Mix Tapes for Sep 17, "My Counter-Culture Crush" and "Thanks for the Music"
Since I haven't posted one of these in a while, I have two of them.
The first one, titled "My Counter-Culture Crush", is inspired by a recent crush of mine. The crush's identity doesn't matter, but what I'm struck by is her distinctive taste and aesthetics. I mean, she doesn't play "Wipeout" on the drums or hand out the Bhagavad Gita, like Ben Fold's Kate, but she might as well. Apparently, this phenomenon of stylish crushes is a pretty obvious concept for songs, since I've noticed there's a bunch of these songs out there, and that they are all quite the same in terms of sentiment, only the detail of the particular counter-culture the crush seems to belong to changes -- Disco, Rock'n'Roll, Mod, or Punk for the BMX Bandits; Beat for Talulah Gosh; Punk again for The Math & Physics Club; Ben Fold's crush seems to be a Burnout; Supergrass have always been attracted to the plain weird; and the scuzziest of all countercultures, Eurotrash, for Cracker -- this one has to be a joke.
The second one, titled "Thanks for the Music", is a set of songs by some great artists that are dedicated to their musical heroes and influences. Stevie Wonder, gives a general ode to jazz and big band music, but focuses on Duke Ellington. Paul Westerberg of The Replacements doesn't hide his love of Big Star's Alex Chilton. David Bowie writes a loving song that starts out praising the power of Dylan's protest songs ("words of truthful vengeance"), but then seems to veer and focus on a persistent fan, whom "a couple of songs from your old scrap book could send ... home again". Regina Spektor paints an impressionist picture of Lady Day singing the blues in a smoke-filled room, bringing a tough audience to tears. Finally, The Boo Radleys reference the Beatles in "The White Noise Revisited", but it is about the therapeutic effect of listening to music -- really listening: letting it permeate you, feeling it deeply, and meditating.
As my new, post-muxtape, mix-tape solution (http://stencil.homedns.org:8181/) allows me to have multiple tapes on, I will upload over the next while all of my earlier mix-tapes.
The first one, titled "My Counter-Culture Crush", is inspired by a recent crush of mine. The crush's identity doesn't matter, but what I'm struck by is her distinctive taste and aesthetics. I mean, she doesn't play "Wipeout" on the drums or hand out the Bhagavad Gita, like Ben Fold's Kate, but she might as well. Apparently, this phenomenon of stylish crushes is a pretty obvious concept for songs, since I've noticed there's a bunch of these songs out there, and that they are all quite the same in terms of sentiment, only the detail of the particular counter-culture the crush seems to belong to changes -- Disco, Rock'n'Roll, Mod, or Punk for the BMX Bandits; Beat for Talulah Gosh; Punk again for The Math & Physics Club; Ben Fold's crush seems to be a Burnout; Supergrass have always been attracted to the plain weird; and the scuzziest of all countercultures, Eurotrash, for Cracker -- this one has to be a joke.
The second one, titled "Thanks for the Music", is a set of songs by some great artists that are dedicated to their musical heroes and influences. Stevie Wonder, gives a general ode to jazz and big band music, but focuses on Duke Ellington. Paul Westerberg of The Replacements doesn't hide his love of Big Star's Alex Chilton. David Bowie writes a loving song that starts out praising the power of Dylan's protest songs ("words of truthful vengeance"), but then seems to veer and focus on a persistent fan, whom "a couple of songs from your old scrap book could send ... home again". Regina Spektor paints an impressionist picture of Lady Day singing the blues in a smoke-filled room, bringing a tough audience to tears. Finally, The Boo Radleys reference the Beatles in "The White Noise Revisited", but it is about the therapeutic effect of listening to music -- really listening: letting it permeate you, feeling it deeply, and meditating.
As my new, post-muxtape, mix-tape solution (http://stencil.homedns.org:8181/) allows me to have multiple tapes on, I will upload over the next while all of my earlier mix-tapes.