Songs I Could Imagine On Mr. Robot

Some of you may have noticed a playlist nestled at the top of last week’s “Who Is Mr. Robot’s Landlord?” episodic recap?

Well, I promised that I would detail out the playlist and share my reasons why I thought that the songs would fit on the show. As usual, I have gone way overboard with the details.

Here we go!

Also, If you have Spotify, feel free to add me to get new playlists, my SN is ypsifactj

The Playlist:

The Songs, Information, and Reasoning

USA Network

One of the reasons that I first fell in love with Mr. Robot was it’s use of music (in particular the use of the song Pictures of You by The Cure in S1E7).

1. Anxiety, Preoccupations, Preoccupations (2016)

Band: Preoccupations is a very good post-punk band from Canada. They used to be called Viet Cong but didn’t have very good answers to why they chose the name when asked in an interview and had to change the name. Before they were Viet Cong, several members were in another great band called Women.

Mr. Robot Connect: Obviously, a song that makes me think immediately of Elliot, here is the first verse:

With a sense of urgency and unease

Second-guessing just about everything

Recollections of a nightmare

So cryptic and incomprehensible

Encompassing

Anxiety

And here is the concluding verse

I’m spinning in a vacuum

Deteriorating to great acclaim

Everybody’s fallen by the wayside

Nowhere near to finding better ways to be

I’m not here purely for the sake

Of breathing, I am wide awake

Excuse my efforts for today

That’s about as Elliot Season 3 as you can get. I am actually pretty shocked it hasn’t been on the show. In addition, no other contemporary band captures the feeling of cold isolation and stark loneliness as perfectly as Preoccupations IMHO.

2. Transmission, Joy Division, Substance (2010 Remastered Version)

The Band: Joy Division and their producer Martin Hannett, in a sense, invented what has become the seminal post-punk sound. Without a doubt they are still one of the most influential bands in the world despite their limited output (recently they have been covered by Trentmoller, Radiohead, and inspired an entire album concept by Danny Brown). After singer Ian Curtis committed suicide (RIP), Joy Division reformed as New Order. Joy Division are from Manchester UK.

Mr. Robot Connect: I cannot believe there has never been a Joy Division song used on Mr. Robot. Yes, I know the connection between Ian Curtis and Elliot might be a bit too obvious, but Ian Curtis was a really smart, really socially isolated, and incredibly lonely genius who suffered terribly with his mental health issues. Elliot looks at other people like he is thinking Ian Curtis lyrics. Elliot’s eyes often look at the world like they are playing Post-Punk music.

3. Evil, Interpol, Antics (2004)

The Band: Interpol were late 90’s Post-Punk superstars and one of the few bands to become incredibly popular playing a classic Post-Punk style of music. They were the leading force of this genre for a surprisingly long time. They are also from NYC (and sound like it).

Mr. Robot Connect: This song makes me think of the relationship between Angela, Elliot, and faith in what they are chasing:

Hey wait

Great smile

Sensitive to faith, not denial

But hey who’s on trial?

It took a life span with no cellmate

To find the long way back

Sandy, why can’t we look the other way?

You’re weightless, you are exotic

You need something for which to care

Sandy, why can’t we look the other way?

I also just think of Angela’s struggle when i hear this song, not sure I can explain why. It is a very New York sounding song for a very New York television show.

4. A Private Understanding, Protomartyr, Relatives In Descent (Domino Records, 2017)

The Band: Protomartyr are the pride of Detroit Michigan (my home area). They have grown from a local band that I used to watch in dive bars to a band playing all over the world. They play a pretty unique and driving music that isn’t easy to categorize but certainly encompasses punk and classic rock. Joe Casey may be my favorite singer in contemporary music.

Mr. Robot Connect: So many it is almost hard to break down quickly. Just look at the first verse and think of Elliot:

Not by my own hand

Automatic writing by phantom limb

Not with my own voice

Pleurisy made to stand on two legs

That’s how I bar my door

In this age of blasting trumpets

Paradise for fools

I mean, that is pretty spot on Elliot Alderson. Joe Casey also makes direct reference to the Flint Water crisis and our Governor’s war on the poor in Michigan, much of Elliot’s justification for 5/9 was to even the playing field for the poor.

I also think the repeated “She’s Just Trying To Reach You” while not specific, has a lot to say about Elliot and his relationship to people in general.

5. Beat On The Brat, Ramones, Ramones (Sire, 1976)

The Band: If you are a person who likes alternative music (and I am) there is no band that defines New York City more completely than the Ramones. I was born in NYC, I lived there when this album was made (although I had no idea at the time). Sadly, every member of this, the original, lineup of the Ramones has passed away (RIP).

Mr. Robot Connect: Probably in poor taste, this song is my way of trying to cope with Darlene’s awful backstory with her Mother Magda. Sometimes, all you can do is try and find some way to laugh. If you haven’t read Red Wheelbarrow there is this heartbreaking story about Darlene and her Mom and a stray cat, just impossible not to love Darlene after all she has been through (RIP Cisco).

6. Check My Profile, Odonis Odonis, No Pop (2017)

The Band: Odonis Odonis are a self-proclaimed “No Pop” band from Canada and one of my favorite finds of this year. Their most recent album, also called “No Pop,” deals at times with the extreme dislocation, loneliness, and alienation exacerbated by mediating our relationships through technology.

Mr. Robot Connect: The song is literally about the dangers of mediating communications with other people through technology. Elliot is a person who can barely interact socially without technological mediation and who regularly transgresses on people’s privacy because his relationship is with their technological footprints as much as it is with them.

Even in the best online communications, there is a question of who the “person” is who we are talking to. In other words, is there something in the technological mediation that strips away necessary humanity from discourse? In my case, is @OnPirateSat Josh? Or a representation of Josh? Is someone who knows @SamSepiol in the Mr. Robot universe a friend of Elliot? Or a friend of a partial representation, a construction, of Elliot Alderson?

7. Silent Treatment, Blanck Mass, World Eater (2017)

The Band: Okay, Blanck Mass is the solo project from Britain’s Benjamin John Power (one half of the electronic noise duo Fuck Buttons). His 2015 body horror album “Dumb Flesh” was one of my favorite albums of that year and his more recent album “World Eater” was a bit more accessible for non-noise fans.

Mr. Robot Connect: I mean obviously, a song called “Silent Treatment” makes sense in the Mr. Robot universe where the protagonist feels more comfortable talking to invisible friends than people he meets in his own timeline.

In this song, I feel a bridge between the music of Mac Quayle, Sam Esmail’s music sensibility, and the almost constant feeling of nervousness and dread on the Mr. Robot television show. It sounds like there is some happy in this song, but underneath the surface is a constant pressure, a tension, and an angst. To me, Mr. Robot is a taut rubber band of tension, constantly increasing and rarely relaxing.

8. Sufi La, Swet Shop Boys, Sufi La EP (2017)

The Band: Swet Shop Boys are collectively Heems (Das Racist), Riz (The Night Of), and Redinho. I was a huge Das Racist fan (Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell) and love the musical stew they put together (heavy Hip-Hop, Indian, British, and Pakistani influences). In addition to the borderless approach to the music, they are extremely political in the best possible way.

Mr. Robot Connect: Mr. Robot is a show with an Egyptian-American protagonist written and directed by an Egyptian-American showrunner and creator. Swet Shop Boys songs are often about the unique ways in which non-white Americans experience life as Americans.

I wanted to include a song that spoke from the perspective of constantly feeling alien in a place that is home. Plus, this song could 100% fit on the show, just a catchy damn tune.

9. Mapquest, Mas Ysa, Untitled EP (2017)

The Band: Mas Ysa is actually a guy named Thomas Arsenault he is Canadian, has lived in Brazil, and now lives in NYC. He is kind of hard to pin down but if you could combine 80’s electronic influences, profound longing and sadness, with hope in a concisely curated music popsicle it would probably sound like Mas Ysa’s music.

Mr. Robot Connect: This song just sounds like a Sam Esmail curation. I have this suspicion that alongside his serious side, Sam is a bit of a “club kid” (did you see him shoehorn in that Chvrches track a few weeks ago?). I was a club kid too, I totally understand. Well, he also told me once that he hated crowds (so maybe he was an interior club kid?).

This song is, I think, about displacement. I am pretty sure Elliot never feels “at home” anywhere he is. In a sense, life is one big and terrifying MapQuest adventure for him (for those under the age of 25, MapQuest used GPS to get directions for us before our phones did everything all by themselves).

10. Glory, Cold Cave, Single (2017)

The Band: Cold Cave is actually Wesley Eisold who is a Darkwave, Noise, and Synthpop creator extraordinaire. His music is very heavily influenced (IMHO) by Joy Division and New Order. He often works with a band (kind of an all-star group).

Mr. Robot Connect: Again, this is a feel song. It feels like it would fit well in the corners of certain Mr. Robot scenes and fits into the Sam Esmail musical oeuvre. This track gets the feel of electronic music in the late 80’s early 90’s maybe even more perfectly than Stranger Things Season 1 captured the feel of coming-of-age 80’s movies.

11. (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction, DEVO, Q: Are We Not Men A: We Are DEVO (1978)

The Band: DEVO are plain and simply one of the most important American bands of the late 70’s through the 90’s. I have argued many times that this is one of the best and most important cover versions of a song ever recorded. It takes the same lyrics and song structure and changed it from Mick Jagger’s preening sexual bragging into a scared and paranoid reflections on sexuality. Brilliant.

Mr. Robot Connect: Elliot can’t get no satisfaction. He is constantly trying and failing to make the world feel comfortable for himself but just can’t get no satisfaction. On a personal note, I think the reason Elliot resonates so deeply with me is that one of my best friends was a lot like Elliot (Bipolar instead of dissociative) and sadly, he committed suicide in the early 90’s. As much as it can seem like a fun show, I know people like Elliot and have seen the sadness up close. DEVO are a fun band but they were trying to make sense of a lot of the same struggles (feeling like the world was just never really made to satisfy your needs or make you feel comfortable in your own skin).

12. Digital Age, Big Heet, On A Wire (2017)

The Band: This Florida band just put out their first full-length album. They are, IMHO, amazing. Very old-school punk, hardcore, and DEVO influenced. At times eclectic at times angry and at times introspective, I am expecting big things from this band.

Mr. Robot Connect: Umm, literal, it’s a song about the troubles of living in the “Digital Age.”

13. Fear Of Sleep, The Strokes, First Impressions of Earth (2006)

The Band: The Strokes were a band all about honoring their NYC roots. Heavily influenced by bands like seminal NYC bands like Television (on Mr. Robot) and the Velvet Underground they took the CBGB post-punk sound from the 70’s and gave it a 90’s gloss.

Mr. Robot Connect: This one is pretty literal too. Elliot straight up doesn’t sleep well. He is also struggling with guilt from the 5/9 hack which he doesn’t want to believe that he was morally responsible for.

14. Cities in Dust, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Tinderbox (1986)

The Band: Siouxsie and the Banshees played at the 100 Club Punk Festival (largely considered to mark the arrival of Punk as a force in Britain). Over the years, the two remaining original members (Siouxsie and Budgie) experimented with every conceivable musical genre.

Mr. Robot Connect: I consider this a spiritual bookend with Sam’s use of Time Zone’s “World Destruction” in Season 1 (World Destruction famously included Johnny Lydon of the Sex Pistols and PIL Ltd. with Afrika Bambaataa). There is an element of excitement to the revolution in “World Destruction” while Siouxsie is wandering around the wreckage admiring the ruins.

15. Rain, Tones on Tail, Everything (1998)

The Band: Tones on Tail is one of the seemingly endless permutations that spun out from the iconic 80’s goth-rock band Bauhaus (Dalis Car, Love and Rockets). It could be true that I first heard this song hallucinating at an early college pool party or that could be a lie (who knows for sure).

Mr. Robot Connect: Well, first, this song still profoundly affects me every time I hear it, it is like entering a number of different universes in one song (sound familiar to a certain television show?).

She said, time to crush this feeling

Writing very long letters as soon as it rains

Ooh, the rain

Ooh, the rain

To dance the night away

He watches topless pin-up faces

A million different jackpots

With a thousand different gazes

This song is about trying to make sense of a world that makes little sense (and is full of painful feelings only rain can wash away), about being surrounded by beauty that you can’t connect to, about being alienated from a world you desperately want to connect to. About the world feeling right but only in brief moments.

And most important, if you close your eyes, it often sounds like rain feels.

I feel like this song is the Blade Runner 2049 of Mr. Robot.

One of my all-time favorite songs.

16. October (Love Song), Chris and Cosey, Single (1983)

The Band: Chris and Cosey were members, along with Genesis P Orridge, of the iconic British performance art and industrial music band Throbbing Gristle. Eventually, they left TG and started out on their own to make industrial dance music (I saw them in a show with SPK in the 80’s).

Mr. Robot Connect: Okay, the first connection was when Sam Esmail finally announced (through an ARG) that the third season of the show would start in October. Instead of sending the word “October” out over social media, I sent this song out as a celebration of the moment. Again, I feel like it fits Sam’s aesthetic but I also feel like it is a great representation of the dream dinner party Elliot starts trying to fight to create during Season 2.

In Elliot’s perfect world, I see him sitting at the table with Shayla as this song plays. In other words, it is the impossible future we all wish for Elliot which is why while it sounds like an incredibly hopeful song, there is just a touch of impossible melancholy hiding under the surface too. I feel like it is a song about dreams that you can almost feel and touch but which are really impossible to make real.

Elliot’s dream is a beautiful dream, he was perfect with Shayla, he does love his friends, but that world isn’t coming back. We literally just saw that no matter how hard Elliot tries, he can’t put the toothpaste back into the tube.

17. Appointments, Julien Baker, Turn Out The Lights (2017)

The Band: Julien Baker has released two albums and they are both spectacular, amazing, and profoundly affecting. She is just an amazing songwriter and singer. This heartbreaker of a song is from her brand new 2017 album.

Mr. Robot Connect: Not sure there has ever been a more Elliot song (except maybe the Elliot Smith catalog).

You don’t have to remind me so much

How I disappoint you

Suggest that I talk to somebody again

That knows how to help me get better

And ’til then I should just try not to miss any more

Appointments

Or:

I think if I ruin this

That I know I can live with it

Nothing turns out like I pictured it

Maybe the emptiness is just a lesson in canvases

I think if I fail again

That I know you’re still listening

Maybe it’s all gonna turn out alright

And I know that it’s not, but I have to believe that it is

This is a song about depression and loss, in this case about loss in a relationship because of depression, but it fits very comfortably into Elliot’s struggles as well. The ache in Julien’s voice sounds like the haunted look in Elliot’s eyes (like he is trying so hard but he knows deep down that things just aren’t going to work out).

Okay, that is the end of my extremely time-consuming Mr. Robot project. Hope someone out there appreciates it :)

Josh is a blogger and freelance writer. Please consider following him on Twitter, throwing a tip into his hat on Patreon, or adding his blog OnPirateSatellite to your feeds.