MILES PARKS, HOST:
Sad songs and cold weather go together like hot cocoa and marshmallows. Kacey Musgraves knows what I'm talking about.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "CHRISTMAS MAKES ME CRY")
KACEY MUSGRAVES: (Singing) And every year, I sincerely try. Oh, but Christmas, it always makes me cry.
PARKS: There are albums I love that I literally will not listen to unless it's under 40 degrees outside. "Skeleton Tree" by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds is one that comes to mind. It is so beautiful, but it is not a summer jam.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SKELETON TREE")
NICK CAVE AND THE BAD SEEDS: (Singing) And it's all right.
PARKS: To hear more about how our music taste changes with the seasons, let's bring in NPR Music's Stephen Thompson. Hi, Stephen.
STEPHEN THOMPSON, BYLINE: Hello, Miles.
PARKS: So is this just a me thing, or does sad music hit different when it's cold?
THOMPSON: Well, I don't think that it's just you, Miles. I join you in your Gloomy Gus-itude (ph).
(LAUGHTER)
PARKS: Nice.
THOMPSON: But I do think, for me, the cold definitely does bring out a different set of music tastes. There are certain, I think, organic sounds, certain gloomy sounds, cozy sounds. If you think about the way that you spend the winter - and what do I want to hear while I'm sipping hot cocoa on my couch? What do I want to hear while bundled up and walking through the neighborhood as the snow falls? You know, obviously, you know, Miles, you and I are privileged to live in a part of the country where we have these seasons. There are absolutely people listening to this show right now who are like seasons, you said.
PARKS: (Laughter) I asked you to bring a few melancholy song recs, actually, for this segment. What can you give us?
THOMPSON: Well, you know, as we're kind of assessing the songs and albums that we love the most, the one that I keep coming back to is only about a month or two old. It's by the Spanish singer Rosalia, and I think there are absolutely wintery vibes to a song like "Reliquia."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "RELIQUIA")
ROSALIA: (Vocalizing, singing in non-English language).
THOMPSON: This is a record - you know, when we talk about the ingredients of what makes a sound feel wintery, often, I'm talking about pianos and strings and kind of organic instrumentation. And I think this record has an ornateness to it that I think kind of fits in with, you know, icicles and snowflakes and kind of these kind of extremely almost mathematical patterns while, at the same time, drawing on something really warm and beautiful. This, for me, is a very wintery record.
PARKS: Well, I do want to ask about how holiday music plays into this because I will die on the hill that "Blue Christmas" is the best Christmas song of all time, and I think part of that is the melancholy angle to it. Where do you come down on that?
THOMPSON: I agree with you completely. The holiday music that makes me happiest tends to represent a more melancholy vibe, and I think that's because it's an act of empathy. It's acknowledging that December is stressful. We have a lot of memories associated with it that aren't always happy. And I think a song that understands that is going to cheer me up in a very different way than a song that is sort of shaking me by the collar and telling me, this is the absolute best time of year, and you should be happy. That will almost invariably make me upset.
And so to me, a great holiday song is acknowledging that the holidays bring great joy, but it's also tinged with regret. It's also tinged with missing people who aren't here anymore. It's tinged with, you know, not being a kid anymore. It's tinged with aging. And a song that really captures that - it's an instant all-time favorite holiday song for me - it's by the wonderful, wonderful singer-songwriter Madi Diaz. She put it out just last year, and it's one that I kind of recently ran into again, and I just love it. It taps perfectly into that conflicting swirl of emotions around the holidays and how we as adults relate to them. It's called "Kid On Christmas."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "KID ON CHRISTMAS")
MADI DIAZ: (Singing) These days, I don't air on optimistic. Something about the way this year went, I wish I could just feel like a kid on Christmas.
THOMPSON: To me, part of the cocktail of emotions around Christmas - it's tied into childhood. It's tied into how you celebrated, the things that made you happy in that time but also, in some ways, the things that make you sad around that time - people you wish you could still spend the holidays with, all of the kind of adult pressures that pile up around Christmas that weren't there when you were a kid. To me, this song kind of takes all of those, swirls them together and taps into an emotion that I find really universal this time of year. And it's not just a straight bummer. It's a mix, and that's what winter is about. That's what the holidays are about. That's what life is about.
PARKS: That's NPR Music's Stephen Thompson. Stephen, let's make it through December.
THOMPSON: We'll do it, Miles. I believe in us.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "KID ON CHRISTMAS")
DIAZ: I think I could feel like a kid... Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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