By Jess Santacroce
Music Writer, Phoenix Radio 

Fall is a beautiful season. Between the colors, the crisp air, and the coming holidays, it is a favorite time of the year for many. But with all the coziness comes a drop in temperature that can bring on health issues or make them worse. It’s respiratory virus season, and some of those can be serious. People with indoor allergies lose the open windows and less crowded spaces that brought them some relief in warmer weather. Those who deal with arthritis or other causes of chronic pain, asthma, Grave’s disease, and depression often find cold weather worsens their symptoms. A lot of us are going to be spending some days, or at least some evenings after work, stuck at home coping with a health issue. While it is not a substitute for the appropriate professional care and treatment of whatever you may be going through, music can help you cope with and heal during those times you are out of commission due to a temporary or chronic health condition. 

Consider these five songs to get you started on your own coping and healing playlist. 

You Sound Like You’re Sick ( The Ramones 1981): Punk

The Ramones “You Sound Like You’re Sick” describes someone who looks and sounds so bad, they need to move into an institution as their new home. While this certainly isn’t something we hope to relate to on a literal level, the combination of the lyrics and the angry tone of the music make this a great one for those times when your health issue is making you feel like you’re just never going to move out of your bed or off of your couch again, and you’ve had just about enough of feeling that way. 

1919 Influenza Blues (Essie Jenkins 1930s): Blues 

Little is known about the origins of this song, including who wrote the lyrics or the exact year that the song was recorded. Based on the music and lyrics, most sources estimate that it must be from sometime in the 1930’s. The song reflects the attitude that illness, in this particular example, the deadly 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, was punishment from God for wrongdoing. It is often featured on protest music sites as a way to protest against this habit of blaming people for their illness, an attitude that certainly still exists today. The song may be nearly a century old, but the message is certainly one that will resonate with anyone coping with both a chronic health condition and everyone telling them that if they just did better, simply ate healthier, exercised more, forced themselves to look on the bright side, or tried this supplement, it would all go away. 

Unwell (Matchbox Twenty 2003): Alternative rock 

The tempo of this song about struggling with mental illness is a bit more upbeat than the lyrics would seem to call for, giving it a hopeful feel despite noting that the person the narrator is singing to does not care about them right now. Adding to the hope is the line “soon enough you’re gonna think of me, and how I used to be.” Anyone who has ever had to make changes in their long-term plans due to a mental health problem will likely relate to this feeling that people do not care, that they brush their illness off as “crazy” or nothing but a series of bad or self-indulgent choices. At the same time, it can serve as a reminder that not everyone will respond in this way, and that even those who do may remember them the way they were when they were healthy. 

Believer (Imagine Dragons 2017): Rock

While many songs about illness and healing are about the issue in general, or at least about an illness or epidemic overall, Imagine Dragons’ “Believer” was written about their lead singer Dan Reynolds’ lifelong struggles with multiple chronic illnesses, including a type of arthritis known as “Anklylosing Spondylitis,” a condition that causes severe back pain as well as other serious health issues like fatigue and reduced flexibility and mobility. 

Despite the cry of “Pain!” throughout the song, it is not about simply being in pain, but about the process of coping with pain and coming out stronger and happier on the other side. Listening to the song can be encouraging for anyone who feels like there is no other side to what they are going through, while its existence serves as a reminder that those with chronic illnesses are not doomed to spend all of their time focused on their illness, and  have the potential to be successful in their chosen field. 


Not Afraid (Eminem 2010): Rap

Eminem has long been open about his struggles with addiction, and has written multiple songs about addiction and the problems it can cause. This one expresses determination to retake control of one’s life and keep promises made to others. Although the lyrics are explicit in places, and there is an undercurrent of anger at both the addiction and those who stood in the way of the narrator’s recovery, the song does encourage fans to take charge of their treatment plan for an addiction or any other serious, long-term health issue. 

Be sure to tune in to 95.5 The Heat: Phoenix Radio to listen for additional ideas for this playlist and more great Blues, Rap, Hip-Hop, R&B, Jazz, Reggae, and Soul. If you suspect you may have one of the health issues referenced in this article or have any other health concerns, please seek help from a trained and licensed healthcare provider as soon as possible. 
 

 By Jess Santacroce
Music Writer, Phoenix Radio

There are countless songs out there about finding someone attractive, falling in love, romantic relationships ending, and looking for romantic relationships of various types. Though not as plentiful, there are still several songs about feeling confident, working, reaching goals, travel, money, partying, facing tragedy, going to school, and spirituality. What if your situation falls into one of those categories, but is a bit more nuanced? What if it isn’t about any of those things at all? No matter how strange, alienating, unique, or just plain unacknowledged your situation may feel, there’s a song for that.

Dealing with a bedbug infestation: Mean Old Bedbug Blues (Furry Lewis, 1927)

While not physically dangerous beyond the pain of their bites, bedbugs wreck havoc on finances and on mental health. Picking up a bedbug from a hotel or other place that has become infested typically results in an infestation of your own home or business. You may spend weeks, months, or even years finding the tiny insects in your bedding, couch, towels, soft chairs, even in your curtains. Getting rid of them requires repeated pricey treatments, ten times as much cleaning and laundering as you typically do, even making large purchases to replace hopelessly infested items. Couple this with the knowledge that there may be something crawling around your house looking to bite you and feed on your blood, and you have more stress than many people can handle.
Finish dragging that mattress to the trash collection site, order a new one, clean your house one more time, then take a break and listen to “Mean Old Bedbug Blues.” The song was originally recorded by Furry Lewis, but there are several covers that are much more popular, including versions by Lonnie Johnson and Bessie Smith.

Cheating with your ex while in a relationship with someone else: Lips of an Angel (Hinder, 2006)

Romantic infidelity is a common theme in popular music. Searches for “songs about cheating” bring up multiple lists of more than forty songs each. Hinder’s “Lips of an Angel” appears to be the only one to make it clear from the lyrics that the narrator is in a romantic entanglement with someone he used to be in a relationship with while officially in a relationship with someone else. In the song, the main character and narrator answers a phone call from his ex late at night by addressing her as “Honey,” and proceeds to confess that while his current partner is in the next room, he wishes he were still with the girl on the phone, noting they “never really moved on.” It gets worse from there, with admissions that the current girlfriend doesn’t even know the two of them still talk, the girl on the phone also has someone new, and there are no plans to discontinue the illicit conversations.
Anyone who relates to the narrator in this one doesn’t deserve to be comforted. Use it as a reminder that many songs express fantasy not reality, the person you’re cheating on probably actually does “have a clue” and you need to be a much better person. Everyone else just needs to remember that this is not an appropriate song for new relationships, engagements, and weddings, even if the title does make it sound like it should be.

Feeling the urge to lie to your friends about why your romantic relationship ended: 50 Ways to Say Goodbye (Train, 2012)

We all deal with unhappy times differently. Some need to lean on friends, going over the situation in detail until we learn something or at least feel better. Others would rather not rehash it repeatedly. Still others don’t want to talk about it because it’s embarrassing. If your unhappy times revolve around a recent breakup, and your situation falls firmly in the “embarrassing” category, there is a song out there for you. Plenty of songs about lying exist, but nearly all of them are either about lying to someone you’re in a romantic relationship with, or suspecting or finding out you’re with someone who has been lying to you. In “50 Ways to Say Goodbye,” the narrator describes a situation in which no deception existed in the relationship, he just doesn’t feel like reporting all the “it’s not you, it’s me” lines his now ex gave him as she broke his heart. He decides to instead tell his friends that his girlfriend isn’t around anymore because she perished tragically, in a series of increasingly far fetched ways.

Unlike the deception in “Lips of an Angel,” the urge to lie presented in this song is understandable. While the situation is pretty specific, we have all had those embarrassing times we wish we could just cover up, even if most of us wouldn’t think to tell some people are ex was eaten by a lion and others that they fried themselves while tanning.

Finding creative ways to get what you want at a great price: One Piece at a Time
(Johnny Cash, 1976)

Money songs tend to be about celebrating it in excess, praising all the indulgences it can bring. There are also songs about saving money, and about living in poverty. Some of these songs are sad. Some are angry. Many are hopeful, full of plans about what the narrators are going to do once they find a way out of poverty.

“One Piece at a Time” takes that a leap further by providing a You-Tube video worthy step by step narrative of a character’s process for building his own unique luxury vehicle after seeing luxury cars he could never afford while working at a factory for low pay. The car described in the lyrics of this song would not only be hideous to look at, it is not something anyone could ever drive. The narrator’s process of collecting the pieces for his project, stealing them and sneaking them out of his workplace, makes the whole idea even worse. But as the song points out, nobody else would ever have car like this, and it wouldn’t cost a dime.

While the song is of course satire, listening to it will probably remind you of that person in your life who would go almost this far to get something they want without paying full price for it.


Always look for some music. No matter what you’re going through or why, there is music to accompany you. Even if you think your situation is something nobody else would understand, or you’re afraid this is something nobody would ever have written a song about, you just might be surprised to learn there is in fact a song out there to comfort, convict, or encourage you.

By Jess Santacroce
Music Writer, 95 5 The Heat: Phoenix Radio 

Classes typically start at the end of August, but most students, teachers, parents, and others whose work revolves around a school feel firmly “back to school” around the beginning of September. As settling in to attend classes and do homework becomes routine, music can often be heard through the doors of children’s rooms, college dorm rooms, and the offices of teachers and older adult students. Conventional wisdom once dictated that this was a bad idea. Music was thought to be distracting, something to listen to after studying was finished for the day, not while doing anything related to learning. Today, it is known that music can boost learning, but every song will not be a great choice for every back to school playlist. The best “back to school” playlist for you or your child will depend largely on what happens when you sit down to study

Difficulty focusing

Between the lure of the phone sitting nearby or tucked in the bag at your feet, the ease of clicking over to TikTok or YouTube from your online class, and the “hustle” mentality that makes us feel guilty for not doing three things at once, difficulty focusing is a common problem in classes and during independent study time these days.

Music can help. Many experts maintain that classical music, or any other type of music without words is best to help you focus. They argue that lyrics often serve as a distraction to the material you, your students, or your children are trying to learn. Others believe the best music to help with focus is any music that is familiar to the person struggling to keep their attention on what they need to learn.
Memory issues

Whether a student is in first grade or heading into the first week of the final portion of their terminal degree program, there are few academic experiences more demoralizing than studying something then being unable to recall the material when needed for a test, presentation, or other project. If memory seems to be the stumbling block for you or your student, music can help.

Earlier this year, a study conducted at Rice University suggests the best music to help with difficulty remembering details is the music the student enjoys, but does not react strongly to in any way. According to the conclusions drawn from this study, those who are having problems recalling more general concepts will want to listen to music that evokes a strong reaction in them. This study was featured in a previous edition of “The Heat Beat,” in an article on the link between music and all types of memory, not only the ability to recall facts and concepts that one has learned. While the study has been published in peer-reviewed journals, there is no record of the study being duplicated as of the writing of this article, despite the fact that a big AI generated “Yes” pops up on your screen when you ask a search engine if it has.

Because the study has not yet been duplicated, we can’t say for sure that choosing songs you like but don’t have a strong response to will help you recall details, while picking out music you react to strongly will help you remember general concepts better, but it may be worth trying in an everyday setting to see if it works for your situation.

Lack of motivation

For some students, parents of students, and teachers hoping to help their students learn, all the focus and memory information and studies in the world aren’t going to prove useful, because study time does not even seem to begin.

While a playlist to improve focus and memory during learning time will be highly individualized, specific songs have been judged to be the most motivating out there. Of course, there will still be some individual taste involved, as nobody is going to want to settle in for a study session backed up by a bunch of music they can’t stand, but it may help to make some selections from the songs that keep popping up on “motivational music” lists. These include “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor, “Stronger,” by Kelly Clarkson, and “Lose Yourself” by Eminem. “Dream On” by Aerosmith, Bruno Mars’ “Uptown Funk,” and “What a Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong have also made motivational playlists. While the band Panic! At the Disco disbanded several years ago, they left behind more than one motivational track, including “High Hopes” and “Hey Look Ma, I Made It.”

Confidence

When confidence swings to an extreme, learning becomes difficult. Some learners are overconfident. They go into the class or even the entire semester believing the work is “too easy” for them, or that whatever they’re more interested in is so much more important, the material they’re being asked to learn can be brushed off. In cases of overconfidence, it would be better to go back to your motivation and focus playlists than to listen to depressing, demoralizing, or discouraging music. That would only make the student want to do absolutely nothing.

For learners grappling with lack of confidence, the belief that they are unable to learn or understand the material presented in school, there are plenty of confidence boosting songs out there, and which ones they are appears to be a mix of individualized response and specific songs. Most of us feel more confident after we’ve worked through something that has been troubling us, so songs that offer catharsis or a new perspective on our particular problem can serve as huge confidence boosts. At the same time, pop songs are typically gathered for “confidence” playlists. “Roar” by Katy Perry, “Brave” by Sara Bareilles and “Bejeweled” by Taylor Swift are popular choices for confidence- themed playlists.

Music may not be able to solve every issue that comes up in school this term, but it can help alleviate several study problems. Start your playlist, try your selections, then make adjustments according to your individual tastes and shifting needs. We may not all respond to the same music, but there is music out there for all of us.




The Heat Squad wishes all students, teachers, and parents a great school year.

By Jess Santacroce
Music Writer, 955 The Heat Phoenix Radio

The approaching end of summer and start of fall means different things for different people. Some are starting or returning to school. Many already missing summer fun. Still others look forward to everything from the weather to the holidays to the colors of the coming fall season. No matter how you feel about the coming summer’s end, there is at least one song to match your mood.

Looking forward to school because you love it there: Be true to your school (The Beach Boys)

Although many people certainly will not be able to relate to this, school, even high school, is a great time for some people. If you fall into this category, The Beach Boys’ classic from 1963 likely reflects your current attitude and/or memories of your days as a student. So upbeat and catchy that even those who shudder at the thought of their school love the song, “Be true to your school” is probably the happiest back to school song ever written.

Eagerly anticipating Halloween: Psycho killer (Talking Heads)
Halloween is a time for some to indulge in their interest in spooky, creepy, even disturbing things, without the judgment that may come during other times of the year. Others love the costumes and candy and sense of make-believe the holiday brings. Halloween playlists are often a part of the celebration either way, and any playlist full of songs about the spooky or the fun and quirky should include this 1977 song by Talking Heads. Not only is the song written from the point of view of a killer, the numerous origin stories lend themselves well to all the urban legends and storytelling Halloween brings. Depending on who you ask and where you look, you will hear that “Psycho Killer” is about real-life serial killer David Berkowitz a.k.a. “The Son of Sam,” the fictional serial killer Norman Bates from the “Psycho” novels and movies, or that it was inspired by another artist known for his spooky aesthetic, Alice Cooper. Be sure to check out both the song and the story behind it to learn which one is the truth, and which is such a creepy urban legend.

Dreading school because you are being bullied: Loser (Beck)

Anyone who has experienced bullying knows that music can be your greatest source of support and comfort during this time. From angry songs that bring catharsis, to sad songs that offer permission to cry, to hopeful songs reminding you that you are not going to be stuck around these people forever, music can literally be life-saving for a child, teen, or even an adult who has become the target of bullying, or whose memories of their school days are tarnished by bullying. Beck’s 1994 song “Loser” belongs on any playlist made to cope with bullying because from the opening lyrics, “In the age of chimpanzees, I was a monkey,” the song lets us know that there is someone else out there who can relate to the experience of feeling like you just don’t fit in wherever you may be.

Missing summer fun: Summer of ‘69 (Bryan Adams)

Listening to this song feels like sitting around in a group swapping memories of your favorite summers. The lyrics tell a specific story about the main character’s summer in 1969, complete with the names of his friends and the reasons why those people left a band they formed that year. When the song ends, the listener can’t help but pick up on the line “Those were the best days of my life,” and begin to think of the best summer fun memories of their own.

Can’t wait to get back to school because of the people you know there: That’s what I go to school for (Jonas Brothers)

Talk to people who report loving or liking school, and you will find some that were either into all the sports and clubs and truly shined during that time, and some who like anywhere they can find books and learning. Then there are people like the main character in this 2006 song by The Jonas Brothers. The young man depicted in these lyrics is a high school freshman looking forward to school each day, even though he describes daydreaming and finding actually being there as “a bore.” Still, he wants to go to school because he’s in love with a senior girl. Like “Summer of ‘69,” this is a song that tells a detailed story that will still bring to mind our own memories. Anyone who may not be the biggest sports or clubs or even academics fan but still looks forward to school, or has fond memories of past school days because of boyfriends, girlfriends, and best friends, will find this catchy early ‘00s pop tune relatable.

Looking forward to the sights and sounds of the upcoming fall: When fall comes to New England (Cheryl Wheeler)

A search for songs about fall (or autumn) will result in numerous playlists, all full of great music ranging from today’s pop hits to classics in all genres, from Jazz to Folk to Rock. Most of these songs use the season as a metaphor for something else, usually change, transition, or loss. There are few for those who are simply excited about cooler temperatures, leaves in deep shades of red, orange, and yellow, wearing their favorite long-sleeved clothes again, and enjoying apple or pumpkin flavored treats. Cheryl Wheeler’s 1993 song “When Fall Comes to New England” is one of the few that does not use the season as a springboard to tell a story about anything else, and simply celebrates the beauty of the season in the New England region.

Anticipating the coming fall as a time to make changes in your life: Autumn in New York (Diana Krall)

Of course, there is a reason so many artists have created and performed fall themed songs about transition and change. It is a time of shifting and change for many people. Schedules often change, bringing a shift in priorities. Cooler weather forces people indoors more, bringing more of a focus on work and/or home. Approaching holidays encourage us to think about family and friends and our memories. Even the shifting clothes, colors, foods, and scents have an impact on our thoughts and moods. The website “Lyric Stories” (www.lyricstories.com) offers a list of 27 such songs. Ryan Conlon, owner and author of the website “Your Music Depot” located at (www.yourmusicdepot.com) offers multiple playlists totaling more than 60 fall songs arranged by moods and genres. This is just one of those songs, one that focuses on the promises that the season brings.

Whether the end of summer and the approach of fall means comfort, change, school, fun holidays and treats, or any combination of those things for you, it is fast approaching. Maybe one or more of these songs can be the first one added to your own playlist as summer 2025 slowly draws to a close.