Our May Playlist is an acoustic collection — spare and rhythmic. Shaped by fingerstyle guitar, warm analog recordings, and lo-fi vocals. Artists like Nick Drake, John Martyn, and John Prine anchor the mood, while newer voices carry that same sense of subtlety forward.

Part of what gives this music its particular tone lives in the guitar itself — especially in the alternate tunings that sit just outside the familiar. Nick Drake rarely relied on standard tuning; instead, he built songs around unusual, often unnamed configurations that let chords ring more openly. The result is a kind of suspended harmony — slightly unresolved, always shifting. “Saturday Sun,” released in 1969, is a soulful reflection on the inevitability of change.

John Martyn approaches the instrument differently, but with a similar effect. He uses unconventional and open tunings — often paired with heavier strings and a physical, rhythmic style of playing. Notes blur, bend, and pulse, giving the music a fluid, almost tidal quality. “May You Never,” released in 1973, feels less performed than offered — a deeply personal song of love and friendship, carrying the spirit of a blessing or wish for someone to move gently through the world.

These tunings shape more than sound — they influence pace. Unhurried, steady, and continuous. It’s the kind of music that folds easily into the day: in the studio while measuring and mixing, in the garden while tending seedlings, in the in-between moments where focus softens but attention remains.

As makers, this is the atmosphere we return to — one that sits naturally alongside the work of composing botanical fragrances and formulating natural products for face, body, and home. It mirrors the way we work with botanical materials: attentive, hands-on, and responsive to variation. Small shifts in season, harvest, temperature, and time quietly shape the final result.

Image: Joel Meyerowitz, Skylight, Provincetown, 1977.