Wow, is it Friday already? Time to kick off the new year with some new tunes. open.spotify.com/playlist/… “All Is On My Side” - Sam Fender. Two weeks ago one of my brothers-in-music sent me a message saying that he was really craving some new War on Drugs music. Two days later this song dropped and I pointed out that his wish had been granted. Fender once again takes the TWOD sound and pops it up a bit.
Happy New Year, everyone! We had our annual boring New Year’s Eve, with a twist. Although we stayed in, M had five friends over for the evening. As we were banishing them to the basement for the evening, S and I cleared out our liquor cabinet and beer fridge down there. It’s the first time we’ve ever done something like that. Although we were reasonably sure the items contained in each would not have been disturbed by M and her friends, we wanted to prevent anyone making a bad choice.
My January 1 stats are always wack, thanks to the flood of Christmas music I listen to each December. With it being a new year and new decade, I will adjust this time to show both my year/decade most listened to artists. 2019 Hatchie - 212 Middle Kids - 183 The War on Drugs - 177 Frightened Rabbit - 165 Prince - 154 Strand of Oaks - 150 Pete Yorn - 149 Sam Fender - 132 Bruce Springsteen - 127 Better Oblivion Community Center - 125 2010s Frightened Rabbit - 3024 The War on Drugs - 2316 Ryan Adams - 2137 Pearl Jam - 1583 The Clash - 1122 Radiohead - 880 The Beatles - 868 Wussy - 815 Crowded House - 814 Dum Dum Girls - 809 Complete stats available at my Last.
I love the turning of the calendar. A new year is an opportunity to look back on what you’ve experienced over the past 12 months while building anticipation for what is to come in the next 12. When the decade is rolling over, that just makes it more fun. I have vivid memories of Christmas break 1979, watching various decade-end retrospectives on TV, hearing ads that pulled the arrival of the ‘80s into their copy, and getting very excited about the new year.
As my post yesterday said, we have closed out the family portion of our Christmas break. Here’s what we were up to over the last week. Like every year, Christmas Eve was a day of manic getting ready. There was prepping as much food as possible for the brunch we were hosting the next day. That included detailed evaluations of what foods/beverages could spend a night in a cooler and what items needed to stay in the steady cool of the fridge.
youtu.be/e6QDVE67j… “The Week Between” - Jonathan Coulton and John Roderick Our house has cleared out. Folks departed last night and this afternoon and now we’ve hit the lull after all the frenzy of the Christmas season. Perfect for listening to this song.
youtu.be/AYwCZqzrm… Every Sample from Beastie Boys’ Paul’s Boutique I figure most of you are on alternate schedules this week. So here’s a bit of a different take on the Friday vid. This person has taken every song sampled on the Beasties’ legendary Paul’s Boutique album and IDed them then offered a snippet of each set against their use on the album. It’s a pretty fun listen if you are as into Paul’s Boutique as I am.
Last week was wild and wacky, which kept me away from my blogging duties. I’ll share some notes to try to get caught up before Christmas. Family News I’m very much a creature of habit. I can adjust most of the time. But when things get too out of whack, I do struggle. Last week we had four different schedules for five days of school. That really messed with my head and I was never sure what day it was or where I was supposed to be.
youtu.be/yXQViqx6G… “All I Want for Christmas Is You” - Mariah Carey This is right up my alley: a holiday music classic that just made chart history. Twenty-five years after its release, “All I Want for Christmas Is You” is currently the #1 song in the country. Because of weird chart rules, it did not officially qualify as a charting single for years and years. But as those rules have been relaxed in the streaming age, “AIWFCIY” has consistently charted in recent years, peaking as high as #3.
There were some happenings around our house this weekend. The big event was M’s first true high school dance on Saturday, her winter formal. As you would imagine, this has involved several weeks of preparations both for her attire and who she would attend the dance with. And then the direct prep dominated our Saturday morning and afternoon when she got her nails and hair done.[1] She ended up inviting three friends over to get ready at our house then take pictures and ride to the dance together.
This was not a classic year for music. There were only a couple albums that I listened to more than a few times, only one of which that I went back regularly over the course of several months. There were long stretches in the year when there were no new songs that I was crazy about. But there were still enough solid songs for me to make my annual list.
youtu.be/XZ2TpEMR6… “2000 Miles” - KT Tunstall If you make a good Christmas song, eventually it will be covered to death. Somehow I’ve only heard a couple versions of this Pretenders original. Coldplay did a very nice, in-studio version at KROQ in the early 2000s. But KT Tunstall’s version is just wonderful.
It’s Monday. That means some of my patented Weekend Notes are in order! Service Hours M, C, and I went to a local food pantry to volunteer Saturday so they could earn some service hours. They were sent to man the produce table, while I spent the first two hours running the door where people waited to have their eligibility status checked. Upon check-in, people received a paper ticket with a number and then waited in the lobby.
It’s tough to crank out a list this week. I’m coming off the high of putting out my Favorite Songs of the Decade list. I’m working on my Favorite Songs of 2019 list. I’m deep into the Christmas music. And new music pretty much dries up this time of year. So just a video this week. youtu.be/OR07r0ZMF… “Christmas in Hollis” - RUN-DMC. The 1980s were a great time for Christmas music.
I love stuff like this. It is crazy to even begin to consider the vastness of space and the objects that might be out there. We have all these ideas, grounded in physics and math as we know them, of what’s going on across the universe. But we don’t really know what is happening beyond our solar system. If those mysteries fascinate you, too, you might enjoy this little summary of what we think is out there.
A whole mess of books to share. I’ve been putting this off because I was having a hard time writing about a couple of them. I think you’ll be able to guess which ones as you work your way through the list. The Last Stand of Payne Stewart - Kevin Robbins This is an unlikely book for me to both read and enjoy. I never liked Payne Stewart. He seemed like an arrogant prick most of his career.
It was an enjoyable holiday weekend at our house. Some highlights… KU Hoops I’ll break this out later, but the KU-Dayton game on Wednesday was a fine beginning to the holiday break. That game is an argument for why college hoops is better than college football. Two very good teams going toe-to-toe in the season’s earliest weeks and a loss does not kill you for the rest of the year.
Well shit, I’m late. Last week I looked back and saw that I released my Favorite Songs of the 2000s on November 23, 2009. I was aiming to post this decade’s list on December 1 but when I saw that date, I figured I better get my shit together and drop this on your heads. Besides, I haven’t even started on my Favorite songs of 2019 and the Christmas music starts rolling on Friday, so time is a wastin’!
Chart Week: November 6, 1982 Song: “Maneater” - Daryl Hall and John Oates Chart Position: #36, 4th week on the chart. Peaked at #1 for three weeks in December and January. I was hoping to turn on the local AT40 replay last weekend and hear a countdown from a Thanksgiving weekend past that would stir up some holiday-themed memories. Alas the station that plays the countdowns had already switched to Christmas music, and the countdown was one of the special Christmas shows that Casey did late in his life.
open.spotify.com/playlist/… “Love You For A Long Time” - Maggie Rogers. Another utterly delightful song from Maggie. “Motorcade” - Peggy Sue. This is a duo from London who are set to release their debut album in February. I love this first track, with its fun swing and driving tempo. “Champion of the World” - Coldplay. “Los Angeles, Be Kind” - Owl John It’s been a long time since I’ve liked a Coldplay song or album.