Welp, here I am again avoiding my responsibilities and just generally being a mediocre at best employee here at the good ol' hotel. I just figured that since I finally burned my summer 2016 CD a couple days ago and I have been thoroughly enjoying it (and listening to nothing else but it), I'd share it with you all. As I do.

                  Quick reflection time: my favorite part about doing these playlists is seeing the evolution of my music taste. I don't have some of my older ones posted on here as I've only just now begun to do that, but I think the oldest CD I have is a spring 2013 one – that's when I officially started. And to be able to track the changes is honestly super cool. I highly recommend doing this for anyone who loves music as much as I do. It's also quite therapeutic?

                  Anyway, reflection over. Here we go!

SUMMER 2016, VOL. 1

01: RICH by Maren Morris

                  Funny story about this one: I found it on Spotify's "What's New" playlist a couple weeks ago and utterly adored it from the word go. It was so fun and catchy, and it was stuck in my head all day every day. So I showed it to my brother, who I thought would appreciate it, and he's like, "It sounds like country, ew." And I was like, "No, it's clearly pop." So I looked it up, and sure enough it's country. But...it's good. Believe me.

02: MILLIONAIRE by Cash Cash feat. Nelly

                  I've been keeping an eye on Cash Cash ever since I was in middle school. I'm not entirely sure why, but I think it might be because I used to have an unhealthy obsession with their song "Party In Your Bedroom." Either way, nothing they've released lately has been very impressive until this song (and it might be only because of Nelly to be totally honest). It's a lot of fun with a rad nod to Nelly's song "Ride Wit Me."

03: SIDE TO SIDE by Ariana Grande feat. Nicki Minaj

                  You've heard what I have to say about this one already, but just know that I still love it and Nicki is still the Queen of Rap.

04: HOLDING ONTO YOU by Twenty One Pilots

                  Ah, here they are again. I think this is currently my favorite song on their Vessel album. Although I kind of go through this phase with every single track, but really...this one is pretty fantastic. I go through some type of out-of-body experience during that ending part (the "lean with it, rock with it" part) every single time.

05: RUN AWAY WITH ME by Carly Rae Jepsen

                  The opening music in this song get me going every single time. I feel like I can take over the world when I hear it. But yeah, I know this is sort of old news but I'm just now hearing it for the first time...so here it is.

06: NO BROKEN HEARTS by Bebe Rexha feat. Nicki Minaj

                  Listen, Bebe Rexha is absolutely adorable and I actually really really like this song. As far as Top 40 radio hits go, this one is probably my favorite thing playing currently (apart from One Direction – obviously). And if you like this even a little, check out some of Bebe's other songs. They're surprisingly impressive.

07: STEP WITH ME by Mika

                  I don't know if I've ever talked about this song before, but I am straight up obsessed with it. Have been for the last few weeks. Mika has such an interesting style of pop music, but I live for it honestly. Every time I hear this song, I'm watching a movie montage of myself bumping into my future husband (ahem, Harry), our relationship's progression from meet cute to wedding day. Yeah. It's that good. Or I'm that cheesy, either way.

08: GREEDY by Ariana Grande

                  One of, if not my absolute favorite from Ariana's new album. Of course I was going to include it. And you already know how I feel about it if you read my album review, so of course I'm going to move on to the next one.

09: SEEING STARS by BORNS

                  Yo, remember that time Taylor Swift wrote down a list of cool songs and posted them onto her Instagram account for all of her followers to devour? One of them was "Electric Love" by BORNS, and now look where I am. Listening to some of his other great stuff. This isn't the only BORNS song you'll see on here either.

10: EAST COAST GIRL by Butch Walker

                  Hey guys, meet Butch Walker. Apparently – according to my iTunes autofill feature – he writes lots of songs for lots of cool people, including but not limited to Avril Lavigne and Train. Meanwhile, he puts out his own music. For me, my first bite of that awesome cheesecake is "East Coast Girl," which showed up on Spotify's "What's New" playlist recently. I don't know that I ever got into talking songs, but this one is pretty cool. The chorus is strong enough that it all just...works. He sounds a lot like Bruce Springsteen in my opinion, so if you dig that, try this out!

11: ALARM by Anne-Marie

                  Another Spotify "What's New" gem here. Whatever week it was that I found all these songs was a good week in music, if you ask me. The first time my youngest brother heard this song on my CD, he thought it was skipping and tried changing it. Slapped that hand away real fast. Anyway, if this doesn't end up on Top 40 radio stations at some point, I'll be pretty surprised. It sounds a lot like Sia to me.

12: HEATHENS by Twenty One Pilots

                  You should have seen me the day I found out this song was released. You also should have seen me the day I found out Panic! at the Disco would be featured on the Suicide Squad soundtrack as well. But on topic, this song. Is so. So. Good. I don't know if this is accurate, but I read a fan theory on Tumblr about the meaning of "Heathens," and it has to do with something along the lines of how hard it is to break into the TOP fandom as a newcomer, not having been there supporting them from the very beginning. That the lyrics warn new fans about how difficult and sometimes dangerous it is trying to fit in with OG fans. This reminds me of every fandom ever, to be honest, but I could see how it'd be particularly relevant to TOP newcomers. Anyway, GO LISTEN TO THIS RIGHT NOW.

13: TOUCH IT by Ariana Grande

                  You know my thoughts. I love it so much and it's always stuck in my head, so here it is.

14: ROCK BOTTOM by Hailee Steinfeld feat. DNCE

                  I adore Hailee Steinfeld. I think she's precious and super talented, and when her HAIZ EP came out after "Love Myself" kicked everyone's butts, I was super excited about it (and I'm still patiently awaiting a full-length album). Of the extra tracks on that EP, "Rock Bottom" was my least favorite. It's not that it wasn't good, it just wasn't as good as the others, in my opinion. Then it was re-released with DNCE, and I kind of thought I was going to hate it – I won't lie. But...I loved it? It was exactly what the song was originally missing. Also the music video is so good. So, while Joe still isn't my favorite Jonas, I'll give him props for not screwing this song up.

15: ODE TO SLEEP by Twenty One Pilots

                  This will probably be the last old TOP song you'll see on any of my future seasonal CD's. If I get super into a Blurryface track, perhaps you'll get one of those, but no more VESSEL or older. The first time I heard "Ode To Sleep" I think I was annoyed by it. I didn't like how it sounds like two different songs between the verses and the chorus, but it quickly grew on me. Now it's one of my favorites on the whole album.

16: BURN IT DOWN by Fitz and the Tantrums

                  This band continues to impress me with every new song I listen to. Their new album was very recently released, and of the entire thing, this is my favorite track. I love the stuttering in the chorus, I love the sounds of the two singers' voices weaving together, I just...it's all so good. Super catchy.

17: JUST CAN'T LET HER GO by Rajiv Dhall

                  It pains me to listen to this sometimes because I just really wish One Direction had released it themselves instead of sold it, but I can't do anything about that now. So it's either Rajiv's version or Isaac's, and if you've ever heard Isaac's...you'll understand immediately why I chose this one. And to be totally honest, it isn't awful. It's actually pretty decent. I just miss Harry's voice leveling me with "breaks...a bill...ion hearts, I know I'm next in line." RIP

18: PAST LIVES by BORNS

                  I've been told that this is a crowd-favorite when BORNS performs live, and I can totally see why. This song actually single-handedly inspired possibly the most in-depth, crazy, out-of-my-league story idea I've ever had a couple days ago. Not sure if anything will come of it, but yeah. I find that I like to have this song playing in the background while I'm doing things; for some reason, it seems to encourage your mind to wander. Which is usually nice.

19: NEW YORK CITY by The Chainsmokers

                  Lots of love for this song. I love The Chainsmokers, and I love that beautiful city. On a side note, who's excited for Halsey's new collaboration with them? I don't know when that's happening, but I remember her saying something about it... Anyway, yeah, I found this while I was looking up their other song "Kanye" a while back, and it's been in my main playlist ever since.

20: 1000X by Jarryd James feat. Broods

                  This last one is also one of those Spotify "What's New" songs from the same week as all the others. I'm telling you, it was a good week. It's probably the slowest of all the lucky numbers that made this playlist, but I think it's super pretty and Jarryd's voice sounds lovely with the girls in Broods. If they made more collaborations, I wouldn't object.

                  And there it is. Another successful night of total procrastination and utter lack of doing anything actually productive. I had fun, didn't you?

                  If you enjoyed any of these songs, let me know! And if there are any songs that you are currently enjoying and think I would love, please tell me about them. I literally love nothing more than adding new stuff to my playlist, and that is no lie. When I'm bored, I just scroll and search around on Spotify and iTunes to see what I can uncover. Help me do that.

                  Take care. x