Playlist #26: Reasons to be cheerful... maybe?

January, again, you have been terrible. Perhaps even more terrible than usual. But in at least two instances—to allow a cliché—it's the songs I listened to that saved me.

When I was first diagnosed with ADHD, I was described as a person who spends so much time thinking of the right word for something.

That was almost 24 years ago. Fast forward to now, and I have a really good example of that quality at work: I’m not sure if I should call this depression.

For one, I was never diagnosed with that, formally. I only did start therapy just as I was starting to figure out that the ex was cheating on me, with sprinkles of gaslighting on top, for one. All those self-doubts, motivated further by the genuine belief that I had to be the “better person” and I wasn’t really just being isolated by the people I wanted to care for me so badly. And in a time when mental health awareness is pretty high (but not really—and that’s another piece I’m working on) that’s not really a term you’re supposed to just casually throw around.

And also, besides, I’m not the guy who stays in bed all day. (My cat would like to have a meow and hiss with you if so.) I still go out of the house, and not just because I have to. My flat isn’t a mess. (Nevertheless, my mother would like to have a word with you.) But—and I’m certain you’ve noticed this creep into the last few playlists I published—I’ve been feeling pretty low recently. January being a slow month, with little to keep me busy apart from the five things I found myself writing here, I’ve been feeling pretty lower. (Does oversleeping count as “staying in bed all day”? And by that, I mean I wake up at six in the morning, instead of fifteen minutes before.) And I wouldn’t say it’s so-called “Blue Monday” because that’s really a marketing ploy to get us to travel more.

Maybe it’s my birthday? I can count with one hand the number of friends who remember—and I wish I was exaggerating, but I’m not. Fine, we’re all busier, and we don’t really greet everyone we ever knew every time. But it does make you insignificant, knowing you’re getting older, and it’s not getting easier, and remembering that, right, nobody really cares about you. You know, I used to be excited about getting older, despite my fear of dying, but not anymore.

And yet, there are some reasons to be cheerful, somehow. Maybe.

Last month, a new BB Girls track dropped. I wrote about them before. They were formerly known as Brave Girls, a Korean girl group with backing from a popular producing team that nevertheless didn’t get popular, at least not until four whole years after the released their eventual breakout single, “Rollin’”. They left the agency, joined Warner Music under a new name, and released a single that felt a little too much, in hindsight. Turns out their contract only lasted for a year, and they were let go soon after—and then, one of the members decided to leave, and the remaining three chose to go independent before forging a partnership with the same label behind newbie group H1-KEY. (I almost said “nugu”—that’s Korean for “who”, as in, “who?”—but I think they have at least one really good song, and they also recently collaborated with Josh Cullen of SB19.)

Sorry, so much back story. Again, BB Girls dropped a new track, and damn, this literally brought a smile to my face the moment I hit play on the video the first time.

“Love 2” is the sound of exuberant freedom. All the back story helps, sure, and the music video, with its poignant and heartbreaking visual metaphor, conveys that really well, but even if you just listen—“Love 2” is the sound of exuberant freedom. It’s city pop but it doesn’t pummel you with it. It’s mature K-pop you don’t really hear a lot of, if only because older groups (especially female ones) don’t get much of a look-in. It’s both refreshing and familiar, upbeat but sentimental. It’s too short. It’s too fucking short. But in two minutes and 49 seconds it manages to make me smile… and then, just as instantly, almost, almost, shed a tear.

Also last month, I heard back from

Niki Colet

. She was on Substack before me, so she’s cooler, sorry. But I didn’t realize she was here, for one, and also, I had always wondered what she’s been up to. I had written about her a couple of times back on the old music blog, and even watched her live. (More gigs in the daytime, please!) Turns out she’s since moved to London, took up her masters, and is now making music there, having released a new EP, We Only Ever Meet In Strange Dreams, last September. Of course I missed it because, again, we’re older, and also because I found myself disconnecting from local music when I closed the old blog and didn’t have to keep so many tabs on it.

I feel Niki has always been different from her contemporaries. I mean, I’m not saying our female vocalists all sound whiny, but I suppose Filipinos love the upper register, and so you hear a lot of that. On the other hand, she has always sounded so cool. (There I go again.) I feel if my mother ever heard her sing, she would say “gusto ko siya” before waxing sentimental about Kuh Ledesma and Joey Albert. I watched her live in her indie folk phase and she always sounded so sophisticated—“Big City”, from her 2019 EP Endless Summer, is one of the more unexpectedly chilling songs you’ll hear—and that remains the case now that she’s exploring the dark, lonely corner of the club, with shades of Everything But The Girl at different points in their career, on the new EP.

The most striking thing about the new record is how vivid it all is. Funny, because the imagery of dreams and memories Niki plays with usually suggests things being very hazy—it does provide a good take-off point for self-doubt. Also, she delivers the songs with an air of mystery, of the “wait, what really happened?” kind. Or maybe it’s because I particularly find it vivid. You have “Ghosts”, by all means a pretty straightforward track, taking on extra resonance, because… I mean, you’ve been reading the Once Monthly, right? All those words about the things you think of when you’re alone, about self-doubt and not being deserving of love…

That said, I had always considered the old music blog—and, by extension, the Once Monthly—as a hobby first and foremost, albeit one I can take too seriously at times. (Oh, if you only heard me explain how I’m not a professional photographer when I watched Shanne Dandan a couple of weeks back.) It does explain the impostor syndrome a bit. I like my music, but I was never comfortable with crowds, especially if I see everyone knows each other and I am so, so alone. It’s easy to forget that what I write does help some people out, and I was genuinely happy to see Niki’s email. It was a reminder that I can do good, that I am capable of doing good, without trying hard to do so.

I mean, it’s nice to be seen, right? And it’s nice to know you’re seen. I guess it’s why I continue to write: in the fervent hope that whatever resonated with me resonates with someone else, and maybe we can strike a conversation, make a connection, maybe become good friends. But depression, mood swings, dark clouds, Blue Monday, people hating on January for no reason, call it whatever you want—it can get in the way. It can dig up the bad things that you buried instead of setting on fire.

“You were never depressed before! You only became like this when we started dating!”

She never really saw me for those nine and a half years, did she? Was that why it was so easy for her to do what she did?

Thanks, by the way, to

Bo

for suggesting the All-Time Quarterback track, and to

Regina Peralta 🇵🇭

for that note about watching God Help The Girl which led me to adding Belle and Sebastian’s “The Blues Are Still Blue” on this playlist. You can recommend songs too—if it strikes my fancy, and I can make it work on the playlist, they do get added. I’m an email away at nicksyoncemonthly@gmail.com, or a poke (remember those?) away on the socials, where I’ll also elaborate on most of the song choices this month. The next playlist drops on 14 March, but I’ll be back with a new Plaka Note sooner, on 28 February.

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On this playlist

• All-Time Quarterback—“Untitled”
  All-Time Quarterback (1999)

• Self—“What A Fool Believes”
  Gizmodgery (2000)

• Belle and Sebastian—“The Blues Are Still Blue”
  The Life Pursuit (2006)

• Niki Colet—“Ghosts”
  We Only Ever Meet In Strange Dreams (2024)

• Maggie Rogers—“In The Living Room”
  single release (2024)

• Birame—“The Worst Parts of You”
  single release (2025)

• Moira dela Torre—“Gaslighter”
  ”I’m Okay” (2024)

• Michael Kiwanuka—“You Ain’t The Problem”
  Kiwanuka (2019)

• Rubblebucket—“Rain Rain Nature Rain”
  Earth Worship (2022)

• BB Girls—“Love 2”
  single release (2025)

• Polo & Pan—“Nenuphar”
  single release (2024)

• Public Service Broadcasting—“The South Atlantic” (featuring This Is The Kit)
  The Last Flight (2024)

• Jorja Smith—“Don’t Let Me Go”
  single release (2024)

• Loryn Taggart—“Tell Me How”
  The Lost Art of Pulling Through (2023)

• Ullah—“I Want It All”
  single release (2025)

• Eliza & the Delusionals—“Another You”
  Make It Feel Like The Garden (2024)