The playlist title "Happy Mayninth!" is the first lie. There's nothing happy about May ninth—or any run, really—until it's over and you're safely horizontal with a beverage. But that's the game, isn't it? You need the lie to get the shoes on. Crispies opens with "Good Times Only," which is both promise and threat, the kind of thing you tell yourself at mile zero when your body doesn't yet know what you're about to do to it.
By track two, Hembree's "Money Time Love" has already introduced the cynicism. This is the playlist acknowledging reality while still pretending optimism matters. Then Andrew W.K. shows up with "Over" and it's pure chaos theory—the warm-up lie collapsing into whatever Hifiklub and friends decided was music that morning. This is the psychological setup: convince yourself things are fine, then immediately contradict yourself.
The slowness gambit at tracks four and five is either genius or self-sabotage, depending on your heart rate. Ryan Ritual and Aspen Forest create space when space is dangerous—when slowing down might mean stopping completely. But that's the thing about running playlists: sometimes you need the emotional breath more than the tempo. "Slip Away" and "LIKE YOU" aren't about speed; they're about remembering why you're out here instead of asleep.
Crispies returns at track six with "Keep on Doing That," which is less a song title and more a command. Then Strawberry Fuzz's live session lands at track seven with "Sadness," and suddenly we're telling the truth. The best running playlists always hide the real stuff in the middle—the confession you wouldn't make at the beginning, the admission that this hurts and maybe that's the point.
Track nine is where the architecture matters most. "Good God Regina It's A Bomb" by Mating Ritual arrives exactly when the warm-up lie has fully dissolved and the finish line is still hypothetical. This isn't motivational poster music—this is controlled panic, the sound of form falling apart and instinct taking over. The production matches what your legs are doing when running stops being mechanical and becomes pure survival. For three minutes, your crisis and the song's crisis sync perfectly, and that synchronization is what carries you through the wall.
The coast phase from Zip-Tie Handcuffs through The Thing's "Dixie Queen" and back to Crispies maintains momentum without demanding heroics. By track fourteen, Trouble Andrew brings the energy back, but Evening Elephants' "Half a Brain" at fifteen is the truth: you're exhausted, operating on fumes and muscle memory. Then Vona Vella closes with "Thought We Were Falling In Love," past tense, which is exactly how every run feels in retrospect—something you thought was one thing that turned out to be another.
May ninth demands a playlist that lies, tells the truth, panics appropriately, and knows when to stop talking. This one does all four.
