STEPHEN TO ANNE MARIE:

SB: What is your favorite song?

AM: Sure Ain’t, by Wilder Woods. Something about that sound that makes me feel gritty and ethereal at the same time and it feels completely outside of my life experience but then he starts singing and it feels like it’s talking about exactly my life experience and I love all of those contradictions.

SB: Have you heard any of these tracks before?

AM: Josh Ritter? Otherwise, nah.

SB: Our music tastes obviously evolve as we get older. In some ways, it makes you appreciate things you never noticed before and in others, it validates what you love about it in the first place. As you've gotten older, what is one thing about music that you've started to appreciate more and what's one thing that you continue to love?

AM: Interesting question. I think, for me, the zoom out question here can extend to more than music. I don’t know where the certainty about preference comes from but I’m sure that in those early years my “likes” were shaped greatly by what our parents liked and, being the youngest, what you and Billy liked. The interesting thing about being the youngest is you get to this point where you are out in the world, which was the college point in my own life, and all of a sudden nobody you know well is dictating or influencing what you like anymore. They’re all far off someplace else. So then people that are basically strangers (sorry, Cuse homies) start introducing you to things and your knee jerk reaction is “No, I don’t like this, it sounds so different.” But really, that’s only happening because the experience of even having that opportunity is so new you’re unaccustomed to it and you don’t know how to do it yet.

Haha the thing I appreciate now is that when I am introduced to something new and I think I won’t like it, I’m usually wrong. So now I have a weird sentimental connection with newness and always remind myself that this new thing in my life could be spectacular if I give it a little breathing room.

Otherwise, I still love a good dance beat. I still love a horn section. A good love song. I do notice and appreciate when a song is an all around great song (technically, melodically, narratively) a little more now I think. In my youth I’d attach to a song for one aspect (the beat, the words) and tell myself it was a world class jam. Now I can at least be more honest with myself when I listen.

ANNE MARIE TO STEPHEN:

AM: What is your favorite song?

SB: Daaaaamn, bringing that fire this month! Love the variety of tempos and styles. Had a lot in this category, but in the end I have to go with Baby Blue by Rence. I think it is just because of when I listened to it first I'd just worked the last day at my job, where I'd spent the last 7+ years working alongside some amazing people. It was late at night, raining and this song came on. This jam has the perfect balance of sadness and optimism for what's next. I'm pretty sure I just looped it until I got home.

AM: Have you heard any of these tracks before?

SB: Move by jesse st john and Intoxicated by Pomo I've heard and now regretting not including them.

AM: I remember when phones advanced enough to have songs as ringtones. It was a big deal. 

Did you ever have a song as your alarm? Mine was a T-Pain song for a whole year in college. If you didn’t, what *could* it have been considering your music taste at the time and the need to motivate yourself to jump out of bed? 

SB: Ok, this is a fantastic question, primarily because it immediately transports me back to the early phone days where we thought hearing an 8-bit ringtone/alarm was the coolest technological advancement to date. And, unlucky for me, I actually do remember the songs I had. For me, the key to selecting a ringtone song was less about finding a song that I really liked (though that obviously had something to do with it) and more about finding the songs that were so recognizable in 8 bit form that everyone would know what it was when someone called you.

I had 3:

For times when I needed it to be more understated, it was In Da Club by 50 Cent. For more freestyle hanging out moments it was Lean wit It, Rock wit It by Dem Franchize Boyz. And for the hitting the club/going out nights it was Big Pimpin’ by Jay-Z. Yeah, I don't even know what to say after this.