A Companion Track is something you’ll see on many of my pieces:

• It isn’t decoration.
• It isn’t me handing you a personal mix.
• It isn’t clout-chasing with a song I think you’ll recognize.

It’s part of the work.

They’re the quiet, essential element beneath the main piece—submissive in function, built to complement the authority on the page.

What a Track Is in My Work

Think of the Companion Track as a literary companion—disciplined, always honest.

It doesn’t speak for the piece. It gives the piece volume—pushing the voice, shaping the atmosphere, and locking in the emotional math.

These tracks are each piece’s signature.

They’re hand-picked based on where my head is, what I’m willing to say, and what I want the piece to express.

That’s why they sit as subtitles under the title: not decoration—structure. It’s all by design, and yes, it mirrors the dynamics within this lifestyle: the voice leads, the track amplifies, and the two work in sync.

Why Music Matters Here More Than Other Media

Music is faster than a film. Cleaner than a conversation. Less forgiving than a paragraph.

It hits the body before it hits the mind.

It puts words to feelings I might refuse to say directly, or can’t say yet without lying. It carries emotions a piece can’t always hold without turning preachy or over-explained. It lets me imply without weakening. It lets the work stay sharp.

A Companion Track is how the piece keeps moving when the writing stops.

Not Random. Not Trendy. Not Borrowed.

These tracks aren’t paired because they’re “the right reference,” or because they’re popular, or because they look smart next to the title.

I have history with them.

Most of them are songs I’ve carried for years—songs that already have a place in my life, in my memory, in my appetite, in my damage, in my recovery, in my standards.

And if a track is newer, it still has to earn the same status: it has to stay on repeat long enough to become canon—not to the internet, but to me. To my nervous system. To what I actually return to.

That’s why they work. They’re not costumes. They’re coordinates.

Beyond the Track

A Companion Track isn’t picked just because it sounds good.

I’m hearing them from different angles.

What it’s already attached to in the culture. Who made it, what album it lived on, what year it was released, what the world was doing when it landed—everything that would change the way the track reads next to my words.

For example: “Seven Nation Army” could be perfect on paper, but it will never touch a piece. It’s been claimed as an arena anthem. The crowd comes with it. The chant comes with it. And that association would overshadow the writing.

When I choose a track, I prefer some kind of obscurity—either truly under-the-radar, or old enough to feel strange again—so a reader can think, this is cool, I’ve never heard this, instead of great, now this song is stuck in my head because I saw the title.

I try to treat media, when it matters, as an artist’s expression—and art as a language for what can’t always be said cleanly. Expression becomes a form of sharing. Sharing becomes a form of connection.

Why the Tracks Don’t Stay in One Lane

My companion tracks run wide because I embrace music—across genres, eras, and worlds—and I don’t cage it.

Unless I’m linking songs as a deliberate series (like the Planetary theme—female-led ’90s vocals, by design), a track can come from anywhere, because the goal isn’t what readers might like; it’s what’s true to me.

Why Some Pieces Have Tracks and Some Don’t 

Companion Tracks weren’t part of the plan from day one. They showed up as the work evolved—because they mirrored what I was building on the page: honest companionship. 

Something beside the voice that isn’t a showpiece, but loyal, intentional, and real.

If you read Cycle I in order, you can watch the shift happen. The tracks start appearing when they’re earned—when the piece wants more volume than words alone can carry.

Some pieces don’t have a track because they’re meant to stand in clean isolation: one emotion, no boost, no echo. Sometimes it’s a different style of entry. Sometimes a track would fight the cadence instead of supporting it.

Some pages do have tracks because they’re their own statement and deserve a little lift—or because I simply find it amusing.

And once a track is paired, it usually stays. I’m not rotating songs like a playlist. I’ll only change one if I have a real reason to—like the artist explicitly asking not to be associated with me or the piece.

Either way, it’s another shard of the same ethic: showing—not telling—what this can feel like from the inside.

How to Use Them

You can read first, then listen.

You can listen first, then read.

You can love the song and dislike my work.

If you choose either of the two former options, the intention is that you’ll feel what the work is built to do.

And if you’re paying attention, you’ll start noticing something:

It’s connected on purpose.

Companion track: “Music is Mine” – Nujabes