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March 3, 2020
Roy Freirich's Playlist for His Novel "Deprivation"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Heidi Julavits, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Roy Freirich's novel Deprivation is a thoroughly engaging and often surprising literary thriller.
In his own words, here is Roy Freirich's Book Notes music playlist for his novel Deprivation:
As someone who has written both, for me song lyrics and prose fiction cross paths. I bring a similar semi-conscious checklist to the determination of when a line or a sentence is finished. Much of it comes from loving and studying poetry, and from there to the “singability” of the words, which depends on both naturally stressed syllables and the duration of vowels in the sense of classical prosody — short vowels for quick (16th or smaller) notes, for instance — and on assonance and judicious alliteration. Rhythm is vital to me, and often I will write a sentence of utter nonsense in a rhythm that definitively conveys the right emotion, and then I’ll “back and fill” with hopefully sensible denotation.
Of course, lyrics are stories, too, even if only in the sense of verse = evidence, and chorus = conclusion. And the best of both should signify with the usual list of literary devices.
All of which means I find songs hard to listen to while writing, because I listen. It’s a semi-professional hazard of being a songwriter, I guess, and one that makes it difficult to keep focus on the prose in front of me when someone else’s efforts are competing for attention. That said, I certainly took long walks with ‘buds on, looking for songs to “put me in the mood” of whatever moment I was attempting to capture in the novel that day. Some are included here, as are others that simply recall the emotions of the book, the themes, or specific characters and their dilemmas. The order of songs charts the novel’s developing despair, the chaotic climax, and denouement.
Somehow, there’s romance in this novel, one true and lasting against the odds. On that note, I couldn’t resist adding Paradise Cove, about an aptly named beach near my home, written by myself and the singer/songwriter Debrah Neal— who became my wife.
"Under the Boardwalk" — Rickie Lee Jones (A. Resnick, K. Young)
Idyllic, with her ever-present sense of wistfulness, recalling the setting of the novel — August, Carratuck Island, off the coast of Long Island, NY.
"Him & I" — Halsey & G-Easy (G-Eazy, Halsey, E. Machuca, J. Lavigne, D. Gwitira, M. Love and The Futuristics)
A feverish, guilelessly lustful teen vow of forever, one for teenaged tourist Cort.
"Feels like Summer" — Childish Gambino (D. Glover)
Sounds like a sensuous summer groove, but with some not entirely irrelevant doomy thoughts. After some red wine and Indica, the good doctor Sam and his summer lover Kathy might get lost in this and find each other in the forward bunk of his very less-than-yar yacht.
"Paradise Cove" — Debrah Neal (D. Neal, R. Freeland)
A songwriter demo of Go Go-ish SoCal pop from the days of songwriting contracts and too many hours in studios—my first lessons in sleep deprivation. I stole some images from these lyrics for the novel. On Carratuck Island, even the locals are sojourners. But aren’t we all?
"Cruel Summer"— Kari Kimmel (S. Jolley, T. Swain, Bananarama)
As the sleeplessness begins to take its toll, this feels appropriately edgy, mournful and not a little creepy.
"Spooks"— Crocodyle (H. Rittman)
I never felt the urge to go supernatural and completely externalize what haunts my characters. After all, can’t deprivation-caused hallucinations seem utterly real to the people having them?
"Paint it Black" — Ciara (The Rolling Stones)
This may be sacrilege, but this echoey version finds a groove I like better than the Stones’ four-on-the-floor, and it still conveys the frenzy of the island’s descent into paroxysms of violence…
"Let Me Out" —Hidden Citizens (D. Olsen)
The utter despair of too many nights of deprivation, the urge to flee—off the island, out of our skins, anywhere away from ourselves.
"Doomed" —Moses Sumney (Sumney, M Otto)
After the chaos reaches its peak, another dawn arrives with dazed exhaustion. Here is the grief and regret of a survivor in rags, moving slowly by a ghost of smoke rising from the ashes of a burned house in the rain.
"When the Party’s Over" — Billie Eilish (F. O’Connell)
Her intimate, ragged voice: every accolade is earned. The crushing loneliness of irrevocably lost connection.
"What a Wonderful World" — Reuben & the Dark (B. Thiele, G. Weiss)
Indeed, finally, as years later we’re with the survivors, who are not unscarred, and not unaware of the sad irony of all that happened to them. Looking forward to the future, but with a lingering echo of desperation in the hope that there will always be one.
Brown Noise
A sleep aid I depend on, pitched slightly lower than white, more like rainfall than static.
Roy Freirich leads multiple lives as a writer—of lyrics, movies, and novels. His lyrics have been sung by legends Aretha Franklin, Smokey Robinson, and Patti Labelle, among many others. He’s written screenplays for Fox Searchlight, Dreamworks, Warner Brothers, and Sony, and adapted his novel, Winged Creatures, for the film, Fragments, featuring Forest Whitaker, Dakota Fanning, Guy Pearce, Josh Hutcherson, and Kate Beckinsale. He lives with his wife, ever-patient editor and frequent cowriter, Debrah, in Malibu, California. Together, they’ve written the libretto for a musical adaptation of Anne Rice’s Cry to Heaven, for Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre. Visit him online at www.royfreirich.com.
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