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Field Music “The Noisy Days Are Over”

The Brewis brothers of Field Music have focused an incredible amount of their creative energy over the past decade on writing music on the topic of aging and maturity, and trying to live an acceptable “normal” life. Those themes suit their music, which has this neat, orderly sound to it, and a fairly anxious and uptight sense of rhythm. It’s neurotic but not overtly so; it’s music that conveys a very British “stiff upper lip” sensibility. But as much as the songs explore a desire to be normal and mature, there’s always a tension and wit that challenges this, and either highlights the absurdity of this sort of repression or questions whether or not this is any sort of path to happiness. “The Noisy Days Are Over” is written like breaking bad news to yourself – sorry, you’re too old for that now, it’s time to be an adult, it’s time for things to be dull and predictable and safe. It’s giving voice to societal pressures, and calling out the idea that you ought to be special, some exception to the order of society. That you should keep having fun and feeling alive when so many other people have moved on from all that. I think you’re meant to take all of this with a grain of salt, but it’s very easy to listen to this and decide that, yes, you’re the immature and selfish one, and time’s running out for you.

Buy it from Amazon.

Fleetwood Mac “Walk A Thin Line” (4/6/79 Version)

Fleetwood Mac’s first two albums with Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham are so extraordinarily popular that it can be hard to feel like you have an intimate relationship with them – songs like “Dreams” or “Say You Love Me” may move you, but they belong to everyone. The relative commercial failure of Tusk, however, allows the audience to have a different connection with that music, and you can indulge yourself in the fantasy that you have access to amazing Fleetwood Mac music no one else knows about. The most recent deluxe reissue of Tusk really encourages that feeling, and gives us at least one alternate version of every song on the record, so you have the option of being the person whose favorite Fleetwood Mac tune is, like, the alternate take of a song from the 3rd side of the weird album after Rumours.

“Walk A Thin Line” is my favorite Fleetwood Mac song, and though I ultimately favor the original official studio version from Tusk, I am immensely grateful that I can hear the song in slightly different variations. The main difference between the recordings – there’s two alternate takes on this reissue, and there’s another arrangement without Buckingham on Mick Fleetwood’s solo album Visitor – comes down to tempo, the prominence of the wordless vocal hook, and how the instrumental bridge near the end is executed. The structure of the song never changes, and even the glossiest versions keep things very simple and focused on the simple, lovely elegance of Buckingham’s melody. This version, from “The Alternate Tusk” disc, sounds a bit sadder to me than the others. There’s something in Lindsey’s voice here that is just a bit more melancholy and defeated, and I like the way that brings out the lingering doubts in this song about going against everyone else and trusting your instincts. I love the mix of pride and paranoia in his voice, and despite everything, the way he conveys this unshakable faith in himself without seeming arrogant or foolish.

Buy it from Amazon.

Radiohead “Spectre”

Radiohead have a rather small number of covers in their repertoire, but one of them is Carly Simon’s “Nobody Does It Better,” a Bond theme. The aesthetic suits them – grim yet elegant, bombastic but refined, sexy in a way that seems a bit sordid and sad. Radiohead’s “Spectre” was passed over in favor of a rather weak song by Sam Smith, which I think we all have to assume was a matter of the studio going with the more commercially successful artist. It’s a shame, as “Spectre” is the finest song made for a Bond film since…what, the ‘70s?…and it’s the best thing anyone in Radiohead has put out in quite some time. The aesthetics of the prime movers in the band are lined up here – Yorke’s feminine and understated vocal, Jonny Greenwood’s stormy orchestration, the rhythm section’s reiteration of that lagging, quasi-jazzy “Pyramid Song” beat. It’s beautiful without pandering even a bit, and straightforwardly melodic without them seeming to apologize for it. It bodes well for the new album they’re likely to release sometime in the coming year.

Visit Radiohead’s Soundcloud page.

Here’s the 2015 survey, featuring 183 songs from across several genres from the past year. A thing I realized in making this survey is that while I strive towards making the ‘80s surveys an “accurate” representation of a year, these present-day surveys sorta nod towards that conceit while mainly representing my lived experience of the year in music. Which is still quite varied, but it’s a lot more personal, and I have more invested in sticking up for the smaller artists I enjoy than acquiescing to include every hit or random artist other critics decide are worthwhile for the moment.

2015 has been an interesting year for this site, in that everything’s sorta gone full circle and it’s the first time in a while where pretty much all of my music writing goes here rather than on BuzzFeed, Rolling Stone, or Pitchfork. Writing the site now reminds me a lot of how it felt in the early days, where it was my only outlet and my methods reflected a philosophical difference with how most other music writing was being done. Back when I started this site, there was very little room in music writing either in print or on the web focused on writing about songs. All the focus was on macro topics and trends and identity politics –– and here we are again! I don’t mean to denigrate or dismiss that stuff, but while I may enjoy reading that sort of thing, it’s not what I do. I think Fluxblog is also back in a position of offering an alternative to the values of other critical institutions, and repping for artists who maybe aren’t “cool” enough to gain any sort of consensus of approval at Pitchfork, Noisey, Stereogum, or Fader.

If you’ve been following this site, I thank you. I don’t pay attention to numbers for Fluxblog, and would be doing exactly the same thing whether the audience was tiny or huge. This is a personal endeavor and a part of my life I would never give up. That said, if you like this site, tell people about it. If you like a thing I wrote, share it. There’s not many paths open to new readers now, and I’d like for people to still find the site somehow. And, of course, there’s the weekly newsletter version of the site for people who don’t want to keep coming back to a website all the time.

Anyway, enjoy the survey.

DOWNLOAD DISC 1

Hot Chip “Huarache Lights” / Grimes “Artangels” / White Hinterland “Chill and Natural” / Kendrick Lamar “Alright” / The Internet “Just Sayin’/I Tried” / Joanna Newsom “Sapokanikan” / Donnie Trumpet and the Social Experiment featuring Chance the Rapper “Sunday Candy” / Kamasi Washington “Leroy and Lanisha” / Beach House “One Thing” / Colleen Green “Deeper Than Love” / Sexwitch “Helelyos” / Wolf Alice “You’re A Germ” / Veruca Salt “Eyes on You” / No Joy “Moon In My Mouth” / Leon Bridges “Lisa Sawyer” / Vince Staples “Summertime”

DOWNLOAD DISC 2

Chvrches “Clearest Blue” / CL “Hello Bitches” / Disclosure featuring Lorde “Magnets” / Swim Good x Merival “Since U Asked” / Prince “X’s Face” / Peaches “Dumb Fuck” / !!! “Lucy Mongoosey” / Belle & Sebastian “Play for Today” / Jeremih “Oui” / Archy Marshall featuring Jamie Isaac “Ammi Ammi” / Lana Del Rey “Terrence Loves You” / Action Bronson “Terry” / Isaiah Rashad “Nelly” / Pusha T “Untouchable” / Deerhunter “All the Same” / Thee Oh Sees “Web” / Lower Dens “Non Grata” / Unknown Mortal Orchestra “Ur Life One Night” / Charly Bliss “Urge to Purge” / Courtney Barnett “Small Poppies”

DOWNLOAD DISC 3

Shamir “Vegas” / FKA Twigs “Figure 8” / Dr. Dre featuring Kendrick Lamar, Marsha Ambrosius and Candice Pillay “Genocide” / The Weeknd “Tell Your Friends” / Drake “Hotline Bling” / Jamie xx featuring Romy “Loud Places” / Erykah Badu featuring Andre 3000 “Hello” / Tame Impala “Cause I’m A Man” / Gardens & Villa “Fixations” / Hinds “Chili Town” / Bad Bad Hats “Say Nothing” / Teen Girl Scientist Monthly “Games” / The Mountain Goats “Werewolf Gimmick” / Electric Six “Two Dollar Two” / Eric Church “Chattanooga Lucy” / Logic “Like Woah” / Selena Gomez featuring A$AP Rocky “Good for You” / Justin Bieber “Sorry” / Christine and the Queens “Tilted” / Demi Lovato “Stone Cold” / Wet “Deadwater”

DOWNLOAD DISC 4

One Direction “Hey Angel” / Of Montreal “Like Ashoka’s Inferno of Memory” / PWR BTTM “Dairy Queen” / Born Ruffians “Stupid Dream” / Kelly Clarkson “Take You High” / Carly Rae Jepsen “All That” / Rae Sremmurd “Unlock the Swag” / Father “BET Uncut” / Micachu and the Shapes “Crushed” / Björk “Lion Song” / THEESatisfaction “Fetch/Catch” / A$AP Rocky “Excuse Me” / Swindle “London to L.A.” / Jimmy Whispers “I Get Lost in You in the Summertime” / Kurt Vile “Lost My Head There” / Florence + The Machine “How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful” / Father John Misty “The Night Josh Tillman Came To Our Apartment” / Aphex Twin “disk hat ALL prepared1mixed 13”

DOWNLOAD DISC 5

The Mynabirds “All My Heart” / Major Lazer & DJ Snake “Lean On” / Maroon 5 featuring Nicki Minaj “Sugar (Remix)” / Passion Pit “Where the Sky Hangs” / Jason Derulo “Want to Want Me” / Panda Bear “Boys Latin” / Missy Elliott featuring Pharrell “WTF” / Janelle Monáe “Hell You Talmbout” / Lil Mama “Sausage” / Damaged Bug “The Frog” / Titus Andronicus “Lonely Boy” / Melkbelly “Bathroom at the Beach” / Wilco “Random Name Generator” / Ratboys “MCMXIV” / Adele “Send My Love (To Your New Lover)” / Waterbed “Do2Me” / Chris Lee (Li Yuchun) “混蛋,我想你 (Only You)” / Rap Monster “Do You” / YG “Twist My Fingaz” / School of Seven Bells “Open Your Eyes” / Majical Cloudz “Disappeared”

DOWNLOAD DISC 6

Sophie “Just Like We Never Said Goodbye” / Madeon “You’re On” / Hudson Mohawke “Ryderz” / Neon Indian “Dear Skorpio Magazine” / Girls’ Generation “Party” / Fight Like Apes “Pop Itch” / Lunchmoney Lewis “Bills” / Young Thug “Constantly Hating” / Miley Cyrus “Space Boots” / Julia Holter “Sea Calls Me Home” / Aurora “Half the World Away” / Destroyer “Times Square” / Eleanor Friedberger “False Alphabet City” / Car Seat Headrest “Times to Die” / Diet Cig “Breathless” / Chastity Belt “Cool Slut” / Ashley Monroe “On to Something Good” / Mark Ronson featuring Kevin Parker “Leaving Los Feliz” / Big Sean “Outro” / Earl Sweatshirt “Quest/Power” / Cakes Da Killa “Serve It Up” / Georgia “Kombine” / Oneohtrix Point Never “No Good”

DOWNLOAD DISC 7

Alabama Shakes “Sound & Color” / Speedy Ortiz “Raising the Skate” / Sleater-Kinney “Surface Envy” / Holly Herndon “Morning Sun” / Keith Ape featuring JayAllDay, Loota, Okasian & Kohh “잊지마 (It G Ma)” / Nocturnal Sunshine featuring Catnapp “Down By the River” / Moon King “Secret Life” / Jenny Hval “That Battle Is Over” / Blur “Ong Ong” / The Last Hurrah!! “Can’t Wait No More” / Built to Spill “Never Be the Same” / Modest Mouse “The Best Room” / Toro y Moi “Empty Nesters” / Bixiga 70 “100% 13” / Joey Bada$$ “O.C.B.” / Oddisee “That’s Love” / She’s So Rad “Sewn Up Sunshine” / Bed Rugs “Drift” / Boots “Only” / Arcade Fire “Soft Power”

DOWNLOAD DISC 8

Future Punx “Post-Wave” / Ought “Celebration” / Torres “Cowboy Guilt” / Doldrums “Blow Away” / Laura Marling “False Hope” / Thundercat “Them Changes” / Janet Jackson “Gon’ B Alright” / Robyn & La Bagatelle Magique “Set Me Free” / Bilal “Open Up the Door” / Kanye West “All Day” / Extraordinaire featuring Killer Mike “What You Said” / Erase Errata “Watch Your Language” / Beck “Dreams” / Deradoorian “Violet Minded” / Woke featuring George Clinton “The Lavishments of Light Looking” / Astronauts, etc “No Justice” / Jim O’Rourke “Half Life Crisis” / Godspeed You! Black Emperor “Peasantry Or ‘Light! Inside Of Light!’” / Soak “Sea Creatures”

DOWNLOAD DISC 9

Coldplay “A Head Full of Dreams” / Battles “Summer Simmer” / Tobias Jesso Jr. “Can’t Stop Thinking About You” / Matthew E. White “Rock & Roll Is Cold” / Wire “Blogging” / Madonna featuring Nicki Minaj “Bitch, I’m Madonna” / Charli XCX featuring Rita Ora “Doing It (A.G. Cook Remix)” / Rihanna “Dancing in the Dark” / Yacht “I Wanna Fuck You Til I’m Dead” / BigBang “우리 사랑하지 말아요 (Let’s Not Fall In Love)” / Leikeli47 “Two Times A Charm” / Young Fathers “Shame” / Rich Homie Quan “Flex” / Jazmine Sullivan featuring Meek Mill “Dumb” / Kalela “Rewind” / Makeshift Shelters “This Song Is Definitely Not About A Boy” / No Ditching “Song for Shelley” / Bully “I Remember” / Princess Reason “Your Divorce” / Yo La Tengo “Friday I’m In Love” / Maribou State featuring Holly Walker “Steal” / Moresounds featuring Fracture “Dead and Bury” / Arca “Vanity” / Jessica Pratt “Wrong Hand” / Sufjan Stevens “Carrie & Lowell”

CL “Hello Bitches”

You might remember CL as a rapper in the K-Pop group 2NE1, who I’ve featured here a few times, and from her feature on one of the best tracks on Skrillex’s last album. She started out mainly rapping in Korean but is transitioning into a bid for worldwide/American success, and this new single is mostly rapped in English. In either language, she’s an impressive and forceful rapper, even if a lot of her moves can seem like the work of a person who’s carefully studied Lil Kim and Nicki Minaj records for years. On a musical level, “Hello Bitches” sounds very American, but even if they’re in English CL’s lyrics are unapologetically South Korean – she’s seamlessly dropping local slang into traditional rap structures, and about half the lines address Asian stereotypes – dismissing the more hateful shit, but having fun with other aspects of it and generally repping for Asian girls all over the place. It’ll be fun to see where she goes with this in 2016. I’d love to see her actually cross over here, because she’s so fun and there’s disturbingly few Asian pop stars in American culture.

Buy it from iTunes.

Coldplay “A Head Full of Dreams”

Coldplay’s new album is so self-consciously joyful that it’s kinda creepy, because even if a guy like Chris Martin has plenty of reasons to be extremely happy, his insistence on telling you how happy he is over and over and over just comes across like overcompensation and/or self-delusion. Coldplay records often feel like performances of emotions, like the things you’d do to show people that, yes, you’re totally a human being and nothing is wrong with me, ha ha, no, look away. But this new one pushes that all to an extreme, and it’s fascinating to hear funky, upbeat, relentlessly optimistic music that perhaps unintentionally signals so much doubt and emptiness. “A Head Full of Dreams” draws on Martin’s career-long obsession with transcendental experiences but has this quasi-EDM throb to it that suits his music surprisingly well, maybe because that music is always angling for transcendence too. The vague sadness at the core of it makes the desire to be happy and feel good about the universe seem urgent, maybe even desperate. It sounds less like a musical comb-over for an aging band and more like someone who’s just fighting for his survival.

Buy it from Amazon.

Isaiah Rashad “Nelly”

Isaiah Rashad’s voice has some of the same grain and accent as Lil Wayne’s, but whereas Wayne often has this sort of manic energy, Rashad has this odd drag to it. He sounds tired and weary, and that’s amplified by the minor-key organ part that’s mixed so far into the background of this track that it’s like a musical rack focus with Rashad’s voice in the foreground and the keyboard notes as a blurry backdrop. “Nelly” has a strong chorus, and I like the way it implies a slight boost in energy while the sound of the music and Rashad’s voice are still rather sedate. The song’s about trying to escape difficult circumstances, and when the chorus kicks in it’s like entertaining an optimistic idea while feeling very skeptical about it.

Buy it from Amazon.

Sleater-Kinney @ Kings Theater 12/12/2015
Price Tag / Far Away / Fangless / Jumpers / Light Rail Coyote / What’s Mine Is Yours / No Cities to Love / All Hands on the Bad One / Words + Guitar / Wilderness / Surface Envy / A New Wave / Was It A Lie? / Bury Our Friends / One Beat / I Wanna Be Yr Joey Ramone / Turn It On / Entertain // Merry Xmas (I Don’t Wanna Fight) / Oh! / Dig Me Out / Modern Girl

Sleater-Kinney @ Irving Plaza 12/14/2015
Price Tag / Fangless / Jumpers / Get Up / Surface Envy / What’s Mine Is Yours / Ironclad / Start Together / Was It A Lie? / A New Wave / Bury Our Friends / All Hands on the Bad One / No Cities to Love / One Beat / The Fox / Words + Guitar / Turn It On / Entertain // Modern Girl / Rock Lobster (with Fred Armisen) / Dig Me Out

Sleater-Kinney “Surface Envy”

Before these two shows, I hadn’t seen Sleater-Kinney since August of 2006, when they played their final gig in New York, about three shows before they disbanded for nearly a decade. During their original run, I saw them many times over – maybe 15 times between 1997 and 2006? Something like that. S-K were a very big deal to me, and their shows were always very emotional for me, particularly during the Hot Rock era. I am happy to report that the Sleater-Kinney of 2015 is just as vital and powerful as the version I saw many years ago, and if anything, they’ve become a stronger live band as their technical skills have evolved and their occasional reluctance about being rock stars has almost completely disappeared. This is most notable when Carrie Brownstein performs “Entertain” at the end of the set, and her theatricality and showmanship is slightly at odds with a song in which she’s telling you “we’re not here cos we want to entertain.”

Corin Tucker’s voice is still astonishing, both in how well she controls its intensity and volume, and in how it can convey particular emotions and depths of feeling that I don’t think anyone else is capable of approaching. The sound of it triggers something that I can’t explain, but hearing her sing is very cathartic. Everyone leaves an S-K show with this sort of “what just happened to me, I need to recuperate” feeling.

These two shows were in very different venues. Kings Theater is a large and fancy theater; a converted movie palace that’s roughly equivalent to Radio City Music Hall. Irving Plaza is a small club, and was THE place for well-known indie acts to play from the mid ‘90s on through the very early ‘00s. (It never went away, but Bowery Presents have basically pushed every cool act towards Bowery Ballroom, Music Hall of Williamsburg, and Webster Hall in the past decade or so, and Irving Plaza is only back in rotation lately as a result of what I’m told is a beef between Bowery Presents and Webster Hall.) Sleater-Kinney is much better in a room like Irving Plaza, where the audience can be in close proximity to the band, and the audience can be a bit more physical in their reaction to the music. The enthusiasm of an audience in a seated venue tends to get dispersed, but all the most enthusiastic people gravitate to each other on a floor, and it changes the temperature of everything. The intensity in the room last night was what I remember best from seeing them in the old days. Seeing how other people connect in an immediate and visceral way to songs like “Get Up,” “Start Together,” “The Fox,” “Words + Guitar,” “Turn It On,” and “Dig Me Out” amplifies that feeling in a way that’s almost entirely overwhelming.

A word about Fred Armisen’s appearance in the encore at Irving Plaza: Their version of The B-52’s “Rock Lobster” was INCREDIBLY faithful, right on down to wheeling out a vintage Farfisa for the exact right organ sound. Armisen is famous for being a gifted impressionist, but his Fred Schneider is so complete and accurate that it was easy to just pretend you were there watching the B-52’s of the late ‘70s. (I saw the real B-52’s play this song a few years ago, and it wasn’t quite as good, but hey, they’re all in their 60s now and it’s fine.) It was very fun, and one of the most committed covers I’ve ever seen, particularly as The B-52’s have one of the most specific sounds in the history of rock music. But hey, that’s true of Sleater-Kinney too.

Buy it from Amazon.

Chance the Rapper featuring Jeremih and R. Kelly “Somewhere In Paradise”

Did you see Chance on Saturday Night Live this weekend? If not, please go do that now. I’ve seen a majority of episodes of SNL in the show’s history, and I can confidently say that his appearance on the show ranks in the top 5% of all SNL musical performances. A lot of SNL performances, even by some of the best artists you can name, are just sorta perfunctory and professional – people playing their current hits and just hoping they don’t fuck anything up on live television. Chance’s performance felt truly live – rehearsed quite a bit, I’m sure, but very clearly alive in a moment and aware of the space where it was taking place. This guy is a hugely charismatic performer, and he’s very aware of what kind of gestures come off well on tv, and how to create a sense of intimacy in a medium that resists it.

Chance is a one-of-a-kind guy, but he’s not alone in the history of hip-hop. The most obvious precedent is Andre 3000, who I think is largely responsible for creating the specific template of rhythm and melody in Chance’s flow. And yeah, there’s also a bit of early Kanye in the vibe of his music. But in the context of popular rap from the past several years, Chance may as well have beamed down from another planet. Rap has been dominated by Drake and Drake-alikes in the past few years, and Chance is very much the radical opposite of Drake. Drake is all about presenting selfish fuckboy feelings over music that implies that he’s otherwise dead inside. It’s empty and soulless, and can be compelling and powerful sometimes for that reason. But Chance is very much alive inside, and the music comes from a place of compassion and generosity that is unusual in contemporary pop. Chance’s music radiates joy and warmth; it’s life-affirming music coming out of rather dire circumstances in Chicago. This feels fresh and different, and it’s a thing I think a lot of people want and need after so many years of cold, cruel-hearted music. Watching Chance on SNL was like watching a new zeitgeist click into place – 2015 may have been a major year for apex fuckboys like Drake, Weeknd, and Bieber, but it’s beginning to look like 2016 will belong to Chance.

Get it from iTunes.

Archy Marshall featuring Jamie Isaac “Ammi Ammi”

Archy Marshall’s identity is a moving target, switching from Zoo Kid to King Krule to Edgar the Beatmaker and his given name on a whim from record to record. And maybe he feels like that in a literal way, like he’s shifting around to much to stick to one name. But on a musical level, I can think of few young musicians with an aesthetic as fully formed as him – sure, this new record is more electronic in nature than the last King Krule album, but that vibe of sleepy nihilism and depressive sexiness is unmistakable. “Ammi Ammi” feels like a cousin to “Neptune Estate,” with Marshall meditating on some complicated, possibly toxic relationship over a track that feels like it’s gradually drifting away from you even as the beat seems to jog in place.

Buy it from Amazon.

Erykah Badu featuring Andre 3000 “Hello”

Andre 3000 performances are so rare now that even something inconsequential or phoned-in can seem precious, but this duet with his ex Erykah Badu is lovely and clever and emotionally nuanced and really, one of the best tracks of his career. This song, a version of The Isley Brothers’ version of a Todd Rundgren tune, has them both reckoning with what their relationship has been and what it is today, and cherishing the deep connection they have without forgetting a lot of their complicated history. It’s a very adult song, and something uniquely suited to Andre’s deft blend of wit and unguarded emotion. The humor is really crucial to getting across the deeper feelings here, and so is the use of in-jokes and pet names. This is a song about communication between two very close people; we’re just listening in.

Get it from Apple Music.

Joanna Newsom @ Kings Theater 12/7/2015
Bridges & Balloons / Anecdotes / Soft as Chalk / Divers / Emily / Waltz of the 101st Lightborne / Have One on Me / Peach, Plum, Pear / Goose Eggs / Sapokanikan / Leaving the City / Cosmia / Time, As A Symptom // Sawdust & Diamonds / Baby Birch

Joanna Newsom “Time, As A Symptom”

I had put off writing about this song for weeks, and then figured I’d wait longer, because I knew I’d be seeing Joanna Newsom play this show. And I still feel oddly under qualified to write about it. The main thing I got from seeing Newsom live is how casual she appears on stage – not just in how she plays her instruments as though they’re purely an extension of gesture and reflex, but in her relaxed demeanor, and how the seriousness of her words don’t overtake the performance of the music. “Time, As A Symptom” is a very heavy song; I would go so far as to say it’s profound in the way it thinks about love and life and time and death. I imagine the chorus like a ladder, and she’s climbing up through the pain and struggle and tedium of life to arrive at the top, and seeing everything with a clear perspective from on high, and what she sees from there is nothing but joy and love. This wrecks me. It is a thought and musical moment so beautiful to me that it’s hard to listen to. I’m not always ready for it, and I think the only reason I didn’t cry when she performed it last night was because I’d been acclimated to the feeling of her music for over an hour at that point. If that climax came any sooner in the night, I just don’t know.

Buy it from Amazon.

Logic “Like Woah”

I wonder about the rappers who write songs about being extremely successful while being only modestly successful, or maybe just possibly eventually successful. Logic is definitely doing well, but I’d put him squarely in the “modestly successful” category. At one point in this song he says he’s “platinum up in this bitch,” which is…untrue. Not that this really matters or negates the feeling of a song about being excited about doing well and having some money, but it is notable. The general mood of this song, from the beat on up, is more about gratitude than showing off, and I’d be lying to you if I told you I don’t feel a bit envious when I hear it.

Buy it from Amazon.

Jeremih “Oui”

I love the way this track frames Jeremih’s silky voice with these bright staccato chords – if the attack was different it’d feel a bit agitated, but the approach is softer, and it makes the whole track feel breezy and light. Jeremih not really doing anything out of the ordinary here, but he sounds genuinely affectionate and kind as he’s singing about wanting to make this girl happy. Maybe that’s faint praise, but I think it means a lot. Also, major points for coming up with a line based on a homonym as clever as “there’s no we without you and I.”

Buy it from Amazon.

Pill “Hotline”

All the sounds in this track signal danger – the thud of the drums, the buzzing siren quality of the organ, the traffic jam skronk of the sax. But Veronica Torres’ vocal pat seems to charge right into harm’s way, and her words and casually confrontational tone has a specific city girl “fuck you, asshole” quality that you don’t really find too often outside of vintage No Wave music. Her character is addressing creepy, predatory men, but she seems a bit creepy and predatory too – very aware of what she’s getting into, but willing to put up with some things to surround herself with convertibles and Infinity Pools.

Buy it from Bandcamp.

Christine and the Queens “Tilted”

“Tilted” is a translated version of a previous song, “Christine,” and though my French is rather poor and I can’t tell how similar the words are between the two, I am impressed by the English lyrics. “I am actually good” is a very interesting refrain for a pop song – defiant, but also oddly defensive. Maybe that’s just the sort of unique phrasing that comes out of translation, but I think it’s lovely. The words aren’t really the point though – in either iteration of this track, it’s really about how that melodic hook floats alongside that main keyboard part, which sorta flutters gracefully through the song’s ample negative space.

Buy it from Amazon.

Wet “Deadwater”

Wet’s music has a lot of superficial gloss that connects it to the more adult contemporary end of modern R&B, but their melodic style isn’t rooted much in soul. A song like “Deadwater” feels more simpatico with melancholy teen pop from the early ‘90s, or even folksy pop like Melanie from the ‘60s. The melody is particularly strong, and I love the way the natural tone of Kelly Zutrau’s voice has this bright, optimistic quality as the melody signals sadness and the lyrics are mostly an expression of futility.

Buy it from Amazon.

Demi Lovato “Stone Cold”

I’ve dismissed Demi Lovato as a second string version of Katy Perry who turns up with bland Perry-like hits whenever the real deal is between album cycles, and while I stand by that assessment of songs like “Cool for the Summer” and “Skyscraper,” the ballad “Stone Cold” reveals something in Lovato that’s not as easily written off. The song is pitched somewhere between understated minimalism and scenery-chewing melodrama, with Lovato belting out some lines like she’s trying to make Christina Aguilera seem subtle by comparison. I think that actually works for the song, though – it’s not hard to imagine a more graceful version of it that shades in the R&B-gospel qualities of the melody, but going way over the top gives it a touch of maudlin camp that enhances rather than undermines the raw emotion at the core of it. She basically sounds like she’s slaying her own song at karaoke, and that’s kinda brilliant.

Buy it from Amazon.

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Dennis Alcapone “Power Version” / Johnny Osbourne “Sing Jah Stylee” / Michigan & Smiley “Rub A Dub Style” / Willie Williams “Master Plan” / The Soulettes “King Street” / Maria Griffiths “Tell Me Now” / Willie Williams and the Brentford Disco Set “Armagideon Time” / Sugar Minott “Love and Understanding” / Alton Ellis “You Make Me Happy” / Prince Francis “Street Doctor” / Green Tea & Chassy “Ghetto Girl” / Prince Francis “Rockfort Shock” / Sound Dimension “Granny Scratch Scratch” / Senior Soul “Is It Because I’m Black?” / Larry Marshall “Nanny Goat Du” / The Mad Lads “Ten to One” / Jennifer Lara “Tell Me Where” / Wailing Souls “Row Fisherman Row” / Cornell Campbell “My Conversation” / Aubrey Adams & Rico Rodriguez “Stew Peas and Cornflakes” / Simms & Robinson “White Christmas”

Over the past seven years or so I’ve developed a personal tradition of listening to a lot of classic Studio One reggae, ska, rocksteady, dub, and dancehall in early winter. I’ve come to closely associate the music with crisp air, early nights, Christmas lights, and the general look and feeling of New York City in this time of year. The music has sorta replaced traditional Christmas music in my life, and though I listen to a lot of this stuff year-round, the comfortable feeling of listening to it under these conditions has become part of why December is unquestionably my favorite month of the year. I’d really like to throw a party someday where it’s just a lot of people in a room lit by Christmas lights, and only Studio One music is played. That’s not in the cards this year, but this collection features a lot of the music I’d want to play at a Studio One holiday party.

My personal Studio One playlist features well over a hundred songs, but this set covers a lot of the very best tunes, and my favorite versions of several popular riddims. (Believe me, it was really hard to narrow down to just one in some cases – I could listen to variations on “Real Rock,” “Rockfort Rock,” “Sidewalk Doctor,” and “Far East” for hours on end.)

If you are new to Studio One – or Jamaican music from the ’60s and ’70s in general – I recommend jumping into this music without burdening yourself with too much context, and just feeling it. This is some of the most joyous, texturally unique, beautiful, adventurous, funky music you will ever encounter. But this is indeed music with a very interesting and rich history, and if you want to learn more about it, this documentary about Coxsone Dodd and Studio One produced by Soul Jazz is a great place to start.

This collection features tracks from various Studio One compilations and singles reissued by the Soul Jazz label. Do yourself a huge favor and buy as many as you can from them. A lot of this stuff cannot be found on streaming services.

Majical Cloudz “Disappeared”

There’s a line in Spoon’s “The Mystery Zone” that’s never too far from my mind, in which Britt Daniel sings about “the times that we met before we met.” He’s romanticizing the time before two people connect in a meaningful way, and he’s fantasizing about going back in time and doing it all over again. This Majical Cloudz song is sorta the reverse of that idea, and dwells on the time after you’ve become estranged from or simply lost touch with someone who was once important to you, and going back to being strangers with separate lives. There’s a lot of yearning for the past in this song, but no fantasy – he wants the old intimacy, and knows he can’t ever go back. He can hardly even imagine experiencing something similar with someone else. It’s an incredibly sad song, but despite its despondent tone it also conveys a lot of kindness and sympathy for the people who’ve moved on. It’s a lot easier to retroactively make the people who disappear from your life into villains, and that’s not what this is at all. This is more like the thing you wish you could say to someone, but can’t out of respect for their wishes.

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This is the third in my series of 1980s survey mixes, which are designed to give more context to the music of that decade. Most versions of ‘80s history focus on specific niches and canons, but mostly ignore or write off parallel and overlapping cultural trends. My goal in doing this project is to highlight all the different things going on from year to year, to better understand the original context of familiar songs and to highlight a lot of the music that has faded from cultural memory. Here are the mixes for 1988 and 1989.

1987 may be the greatest year of the ‘80s – the sheer number of enduring classics in this set, particularly on the first disc, is staggering, and I think a lot of the aesthetic of “80s-ness” in music today is largely rooted in the music of this year. This isn’t to say everything is perfect, but I think it’s safe to say that blockbuster pop and “college rock” are both at their pinnacle in this year. There’s also a lot of top-quality cheesy pop music in this year, and a good number of songs that you may not recognize in terms of artist/song title, but will probably be like “oh, they play this all the time at the pharmacy” when you hear it.

Thanks to Paul Cox, Sean T. Collins, and Chris Conroy for their assistance in putting this set together. I’m going to pause this project in December for the 2015 survey set, and resume it again in mid to late January with the 1986 survey.

DOWNLOAD DISC 1

U2 “Where the Streets Have No Name” / INXS “Need You Tonight” / George Michael “I Want Your Sex” / Whitney Houston “I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)” / Michael Jackson “The Way You Make Me Feel” / Prince “U Got the Look” / M/A/R/R/S “Pump Up the Volume” / Sly & Robbie “Boops (Here to Go)” / Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam “Head to Toe” / Terence Trent D’Arby “Wishing Well” / T’Pau “Heart and Soul” / Aretha Franklin featuring George Michael “I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)” / Def Leppard “Pour Some Sugar On Me” / Swing Out Sister “Breakout” / Erasure “Victim of Love” / The Fall “Hit the North” / Eric B and Rakim “I Know You Got Soul” / LL Cool J “Going Back to Cali” / Suzanne Vega “Luka”

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R.E.M. “Finest Worksong” / The Cure “Just Like Heaven” / Depeche Mode “Never Let Me Down Again” / Belinda Carlisle “Heaven Is A Place On Earth” / Fleetwood Mac “Everywhere” / Eric Carmen “Hungry Eyes” / Pet Shop Boys “What Have I Done To Deserve This?” / ABC “When Smokey Sings” / Kool Moe Dee “How Ya Like Me Now” / Run-D.M.C. “Christmas In Hollis” / Joseph Cotton “No Touch the Style” / Jody Watley “Looking For A New Love” / Madonna “Who’s That Girl” / Squeeze “Hourglass” / The Smiths “Girlfriend In A Coma” / George Strait “All My Ex’s Live In Texas” / Bruce Springsteen “Brilliant Disguise” / Rosanne Cash “If You Change Your Mind” / Cabaret Voltaire “Don’t Argue” / The System “Don’t Disturb This Groove”

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Bill Medley and Jennifer Warnes “(I’ve Had) The Time of My Life” / Richard Marx “Don’t Mean Nothing” / Rick Astley “Never Gonna Give You Up” / Debbie Gibson “Only In My Dreams” / Tiffany “I Think We’re Alone Now” / Kim Wilde “You Keep Me Hanging On” / Club Nouveau “Lean On Me” / John Cougar Mellencamp “Cherry Bomb” / Just-Ice & KRS-One “Moshitup (1-800-Suicide)” / Public Enemy “Public Enemy No. 1” / Nitzer Ebb “Join In the Chant” / LeVert “Casanova” / Skinny Puppy “Addiction” / Starship “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now” / Atlantic Starr “Always” / They Might Be Giants “Don’t Let’s Start” / Los Lobos “La Bamba” / Billy Idol “Mony Mony (Live)”

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Guns N’ Roses “Welcome to the Jungle” / Motley Crue “Girls Girls Girls” / Aerosmith “Dude (Looks Like A Lady)” / Sinead O’Connor “Mandinka” / Midnight Oil “Beds Are Burning” / Biz Markie “Nobody Beats the Biz” / MC Shan “Kill That Noise” / MC Shy D “Gotta Be Tough” / Dana Dane “Nightmares” / Icehouse “Electric Blue” / Johnny Hates Jazz “Shattered Dreams” / New Order “True Faith” / Reese & Santonio “Bounce Your Body to the Box” / Echo and the Bunnymen “Lips Like Sugar” / Bl’ast “It’s In My Blood” / The Bangles “Hazy Shade of Winter” / Robbie Robertson “Broken Arrow” / Jandek “I Passed By the Building” / Holger Czukay “Blessed Easter”

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Penguin Cafe Orchestra “Perpetuum Mobile” / Sonic Youth “Schizophrenia” / Sisters of Mercy “This Corrosion” / Anthrax “I Am the Law” / Candlemass “Dark Are the Veils of Death” / XTC “Dear God” / The Pogues featuring Kirsty MacColl “Fairytale of New York” / Heart “Alone” / Pink Floyd “Learning to Fly” / Sting “Englishman In New York” / Tom Waits “Way Down in the Hole” / Frankie Knuckles “Baby Wants to Ride” / Fat Boys featuring the Beach Boys “Wipeout” / Exposé “Let Me Be the One” / Laura Branigan “Shattered Glass” / Buster Poindexter “Hot Hot Hot” / Public Image Ltd. “Seattle” / King Missile “Sensitive Artist”

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Pixies “Caribou” / The Grateful Dead “Touch of Grey” / 10,000 Maniacs “Like the Weather” / The Replacements “Alex Chilton” / Dinosaur Jr. “Little Fury Things” / The Jesus and Mary Chain “April Skies” / Game Theory “Dripping with Looks” / Siouxsie and the Banshees “This Wheel’s On Fire” / Pulp “I Want You” / Whitesnake “Here I Go Again” / Bob Seger “Shakedown” / Ice-T “6 ’N the Mornin’” / Too Short “Freaky Tales” / Conroy Smith “Dangerous” / Phuture “Your Only Friend” / Derrick May “Nude Photo” / Was Not Was “Walk the Dinosaur” / Charlie Haden Quartet West “Bay City”

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Coldcut “Say Kids (What Time Is It?) / Kaos “Court’s In Session” / Schooly D “Saturday Night” / Spoonie Gee “The Godfather” / Beastie Boys “No Sleep Till Brooklyn” / Suicidal Tendencies “Possessed to Skate” / Testament “C.O.T.L.O.D. (Curse of the Legions of Death)” / Dag Nasty “Trying” / Spermbirds “Americans Are Cool” / Blasters “Just Another Sunday” / John Hiatt “Thank You Girl” / Lou Gramm “Midnight Blue” / F.R. David “Don’t Go” / Reba McEntire “The Last One to Know” / Marianne Faithful “As Tears Go By” / MX-80 “We Will Bury You” / Bongwater “His New Look” / The Embarrassment “Wellsville” / The dB’s “Think Too Hard” / The Wedding Present “Anyone Can Make A Mistake” / Love & Rockets “No New Tale to Tell” / Dolly Parton, Linda Rondstadt, and Emmylou Harris “To Know Him Is To Love Him”

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Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine “Rhythm Is Gonna Get You” / Maxi Priest “Some Guys Have All the Luck” / The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu “All You Need Is Love” / Red Hot Chili Peppers “Me and My Friends” / Rhythim Is Rhythim “String of Life” / Eurythmics “Beethoven (I Love To Listen To)” / Blue Mercedes “I Want To Be Your Property” / Admiral Bailey “Kill Them With It” / E.U. “Da Butt” / T La Rock “Lyrical King” / Marshall Crenshaw “This Is Easy” / Wire “Ahead” / Hüsker Dü “Could You Be the One?” / Big Black “Bad Penny” / The Bats “Sir Queen” / Lyle Lovett “If I Had A Boat” / k.d. lang “Angel With A Lariat” / The Housemartins “Five Get Over Excited” / Lloyd Cole and the Commotions “From the Hip” / The Go-Betweens “Right Here” / Aztec Camera “Somewhere In My Heart” / Celtic Frost “Mesmerized” / Rollins Band “Do It”

Future Punx “Post-Wave”

Future Punx really commit to their premise – this is a song about the future of punk, and it’s a future that imagines the movement eventually succeeding in “smashing the state” and literally saving people’s lives. They sound like the future as imagined in the late ‘70s or very early ‘80s, which is to say… it’s actually more new wave, and rather a lot like Devo. The concept is fun, but the music is a lot better. This isn’t tremendously original in style or tone, but it’s so much in the spirit and tone of a lot of weirdo sci-fi punk from the early ‘80s that it’d be easy to believe this was released in 1981 and not a few months ago in 2015. I can get very cynical about punk, but this is the type of song that makes me believe in the genre, or more specifically, the elements of the genre that informed new wave.

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!!! “Lucy Mongoosey”

On both a musical and lyrical level, “Lucy Mongoosey” seems to be about situations which are mostly good, but there’s something slightly wrong about it and you just can’t really place it. The music is mostly funky and bright, but there’s a sad drag to it, and Nic Offer’s voice sounds worn out and exhausted as he gently begs someone not to waste his time. There’s a lot of affection in this song, but it’s all tainted by a vague unease and an acute awareness that time is running out, one way or another. Maybe the point of a song like this is to force someone’s hand, and to get things right somehow. Offer certainly doesn’t sound like a guy who’s excited about the possibility of wrecking a good thing because it’s not totally perfect. If anything, “Lucy Mongoosey” projects a feeling of guilt about thinking that way.

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