the season's latest trend of crumbs from a Starbucks croissant all down the front of my shirt.

exactly what I won't look like this week

It's all good, though, because I will be beating airport-Karlie in one thing: my playlist.
Okay, Karlie Kloss probably also has a really good taste in music, but let me give myself this one. I have nothing else.
Anyone who knows me knows that music has been one of the most important and consistent things in my life since I was in middle school. I don't have any claims to musical talent or any knowledge of musical technique or theory, but I do, if I may say so myself, have a really sick taste in music - mostly because it's insanely eclectic and really, really bizarre.

So, before I take off for the UK, I thought it would be fun to share a playlist that'll get me through the day of traveling. And, since I don't have the space, time, or patience to make a playlist that will last for the entire flight, what follows is a list of the top 20 songs I'll be listening to while I'm cruising at 30,000 feet over the Atlantic. (In no particular order, one song per artist, and also mostly new music or music that I just discovered because if I started going back in time we'd be here forever.)

Embrace it.