A Spy on a Plane Early in the Morning

For when the vibe is moody, muted, and sultry.

A Spy on a Plane Early in the Morning -- The Vibe Triangulation

Spying is the world’s second oldest profession. This long history offers a deep narrative well to draw from, which is probably why it’s such a rich genre in American storytelling. But there’s a little more to it than that. Espionage is a tradecraft like plumbing or photography, but it’s also a dangerous occupation like law enforcement or the military, and there’s a layer of shadowy calculation like in politics or crime. Spies deal in secrets -- in uncovering them, in protecting them and usually for some greater good. And there has to be some greater good because spying takes its toll. The effort and sacrifice wouldn’t be worth it otherwise. Spying is hard. The Spy Who Came in from the Cold offers a fascinating dive into this sentiment. Spies operate in a grey area with little input or support, where the outcomes of their choices are not always known and the implications can be immense. It is not an exaggeration to say that spies have saved people (see Operation Mincemeat and Ashraf Marwan) and spies have killed people (see the Bay of Pigs).

Daring and self-sacrifice are romantic. Complex and understated skill is sexy. Power is intoxicating. Everything in this space has the potential to be very emotionally charged, so it’s all very interesting. But there’s a little more to it even than that. Espionage is a good vessel for exposing truths because the field itself is about exposing truths. There are layers of information: you know that they know, but do they know that you know that they know? Just look at the system for classifying information used by the U.S. government. The levels of classification grow by degrees of danger. The highest level of classification protects information that, if exposed, would cause “exceptionally grave danger” to national security, but it doesn’t stop there. Additional echelons of defense (caveats, special access, need to know) narrow the circle of people with access to a secret to protect the “sources and methods” used in procuring the secret, so that secrets can continue to be gleaned from that avenue. Information is fragmented to such a degree that very few people know the whole truth. So, if everything in espionage is a secret, there is that much more story to tell.

This playlist, capturing the shadowy, tantalizing vibe of a spy on a plane early in the morning, unfolds like a secret. It seeks to dive into the mystery of where the spy is going, where they come from, what they are up to, and how it feels to live so much of life steeped in intrigue and misdeeds. There is a tightly controlled understanding that all the lies, manipulation, seduction, and worse are wrong on their face but are made clean by their necessity, and hey, maybe they’re a little fun. That’s how things begin, in the Got It-Don’t Want It Now corridor with Hunger of the Pine, Criminal, and I Put a Spell On You.

But very quickly things take a turn for the frantic, reflecting the deeper truth that the ends don’t always justify the means. Moments that make your heart beat fast – the sneaking, the lying – are that way because you might get caught. And what then happens when you are? You can run. You can run from the enemy, run from your past, but you can’t run from yourself. As they say, no matter where you go, there you are. What began as sultry and sensuous ends in a state of near total abandon with Tusk and Sinnerman.

The whole thing sits on a diverse foundation of lush, feminine vocals from the lilting Joy Williams (Hush) to the throaty and almost rabid Fiona Apple (Criminal) to the heady and crystalline Hannah Reid (Nightcall). Earthier, more masculine sounds from Matt Berninger (Hush) and Adam Turla (My Baby Shot Me Down) punctuate and marry with the ladies on top of minimal instrumental backing throughout to create a canny, spine-tingling tone. Lyrically, there is naturally a lot about deception, danger, and desperation.

And then there is the Alex Turner of it all. He’s featured in three tunes on this playlist because I believe that he is on a career-long (as of yet unrealized) quest to pen a Bond song. I say this with only the barest hint of sarcasm. Does it skirt the “only one song per artist” rule of playlist building? It does a bit, but I square the choice by using three different artistic projects that Alex Turner happens to be involved in. Vertigo is by Mini Mansions and only features Alex Turner in one delicious verse that evokes a psychedelic series of images: a deceit, a heist, a drop, an accord all wrapped up in a sexual fantasy. My Mistakes Were Made for You has the sound of an aroused early Beatles, and in it, Alex Turner is part of a duo of naughty boys who are reckoning with their own misdeeds. “’Cause we’re just following the flock ‘round and in between/Before we smash to smithereens like they were/And we scramble from the blame” reeks of hollow desperation and urgency. In Sculptures of Anything Goes an older, more mature Alex Turner, this time of the Arctic Monkeys, wonders if your mother ever thinks of him over an ominous, synthetic sound. There’s a kind of exhaustion in both the music and the lyrics here that is underpinned by an insistence on carrying on. Obviously, this playlist couldn’t exist without this trio of songs, which form the desperate, melancholic heart of the thing.

The bonus track here is a palate cleanser. I prefer the live version of Moonlight and Vodka, which is literally a song about an American spy trapped in Moscow, we assume, during the Cold War and lamenting his position in life. “Espionage is a serious business,” de Burgh says. Isn’t it just.

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