Friday Playlist
NSFW Warning A very raw track included this week. I’ll note it below so you can skip if needed.
Since returning to Apple Music a year-and-a-half ago, my daily playlist has pulled in songs from over a dozen smart lists. I’ve carefully designed it to ensure I am balancing new music and old. The master smart playlist is capped at 100 songs.
This week I noticed it was often filled with less than 100 tracks. 95, 96, somewhere in there. The cause? The new music has really dried up over the past month. For much of this year it felt like I was flooded with new tracks, and couldn’t work through the queue fast enough to whittle them down to 10 or so each Friday. The last few weeks it has been tougher to build these, but those numbers confirmed that we are in a bit of a lull.
That means this week I’ll throw in a few older tracks to fill things out.
“Hypersonic Missiles” - Sam Fender. This song has been going through my head for a couple days. With the lack of new music, might as well kick off this week with my #3 song of 2019. Sam’s come a long way since this, which was his introduction to the US audience. Who knew seven years ago this guy would eventually land the longest lasting #1 song in British chart history?
“Overthinker” - CHVRCHES. I’ve only listened to this three times, so I may be a bit premature, but this is one of CHVRCHES best songs ever.
“Wish Upon You” - Florence Road. This group of Irish ladies have some Maggie Rogers vibes. At least on this track.
“Dormir Tarde” - Mourn. Translated: sleep late. We all get to do that this Sunday. Remember to set your clocks back an hour!
“Chopping Mountain” - Ibibio Sound Machine. No one else makes music quite like ISM. Thank goodness we have them.
“Solace of You” - Living Colour. Being in Lawrence in the fall made me think of music I listened to this time of year during my time living there. Then the algorithm spit this out Wednesday and I knew that, as always, it is tapped into my deepest thoughts. Creepy.
“Ghost’s Host” - Classic Traffic. Needed one “spooky” song for this week. Not sure this really qualifies but it’s what I have.
“Mind Playing Tricks On Me” - Geto Boys. NSFW Warning OK, two spooky songs, and I nearly forgot about this. “This year Halloween fell on a weekend…”
“Ah! Leah!” - Donnie Iris. Iris had three Top 40 hits as a solo artist, this the biggest, making it to #29 in early 1981. I wouldn’t call it a forgotten classic, but it is one that a lot of folks recall fondly. Me included. I had no idea this was originally written as an anti-war song, but when Iris and his co-writer realized a friend of theirs had dated a woman named Leah, and her name fit their original melody, they totally changed what it was about. I also had no idea this has long been a theme song for all things Pittsburgh, thanks to that being Iris’ home region. He passed away this week at the age of 83. RIP.
“Thriller” - Michael Jackson. Michael would probably like that there are three different versions of this video available, ranging from just under four minutes to nearly 14. I chose the middle option. Happy Halloween everyone!