Princess Chelsea shares a special fishing edition of the perfect weekend playlist.
Women love her, and fish fear her: any given weekend can be made perfect in Princess Chelsea‘s eyes if a bit of rock fishing is involved. “It’s sustainable and great for your nervous system. It’s great by yourself or with one or two friends. This means no small talk and only a quality hang,” she says. “Bring a boombox, some Marlboro golds and ideally a bottle of champagne. Drink straight from the bottle; it’s more iconic. Don’t forget to bring your berley bag home with you when you leave.”
This weekend’s plans are slightly different for Princess Chelsea, who is hosting a Twin Peaks-themed midwinter ball in Auckland’s Civic Wintergarden on Saturday night before taking on New Plymouth’s Theatre Royal the Saturday next. “Half Hexagon and my band are playing – there will be at least two smoke machines, fake trees and karaoke,” she says. “We wanted to put on something special for you all in the dead of winter.”
But first, fishing. To get into the flow, Princess Chelsea has shared her perfect weekend playlist, fishing edition, for the best tunes to lure fish, tap into their psyche and reel them in.
Enya – ‘Orinoco Flow’
I got it in my head that fish love the music of Enya, particularly this song. This is because I just decided this was a fact one day and confidently proclaimed it to my fishing partners. And it worked. It seemed to instantly trigger bite time. So I have taken Enya as the leaping point, the first picture on the mood board for this fishing off the rocks playlist. We are talking about beautiful, earthy sounding music with a leaning toward the ambient – a spiritual quality about it that does not necessarily require a conscious understanding of language or lyrics. Music that fish would like.
Sister Irene O’Connor – ‘Fire’
Irene is an Australian nun that plays a Casio. Fish like spiritual music and music of beauty. This is both.
Beach Boys – ‘Til I Die (Alternate mix)’
Legend has it an engineer named Stephen Desper recording The Beach Boys did this alternate mix himself while they were on smoking break. By staggering the arrangement he features the vibes and Brian’s meticulous vocal arrangements more resulting in an ethereal slow burner that fish would love.
Royksopp – ‘So Easy’
This is the perfect soundtrack to watching a stingray swim up to you in the shallows. Watch as it glides. It has a distinctly Enya feel – those pizzicato strings remind me of Enya’s iconic use of the “Pizzagogo” preset on the Roland D-50 synth. This song samples Bobby Vinton ‘Blue on Blue’ which is also the colour of the ocean.
Matt Monro – ‘Born Free’
This song is used in bank ads at the moment but it’s a beautiful sentiment about being born free and following your heart which some of us are lucky enough to be. If you are fishing off the rocks at will then you are likely to enjoy this song about being free. When Matt Monro hits “stay free” on the key change, it should hopefully make you well up inside. Sorry fish if I catch you.
The Delfonics – ‘Ready or Not Here I Come’
Watch out fish – I’m gonna find you! Just need an excuse to get The Delfonics on every playlist.
Charles Esten as Deacon Claybourne (Nashville soundtrack) – ‘A Life That’s Good’
Charles is famous as being an actor from the TV series Nashville, the moody broody ‘Deacon Claybourne’. Part of the reason he is so convincing on screen is that he is a musician IRL and essentially seems like he’s playing a slightly more troubled version of himself. I have been quite struck by the quality of the music on this television show, which makes sense seeing as most of it is written by those at the top of their game in the Nashville songwriting world. ‘A Life That’s Good’ is a beautiful song about appreciating what you have. When you fish, you think – and this song encourages a grateful type of thinking rooted in mindfulness.
Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda – ‘Om Shanti’
What we like to call “mindfulness” today has its roots in eastern philosophy and ideas. Alice Coltrane wrote some wonderful albums of spiritual music written while living in an ashram she opened outside of Los Angeles. The music is inspired by her adoption of Hindu music and traditions and uses vedic chants mixed with gospel singing and at times old Casio synths. There is a great compilation record you can buy called The Ecstatic Music of Alice Colrane Turiyasangitananda which I highly recommend – it’s become one of the favourites of my collection.
Lucinda Williams – ‘Side of The Road’
This is a song about taking some time to yourself, from your partner or family and the need to feel independent and alone… sometimes. Lucinda is trying to explain this need to her partner and reassure them that it’s OK. Some wonderful lines in this song like “If only for a moment or two, I wanna see what it’s like to be without you”, and “I want to know you’re there, but I want to be alone” – these are all sentiments that remind me of the need to just go fishing by yourself or do something simple like that without having anyone around to worry about or explain yourself. Just you, a fishing rod, a cigarette and your bottle of Mumm.
Bob Dylan – ‘I Contain Multitudes’
Daddy Dylan is the most lyrically-focused narrative based or poetry songwriters with a brain acknowledged as an important influence. Taken from Dylan’s 39th studio album Rough and Rowdy Ways, ‘I Contain Multitudes’ is a song I feel is about Dylan himself, sung in first person about first person. He nabbed the title from a Walt Whitman poem. He’s flexing. It’s about his entire life. But he’s also describing every single one of us. Fishing is perceived by some as a dude activity, or an activity by only a certain type of person. I call bullshit on this because we all contain multitudes. Anyone can love fishing and anyone can hate it. We all contain multitudes.
Dylan is a perfect artist to listen to while fishing – you got time, you got the pace, you’re staring at the ocean. It’s like reading a book but you don’t have to use your hands, which is helpful because you’re using your hands reeling in fish.