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Mar 25, 2020 By Dom Gourlay COVID-19 Quarantine Playlists

As most of us are understandably stuck inside for the foreseeable future due to the necessary COVID-19 quarantine, we’ve asked our writers to put together Spotify playlists to help us all pass the time. Some will be mixes of music they are currently listening to as a means of getting them through the crisis, others will be centered on a particular theme, scene, genre, or decade. With each one we’ve asked the writer to also submit a photo showing some aspect of their quarantine life, be it their home office desk, hanging with their kids who are off school, or something else. Here is a COVID-19 quarantine playlist from Dom Gourlay, who is based in the UK, accompanied by a photo of his two-year-old son Johnny helping him get some work done.

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The clue’s in the title I guess. COVID-19 or coronavirus as it’s more commonly known has already devastated other parts of the world and we’re just entering the initial stages of the pandemic here in the UK. The entertainment, licensing, and media industries have already suffered irreparable damage thanks to a dithering prime minister and his government reluctantly ordering the closure of venues, bars, and restaurants. Causing many proprietors to take a moral stand and close of their own accord, resulting in thousands of workers becoming unemployed in the process. Schools are now closed indefinitely and those still at work defined by status (or key workers as those of
major national importance are now known as). It’s an unprecedented time of uncertainty that’s already claimed over 20,000 lives worldwide, with the death toll continually rising at an alarming rate.

For the 50 songs chosen on my playlist, I’ve gone for the obvious (“Every Breath You Take,” “The Air That I Breathe,” “Isolation”) to the darkly humorous (“Touch Me I’m Sick,” “National Shite Day,” “I Wanna Be Sedated”). Some have become anthems for the COVID-19 generation in their own right—The Knack’s “My Sharona” has been renamed “My Corona”—while others depict the impending gloom many of us are experiencing on a daily basis (“It’s The End of the World As We Know It,” “Time Is Running Out”).

Whatever happens next is anyone’s guess, so as it looks like we’re going to be confined to our humble abodes for the foreseeable future, music could be the only companion many of us experience. With that, the only thing left to say is sit back, listen, and (hopefully) enjoy!

Follow Dom on Twitter at @domlikesrabbits.

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