Happy Monday, and May the 4th be with you! And all my Lutheran friends say, “And also with you.” Here’s a playlist.

1. Pat McGee Band, “Bookends”: A student introduced me to this band last week. Pretty solid singer-songwriter stuff.
2. Nocturnne, “Proximity”: A DIY singer-songwriter (I have a thing for that style) writing exactly what you think a 20-something singer-songwriter would write. It’s not bad, but I’m not sure it’s really speaking to me.
3. Old 97s, “Timebomb”: A ripsnorter of a song, it explodes out of the gate and blew little grad school Charlie’s mind back in the early 2000s. It remains awesome.
4. Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeroes, “Man On Fire”: Let us cast our minds back to the far-flung year 2012, when Stomp-Clap-Hey! ruled the airwaves and a band with such an unwieldy name could come to prominence. And then let’s never speak of it again.
5. The Elected, “It Was Love”: This song (and this band more in general) gives me hope that there’s an audience out there for someone whose voice is weak like mine.
6. Elton John, “Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me”: Elton John just makes you feel things sometimes, y’know?
7. Ram Jam, “Black Betty”: Bam-ba-lam.
8. Molly Hatchet, “Flirtin’ With Disaster”: Somehow this turned into a Southern Rock playlist without me even trying. But if you don’t find yourself doing 90 down the highway with this song blasting out the windows, there’s something wrong with you and you might be clinically dead.
9. Marshall Tucker Band, “Can’t You See”: If there is a sadder Southern Rock song out there, I don’t know it, because most rock songs don’t encourage you to “crawl inside and die” in a hole in the wall or jump off the tallest mountain in Georgia (a state totally known for its tall mountains).
10. The Dandy Warhols, “Minnesoter”: My favorite song about being someone from Minnesota? I’m not sure that’s actually what it’s about. I’m not sure the guy who wrote it is entirely sure what it’s about.