Friday Playlist

A juicy list this week with a bunch of good, new tracks; a throwback; a re-imagined classic; and another by a classic artist that is new to me.

“New Distraction” – fanclubwallet
Perfect, late summer song. Our three weeks of False Fall have passed and it is going to be in the 90s much of the coming week, so the song fits the moment in our part of the world.

“56 Nervous Breakdowns” – Luke Maines & Peter Buck
The latest release by the (kind of) ongoing project featuring Maines of Auteurs and Buck, formerly of R.E.M.

“Hey You” – The Belair Lip Balms
An Australian band signed to Jack White’s label? I’m all in based on that alone. The band name is kind of dumb, though.

“In Your Head” – Nation of Language
Not many bands do synth pop like this, that both honors the classic, Eighties stuff and stands on its own, as well as NoL.

“Wonder” – Danger Mouse and MorMor
Tom Breihan called this track “new-wave soul,” a description I quite like.

“Young Offenders” – Spiritual Cramp
An up-tempo song about having fun with your friends? Yes, please!

“Guard Dog” – Snooper
Another single from Jack White’s Third Man Records, this one more punky than the first. Good use of dog barks and cowbell!

“freefall” – Jane Inc.
And now our second artist from Toronto (MorMor is also from there). A wonderful track that calls back to the poppy R&B of the early Nineties that crossed racial and musical lines.

“Dance Stamina” – Pluto
A really solid song that would have been out right when I started my old music podcast. This band had a big moment in their homeland of New Zealand, with this song spending over half a year on their Top 40, and the album going double platinum. Their Wikipedia page is kind of fun, written either by a superfan or someone in the band trying to bend the narrative.

“Born In The USA (Electric Nebraska)” – Bruce Springsteen
What a year for the true Springsteen Heads. First the box set that featured seven albums that had been sitting in his vaults for decades. A movie about the making of his Nebraska album later this fall, starring Jeremy Allen White. To go along with that, a remastered version of that 1982 album that includes perhaps the holy grail of Bruce’s vault: the mythical “Electric Nebraska” album. After recording Nebraska on his own, he took the songs to the E. Street Band. He was dissatisfied with how they turned out and shelved them, releasing his original, spare takes.

Included in those sessions were early work on some of the songs that ended up on the Born In The USA album in 1984. Including this, which sounds nothing like the album version and is completely awesome. It is much more raw and immediate than the synth-heavy version that ended up on Born In The USA. I hear some Credence Clearwater Revival. That fits. The message of the song is far less ambiguous in this form, but given how people still don’t understand what “Fortunate Son” is about, I’m not sure if “BITUSA” wouldn’t have still been hijacked by people who didn’t bother to listen to its message had this been the version sent to radio stations.

“Union City Blues” – Blondie
The other night my uncle asked what I thought of this song. I had to admit I had never heard it, or at least didn’t remember ever hearing it. Pretty good track. The video, though, is something else. I had never seen Debbie Harry play guitar before, for starters. And then the second half? Well, I guess you shouldn’t ask white men on drugs to dance while filming.