Friday Playlist

I’m going to try to mix these up a little more than I have been lately. The focus will still be on sharing new(-ish) music. But I’m also going to throw in a few more older songs each week, just to stretch this out a little and make it feel a little more like my old podcast. If I could figure out a way to put my own vocal commentary between Spotify tracks, I would re-launch that podcast. Alas, I’m not that smart and don’t want to go out and buy every song I share each week so that I can record. A simple playlist is probably better for all of you, anyway. So just imagine my voice as you read through the little tidbits I share for each of these songs.

“Desire” – Liza Anne
I’m deep in a run of the music I listen to being dominated by female artists. It’s been several years now and shows no sign of abating. Nashville’s Liza Anne comes at that sound from a slightly different angle. The crunchy guitars lends this song a heavier, late 90s feel while her vocals don’t sound too far away from Phoebe Bridgers.

“Kyoto” – Phoebe Bridgers
Speaking of Phoebe, another new track from her in advance of her upcoming album. On this you can hear the influence of her work with Conor Oberst in Better Oblivion Community Center. The brightness here was not present on her first album.

“Never Destination” – Pearl Jam
I should go back and look, but this may be the first time since I’ve had this blog that I have not reviewed a new Pearl Jam album. I’ve listened to Gigaton a little bit over the past month. It’s ok. I like a few tracks quite a bit, the rest kind of blend together. This track is not a throw-back; the lyrics don’t make you think of “Jeremy” or “Animal” or “Corduroy,” etc. But it is nice to hear the band cut loose and clearly enjoy playing together on a track that should get you at least stomping your foot if not jumping around a little bit.

“Sunflower” – Dizzy
There are a lot of songs about sunflowers out there. My girls loved Post Malone’s from last year (I liked it, too). Vampire Weekend had a popular one. I think back to Paw’s song about jealousy in the Lawrence, KS music scene from the mid–90s. This Canadian group adds their name to the list with this gorgeous, breezy track.

“Hole In the Ice” – Neil Finn
I’ve been trying to listen to an album, start to finish, every day. A few days back I went through Finn’s 2002 disk One All, which is filled with great tracks.[1] This is one of those tracks that doesn’t stick out at first, but slowly burrows its way into your head and reveals itself over time.

“Long Time Coming” – Delays
A band that showed tremendous promise in the early-mid ‘00s produced a song that I listened to endlessly back in the spring of 2005. I first heard a live version of this the band recorded for a BBC show and fell in love with it. That was back in the days when I would listen to a song over-and-over again if I liked it. I remember listening to this song endlessly while I ran errands one day, hitting the back button on my iPod as soon as it ended to start it again. For all that, I had kind of forgotten about it until I did a review of my iTunes catalog recently to add some more tracks to my Spotify Liked Songs list. Glad I re-found it, as it remains glorious.

“Heart of Glass” – Blondie
Tom Breihan’s The Number Ones is about to cross into 1981, so it’s been a couple months since he posted his review of this, Blondie’s first #1 hit which peaked in 1979. It’s a near perfect song of its era, and this is a nearly perfect video. My biggest memory of the song? Remember Chu Bops, the bubble gum pressed into the shape of an album that came in a mini-album sleeve? The only one of those I ever remember having was for “Heart of Glass.” It took me a few moments of debate to decide if I should actually chew the gum or keep the package sealed as a collectors item. I made the smart decision and chewed the gum. Oooh-oooh, aaah-aaah…

(Coincidentally today’s The Number Ones entry is another Blondie song.)