Mac Miller and the Beauty of Swimming in Circles
“Everything ends, but what do endings really mean?”
That’s not exactly the type of question you’d be thinking about while running on the treadmill. However, on one winter afternoon, that’s the exact question I was faced with as I started an episode of my favorite podcast. It’s not the ideal soundtrack for pumping iron, but for a nerd like me, Dissect is a perfect choice. A podcast that breaks down and analyzes my favorite albums seasonally. This season: Mac Miller’s Swimming in Circles, the double album combining the late artist’s magnum opus, Swimming, and his posthumous final album, Circles. This question, the one about endings, has been posed many times throughout this season of Dissect, but it was here, in the 11th episode focusing on my favorite song from Mac, “So It Goes,” when the question lit a fire in my mind. It’s one that I believe really begins to get at the beauty that is to be found in Mac’s final two offerings to the world. How water and circles are perfect analogies for life on earth and the struggles we face while trying to live and improve.
Life is a cyclical experience. We come from nothing, a state of not existing. Then we’re born and exist in this world, but in the end, we return to nothing, a circle. From ashes to ashes. The earth is a circle, the sun and moon the same. The earth spins while rotating around the sun completing a circle. They all exist in our circular solar system, in a universe that is ever-expanding in the shape of a circle. It’s a flawless shape, with every part having equal distance from the center. It doesn’t get more perfect than that. However, the thing most important about circles is that they never end. If you draw a circle, you end it right where you started, just like life. Just like circles, life (or the more existential idea of time) never ends, it just keeps going. I believe that’s part of what Mac is conveying to us in these last two albums. Showcasing the cyclical patterns in our lives. As we grow and learn, we try to be a better version of ourselves. This often leads to us failing, which makes us feel like we’re right back to where we started… going in circles. To live is to swim, to keep trudging forward through the waters of the unknown. Occasionally, a wave may come and set us back. It may even send us all the way back to shore. What do we do then? You hop back in, do it again. In Swimming, Mac reminds us that we must keep going, but how are supposed to go on knowing that things (including ourselves) are likely to get in the way again? He tells us in the final track of the final record he gave the world, “So It Goes.” The song is an acceptance, a celebration even, of the dichotomy of life. I feel great one moment, then awful the next. We improve, just to fall short again. Mac tells us in this album that we need to come to terms with this inevitable experience of winning and losing, understanding one can’t come without the other no matter how painful it is and to savor the good moments while they are still here, because one day, they won’t.
On that same song, Mac’s final lines links Swimming to Circles saying, “My God it go on and on, Just like a circle I go back where I’m from.” This of course speaks to the previous sentiment about life’s cyclical nature, but this is important as this can also be seen as Mac himself accepting this idea. This is because the song “So It Goes” works as a moment for both Mac and the listener to surrender to the universe, to allow the soul to experience joy and to be honest with oneself, even if it’s painful. And that then bring us to Circles, a beautifully and strikingly honest and melancholic album, that sees Mac confront himself and his demons, which is made more haunting and eerie by this being a posthumous album. Whereas Swimming was Mac’s journey to being able to be accepting and loving of all things in life, including death; Circles was the sound of a man using that acceptance of life and all the things that come with it to come to terms with himself and make peace with demons, creating a sonically rich and intimate listening experience. The greatest example of this to me is on “Good News,” the lead single from the album and my personal favorite. The song’s lyrics read like a candid venting session of Mac’s. With lyrics like “Why can’t it just be easy? Why does everybody need me to stay?” and “all I do is say sorry, Half the time I don’t even know what I’m saying it about.” Mac is expressing his guilt and the pressure that comes with his position as an artist and influential figure to the fans that love him. The hook, says that “they” only want good news, that they don’t like it when he’s down. Even though this isn’t necessarily a bad thing to want that from your favorite artists, it also doesn’t allow them to be human, to make mistakes or just live. He says that they get uncomfortable when he’s “flying” or high. It’s a super intimate thought, to lament the idea of fans being scared for him. On “Good News,” Mac is pouring his heart out, telling us about the issues he has with fame and life under microscope of the public eye. It’s a very raw and honest sentiment to make, one that many people with Mac’s status would fear making because the sentiment could be misconstrued as him being ungrateful. However, it’s brave of Mac to still say this to the world, reminding us that he is still a human. He does this all over Circles, being honest with himself and his issues. It makes listening to the album a truly rewarding, yet devastating, experience that stays with you long after you finish the album.
I believe that being honest with yourself and others is important and vital to living a meaningful life, but to get there you must accept it all: this life, this world, with all its flaws, ugliness, beauty, and wonder. It will eat you alive if you let it. We don’t have control over anything except ourselves and you must be okay with that, make peace with that. That is something I was struggling with in the years since both these albums came out. I’ve found solace in the messages that I took from these albums, and they’ve helped me to appreciate the great moments while they’re here. As I sit in this café, five months after I first heard that question about endings and what they even mean, I appreciate that I’m sitting here doing the thing love to do. And I know heartbreak is around the corner, but the ever presence of grief reminds me to enjoy these small pockets of joy. I employ you all to do the same. And though it saddens me to remember that we won’t hear anything else from a legend that left this world too soon, I appreciate what we did get and will pass it on whatever way I can. So, yeah, everything ends, but what do endings really mean?
