fun.

Playlist #126

/ xeyeti / Leave a comment

It’s a Tuesday following a holiday on a Monday, which makes it a Playlist day! The next Eddie Hazzard book, a short story collection titled Quick Cases, is up for pre-order! I’ll post the cover reveal as soon as I have it back from my illustrator.

  1. Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit, “Death Wish”: Isbell’s latest album, Weathervanes, continues to drill deep into my soul.
  2. Pearl Jam, “Corduroy”: Was Vitalogy the last truly great Pearl Jam record? Or was it Vs?
  3. EL VY, “Happiness, Missouri”: This is a two-minute shot of adrenaline right in the arm.
  4. The Raconteurs, “Carolina Drama”: Who is Billy’s daddy? Is it the priest or the milkman?
  5. Rhett Miller, “The El”: The most romantic song written about a public transit system since…um, ever, I guess. I can’t think of any other romance songs based around public transit.
  6. Yola & the Highwomen, “Hold On”: No, it’s not a Wilson Philips cover, sadly. It’s still a good song, though.
  7. Fun., “Carry On”: It’s a fun song by Fun. I’m always a bit suspicious of bands that include punctuation in their name. I’ve got my eye on you, band that hasn’t released an album since 2012.
  8. Foo Fighters, “These Days”: Hey, it’s a Foo Fighters song I can play on guitar! What fun!
  9. Florence + the Machine, “Shake It Out”: Every Florence + the Machine song feels like running an anthematic marathon, and I am exhausted at the end of it.
  10. Electric Light Orchestra, “Eldorado”: I had an argument (or a debate or whatever) with my brother over the weekend in regards to this album. I claim it’s their most consistent album, thematically and stylistically. He argues that the point of ELO is that Jeff Lynne had so much more diverse inspirations than your typical ’70s rock band and that cohesion was never the point. I think he’s just mad about “The Whale” on Out of the Blue).

Playlist #111

/ xeyeti / Leave a comment

Happy Monday, folks. It’s the last week of school finally, and all the kids (and teachers) are antsy to get the heck outta Dodge. Here’s a new playlist for ya.

  1. Jenny Lewis, “Joy’All”: Nothing Jenny Lewis has done since Rabbit Fur Coat has really grabbed me like that one album did. This song, off the album of the same title (pronounced “Joy y’all”) is good, but it feels too…by the numbers? It’s a retread of stuff she’s done better in the past.
  2. Foo Fighters, “Hearing Voices”: There was so much new music I was interested in released last week that I still haven’t listened to it all (I’m partway through this Foo Fighters album, for instance, and haven’t even started on Janelle Monae’s new one yet!). That said, this song – and, to some extent, the entire album – are all about the Foos dealing with the loss of longtime drummer Taylor Hawkins.
  3. Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit, “King Of Oklahoma”: I was probably predisposed to liking this song just given its title (and the fact that it’s a Jason Isbell song), but the fact that it rings true probably also helps.
  4. Hawksley Workman, “Ilfracombe”: Heard this in a store? Or on a TV show I was watching? I don’t recall, exactly, but it grabbed my attention at the time, and I kinda dig it. No, wait, it was on NPR. That’s it.
  5. Bob Dylan, “What Was It You Wanted”: Dylan recently released Shadow Kingdom, a sort of live-in-the-studio-reimagining of some of his classic songs featuring a backing band of several guitars, a bass, and an accordion. As an interpreter of other people’s songs and, of course, of his own, Dylan remains a fascinating study. These tracks are all stripped down and rebuilt from the ground up, using different melodies and rhythms that make them feel familiar and completely unfamiliar all at once. And they’re all mercifully short: no 40-verse versions of anything here.
  6. Rufus Wainwright, “Harvest (featuring Andrew Bird and Chris Stills)”: A beautiful rendition of a Neil Young classic. Wainwright lets his collaborators take the lead and offers some beautiful vocals of his own.
  7. 40 Watt Sun, “Behind My Eyes”: A song for when you want to slow everything way down and maybe take a nap.
  8. Wilco, “Whole Love”: I’ve started developing a taste for latter-day Wilco, which apparently includes this album that came out 12 years ago now somehow.
  9. Fun., “We Are Young (featuring Janelle Monae)”: See, I haven’t listened to her new album yet, but I still found a way to slip her onto the playlist this week anyway.
  10. Hank Williams, “You Win Again”: Hank knew how to write a tear-jerker, woe-is-me song.

Playlist #19

/ xeyeti / Leave a comment

Week three of the school year rattles on. Here’s some tunes to carry you through.

  1. Gin Blossoms, “Just South of Nowhere”: The Gin Blossoms have become one of my favorite bands from the 90s, and this is one of my favorites by them. Pre-New Miserable Experience.
  2. Electric Light Orchestra, “Daybreaker”: An instrumental from the Jeff Lynne-led band. It’s off of On the Third Day, where ELO really became ELO.
  3. Rhiannon Giddens, “Better Get It Right the First Time”: This woman can write a damn song, lemme tell you. She also plays a mean banjo, though that’s not present on this track. This is more of an old-school R&B number, with a rap break that actually really works well.
  4. Robert Earl Keen, “The Road Goes On Forever (Live)”: “The road goes on forever/and the party never ends,” he sings, and I’m still not sure if that’s a statement of undeniable fact or a plea to never let go.
  5. The Who, “The Seeker”: Any song that references the Beatles, Bob Dylan, and Timothy Leary in the same verse is some kinda wonderful.
  6. Patti Smith, “Because The Night”: When Bruce Springsteen gives you an unfinished song, you take it and you rock it out. Patti Smith definitely did.
  7. Paul McCartney, “Brown Eyed Handsome Man”: Shortly after his first wife, Linda, passed away, Paul got into the studio with a bunch of buddies (including guitarist David Gilmore) to record a bunch of old 50s rockers and a few new tracks written in the same vein. They slap. They all slap. This one especially.
  8. Dawes, “That Western Skyline”: The first song off their first album is filled with so much promise. So much. Those Laurel Canyon harmonies are just perfect. The rest of the album – and honestly, everything they’ve put out since – feels like a failure of that promise.
  9. fun., “Some Nights”: Another band that falls flat right after their first song or two. Maybe what I expected from this song and what the band actually want to do are two very different things.
  10. Elliott Smith, “Either/Or”: It strikes me to this day that Elliott Smith died far too young. If I can be half – hell, even a quarter – of the guitar player or musician or songwriter that he was, I’d be perfectly happy with that.