The official IGNORE ALL PREVIOUS INSTRUCTIONS playlist
Everything Is True
Ada Hoffmann's author newsletter
As often happens with the drama and excitement of a book launch, I slipped under for a bit afterward, and didn't get this post to you when I told myself I would. But there's one more little promo piece that I wanted to post and didn't yet! I posted a link to the official IGNORE ALL PREVIOUS INSTRUCTIONS playlist a few months ago, but now I want to sit down and explain what the songs on the playlist actually mean to me.
First, two quick little pieces of news:
Here's an in-depth interview with me by Vincent Halles from Phrasemaker.
I got a tattoo based on the cover art from the OUTSIDE books.
And now, the playlist! You can listen along on Spotify if you have Spotify, but I've also included YouTube links. As with all such playlists, some vague spoilers can be inferred simply from the choice of songs - but anything beyond that level will be ROT13'd.
This one is a little bit of a departure for me in terms of playlists. Often I go with a mix of genres or I just rock out with a whole bunch of epic sounding metal. But IGNORE was a book that insisted to me, from the very beginning, on being a pop confection.
Don't know why I'm shy
I kill every vibe
Stay home Friday nights
They take me out, I'll just cry
This song is fun and buoyant, despite the lyrics, and makes a good introduction to the vibe of the whole playlist. If this book was a movie, then I picture it playing at the beginning while Kelli starts her day and commutes to work. It's also an apt expression of her personality at the start of the story - in tune with something, but intentionally alone.
Made of things you’re told not to believe in
I’ll show you sights you couldn’t dream of
The offer Rowan makes to Kelli when he drops back into her life - or, at least, the one he likes to tell himself he's making.
Kelli is intrigued, but also suspicious; she's sure that Rowan's hedonistic, rebellious new lifestyle can't lead to anything good. (There's really not enough English in this song to make a good pull quote, but here's a translation.)
I've been too comfortable
Feelin' nothin' at all
Think it's time for a change
When Kelli arrives on Io and meet's Rowan's friends, she starts to cautiously open up.
Kerli - Can't Control the Kids
If you're a bad influence,
I'm in trouble
The dance party.
I'm that knife in your boot, girl, I got ya
I'm your number two man in a fight
The heist team.
Oh, you broke my heart, now I'm smart
You made the worst enemy, one that knows you well
Betcha thought that I would never tell
But of course, hanging out with a crime syndicate isn't all fun and games. Orgenlrq ol Ebjna, Xryyv oebbqf va qrfcnve naq cynaf gb ghea gur gnoyrf ba uvz - rira vs gnxvat uvz naq gur Oevzfgbar Flaqvpngr qbja zrnaf gur raq bs rirelguvat sbe ure, gbb.
But, baby, boys go to Jupiter to get more stupider
And Beyoncé said that we run the whole entire Earth!!!
In the book itself, present and past sections alternate, but in the playlist it made more sense to group the songs about the past all together. Now that the present part of the story has gotten to a dramatic part, this song is the perfect song to transition us back to the story of how the characters got here in the first place. Seriously I cannot express how perfect it is. It's the cheerful childhood misandry that Rowan and Kelli throw themselves into wholeheartedly, right up until the point where Rowan realizes to his chagrin that he's also a boy. It's literally Jupiter. And it's framed and contrasted as a flashback against the young adult heartbreak that the characters are going through in the present. It's like this song was written for the book??? It's perfect and also very funny - complete with the band good-naturedly giggling at their own audacity. I'm not even a girl but I love it.
Candi Carpenter - Novels About Vampires
I wanted you to drain the blood out of my body
And replace it with yours, yours, yours
Rowan and Kelli's teenage relationship, from Kelli's point of view.
On every playlist I end up with one or two songs that I'm not sure I can fully justify as being about the story, but in my heart they are so much about the story that I can't possibly not have them there. This is one of those songs. There are a lot of little details that don't fit with what actually happened to Rowan and Kelli; as maybe the most obvious example, Kelli didn't think of Rowan as a boy while they were dating in high school. And she was never that into vampires in particular. But I love this song very much, because I think it's saying things about the good girl/bad boy dynamic that I've never seen anybody else say in quite this way. The role of fiction, the bad boy as an escape from reality, the reasons why a girl who is being extremely good might feel that she has something to escape from. And I think that Rowan always was, unconsciously, acting out the role of the bad boy - even long before he understood that he was a boy.
But why'd you go back in the closet?
All the heavy things live in it
Rowan and Kelli's teenage relationship, from Rowan's point of view.
I'll drop the match then watch me walk away from everything
Gur raq bs Ebjna naq Xryyv'f eryngvbafuvc (ebhaq bar) naq gur sver (zx. 1). Sbe obahf cbvagf, gurer'f gur yvar va gur fbat nobhg gur sver orvat "unys nf purnc nf gurencl." V'z abg tbvat gb fnl guvf fhcre fcrpvsvpnyyl rira va ebg13, ohg gur ovt greevoyr gvccvat cbvag gung pnhfrq gur sver gb unccra unf n ybg gb qb jvgu NV gurencl naq ubj vg'f hfryrff.
Vs nalguvat, V qvqa'g qent ba NV gurencl va guvf obbx dhvgr nf uneq nf vg qrfreirf. Gur arjf nobhg NV pungobgf npgviryl pnhfvat cflpubfvf naq urycvat crbcyr xvyy gurzfryirf qvqa'g fgneg pbzvat bhg vagb znwbe choyvp ivrj hagvy zvq-2025 - fb yngr gung V jnfa'g rira noyr gb zragvba vg va gur nsgrejbeq. Lbh pna ernq gung fbeg bs snvyher fgngr vagb gur artngvir fcnpr va guvf obbx vs lbh ernyyl gvyg lbhe urnq naq gel uneq naq fdhvag - ohg V trahvaryl jnfa'g guvaxvat bs vg ng gur gvzr. Vs V unq orra, V jbhyq unir fnvq n yvggyr zber.
Found my own little place I can hide
Kinda dark, but at least it's all mine
After the breakup with Rowan, teenage / young adult Kelli fully hides. She tells herself that conforming and staying out of trouble is the best thing to do now, and she even finds a kind of success that way - but deep down, no matter what she tells herself, she knows something isn't quite the way it's supposed to be.
This was the last song that I added to the playlist, years after most of the others, but I think that it's perfect there.
I had to tell myself you're toxic
Better off 'cause you're the problem
Really, I just couldn't take it being hated by my favourite person
Now we're closing the flashback circle and journeying back to the present part of the book, as both Rowan and Kelli try to grapple with what they really were to each other, and what they are now.
Fun fact, there's a line in the book that is directly inspired by a line in this song. It's when Ting says to Kelli, "Oh, yeah, for ages... He always talks about you when he's drunk."
So this is Wonderland
Where all your dreams come true
You gotta go get yours before they come get you
Kelli's disillusionment with Inspiration.
So throw your hands up if you're feeling it too
We're getting banged up, tryna run from the truth
For all the kicking and screaming and fighting the feeling of working it through
Guvf fbat vf gur fgneg bs gur sver, zx. VV, juvpu vf fhssvpvragyl rzbgvbanyyl vzcbegnag gb zr gung vg npghnyyl trgf guerr fbatf, naq lbh pna guvax bs vg nf Xryyv'f fbat vs lbh jnag gb. V crefbanyyl guvax gung bayl gur svefg irefr vf Xryyv'f ibvpr, naq gur erfg bs vg vf Munyru'f. Vs lbh'ir ernq gb gur raq bs gur obbx gura lbh cebonoyl xabj jung V zrna. Xryyv, ol abj, unf ure ernfbaf gb erory, ohg Munyru unf ernfbaf bs ure bja, rira vs fur oneryl yrgf ba nalguvat gb Xryyv nobhg jung gubfr ernfbaf ner. Abj fur'f frg guvatf va zbgvba, naq fur'f orpxbavat Xryyv nybat gb wbva gur sver naq zbgvba jvgu ure.
Munyru vf abg arprffnevyl n punenpgre jvgu tbbq vagragvbaf - ure vagragvbaf ner, arprffnevyl, bcndhr - ohg V trahvaryl qba'g guvax bs ure nf n ivyynva. V guvax bs ure nf n pngnylfg. Rirelguvat va Xryyv'f yvsr jnf ng gur cbvag jurer vg arrqrq gb oybj hc, naq Munyru vf gur bar jub vf haercragnag rabhtu gb fgevxr gur zngpu.
i-dle - HWAA (English version)
Go tell the ice my spring is coming 'round
I'm starting up my fire, stoking it up high
I'll win back springtime that I lost
The fire, mk. II.
I'm never going back.
Burn the bridge, burn it all...
We don't have to be forgiven.
Bodytalkr (feat. Erin McCarley & Fleurie) - Hypercolor Feeling
We were born to be
Painting galaxies
Don't give up on me
Having escaped now, and on the run, Rowan and Kelli ponder what might come next.
Loving you makes me hate you too
I know it could be anybody
It should be anybody else
But it's you, you, you, you, you, you
Rowan and Kelli, reconciling.
You see, I'm a man
I'm an always-changing man
I'm a man,
I'm some next-level man
I first encountered this song - a cheeky, trans cover of the Muddy Waters classic - on one of Spotify's Pride playlists, and I was immediately, like, wait, that's Rowan. That's Rowan's energy.
So it’s the closing credits of the whole playlist, of course. He wouldn't be Rowan if he didn't want to have the last word.
