Monday Mixtape, Vol. 172 - A Declaration of Celebration and Relief

This is a special Monday Mixtape, and I hope you can rejoice with me in the news that we have a new leader, president-elect.

So it’s only appropriate that we start the mixtape with Queen’s anthem, the same song that blared through all of DC when the Washington Capitals hoisted their first Stanley Cup as they paraded around the city in ecstasy. As much of a Caps fan as I am, our recent election results is probably a bigger deal.

While these mixtapes usually feature new music, exceptions must be made. Queen is one of them. Bill Withers another, Hall & Oates for sure, Radiohead a must.

Foo Fighters is another. They were the musical guest on SNL this past weekend, and appropriately they closed the show with “Times Like These,” an acknowledgement of times like these when we can learn to live again, to give and give again, and it’s times like these you learn to love again. Somehow I hope there’s a middle ground that can be found. But it’s times like these where’s there’s at least hope.

And what a performance by the Foos.

Many of the other tracks are a feeling, a message, a declaration of celebration and relief.

Hallelujah.

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 168 - Sufjan Stevens' The Ascension Meets Radiohead's Kid A

I’ve got an interesting mixtape for this week thanks to Sufjan Stevens blowing my mind with his latest album, Ascension. I immediately got vibes of (one of) Radiohead’s masterpieces, Kid A.

The influence is uncanny, and I’ve never heard a better album that maintains an artist’s own brilliance (listen to the intense and otherworldly“Death Star”) while also paying tribute (knowingly or unknowingly) to Radiohead’s classic from twenty years ago.

This week’s mixtape features my favorite songs from Stevens’ new album followed or preceded by the song from Kid A that I believe influenced the sound.

Kid A was WAY ahead of its time, and Stevens’ album sounds part of the time. The album can be chaotic and pulsating, lonely as the single star shining in the night, holy and ethereal, or all the above in one track.

The album is purely electronic, and the result puts Stevens’ talents in a rare stratosphere. This album is HEADPHONE/VINYL MUSIC: you have to hear it purely to get every strand and syllable, each whisper, every key collaborating into a galactic explosion of electronics and beauty. I’m just blown away.

The Ascension is a long album (1 hour 20 mins). It’s heavy (“a season of pain and hopelessness,” as Stevens says in “The Ascension”) and deals with dark and hopeless thoughts. Musically, it’s the complete opposite of his last album, the amazing “Carrie and Lowell,” but thematically, it has a lot of parallels.

I still haven't tackled Stevens’ earlier stuff, which is highly beloved and acclaimed, particularly 2003’s Michigan and 2005’ Illinois. I will get to it shortly.

But in the meantime, I hope this mixtape strikes a chord with those who love Stevens., Radiohead, or are just discovering one of them!

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 47

Sorry that I have disappeared for two weeks, but I was just on a two-week long binge trip of work. 13 straight days to be exact. I would love to tell you about how wild it was and how many different qualities come out of human beings that are stressed and sleep deprived beyond reason, but I will only do that in person!

Anyhoo, a TON has been going on in the wide world of music, including Radiohead putting their new album and "In Rainbows" on Spotify!! Years back, I was trying to make a Best of Radiohead playlist on Spotify but just couldn't because I thought "Nude" and most certainly "All I Need" needed to be included. But good news, now that all of their albums are on Spotify, I can do it. See you in a year. 

Radiohead’s new album, A Moon Shaped Pool, is the calmest album they’ve made, a slow pace around the orchestra pit. I’m not sure how many instruments were involved in the making of this album, but the simplicity of the piano and strings in “Glass Eyes” was the most effective of all and delicately gorgeous. Radiohead also gave their loyal fans who know every B-side they’ve ever made a true treat at the end of the album, a studio version of “True Love Waits.”  

Nobody liked Band of Horses last album. Because it was really bad. Fortunately, their new album is pretty good, none better than the opener that starts with their patented chill-reverb guitar and Ben Bridewell’s vocals. Speaking of these guys, if you haven't listened to my Best of Band of Horses, here's the mix!  

After the first 30 seconds, if you had to guess whose song “Wow” was, what are the odds you would have said Beck? One percent? Five? The point is the man adapts and creates like no other artist I can think of. 

If you actually listen to Whitney (a spin off of two dudes from bigger bands, one from Unknown Mortal Orchestra and the other Smith Westerns) instead of just the instrumental from them that I included, you may think the lead singer sounds like the greased-up deaf guy from Family Guy:

and you will probably be right. Nonetheless, I still like the album as it’s the sound of summer. And we all need more summer. 

If you haven’t listened to the Car Seat Headrest album, get on it. 

Wild Beasts have been a band I’ve followed for many albums, and they’ve never really caught on, mainly because their lead singer refuses to sing any way other than a man reading an erotic novel like an opera singer. He tones it down a but with “Get My Bang,” the catchiest song they’ve ever written. It’s still no “The Fun Powder Plot,” my favorite song they’ve done from back in 2009.

Have a great week, I am flying to Croatia as we speak and will be navigating down the coast over a two week span in a rental car with a manual transmission (that I somewhat forget how to use). Pictures will be posted upon my return. You can't go to Lake Plitvices and not return without pictures. 

Albums to look forward to in 2015!

I've scoured the interwebs for a bunch of info on 2015 album releases (thank you Consequence of Sound, Stereogum, Pitchfork, Metacritic, Ranker) and here's an incredibly quick listing of albums that I promise to listen to MANY MANY times which are ranked from somewhat excited to RIDICULOUSLY excited):

Brandon Flowers - TBA
Savages - TBA
The Dodos - Individ (1/27)
Wild Nothing - TBA
Panda Bear (Noah Lennox from Animal Collective) - Panda Bear Meets The Grim Reaper
Heems (from the now extinct Das Racist) - Eat Pray Thug (3/10)
Jose Gonzalez - Vestiges & Claws (2/17)
Fleetwood Mac - TBA
Chromatics - Dear Tommy
Pusha T - King Push
Freddie Gibbs - Lifestyles of the Insane
James Blake - TBA
DIIV - TBA
Purity Ring
Belle & Sebastian - Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance (1/20)
The Decemberists - What a Terrible World, What a Beautiful World (1/20)
Father John Misty - I Love You, Honeybear (2/10)
Death Cab for Cutie - TBA
Chance the Rapper - Surf
Blood Orange - TBA
Joey Bada$$ (finally!) - B4.DA.$$ (1/20)
Band of Horses - TBA
Drake - Views From the 6
Adele - TBA
Modest Mouse - Strangers to Ourselves (3/3)
Beach House - TBA
A$AP Rocky
Grimes - TBA
Run the Jewels - RTJ3
My Morning Jacket - TBA
Kanye West - TBA
Kendrick Lamar - TBA
Radiohead - TBA
Frank Ocean - TBA