Playlist #156 – School Daze

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Happy Monday, folks! As we near the end of April, students’ minds start turning to thoughts of summer and freedom from the tyranny of…um…*checks notes*…learning. Here’s an appropriate playlist, all because I listened to the new Taylor Swift album this weekend and it features a song called “So High School.”

  1. Taylor Swift, “So High School”: I mean, I told you right up there why I put together this particular playlist, didn’t I? This song was mentioned right there. It’s not about high school per se, but it is about people being petty and small-minded and acting very high school, so we count it.
  2. The Angels, “My Boyfriend’s Back”: There’s nothing in this song to particularly attach it to high school students, but it feels very high schoolish to me. “My boyfriend’s back, and you’re gonna be in trouble,” they sing, and it’s very taunting and playground-esque.
  3. Bruce Springsteen, “Glory Days”: Ah, who doesn’t look back on high school as the time when your life was at its absolute peak? I mean, I don’t, but I also didn’t plateau at that point in my life and went on to do other, better things.
  4. Chuck Berry, “Schooldays”: Hail, hail, rock and roll.
  5. Old 97s, “Friends Forever”: You know how some folks go from nerds to kickass musicians in a rock band? The Old 97s know.
  6. The Mountain Goats, “Fall of the Star High School Running Back”: We’ve talked about this song. Don’t go from being the star running back on the high school football team to a drug dealer. You will get caught and you will receive an adult sentence for it, especially in Texas.
  7. Loudon Wainwright III, “School Days”: Loudon Wainwright III has this wonderful way to approach nostalgia and the yearning for the past that I’ve always loved.
  8. Pearl Jam, “Education”: In case you need a little Pearl Jam in your day. I know I do. Their new album is also actually pretty solid.
  9. Pink Floyd, “The Happiest Days of Our Lives/Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2”: Like I wasn’t going to put this song on this list. And yeah, it’s technically two songs, but they are always played as a single song, so I’m only counting it as one.
  10. The Ramones, “Teenage Lobotomy”: C’mon, we all think they’ve had ’em. It’s the only explanation for the slack-jawed looks I get every day.

Playlist #155 – The Old 97s

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Tuesday is the new Monday, right? The Old 97s put out a new album recently, and it’s pretty great. So, here’s a playlist of some of my favorite Old 97s songs. I had to do 12, ’cause 10 just wasn’t enough.

  1. “Mama Tried”: The Old 97s burst right out the gate with their sound already pretty-well established: fast acoustic strumming, some Chet Atikins-like electric, and a railroad rhythm section that leaves you pretty breathless by the end of the song. This Merle Haggard cover is pretty emblematic of their approach.
  2. “Victoria”: Most of the best Old 97s songs are witty, quip-filled emotional wringers about the dastardly women who’ve done Rhett Miller wrong and the whiskey he’s drinking to forget about them.
  3. “Doreen”: So the original version of this song, off their debut Hitchhike to Rhome, is a string-band get-down that feels only vaguely out of touch with the rest of the album. But the reworked version on Wreck Your Life feels more in line with their usual sound and is just a barnstormer of a tune.
  4. “Barrier Reef”: This is the song that got me into this band. “So I sidled up beside her/Settled down, shouted, “Hi there/My name’s Stuart Ransom Miller/I’m a serial ladykiller”/She said, “I’m already dead”/That’s exactly what she said” is just the best worst pickup line I have ever heard.
  5. “Big Brown Eyes”: Early Old 97s albums often featured reworked versions of older songs. On Too Far To Care, You’ve got this one and “4 Leaf Clover,” a rework from their debut. Both benefit from years on the road and improved musicianship.
  6. “Crash on the Barrelhead”: Sometimes the bassist sings? And it’s not bad? I’m as surprised as you are.
  7. “Designs on You”: When all you want to do is have a fling with an engaged woman and she seems kinda willing, but you don’t wanna come across as too skeevy.
  8. “In the Satellite Rides a Star”: If I had to pick a favorite Old 97s song, I’d ask you why you hated me and wanted me to choose between all of my beautiful, alcoholic children. But, gun to my head, it’d probably be this one. This week, anyway.
  9. “Champaign, Illinois”: Other weeks, it might be this one, which “borrows” (with gracious permission) the chord progression from Dylan’s “Desolation Row” for a song about the Midwest and a touring band.
  10. “Most Messed Up”: While this was probably once quite true for frontman Rhett Miller, he’s sobered up these days and far less likely to engage in debauched shenanigans. But hey, it’s fun to relive the (rather alcohol-soaked and hazy) past sometimes.
  11. “Holy Cross”: Why this song never ended up on an album proper, I’ll never know. It’s so damn good.
  12. “By the End of the Night”: Off their latest, American Primitive. The new album doesn’t really mess with the formula they’ve been working with for the past 30 years, but if it ain’t broke…

Playlist #154 – Eclipse Music

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Happy Monday and happy eclipse day, folks. The moon is gonna pass in front of the sun today, freak a buncha people out, and maybe signal mankind’s final doom and destruction? At least the weather is nice here for it, where we’ll only get 80% occlusion instead of the totality that they’ll see in, say, Cleveland. Of course, you’d have to be in Cleveland for that, so…tossup?

  1. Bonnie Tyler, “Total Eclipse of the Heart”: Let’s go ahead and get the most obvious one out of the way first. Yes, this is gonna be on everyone’s eclipse playlist. Yes, it is very, very obvious. It’s still a good song, though.
  2. Pink Floyd, “Brain Damage/Eclipse”: The other most obvious choice. Well, half of it is, anyway. But I feel like you can’t really play “Eclipse” without first playing “Brain Damage.” It’s like playing “Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2” without playing “The Happiest Days of Our Lives.” Y’know, I’m starting to think this is a specific Pink Floyd issue…
  3. Bruce Springsteen, “Darkness on the Edge of Town”: Now, we get into some less obvious tracks. Yes, it’s more of a sunset, metaphorical darkness in the Springsteen song, but that doesn’t mean it couldn’t have also applied to a total solar eclipse. Springsteen’s songs are multifaceted, I tell ya!
  4. David Gray, “Red Moon”: While the occluded sun is the obvious star of the day (pun definitely intended), let’s not forget the one who’s making it all possible: the moon!
  5. U2, “Staring at the Sun”: Let us say a quick prayer for all the optometrists who will be seeing folks over the next few weeks who are complaining about not being able to see a damn thing ’cause they literally stared at the sun without any protection or forethought.
  6. Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, “Straight Into Darkness”: Again, a more metaphorical darkness than what we’re really dealing with during the eclipse, but do you know how rarely eclipses are the subject of songwriting? There’s not a lot out there, is what I’m saying, so you take what you can get, especially if it’s a kickass Tom Petty song.
  7. The Police, “Invisible Sun”: Replaced a previous Police song on the list, “Darkness,” because I think this song is way funnier to have on the list.
  8. The National, “The System Only Dreams in Total Darkness”: Well, get ready, system, ’cause in certain parts of North America this afternoon for about three minutes, you’ll be able to dream!
  9. George Harrison, “Beware of Darkness”: Some folks do think the eclipse is an ominous omen (is that just saying an omen-like omen? I feel like it might be. I don’t care. I’m leaving it in) of ill things to come. I think George Harrison just wanted a nightlight left on so he could find his way to the bathroom.
  10. Bob Seger, “Sunspot Baby”: I think Bob Seger is a criminally-underrated songwriter who’s built like the Platonic ideal of “Dad Bod” and just put together the best bar band you’ve ever heard. And did you know that sunspots are cool enough that water vapor can exist in them? Isn’t that wild?

Playlist #153 – Annabelle the Horsewoman

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Happy Tuesday, folks! I returned from the great wide west to my humble abode in Virginia safe and sound. And today is eldest niece Annabelle’s birthday! In her honor, all of the songs have to do with horses, ’cause that girl is equestrian.

  1. Bob Dylan, “All The Tired Horses”: The kickoff to the infamous Self Portrait album doesn’t even feature any Dylan vocals. Which probably should’ve been a sign to folks, I think.
  2. Moxy Fruvous, “Horseshoes”: “You keep handin’ out horseshoes/Horseshoes have gotta be tossed.”
  3. America, “Horse With No Name”: Spoiler alert: you don’t have to keep riding a nameless horse. You can give it a name anytime you want. Horses don’t care. They don’t know their names.
  4. Bruce Springsteen, “Silver Palomino”: According to britannica.com., a palomino is a “colour type of horse distinguished by its cream, yellow, or gold coat and white or silver mane and tail.” Which…I mean, I guess you can refer to a horse by its mane color primarily, sorta like we do with hair color, except humans aren’t completely covered in hair that gives us a much better descriptor we could use, Bruce.
  5. Aerosmith, “Back In The Saddle”: If you fall out of the saddle, this song encourages you to get back up and climb back into it once more. Whereas I would say, “Bugger that for a lark, I’m gonna go have a lie down.” Because I apparently became British when I fell.
  6. Counting Crows, “Another Horsedreamer’s Blues”: Why does dreaming of horses give one the blues? I do not know. Maybe it’s because they’re so expensive?
  7. The Rolling Stones, “Wild Horses”: I dunno, I get the feeling wild horses would not want to be employed, let alone to drag anyone anywhere. But maybe that’s just me.
  8. Soul Coughing, “16 Horses”: I have so many questions. Why is she pushing the horses? Why sixteen of them, specifically? You guys have a lot of explaining to do.
  9. The Beatles, “Dig A Pony”: But not as much explaining as John Lennon has. Why do you dig a pony, John? And how? What is…is this a sex thing? Do I really even want an answer to that question?
  10. Tom Waits, “Pony”: Why does he sound so sad while he sings about riding his pony? I thought these things made people happy. I don’t understand.

Playlist #152 – Talk Singin’

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Happy birthday to me! And happy Wednesday, I guess. I’m currently in the heart of Oklahoma, visiting family. Anyway, here’s a playlist of songs that feature talk singing.

1. Bob Dylan, “Talkin’ John Birch Paranoid Blues”: A tongue in cheek look at the very real John Birch Society, an anti-communist group back in the ‘60s that was more than a little paranoid.

2. Beck, “Loser”: “In the time of chimpanzees, I was a monkey.” If that doesn’t speak to your soul, you probably weren’t in your teens in the ‘90s.

3. Butthole Surfers, “Pepper”: I’m not really sure what this song is about. A group of friends who all die horrible deaths? Maybe. Random word association? Far more likely.

4. Cake, “Never There”: The band that made the donkey call cool again.

5. Shawn Mullins, “Lullaby”: “She’d be a whole lot prettier if she’d smile once in a while” just comes off real creepy, Shawn. Maybe…maybe don’t say things like that in a song, yeah?

6. Soul Coughing, “Blame”: Sampling and bass & drums and repetitive lyrics, oh my.

7. Arlo Guthrie, “Alice’s Restaurant Massacre”: An 18 minute epic that tells the story of Thanksgiving, littering, getting drafted, and getting out of being drafted by telling the psychiatrist you can get anything you want at Alice’s Restaurant and then just walking out.

8. Ted Leo & the Pharmacists, “Bomb. Repeat. Bomb.”: A raucous, punky song that rips.

9. Van Morrison, “And the Healing has Begun”: The featured spoken-word section really makes the song drag, but it’s still a fun tune.

10. Harry Nilsson, “Everybody’s Talkin’”: There’s no talk-singing in this song, but the title sure fits.

Playlist #151: Women’s History Month

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Happy Monday, folks! A slightly chilly Monday as winter tries its damnedest to cling to life in its final week. Here are ten songs, all by some of my favorite female artists, in celebration of Women’s History Month.

  1. Waxahatchee, “War”: This song was stuck in my head for a good part of the weekend. Which would’ve been fine if I could’ve remembered the name of the song and who it was by, but I couldn’t. Then I remembered. ADHD is a bitch sometimes.
  2. Hurray for the Riff Raff, “Snake Planet (The Past Is Still Alive)”: So I’m, like, 90% sure Alynda Segarra is non-binary, but I’m still gonna count them for this list? They’ve got a good voice and are doing interesting things with Americana, so I dig ’em.
  3. Aimee Mann, “Stranger Into Starman”: Every time I try to come up with an Aimee Mann song to put on a playlist, this is always the first song that pops into my head. Is it her best song? No. Is it the most memorable? Probably not. Is it one that I absolutely love and will listen to over and over because I love it and I love her voice? Oh my, yes.
  4. Alabama Shakes, “Gimme All Your Love”: Damn, this woman’s voice. She could sing the phonebook and I’d be enthralled.
  5. Alison Krauss & Union Station, “Doesn’t Have To Be This Way”: I didn’t sleep well last night, and there’s the chance that listening to this song will put me back to sleep. But that’s okay, because it’s such a beautiful song to drift off to.
  6. Amanda Palmer & Friends, “Beds Are Burning”: Who doesn’t love an Australian cover? New Zealanders, that’s who.
  7. Aretha Franklin, “Respect”: When you mention the Queen’s name, you’d best put some respect on it.
  8. Dolly Parton, “Seven Bridges Road”: A perfect match of a voice and a song.
  9. Elastica, “Stutter”: Who doesn’t love surreptitious songs about erectile dysfunction?
  10. Nina Simone, “Feeling Good”: But damn, this woman had a voice that could make a dead man walk.

Playlist #150: Phil Collins, Face Value

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No, I’m not abandoning the weekly playlists. I just wanted to try something different! So instead, I’ll be occasionally spotlighting albums that were important to my growth and development as a music appreciator. We’re starting off with 1981’s Face Value, from Genesis drummer and balding guy hero Phil Collins.

Man, this is a weird album. Like, truly strange. The huge drums in that first song, “In the Air Tonight,” obviously need no introduction, as that drum fill is one of the most iconic in music history. But as hypnotic and disturbing as that opening track is, the album gets even stranger from there on out. Collins indulges in blue-eyed soul, ’80s R&B, and . . . I’m honestly not even sure how to describe most of the songs on this album. They don’t seem to belong to any one specific genre, and they borrow from so many musical traditions that it’s hard to pin down exactly what he was trying to accomplish here. It’s like he threw a bunch of stuff at the wall, saw a good chunk of it was sticking, and just said, “let’s go with all of it,” and threw a bunch more random stuff at the wall.

So, after “In the Air Tonight,” the album plays around with that blue-eyed soul that I mentioned earlier for a couple of songs. This is pretty familiar territory for a Phil Collins solo album (or, at least, it will become familiar territory for such an album. This is his first solo outing, after all). “This Must Be Love” wouldn’t sound out of place on an Aaron Neville album from the same time period, honestly, and neither would “Behind the Lines.” They’re solid love songs, slickly produced. He’ll return to this style – with more punch and horns – on “I Missed Again,” another obvious highlight.

But tracks four and five are where Collins seems to go off the pop rails. I described “The Roof is Leaking” on last week’s playlist, where I essentially called it one of the more harrowing songs about homesteading I’d ever heard. And he does all of it with just a piano, a banjo, and a slide guitar. It’s awesome and dark and I kind of love it. This dovetails into “Drone,” which features African-tinged drums and wordless vocals. It sounds like something Pink Floyd would’ve done if they’d tried to make Ummagumma in the ’80s.

“You Know What I Mean” is the sort of ballad that Phil Collins created a whole new career out of singing in the ’80s. It’s all pianos and strings and manages to sound sincere and bittersweet without falling too deep into schmaltz, which is a nifty and difficult trick to pull off. “Thunder and Lightning” is the ’70s Earth, Wind, and Fire hit you never knew Collins had in him. “I’m Not Moving” is funky. That’s the best word to describe it, and it causes me a bit of pain to think of this guy who could have won “most likely to be a Russian taxi driver” in the late ’70s.

The album closes with a Beatles cover, a ballsy move from anyone. He goes with “Tomorrow Never Knows” and shows folks that Ringo ain’t the only one who knows his way around a drum kit. It’s weird and pulsing and almost psychedelic, if just a little too polished to quite fit that style.

It’s a weird pop album, which is pretty fitting for 1981, which I feel was something of a transitional time in pop music. If someone as self-effacing and goofy as Phil Collins could become an adult contemporary superstar back then, anyone could make it. Of course, that also assumes they could write songs as good as the ones that were on Face Value, and that’s a higher bar to clear.

Playlist #149

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Happy Monday, folks. We’re into March now, which means my birthday is coming up (and what better way to celebrate than to buy one of my books or listen to one of my albums?). Anyway, here’s this week’s playlist.

  1. Hurray for the Riff Raff, “Colossus of Roads”: I probably made a mistake listening to this album first of all of their albums, because none of the rest of their stuff sounds like this. It’s folky and country and Americana and mostly acoustic, and it makes me want to put more slide guitar in my own songs.
  2. Big Star, “Thirteen”: No song has ever encapsulated what it feels like to be a teenager better than this.
  3. Paula Cole, “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone”: Where, indeed?
  4. Phil Collins, “The Roof is Leaking”: Possibly the best song about cold homesteaders the 1980s ever produced.
  5. Rhiannon Giddens and Iron & Wine, “Forever Young”: Who loves a Bob Dylan cover? Iron & Wine loves a Bob Dylan cover. And Rhiannon Giddens. And me.
  6. Rob Thomas, “Streetcorner Symphony”: I will be the first to admit that Rob Thomas does not create what you would call “good” music. It is disposable and forgettable. It adds nothing to one’s life. But damn, while the song is playing, it is everything you ever wanted a song to be.
  7. Shannon McNally, “Bring It On Home”: What can I say, I like it when I hear covers of old blues standards.
  8. Thom Yorke, “And It Rained All Night”: Do you ever get the feeling that maybe all of Thom Yorke’s problems could be solved if he just got a little bit more sun?
  9. The Yardbirds, “For Your Love”: Yeah, it’s a Yardbirds song without a guitar solo, which feels a bit like blasphemy, but it’s still a damn good song.
  10. Waxahatchee, “Oxbow”: Hey, they have a new album coming out this year, don’t they? I’mma listen to that.

Playlists #147 and #148

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Good morning and happy Monday, folks. I’m back from Oklahoma. We had to have a funeral for my grandmother who passed away on the 17th. Here are two playlists to make up for missing last week. The first is a selection of my songs, while the second is just a list of songs I’ve been listening to lately.

Playlist #147: A Whitman’s Sampler of Charlie Cottrell Songs

  1. “Unanswered Prayers”: I still love the slide guitar on this one.
  2. “Saint Joan”: Clif really likes how slightly off-kilter the piano on this one is, and I have a hard time disagreeing with him.
  3. “Complete Control”: One of my better rockers.
  4. “I Wish You Would”: I feel like this song could’ve been recorded anytime between 1967 and yesterday. Dig that Bakersfield guitar solo.
  5. “Oh, My Love”: The vocals on this one were overdriven a bit on purpose, and I’m probably most-proud of those guitar solos.
  6. “Dark On My Street”: Still one of the best-recorded songs I’ve ever done; Clif played all the instruments on this one.
  7. “Burnt Offering 2”: If there’s one song that illustrates how important it is to have a good collaborator working on your songs with you, it’s this one. Clif took what I’d recorded and turned it into a powerful, dare I say beautiful song.
  8. “My Head’s Not Equipped To Deal With This Bliss”: An older song that I recorded for the latest album. The new album, Middle Aged Heartthrob, is half old songs, half brand-new songs.
  9. “Losing Sleep”: Just me grappling with death, the passage of time, the collapse of American society, and my reading list.
  10. “The Ocean Just Gets In The Way”: This was originally going to be the closer for the new album, but then Clif went and recorded that little banjo bit at the end of “As Shadows Lengthen” and it just felt like the perfect way to end the album, so this became the penultimate song.

Playlist #148

  1. The Low Anthem, “Champion Angels”: I’ve spent most of this morning listening to Oh My God, Charlie Darwin, and this is one of my favorite songs on there.
  2. Martin Sexton, “Diner”: I blame the TV show Scrubs for this one.
  3. The Mountain Goats, “Fall of the Star High School Running Back”: Who doesn’t love a story of a high school football star who gets injured, starts taking pain medication, then starts selling pain meds for profit?
  4. Norah Jones, “The Long Way Home”: Not the Supertramp song, but the Tom Waits song of similar name.
  5. Ondara, “Torch Song”: I like the simplicity of the instrumentation on this one. Mostly just acoustic guitar and standup bass.
  6. Wings, “Helen Wheels”: McCartney rarely rocked out that hard, but this one rips.
  7. Brian Fallon, “Forget Me Not”: I still like the way he shouts the girl’s name, “Stacy!” at the beginning of the verse.
  8. Jars of Clay, “Reckless Forgiver”: I like the idea of reckless forgiveness. It takes a concept that is usually so carefully considered – forgiveness – and says just give that to everyone, everywhere, regardless of anything. It’s a nice idea.
  9. David Gray, “Easy Way to Cry”: I was on a David Gray kick on the drive home this weekend, listening to several of his albums back to back. This one always sits with me afterwards.
  10. Josh Ritter, “Monster Ballads”: I often wish I was a better lower-register singer. Songs like this make me rue that lack even more.