This week's playlist is an anomaly, in that it's not one I personally constructed. For the past few years, I've been subscribed this playlist on Spotify, and soon, it will stop being updated forever. Someone recommended the playlist to me (it might have been Vulture?) some time ago, and ever since it's been a favorite. This week's mix, in honor of the finale, is a collection of songs from AMC's Mad Men.
Mad Men, when it first aired, was notable first and foremost for its set design and commitment to portraying the 60s in New York with accuracy and panache. The music was a big part of the show's commitment to the time period. Song titles and band references were dropped deliberately to solidify the verisimilitude. As time went on, Mad Men became a richer, deeper experience for viewers; it was more than just an aesthetic fantasy. Mad Men is without doubt one of the densest, most literary, most textually challenging shows of all time.
As the show deepened, the music gained greater significance, lost some of its rigid adherence to period propriety. There have been some anachronistic song selections over the course of the series, from The Decemberists to David Bowie. Even by the second episode, we hear The Cardigans closing the episode with "The Great Divide." Mad Men has always been very deliberate with the songs that play over its end credits, easing us out of the episode and solidifying the episode's central theme. In the case of the Cardigans, that great divide was between Don and Betty, already, even then, irreconcilably separate people.
One of the rarest, most enticing things about Mad Men has been this obsessive attention to detail. Everything is deliberate and calculated. Everything on this show had meaning and significance. There has not been a show since that has been so trusting with its audience, so sure that viewers will put in the work necessary to explicate the show's text. With the growing trend towards reboots and limited series, it may be a long time still before we have an extended series that rivals Mad Men in ambition and scope.
Stay tuned for an upcoming piece about the specifics of the series finale and the show's legacy, but in the mean time, enjoy this excellently curated playlist on Spotify.
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