While the holiday season is generally a time for joy and cheer, it isn’t always that way for everyone. It can be a trying time for some people, and sometimes you need some help. That’s the aim of new zine and compilation, Sick Sad Sounds. Today we are bringing you the first play of the excellent four tracks on their ‘Sick Sad Christmas’ mixtape, which you can hear below.
“2016 has been the most isolating year of my adult life,” explains Julie Gomez of Sick Sad Sounds. “I started dreading the idea of having to come home for the holidays in August. The questions of what I had been doing that year, what I planned to do in the following year, who I’m dating, navigating family opinions that are stark opposites of my own, it was too stressful.
“The Sick Sad magazine and Christmas Comp derived as a personal project to give people in our music community something to connect them to the community while we’re all off visiting family for the holidays,” Gomez continues. “I wasn’t looking forward to having to go to my hometown for a week and be separated from the people who have helped me get through this year. I wanted to give members of our DIY community something to take home with them, so when they feel alone with their family they can read the magazine or listen to the comp and feel a little bit connected to our little DIY family.”
‘Sick Sad Christmas’ is available now via Bandcamp, where 100% of the profits will go to non-profit Austin, Texas, based organisation, SIMS, who offer low-cost mental health services to the music community.