Monday Mixtape, Vol. 232

So Post Malone jumped on the country music train and wrote an album where pretty much every song has a feature from every big country artist you can imagine. It seems like a popularity/money grab, an easy way for one of few best hit makers of the past decade to find a broader audience, reinvigorate his fans (and maybe himself) and capture the entire population of music listeners. (Posty is the #10 Artist in the World according to Spotify with 77M monthly listeners).

If he genuinely wanted to make a legit country album and wanted to write a phenomenal country album, that kind of album doesn’t have features on 15 of the 18 tracks. The first single is a catchy but mostly empty track with one of the biggest hit makers in country, Morgan Wallen.

It may sound like I’m hating, maybe I am, or maybe I just don’t understand it or wished it wasn’t the lazy features album when an artist has run out of ideas and covers it with names. The only person who really cares about all this is me, and it’s a pretty pointless exercise, but one my mind does and for no great reason is sharing with you.

And yet. I still like some songs on the album. It may not surprise you to hear my favorite song is one of the three songs with no features, “What Don’t Belong To Me,” the first track on this week’s mixtape. It’s one of those catchy sad songs. That’s the Post I like:

Every string, every chord, my guitar
I'll give you everything in the world but my heart
'Cause I gave half to them halfway lovers
I left some to them two drunk summers
Left a piece at the bar with the keys to my car
I know I'm never gettin' it back
I lost a lot to that whiskey-sippin'
I gave the rest to that rockstar-livin'
Take all of me, but thеre's one thang missin'
Baby, I can't give you what don't bеlong to me

As for the rest of the artists on this week’s tape, it’s a blend of rock (what the hell is the madness of this Bad Moves song??? So great.), pop (Sunday (1994) is a legit up and comer reminding me of Beach House and The Cranberries), indie (Steve Lacy is awesome and Omar Apollo is a great talent in the Frank Ocean genre), and the great Fred again (with the help of The Japanese House).

Enjoy!

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 218

Hey hey, reporting live from somewhere for some music! While I have not been good at posting new music, I have been good at listening to a bunch of new stuff. I’ll try to get it on these mixtapes! Enjoy, some great new artists here.

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 214

Remi Wolf bursts out into this week’s mixtape with panache, rhythm, and some choice words for the ladies,

All these little bitches telling me what to do
They really gettin’ me hot
I got a bone to pick
Ain’t got a bone to lick

Her flow is phenomenal. She rides the rhythm in every direction and controls the whole song vocally. This was recorded live and is a testament to her talent. I wrote about her many months ago on her track “Disco Man,” another track to check out.

My recent obsession goes by the name of The Backseat Lovers. The vocals remind me of a mix between Bombay Bicycle Club and The Kooks. Other sonic influences I hear include Bloc Party, lots of Kings of Leon (mainly the guitars, that little riff that starts “Kilby Girl” as well as the reverb in the background), Two Door Cinema Club (the quick transition made to clean guitars at 3:03 and the soaring riff that follows is exactly like TDCC’s “What You Know”) .

Speaking of TDCC, they released a new album! I’ll note again that the last live show I saw of them a year ago was really, really good, like knocked-my-socks-off good. The kids are professionals now. I gotta listen to the album more, it kinda feels like it’ll grow on me over time like their last album.

I love their smidges of silence, and the use of quiet to contrast their loudness, and they do this well on their more introspective tracks (check their 2019 major label debut for more).

Julia Jacklin just released her highly anticipated new album, and I think this is the best track.

Extra points if you recognize the voice on the Amtrac song :)

Beabadoobee is awesome. Really awesome. Her album this year is so damn good. Gotta be Top 10 this year.

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 59

I'm going to try to write this in five minutes. I'm exhausted. Here goes. 

I'm seeing Bon Iver on Tuesday at the Fox. I've never seen him. It's going to be an epic show, in part because he tends not to play a ton of shows, so I'll really savor this one. Hearing his falsetto live, playing his beat up guitar while singing "re:Stacks" (my favorite Bon Iver song right above "Beach Baby") will be a memory I hope I can have. Coming in third place of my favorite songs by Justin Vernon might be "33 God," it's just that good. 

Three minutes.

Ark Patrol is some weird DJ who lives in Berkeley and has made some very chill and spacey songs. This one is a bit more catchy. Check out "Tokyo" for another!

Alex Frankel is from the very talented duo, Holy Ghost! To date, I still think their debut is one of my favorite Electro-Pop albums I've heard, and I really don't think they get the respect they deserve. They're better than Chvrches yet get one tenth the love. 

One minute!

Night Moves FOR GOODNESS SAKE LISTEN TO THEIR ALBUM.

Temples! Tame Impala lite. Maybe Tame Impala wanna bes, okay Tame Impala wanna bes. Particularly on this track the lead singer's voice is even more Kevin Parker-ish. BUT their debut album was really really good. So there's that.

I did it! Seeya!

New Local Natives Song - Past Lives

And OF COURSE they came to play a teeny club in SF yesterday when I was out of town. OF COURSE. Fate has seriously gotten in our ways on a number of different instances (including one where I met a girl working at a burger shop who knew the band and was going to the show the following week and said I should come hang out with them - but I was going out of town!), but I will always love these guys. They have been one of my three favorite bands since 2010 (Tame Impala and US Royalty would be the other two) and while I really enjoyed their second album, I didn't obsessively love it like their debut. 

They've been working on new music for years (or at least haven't released an album since early 2013) and here's the first track they've released from their new album to be released this year!