While tabling at the STEPS lawn this past Friday, The Brown and White asked students what their “Song of the Semester” is in an attempt to capture life at Lehigh and the overall mood of its students in the spring of 2025.
“No Good” — Kaleo
“The Boy in the Bubble” — Paul Simon
“MUTT” — Leon Thomas
“Gypsy” — Fleetwood Mac
“NOKIA” — Drake
“Won’t Go Home Without You” — Maroon 5
“Sunday Morning” — Maroon 5
“Vanish Into You” — Lady Gaga
“The Giver” — Chappell Roan
“Anxiety” — Doechii
“Fein” — Travis Scott, feat. Playboi Carti
“Deja Vu” — Beyoncé feat. Jay Z
“Chasing Paradise” — One Republic
“Vienna” — Billy Joel
“Rattlin’ Bog” — The Irish Descendants
“The Days” — Chrystal
“Over the Hills and Far Away” — Led Zeppelin
“Good Life” — Kanye West
“Violent Crimes” — Kanye West
“Feel It” — D4VID
“JRJRJR” — Jane Remover
The Brown and White asked students what their “Song of their Semester” is when tabling on the STEPS lawn. The songs recorded captured the campus’ excitement for spring and anxiety around change at the end of the semester.
The most consistent thematic through line in these songs is a surface-level cheerfulness. The upbeat sound runs all the way from “Gypsy” by Fleetwood Mac, an ode to the inner hippie who lives in all of us, to “Good Life” by Kanye West, which simply proclaims “welcome to the good life” instead of beating around the bush.
But this shallow positivity hides a deeper, multifaceted emotional truth that flows through many of the songs picked by Lehigh students. Themes of change are inescapable, and while walking through campus, it’s easy to see why.
Barren trees are blossoming into vibrant pinks, but amid the newly emerging beauty, another kind of change is onrushing — tensions run high as students rush to cement their summer or future plans.
We received a smattering of songs that have bounced their way through TikTok, infiltrating students’ ForYouPages — “MUTT” by Leon Thomas, who’s known by Gen Z from his role on the Nickelodeon show “Victorious,” “The Days” by Chrystal and “Anxiety” by Doechii, who won Best Rap Album at this year’s Grammy Awards for “Alligator Bites Never Heal.”
The only song to receive two nominations was “NOKIA” by Drake, who has somehow crawled his way back into the public’s good graces after a thorough beatdown by Kendrick Lamar throughout the past year — one of rap music’s most famous beefs.
Many of the picks, like “NOKIA,” represent the stages of going out, from “Rattlin’ Bog” an Irish folk song played during a drinking game ubiquitous at pregames, to “Fein” by Travis Scott and Playboi Carti and “Deja Vu” by Beyonce and Jay-Z, which are mainstays in fraternity basements, albeit different fraternities.
For many people, the spring represents shaking off the winter gray by catching up with friends they haven’t seen in a while, stepping out of their comfort zone, and switching their thick puffer jackets for tank tops and dresses. But there’s still a dash of wistfulness and nostalgia throughout many of the selected songs.
For Lehigh students, heading into summer doesn’t only mean sunny skies and lounging at their parents’ house. It also means leaving behind friends, getting ready to pack up the room they’ve lived in all semester and perhaps even adjusting to their first internship. For those who are graduating in less than a month, it means taking their first steps into a full-time job and establishing a life all on their own.
In “Gypsy,” this nostalgia manifests by reconnecting with a freer internal version of oneself — the “gypsy that remains.” The dreamy, bright instrumentation is overlaid with lyrics about restoring an attachment to internal self while trying to move into the future. This is emblematic of this juxtaposition facing college students at the end of a school year.
These same threads also exist in “Over the Hills and Far Away” by Led Zeppelin, also a song about journey and change — “Many times I’ve gazed along the open road/Many times I’ve lied/Many times I’ve listened/Many times I’ve wondered/How much there is to know.” This song is more desperate to leave the past behind and move forward than “Gypsy” is, but both focus on change. Both also show Lehigh students are looking forward to that change, with quick, upbeat tempos pulling them forward, even if there’s some sadness behind them.
A song suggested to us that represents a more contemplative side of pushing forward to try to achieve your dreams is “Vienna” by Billy Joel.
Every year, Lehigh Admissions compiles a list of songs that applicants think the admissions staff should listen to while reading their application. And each year, “Vienna” by Billy Joel makes the list. For the class of 2026, it was on the playlist 19 times.
The song is about realizing there’s so much time to accomplish your goals. It gives a gentle reminder to young people to, “Slow down, you’re doin’ fine/You can’t be everything you want to be before your time.”
This reminder is important for high school seniors applying to college and even more important for college students entering the summer, anxious about their upcoming internship, anxious about not having one, anxious about starting their post-grad job or anxious about still fighting through a seemingly impossible hiring system to find that position.
These last few weeks of the semester are confusing. There’s a yearning to have fun when you can, but anxiety and anticipation for the future simmers, always bubbling underneath the surface. And it seems these feelings have found their way into the music the Lehigh community is listening to.
What is shown in our spring ‘25 playlist is, often, these complex emotions exist in even what seems like easy listening. For example, in Maroon 5’s “Sunday Morning,” Adam Levine is begging for his lover to return to him despite feeling like the first warm day of spring.
Even the instrumentally upbeat “Boy in the Bubble” by Paul Simon, whose fast tempo, innovative instrumentals pull the listener forward, has lyrics about inequity and terrorism.
The seasons are in flux, Lehigh students are in a period of transition, and the United States is in a rapid and violent period of instability. This snapshot into the minds and ears of our campus reflects this.
But it also shows a sustaining and unbreakable hope.
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