My Imaginary Top 20 "Songs" of the Week
I love mp3s for one simple reason. I love programming my own endless radio station in iTunes. I have a few specific playlists to the side, but I rarely listen to them any longer. I have one playlist simply called "Radio" that could play for 24.1 days, contains 8621 items, and takes up a whopping 58.6 GB.
I keep the next 250 songs pretty much well cared for, carefully selected for balance and compatibility. The next 3000 songs are also like this because when I've played 10 or a 100 songs I often move huge chunks of songs I don't want to listen to again (at the moment) down as near complete programmed pods, as it were.
Anyway, it changes so often, my current playlist. So I'm going to make a list every week or so of the songs that have dominated my listening this past week. The songs I keep playing over and over. The hits. Not necessarily in this order, but the number one song is definitely my favorite newly discovered song of this week.
1. Sinner Man - Nina Simone
2. Mississippi Goddam, Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood, I Put A Spell On You, See-Line Woman, Ne me quitte pas and others - Nina Simone (from The Best of Nina Simone)
3. 12 and Black Tables - Other Lives (after I check my budget, I'm rushing out to get their new album)
4. Set Fire To the Rain, Someone Like You, Rolling in the Deep - Adele
5. Black Water and Woman - Timbre Timber
6. Five-O and Skindiving - James (from the 1993 album Laid but I'm just discovering this album this year)
7. Sad Song and Blue Tip - The Cars (new!)
8. Warpath - Esben & The Witch (indescribably trippy)
9. Dog Days Are Over - Florence and the Machine
10. Tuareg Dancehall - Highlife
11. The Edge of Glory and others from Born This Way - Lady Gaga alongside Born To Run, Jungleland, and Backstreets - Bruce Springsteen
12. The Longest Road and Strange Condition - Morgan Page with Lissie
13. In Sleep, Bully, Oh, Mississippi, Here Before and many others - Lissie (favorite new artist of the past year)
14. Face in the Crowd - Cat's Eye (and I plan to buy some of this singer's main band's music, The Horrors. This is an incredibly fun piece of music, firmly 2011 sound but reminiscent of 1960s gogo/beat music in a way. When I hear this song I think of James Bond for some reason)
15. So Beautiful or So What, Rewrite, The Afterlife, Amulet, Love is Eternal Sacred Light, Questions for the Angels, - Paul Simon
16. Yes We Can Can and Fairytale - The Pointer Sisters
17. Talking To The Moon, Liquor Store Blues, Runaway Baby, Grenade, Just The Way You Are - Bruno Mars (guilty pleasure. Sue me.)
18. Dancing Days, Over the Hills and Faraway, Misty Mountain Hop, When the Levee Breaks, The Ocean - Led Zeppelin and Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down, Angel Dance and Central Two-O-Nine - Robert Plant and Nothin' and Let Your Loss Be Your Lesson - Robert Plant and Alison Krauss
19. Record Collection - Mark Ronson & The Business International featuring Simon LeBon and Somebody To Love Me - Mark Ronson & The Business International featuring Boy George
20. A Change Is Gonna Come, Tomorrow Never Knows, The Times They Are A Changing, Imagine, Timilant Tallay/Exodus, La Tierra and Space Captain - Herbie Hancock and Tomorrow Never Knows - The Beatles
21. Swim - DJ Cam
22. The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, No Knock, Whitey's On The Moon, Lady Jane and John Coltraine, Me and the Devil - Gil Scott Heron (RIP)
23. I Got A Line On You - Spirit
24. Dave Clark Five's Greatest Hits
25. You Were Never There and Separate Lives - Diego Garcia
And heapings and tastes of:
Wye Oak, Mumford & Sons, Cage the Elephant, David Bowie, Leon Russell, Bat For Lashes, Carolina Chocolate Drops, MGMT, Broken Bells, Monsters of Folk, Bright Eyes, My Morning Jacket, Wanda Jackson, Loretta Lynn, Vieux Farka Toure, Paul McCartney/Wings, The Beatles, Damien Marley, Midlake, The Civil Wars, Corey Chisel and the Wandering Sons
I owe a large part of my vast library to the free podcasts and downloads of KCRW, KEXP, Minnesota Public Radio, iTunes, and Spin magazine.
That's this week's tendencies. I'll check in again next week or so.
I keep the next 250 songs pretty much well cared for, carefully selected for balance and compatibility. The next 3000 songs are also like this because when I've played 10 or a 100 songs I often move huge chunks of songs I don't want to listen to again (at the moment) down as near complete programmed pods, as it were.
Anyway, it changes so often, my current playlist. So I'm going to make a list every week or so of the songs that have dominated my listening this past week. The songs I keep playing over and over. The hits. Not necessarily in this order, but the number one song is definitely my favorite newly discovered song of this week.
1. Sinner Man - Nina Simone
2. Mississippi Goddam, Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood, I Put A Spell On You, See-Line Woman, Ne me quitte pas and others - Nina Simone (from The Best of Nina Simone)
3. 12 and Black Tables - Other Lives (after I check my budget, I'm rushing out to get their new album)
4. Set Fire To the Rain, Someone Like You, Rolling in the Deep - Adele
5. Black Water and Woman - Timbre Timber
6. Five-O and Skindiving - James (from the 1993 album Laid but I'm just discovering this album this year)
7. Sad Song and Blue Tip - The Cars (new!)
8. Warpath - Esben & The Witch (indescribably trippy)
9. Dog Days Are Over - Florence and the Machine
10. Tuareg Dancehall - Highlife
11. The Edge of Glory and others from Born This Way - Lady Gaga alongside Born To Run, Jungleland, and Backstreets - Bruce Springsteen
12. The Longest Road and Strange Condition - Morgan Page with Lissie
13. In Sleep, Bully, Oh, Mississippi, Here Before and many others - Lissie (favorite new artist of the past year)
14. Face in the Crowd - Cat's Eye (and I plan to buy some of this singer's main band's music, The Horrors. This is an incredibly fun piece of music, firmly 2011 sound but reminiscent of 1960s gogo/beat music in a way. When I hear this song I think of James Bond for some reason)
15. So Beautiful or So What, Rewrite, The Afterlife, Amulet, Love is Eternal Sacred Light, Questions for the Angels, - Paul Simon
16. Yes We Can Can and Fairytale - The Pointer Sisters
17. Talking To The Moon, Liquor Store Blues, Runaway Baby, Grenade, Just The Way You Are - Bruno Mars (guilty pleasure. Sue me.)
18. Dancing Days, Over the Hills and Faraway, Misty Mountain Hop, When the Levee Breaks, The Ocean - Led Zeppelin and Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down, Angel Dance and Central Two-O-Nine - Robert Plant and Nothin' and Let Your Loss Be Your Lesson - Robert Plant and Alison Krauss
19. Record Collection - Mark Ronson & The Business International featuring Simon LeBon and Somebody To Love Me - Mark Ronson & The Business International featuring Boy George
20. A Change Is Gonna Come, Tomorrow Never Knows, The Times They Are A Changing, Imagine, Timilant Tallay/Exodus, La Tierra and Space Captain - Herbie Hancock and Tomorrow Never Knows - The Beatles
21. Swim - DJ Cam
22. The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, No Knock, Whitey's On The Moon, Lady Jane and John Coltraine, Me and the Devil - Gil Scott Heron (RIP)
23. I Got A Line On You - Spirit
24. Dave Clark Five's Greatest Hits
25. You Were Never There and Separate Lives - Diego Garcia
And heapings and tastes of:
Wye Oak, Mumford & Sons, Cage the Elephant, David Bowie, Leon Russell, Bat For Lashes, Carolina Chocolate Drops, MGMT, Broken Bells, Monsters of Folk, Bright Eyes, My Morning Jacket, Wanda Jackson, Loretta Lynn, Vieux Farka Toure, Paul McCartney/Wings, The Beatles, Damien Marley, Midlake, The Civil Wars, Corey Chisel and the Wandering Sons
I owe a large part of my vast library to the free podcasts and downloads of KCRW, KEXP, Minnesota Public Radio, iTunes, and Spin magazine.
That's this week's tendencies. I'll check in again next week or so.