Five Best Albums To Fall In Love To

Five Best Albums To Fall In Love To
Words & Picks by Will Howard

In writing this article I am admitting a fact that my closest friends know I have denied for some time now: love does exist. At risk for being taken as sappy, or a romantic, or any other mild attempt at an insult for now again believing in love, I am inspired to share the albums which serve to expand this feeling of love. These are the albums, which I turn on when I am missing the girl I am in love with. They are both personal and universal in their message and vibe. They are albums which no matter how far apart we are, no matter how low my day is feeling they remind me of the moments I get to spend with her. I hope they remind you of the love that I thought never existed. I hope they help you find the love I have found. Love is a beautiful thing: don’t let anything remove that from your heart for longer than a moment.

Death Cab for Cutie – Plans
There is something just hauntingly beautiful about the song “I Will Follow Into the Dark”. The song as mellow and dark as it may seem somehow brings thoughts of beauty and passion to my mind. The power of someone being willing to follow you through the darkest and most difficult of times willingly and knowing the uncertainty is beyond powerful. The rest of the album bears the same sentiment to me.

Jack’s Mannequin – Everything In Transit
Something about Jack’s Mannequin just always brings about the brightness to me. Although Everything In Transit is the album that I chose, it was quite difficult for me to choose amongst the entire discography. The brightness of the piano, the upbeat tempo of all the songs, Everything in Transit is the record that just makes me want to sit down in a car and drive around town with the window down just thinking about how wonderful things are.

Jimmy Eat World – Chase This Light
The first song I encountered off of Chase This Light was the music video for the song “Always Be”. A bright and upbeat song focusing on the connection between two individuals who just can’t seem to connect at the right moment. As the video comes to a close the two lovers finally come together, bringing together this permanent connection of my mind with the close of this song and two lovers always being together.

Something Corporate – Leaving Through the Window
So I guess choosing both of Andrew McMahon’s previous project shows my affinity for piano when I’m feeing joyful. This however is by far one of my favorite records of all time let alone when I’m feeling in love. With the opening track “ I Want to Save You” and the following “Punk Rock Princess” as a teenage punk I immediately thought this would be the soundtrack to my love life for the rest of my life. Despite the shedding of much of my preconceptions and judgmental punk and metal attitude as I’ve aged something about this record has always been personal for me. As my girlfriend and I recently created our own parody of the track, which seems to fit better to our life, this record has been reinvigorated in my mind. There is not a track on this record, which fails to make me feel good, no matter the underlying message.

The Starting Line – Based on a True Story
So this one requires a bit of a backstory. At fourteen I found my first vacation romance, granted it was young, naive, and entirely nothing compared to other romances of my life this was the first time where something took hold so quickly (granted it disappeared even faster). The girl, whom I have long since lost touch with, was the first person to show me The Starting Line. She sent me the song “Stay Where I Can See You” on YouTube and I was immediately hooked. The album became the soundtrack to that vacation, and therefore this attempt at a fourteen-year old vacation romance. Since then it has always been a record I turn to. Living a hectic and rather busy life I find myself seeing less than I would like of the girl I love, and this record makes that distance seem shorter and the time less than it really is.