Playlist : April 4th - 8th, 2011

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes.

My playlist for this week features an artist I've only just discovered, the new LP from Snoop Dogg, an eclectic mix from Spin Magazine and Jenny Lewis among others. See here:

1. Fleet Foxes - Helplessness Blues
2. David Dondero - Simple Love
3. Digable Planets - Beyond The Spectrum : The Creamy Spy Chronicles
4. Josh Rouse - Under Cold Blue Stars
5. Radiohead - Hail To The Thief
6. VA - Spin Magazine, April 2011
7. VA - Uncut : Hard Drive
8. Jenny Lewis - Acid Tongue
9. LCD Soundsystem - Sound of Silver
10. Snoop Dogg - Doggumentary

Top Five Artists Last Week

1. De La Soul
2. Nas
3. Drive-By Truckers
4. Best Coast
5. Steve Tannen

Song of the Week : Drive-By Truckers - Used to Be a Cop

This week’s track is from the latest Drive-By Truckers album, Go-Go Boots. It’s about a police officer whose life has gone to hell. Thrown off the force for a bad temper and nerves, he’s a one time abused child, unemployed divorced alcoholic stalking his ex-wife.

Feel good track of the year!

There’s a driving bass line and drum track with the scream of some nice lead guitars under some raw vocals. It’s great storytelling and a great performance. Hope you like it. The album as a whole is really interesting. The vocal duties are shared by at least three members of the band, including a female, so it has an eclectic feel while being roughly cohesive. Check it out.

Outro

That's me for the week people. Shouts to my homegirl @Hay2theley who has asked me to impart my knowledge of the old school to her. I knew there was a reason I read all those books/watched all those movies/bought all those albums/painted all those pieces/did all those turtles.

Respect. Peace out. In the name of Herc, Bam and Flash, yes ya'll.

Playlist : March 28th - April 1st, 2011

Hey there Work Tunes peeps. This week I have got a couple of new albums (Iraho and Go-Go Boots), an old favourite or two (Let Love In and Pretty In Pink OST), an album by a band I've been meaning to hear more of for a while (Yeah Yeah Yeahs) and a recommendation from a trustworthy Twitter source (The Felice Brothers). What it all looks like together is something like this:

• Awesome Dre - Can't Hold Me Back
• Iraho - Iraho
• VA - Pretty in Pink OST
• Justin Townes Earle - Good Life
• The Felice Brothers - Tonight At The Arizona
• Beastie Boys - Hello Nasty
• Drive-By Truckers - Go-Go Boots
• Nick Cave - Let Love In
• Steve Tannen - Stopped at a Green Light
• Yeah Yeah Yeahs - It's Blitz

Top 5 Artists

1. De La Soul
2. Uncle Tupelo
3. Bright Eyes
4. Mr. Bungle
5. The Velvet Underground

Song of the Week : The Buggles - Astroboy (And the Proles on Parade)

I stumbled across this album last week and my first thought was “OMG they had a whole album?!” ‘They’ being The Buggles, he one-hit-wonder extraordinaires who wrote Video Killed The Radio Star.

The other tracks on the album are fairly diverse. Sometimes they sound a bit like Madness, others you think it’s The Cars, but generally nothing else sounds like Video (which I still maintain is a superb pop song).

I thought I’d make a track SOTW just so you could say you’ve heard more than one The Buggles song. I chose this one because it’s about Astroboy and he’s pretty mint.

Adios Amigos

That's it for now. I will try and narrow down the whole month's list to maybe 5 albums for a proper review later in the week. Until then, keep a good head and always carry a light bulb.

Playlist : March 21st - 25th, 2011

Hello and welcome to Work Tunes. For this week's listening, I've dug into an old school favourite I just bought on vinyl, grabbed an album from one of the 80s ultimate one hit wonders and slotted in yet another Dolorean LP.

Check it out:

1. Televison - Marquee Moon
2. Velvet Underground & Nico - Velvet Underground & Nico
3. De La Soul - Three Feet High and Rising
4. The Strokes - Angles
5. Wilco - Wilco (The Album)
6. Nas - Hip Hop Is Dead
7. Dolorean - Violence In The Snowy Fields
8. Uncle Tupelo - No Depression
9. Bright Eyes - Lifted
10. The Buggles - The Age of Plastic

Top 5 Artists This Week

1. Dolorean
2. Train of Thought
3. Jack Johnson
4. Blind Pilot
5. Hilltop Hoods

Song of the Week : Bright Eyes - We Are Nowhere And It's Now

I’ve always liked this album, but it has mostly been a likeable sound, if you know what I mean. I’d listen to it, but all it really was was melody that sounded good and Conor Oberst singing over the top. The lyrics, I never really listened to before, but there was a general sense of “I’m a hipster… I live in New York… I’m so cool it hurts… Usually, I’m drunk and sad.”

What happened the other night at sleep time though, due to using earphones instead of Bluetooth (earphones being louder), I didn’t sleep but listened to it. This song made me click that there is some really exceptional writing on this album. I’ve always known that about Lua but only because of the other version.

With lines like:

Like a ten-minute dream in the passenger’s seat

While the world it was flying by

I haven't been gone very long

But it feels like a lifetime

And

Where the waitress looks concerned

But she never says a word

Just turns the jukebox on

And we hum along

And I smile back at her

I suddenly had some interest in what was being said. And yes, it still says “I’m a cool NY hipster who is drunk and sad” but it lays out a series of images that seem like a scene from a mumblecore indie film. Plus it has Emmy Lou Harris, which is always a bonus. Hope you like it and it doesn’t bum you out too much.

Ciao for Now

Next week there will most likely be two posts. The first will be for that week's playlist and the second for a proper review of the best of the month. Hope to see you there.

Ciao for now, you kooky kids.

Playlist : March 14th - 18th, 2011

Hello and welcome to another pared down version of Work Tunes.

This week there's a couple of new artists for me in Blind Pilot and Jack Johnson. Yes, I have honestly heard no Jack Johnson (well apart from that song he did where Ben Stiller was in the film clip). I'm also looking forward to the remix version of Gil Scott-Heron's 2010 release I'm New Here - done by Jamie XX and called We're New Here.

This is what it all looks like.

• Jack Johnson - To The Sea
• Beach Fossils – What A Pleasure
• Hilltop Hoods - A Matter Of Time
• Train of Thought - Moving Heads
• J Mascis - Several Shades of Why
• REM - Collapse Into Now
• The Murmurs - Pristine Smut
• Vetiver - To Find Me Gone
• Gil Scott-Heron and Jamie XX - We're New Here
• Blind Pilot - 3 Rounds and a Sound

Top 5 Artists Last Week

1. Dolorean
2. Snoop Doggy Dog
3. Tori Amos
4. Sonic Youth
5. Mellow Drum Addict

Song of the Week : Dolorean - Country Clutter

I know a couple weeks back in a daze of being newly smitten with Dolorean I picked one of their songs. It was a good song, but probably not a good representation of them. The other day, my copy of their latest album The Unfazed arrived. This track, Country Clutter is more true to why I really like them. It’s interesting how it shuffles along in a bit of a death march as well as building at points like it’s about to kick the distortion pedal on. Lyrically, it’s honest and angry and a little bit bitter, which I always like. Enjoy!

Postscript

Most of this post was cobbled together prior to today. I saved this draft before hearing about the earthquake in Japan. I debated whether to just post it without acknowledging that tragedy, but I just couldn't do it.

The footage I've seen tonight is impossible to ignore. The thick slow sludge of the ocean around Sendai swallowing the farm lands and the vast tracts of sheds; sweeping houses and vehicles and fences along, like some cheesy black blob from a 1950s sci-fi film. I'm not one for prayer, but I do hope with every ounce of my own being that no more lives are lost. The last I heard, more than 200 bodies had washed up on the beach. It's terrifying and horrid and all too big to fathom. 200 lives or 200,000+ as on Boxing Day, 2002, it makes no difference; one is too many.

起死回生 kishi kaisei :

Wake from death and return to life.

Playlist : March 7th - 11th, 2011

So here we are again. I've decided to just list my playlist every week to keep track of what I've played. Then every month, I will blog a selection of albums from all those I've played. Make sense? Good. Let's continue.

• Paul Kelly The A - Z Recordings (Disc 8)
• Sonic Youth - Dirty
• Ben Folds Five - The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner
• Tori Amos - Scarlet's Walk
• (Please) Don't Blame Mexico - Concorde
• Mellow Drum Addict - East Bound Train
• Snoop Doggy Dogg - Doggystyle
• Spin Magazine - March Issue Playlist
• The Whispertown 2000 - Swim
• Gillian Welch - Revival

Top 5 Artists of Last Week

1. The Rolling Stones
2. Radiohead
3. Digable Planets
4. Edie Brickell and New Bohemians
5. Dolorean

Top 5 Tracks of Last Week

1. Conor Oberst with Gillian Welch – Lua
2. She's Spanish, I'm American – These Long Summer Days
3. Ryan Adams & The Cardinals – Magick
4. Justin Townes Earle – Christchurch Woman
5. Digable Planets – Pacifics

Song of the Week

This week I have gone with a track that came with my most recent edition of Spin Magazine for Zinio on my iPad. It’s great how the digital version always has a playlist for free from iTunes.

This is Wye Oak – Civilian. I don’t know a lot about this band, but I have heard their most recent album over at NPR It’s a pretty good listen. Fairly moody indie pop with a decent layer of fuzz and jangle. Civilian has a bit of a country stomp about it while keeping the indie atmospheric vocals before it launches into a bit of rock. Not bad at all.