This is the 33rd playlist in the Eclectic Playlist Series; there are only three artists in this month’s mix that have been featured here before, in one of the other 32 lists (and each has been featured only once previously). There’s really that much music out there, folks. That so much of it is squandered by the relentless reductionism of internet algorithms…well, let’s just say it’s a shame, and that if you’re reading this you’re in luck because it doesn’t happen here. This month’s playlist is another case in point, ranging reasonably far and wide in genre and decade, but also dancing through some serendipities of sound, feel, and outlook. The segues are occasionally challenging but I did my best to have the songs make sense even if they initially seem to be bumping into each other. And it’s all okay in the end because of the twin, Spector-ish culmination: the Ronettes into “Just Like Honey.” First we get an epic with as heart-rending a resolution, musically speaking, as has pretty much ever been written; then we can float off, Scarlett-Johansson-ly, to the indeterminate tones of The Jesus and Mary Chain. Everything, in the end, is lost in translation, most of all our heart’s desires. But it’s alright. Everything is everything. We make contact. The building may be burning but it’s we who are ablaze.
Full playlist below the widget.
“Around the Bend” – Martha Wainwright (Goodnight City, 2016)
“Everything is Everything” – Lauryn Hill (The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, 1998)
“Victim of Love” – The Eagles (Hotel California, 1976)
“You as You Were” – Shearwater (Animal Joy, 2012)
“Don’t Leave Me This Way” – Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes (Wake Up Everybody, 1975)
“This Is The House” – Eurythmics (Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), 1983)
“Moving to L.A.” – Art Brut (Bang Bang Rock & Roll, 2005)
“But It’s Alright” – J.J. Jackson (single, 1967)
“Ablaze” – School of Seven Bells (SVIIB, 2016)
“Girls Talk” – Dave Edmunds (Repeat When Necessary, 1979)
“Contact” – Brigitte Bardot (Show, 1968)
“Lover’s Waltz” – A.A. Bondy (American Hearts, 2007)
“Mia & Sebastian’s Theme” – Justin Hurwitz (“La La Land”: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, 2016)
“Dim” – Dada (Puzzle, 1992)
“Jerry’s Pigeons” – Genya Ravan (Urban Desire, 1978)
“Nothing Burns Like Bridges” – Penny Century (Between a Hundred Lies, 2007)
“Let X=X” – Laurie Anderson (Big Science, 1981)
“Go, Hippie” – Fountains of Wayne (Utopia Parkway, 1996)
“I Can Hear Music” – The Ronettes (single, 1966)
“Just Like Honey” – The Jesus and Mary Chain (Psychocandy, 1985)
Fingertips 