The advent of the new year seems to almost wear a coat of desires; resolutions are materializing, nagging for healthier lifestyles. Decades are being analyzed, each person recognizing the revolving door that is mortality: transparent, quick, fleeting, and hard to avoid being brutalized by the wretched spin. 

But perhaps most important to donning our 2020 boots is the melancholy with which we salute the music that drove us through. How does fleeting mortality coexist with music? 

Perhaps one of the most monumental albums to drop in 2019 is “When I Loved You,” by Bluebiird, the stage name of performing artist Emily Osment. (Yes, Lilly Truscott from “Hannah Montana.”) 

Released on Sept. 27, the album contains songs that portray the magic of heartache to the foreground of bedroom folk/pop music. 

The first track, “Black Coffee Morning,” which was released on Mar. 7, is a poetic masterpiece, altering the proportions of the world to convey Osment’s perception of reality; she is both a passenger within the song and the active agent, demanding confrontation.

“I hope you know where you’re going, but you’re just as lost as me/And you walk with such conviction and I’m eyes-closed following.”

Osment identifies a duality within relationships—she is being pulled between the unknown and what the other character believes to be the truth. The reckless confidence of this second character indicates Osment’s wistful reminiscence of being led beyond the truth—of being lost in a city that, in memory, supersedes spatial limitation. Truth and lie are merely equal parts in a larger history of love. 

In the second track, “Sailor,” Osment’s poeticism invites the listener to inhabit a whimsical seascape of mystifying images, strewn about like chaotic toy soldiers.

“Leave out your toys, let them know you’re gone/Show your tongue through your broken teeth/No rules in emergencies.”

Within the exploration of a relationship, Osment finds that there are many parts that make up one we love. Disparate, philosophically impenetrable parts that thin the blood and make music out of randomness. This epitomizes the artistic capacity of Osment. She cultivates mystery, telling her sailor in vivacious litany that “it’s two of us all the way home,” only to break the stanza with “and only one survives.” 

It is important to let this music—as any good music does—teach us about love. Osment creates a space to acknowledge the vibrations of our relationships. This space is indispensable in the new year—for many feel this is the time to evaluate life choices and situations.

Indispensable. A word with scrolls of usages, but one that is central to humanity. Being wanted is an art which we seem both incredibly adept and pathetically incompetent at performing. Because, as Osment sings, we are an amalgamation of many parts, not necessarily homogeneous. Inherently, her music calls listeners to action—to reclaim agency, and to recognize the tidality of self-advocacy.

“Salt screams, don’t you know these things reveal themselves?/Oh Sailor, don’t you know you roam alone?”