Monday Mixtape, Vol. 210

I’m back for a second week in a row! It’s like Joe Dimaggio’s hit streak.

King Gizzard’s “Magenta Mountain” is the song-child of MGMT’s “Electric Feel” and “Kids.” These are two of the greatest (and even more influential) songs of the past 25 years, so I welcome all copycats.

Oracular Spectacular is now 15 years old…so that makes me…really old.

Sharon Van Etten’s new track is very outside her lane, which is great. Gives me Arcade Fire vibes.

The hell if I know who Lo Moon and Ceramic Animal are.

I’m a Wilco fan boy, always will be. At this point, they’re properly rated, maybe they have been since Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Why do I love Wilco? Because they do things like this! Sadly, I missed out on Wilc-O’s, the cereal. No longer available :(

Jeff Tweedy is properly underrated, always will be. He’s my Dylan. Yeah, I said it. I didn’t say he was Dylan, so cool out, but listen to “Ambulance” and soooo many songs before that. Listen to his solo albums. Listen to the album he made with his 16 year old kid! It’s all great, and Tweedy’s a poet every step of the way. That dude and a guitar is all I need.

Let’s end with Lupe, another wordsmith. His new album is good. It’s simply produced. It allows Lupe room to breathe. He exhibits his masterful wordplay while not trying too hard (there’s a bad line or two and couldn’t believe Lupe was cool with it, but that’s me being petty.). And his voice sounds like old Lupe.

Turns out Lupe recorded his album with a $100 microphone and GarageBand! Which is less than I spent on my album! And my album was SO MUCH better than Lupe’s. Ok ok, it was so much worse, which goes to show that money can’t buy talent. But then there’s the entire pop music industry which would say otherwise. So I guess that goes to show that money can buy you talent, but you have to have enough money to buy you talent, and I didn’t have enough money to buy me talent even though I had more than $100 but not as much as Iggy Azalea.

Enjoy the week.

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 203

It’s taking a bit of time for 2022 to ramped up with new music. This past week might have been the biggest release date so far with Spoon, Animal Collective, Big Thief, alt-J, and Cousin Stizz releasing new albums. I can’t wait to dig into Spoon’s new album. They might be the most underrated band in the indie/rock genre. They’ve been rocking out with quality albums since 1996! I’ll get to them on next' week’s mixtape.

So this week’s starts with a couple my favorite newbies, BENEE (who had my #2 Album of 2020) and Mallrat. BENEE’s new track is typical for her: catchy and bouncy as hell, makes you happy. Mallrat’s track develops and vibes for most of the song, but the best part is the last minute sample of Memphis’ Gangsta Pat. LOVE That ending.

I read Pitchfork’s 5.0 review of Cordae’s new album From a Birds Eye View. Needless to say, the critic was not too pleased. But I’m not a critic, I’m a lover, and I enjoyed the album. One of my favorite’s, “Jean-Michel,” shows his lyrical chops:

I been having vivid dreams, them shits is more than scary
Graveyards or mortuaries
Haunted by these goals that I'm tryna accomplish
Underrated, over-hated, I'm tired of the nonsense
Things I've could've done better, it lies in my conscience
And I'll never forget it, I'm my worst critic
Such a overthinker, I'm so self-reflective
God willing, these parables go and sell some records
Politicians out here lying, tryna sell a message
Ten thousand hours, penmanship is well-perfected

Not bad for a young guy. We’ll see where he goes from here.

Another couple rappers grace the mixtape, the unknown Young Truth and the very well known Lupe Fiasco. A couple bands I recently discovered. Spaceface bring some interesting vibes of sunny psychedelia, I can’t quite explain what Bad Suns is, but I enjoy the song!

And I hope you enjoy the week.

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 138

This White Reaper track has got to be the song of the summer! How good is the guitar??

It only takes a few seconds into this recently released Lupe Fiasco track that I knew it had to be recorded back in his Food & Liquor days. If it wasn’t for Lupe’s “F and F” shoutout (to Lupe’s label 1st and Fifteenth) that he constantly yelled out on his classic debut album, the production and flow is old school Lupe. According to Complex, this was recorded before Food & Liquor and will be part of a release by Lupe’s longtime business partner of unreleased tracks over many years of their label. Can’t wait.

Not sure who Litany is, but “My Dude” got me caught with its 80s vibe and the gal’s voice.

Funny because I was talking on last week’s mixtape write-up about how Whitney reminded me of Real Estate, but then I started listening to Golden Daze, and dear lord, Golden Daze wins for best album of the year that sounds like Real Estate. It’s not a bad thing, Real Estate had the acoustic indie chill vibe on lockdown for many years at which point Mac Demarco kind of took over (and might have ceded the belt given how much I disliked his last album), but there were bound to be a ton of admirers influenced by Real Estate. Often imitated, never duplicated.

Enjoy the other music on this week’s mixtape and have a great week!

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 67

I gotta start this mixtape with Lupe. The first track off his new album, "Dopamine Lit (Intro)" is a banger. Lupe attacks the track "Mural" style with wordplay and words stacking on each other like a Jenga tower. He also gives a shout out to Frank Ocean with a line. "Jump" is another banger like an old school Lil' Wayne track with storytelling.

Lupe's new album, however, is a total mess. There is absolutely no continuity when a song like "Jump" is accompanied by poppy rap-r&B slow jams that sound like a duet with Ed Sheeran and Milli Vanilli. Half the album is awesome and half sounds like a record label required Lupe to have eight shitty pop-rap songs. If this album only included the great rap, it would have been quite the follow-up to his amazing last album, Tetsuo & Youth. Alas, that did not happen. 

Ryan Adams just release this new album! And it's great, I have really been enjoying it and still need to listen to it much more. I think the first track from the album, "Do You Still Love Me?" is the best song on the album. That's why it is on the mixtape. But it's worth some listens. 

Future decided to drop a surprise album, and I gotta say, the album sounds different than his other stuff. He's moved to some different beats and quicker flows, sounding a little less codeine-influenced and more of some sort of upper drugs that he may enjoy. "Draco" is my favorite song, an upbeat thumper. 

Real Estate has a new album coming out. They lost guitarist Matt Mondanile to his great solo project Ducktails, but it's still sounding like they haven't missed a beat. Their last two albums have been really fantastic and complete, the total opposite to Lupe, their albums flow like packed rivers. 

This song from London Grammar sounds a bit like Temper Trap and a bit like them. Her vocal chops are legit.

To end the mixtape, I'm leaving you with Charlotte Day Wilson, a sultry singer I first heard on Badbadnotgood's album then heard on a Local Native's remix of my favorite song from their new album, "Dark Days." This song is sexy.

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 8

Good Morning! Hope the weekend treated you well. It's especially a good Monday because The Maccabees are back on Spotify! For some reason (due to their record label I imagine), their amazing album, Given To The Wild, written up and loved by yours truly, is not on Spotify, but their new album is set to release sometime in 2015, and their first single, "Marks To Prove It," IS on Spotify, so hopefully the album will be as well. The single is an in-your-face rock song that I've been listening to incessantly for a few weeks. Their sound changes constantly from song to song, so I still have no idea what the new album may sound like, but needless to say, I'm pretty excited.

Halsey, a 20 year old American, just released this track that should instantly remind you of another talented young singer, Lorde. This song is pure pop. It's catchy as hell, and I love the disdainful lyrics about the music industry complex, again like Lorde. 

Although I wasn't overly impressed with Strange Names' debut album, "Ricochet" is a great track!

For the hip-hop heads out there, "Countdown" has to be right down your alley. Great beat, great hook, and Consequence and Lupe Fiasco together on a track?? Yes please.

Jamie xx's (member of The xx) debut album, In Colour, has been getting a ton of love from critics all over. I've been enjoying the album as there are so many different types of music packed into the album which really showcase the true ability of a DJ - to understand and appreciate the multitudes of elements and genres of music yet make them intertwine seamlessly to the listener. It's a hell of an accomplishment of an album to veer so heavily in different directions yet still be listenable from front to back. Jamie xx's track on this mix, "I Know There's Gonna Be (Good Times)," starts will some old soul sample then veers into a reggae-ish beat with "it" rapper Young Thug giving his off-kilter signature delivery. Yeah, it's a bit weird, but we all need to keep it weird (right, Austin?). 

Finally, Moses Sumney is a singer/songwriter I just stumbled upon because Pitchfork named one of his tracks Best New Track. This track, "Plastic," is just a simple ballad that spoke to me. Simplicity at its best.