President Obama welcomed his successor, President-elect Donald Trump, to the White House Thursday. What an uncomfortable sentence to write and read, especially for the 48 percent plurality of voters who preferred Hillary Clinton, and the far higher percentage of DC-area residents who opposed Trump’s election.
A lot of us at Washingtonian are still trying to deal, too. So we made a playlist with the goal of nudging you a bit closer toward the end of the post-election daze, even if the alarm of having a President Trump doesn’t wear off. But this is not an entirely mopey list. We’re going through a lot of emotions here.
First up is Desaparecidos’ “The Happiest Place on Earth” and Slayer’s “Postmortem.” From there, the list spans genres from rap to pop-punk to country and includes two full symphonies, a James Bond theme song, and few empowering tunes that got some airtime at campaign events this year. “Fight Song” is a solid pop track. There’s also Chance the Rapper’s “Blessings,” which a crowd protesting Trump’s victory sang outside the White House on Wednesday night. DC punk band Priests’ 2013 song “USA (incantations)” gets a turn, too.
The last spot to Kanye West’s 2010 track “So Appalled.” As an acquaintance pointed out this week, we probably should’ve had this song in mind all year. The opening lyrics: “I’m so appalled, Spalding ball/Balding Donald Trump taking dollars from y’all.”
Wow. West 2020.
Benjamin Freed joined Washingtonian in August 2013 and covers politics, business, and media. He was previously the editor of DCist and has also written for Washington City Paper, the New York Times, the New Republic, Slate, and BuzzFeed. He lives in Adams Morgan.
