DJ Jim Q's Playlist: CYCLE

Greetings, CreativeMornings listeners. Welcome to the final playlist of 2024. It seems strange that 2025 is upon us, but here we are—yet another cycle around the sun. The year’s end always makes me recall one of my favorite lyrics from Pink Floyd: “The sun is the same in a relative way, but you’re older, shorter of breath, and one day closer to death.” Sorry—it got a bit dark there at the end, just like 2024.

That brings me to the theme for this month: Cycle. Selected by the Freiburg chapter, this theme inspired a song list that celebrates repetition, circular processes, and sequential phases. The concept of cycles is essential for music composition. Repeating melodic motifs and looping rhythmic patterns serve as the foundation of most contemporary music. Like the steady meter of a heartbeat or the predictable tick-tick of a clock, there is something reassuring and intuitive about musical repetition. When done properly, a songwriter can deftly craft an appealing balance between the monotonous and the meditative. Most songs carefully mix these repetitive patterns with evolving elements. With each cycle, a new auditory dynamic is introduced, adding novelty to the familiar and enhancing the sonic story. Listen to most modern popular songs, and you’ll likely hear this combination at work.

Another way to bring novelty to repetition is by employing polymeters—repeating patterns of different lengths and time signatures played simultaneously at the same tempo. This creates an effect of a constantly shifting and evolving composition: sometimes aligned, sometimes adrift, but always in sync. I like to think of this as similar to how the planets in our solar system orbit one another. Some rather complex sonic scenes can be created with this technique. “Touch and Go” by The Cars is a great example, where a five-against-four polymeter is used. Listen closely, and you’ll hear the drums and bass playing five beats per measure, while the synthesizer and guitar are playing four beats per measure, creating a swirling, intriguing somewhat unconventional feel. There is so much more to unravel about the cyclical nature of music, polyrhythm, and polymeter, but for now, we’ll leave it there—lest I start sounding too repetitive.

What comes around goes around—the theme this month is Cycle. Our playlist is filled with songs of repetition and periodicity. From Bobbie Gentry’s “Seasons Come, Seasons Go” to Fugazi’s “Repeater” to Mobb Deep’s “Cradle to the Grave”, the cyclical reigns supreme in this month’s song cycle. Enjoy these songs of repetition from Nao, Joan Shelley, and Yves, and a cast of other great artists. Load it up, let it spin, put it on repeat, and settle in for an auditory loop or two through the list.

Thanks for listening. I hope to see you here again next month. If you enjoy these playlists, give me a shout on X, and be sure to follow me on Spotify.