Back in 2021 when I was still gathering my ideas for this blog, I started a money playlist. When I was prompted to think about my relationship with money, some of the first things that came to mind were song lyrics. My parents raised me on the blues (my dad’s favorite) and hard rock (my mom’s favorite), so now my brain acts like a very specific music encyclopedia filled with all my influences and the hybrid genres of modern music.
Each song on the playlist represents a memory for me: “Addictions” by Lucy Dacus from her album “Historian” is a song about some long-ago failed relationship, with the lyrics, “Buy-low-sell-high kind of guy / Invest your time in what’s worthwhile / Was I a risk without reward or did I make you proud?” The album came out in 2018, the year after I began working at AAII. I recall listening to it on the train into the city, feeling like I was part of an inside joke—I had just become entrenched in this investing language, and it was used in a creative way I hadn’t thought of before. I started to notice other finance phrases seeping into my own writing, like “last in, first out” (an accounting approach). I was beginning to see how this thinking could be applied to all aspects of life—everything took either time or money, everything was a risk, but would it be worth it?
Of course, I had to include the classic “Taxman” by the Beatles. “Revolver” (1966) was one of my first Beatles albums growing up. My dad had the CD, and he would play it in the car for us. Later when I became independently interested, he would let me listen to it on my beloved, consistently broken Walkman. I never took the lyrics seriously until I was an adult, “Should 5% appear too small / Be thankful I don’t take it all.” Now with a financial education, I know that 5% is quite a lot, especially when it comes to fees. In fact, 1% is still too much for you to be paying anyone to manage your money. The Beatles are using satire in this song, assuming the point of view of the greedy government, but many British musicians (including the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie and Adele) have had similar complaints about taxes when they reached fame. The more you make, the more they take!
“Suga Mama” by Beyoncé might be my favorite song she’s ever done. In it, she subverts the skewed power paradigm between a man and a woman. Not only does she have enough money to be independent, but she can also take care of a whole man, buying him whatever she wants? Go off, girl. The song practically drips with feminist confidence with the lyric, “let mama do it all.” This is Beyoncé after all! She has proven herself to be capable of more than anyone thought possible, breaking down race, gender and genre barriers to be able to express herself and reclaim her past without feeling trapped in any predetermined box. She has so many great songs about money, and I wish I could include them all, but “Suga Mama” is one I keep coming back to. When I got tickets to see Beyoncé in 2023, it was the first song I started blasting to celebrate! Recently, the friend I went to see her with jokingly asked, “Where are the sugar daddies!!!!!?????” I responded: “BROKE” 😂.
The lineage of influence in music is a fruitful topic for me, so the playlist includes some cover songs along with their originals. In addition to “Credit in the Straight World,” first written by Young Marble Giants and popularized by Hole, we have “List of Demands (Reparations)” by Saul Williams, later covered by my favorite band the Kills. Williams is also a poet and all-around creative person, much like Alison Mosshart and Jamie Hince of the Kills, who have deliberately been independent musicians in a greedy industry. The song starts with the lyric, “I want my money back.” Williams says of his song about power and freedom, “I’m tired of the hustle and the make-believe hustle. I’m tired of buying into ideas that divorce me from my potential. I’m tired of having my potential explained in terms of money.” Williams expresses how easy it is for art and hard work to be exploited and lists his demands for getting free from the perpetual capitalistic churn.
I hope you enjoy the playlist! Let me know what songs come to mind when you think about money so we can grow our money music library together.
Sign up below to be notified by email when I post something new! If you do not have a WordPress account, you will need to create one.