Air Traffic

Check out this band recently signed to EMI. I'm hoping for good things from these 20-year-olds from Bournemouth, England.

Even Better at the End of June

My intention was to make a Country Time Lemonade, soft and slow, sweet and summery, sundown Sunday compilation for my week at home. Well, Sunday was gorgeous, and here's what we listened to:

1) Nina Simone - I Shall Be Released
2) Leo Kottke & Doc Watson - The Last Steam Engine Train (from a live recording on A Prairie Home Companion)
3) Loose Fur - The Ruling Class
4) Johnny Cash - The City of New Orleans
5) Eva Cassidy - Time After Time
6) Matt Nathanson - Romeo & Juliet
7) Johnny Cash & Fiona Apple - Father & Son
8) The Beatles - When I'm Sixty Four
9) Old 97's - In the Satellite Rides a Star
10) Redbird - You Are the Everything
11) Hem - South Central Rain
12) Richard Julian - Love of Mine
13) Josh Ritter - The Bad Actress
14) Townes Van Zandt - Flyin' Shoes
15) KT Tunstall - Black Horse & The Cherry Tree (Live @ VH1.com)
16) Jackie Wilson - Please Tell Me Why
17) Otis Redding - I've Been Loving You Too Long
18) Lightinin' Hopkins - Found My Baby Crying
19) Muddy Waters - Walking Blues
20) Buddy Guy - Try to Quit You Baby
21) Ray LaMontagne - Trouble
22) Josh Ritter - Good Man

Thom Yorke - Black Swan

Awesome April Music

The compiling of songs for this mix began way back in April and has extended into June. You can see that I began by trying to stick only to new releases, relatively speaking, but as usual, I ended up fleshing it out by throwing in a bunch of discoveries and rediscoveries. I hope you like it.

1) Track a Tiger - Sound as Ever song
2) Ian Love - The Only Night song
3) The Eighteenth Day of May - Sir Casey Jones official site
4) Jolie Holland - Springtime Can Kill You song
5) Gnarls Barkley - Crazy song
6) Katharine Whalen - You Who official site
7) The Mountain Goats – Fall of the Star High School Running Back
8) Drive By Truckers – Sounds Better in the Song
9) Fleetwood Mac - Beautiful Child lyrics
10) Lyle Lovett – Her First Mistake
11) Julie Miller – All My Tears bio
12) Blur – Tender song
13) Lee Dorsey – Get Out of My Life, Woman info
14) John Prine – Your Flag Decal Won’t Get You into Heaven Anymore
15) The Band – The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down
16) Percy Sledge – Out of Left Field
17) Smokey Robinson & the Miracles – I Second That Emotion
18) Bonnie “Prince” Billy – I See a Darkness song
19) Beck – Guess I’m Doing Fine live cut from VH1
20) Sufjan Stevens - Adlai Stevenson
21) Jon Brion - Creep (Live at Amoeba Records) video song

Music for a Rough Day

This mix has been a month or so in the making, but it's finally time, I think, to post it. Since finishing with school, losing the family I'd help to cultivate over the past couple years, I've been down. This is just some of the music I've listened to since finishing. And I might as well explain that I wanted to hear these songs as sung by their writers, even though someone else may have had more success singing the song.

1) Warren Zevon - Reconsider Me
2) Harry Nilsson - Gotta Get Up
3) Leon Russell - A Song for You
4) Billy Joel - Vienna
5) Fred Neil - Everybody's Talkin'
6) Elton John - Talking Old Soldiers
7) Townes Van Zandt - No Place to Fall
8) John Prine - Illegal Smile
9) Leonard Cohen - The Stranger Song
10) Jimmy Cliff - Many Rivers to Cross
11) Randy Newman - Real Emotional Girll
12) Paul Simon - American Tune
13) Wilco - Reservations
14) Josh Ritter - Here at the Right Time
15) Neil Young - Down by the River
16) Loudon Wainwright III - New Paint
17) Kris Kristofferson - Help Me Make It Through the Night
18) Jackson Browne & Warren Zevon - Hasten Down the Wind

So not all sad and lonely, but you can see where I was going.

Earlier this year, I posted a bit on the music used in the teaser trailer for Marie-Antoinette which made its debut to huge boos at Cannes. Thank you Blake for this review of the movie and the boos.

This mix is dedicated in part to my brother Ben, who this weekend is graduating from college.

1) Merry Clayton - Yes
2) Howard Jones - Everlasting Love
3) Howard Jones - No One is to Blame
4) Howard Jones - Things Can Only Get Better
5) Matthew Wilder - Break My Stride
6) Boy Meets Girl - Waiting for a Star to Fall
7) Paul Young - I Want to Know What Love Is
8) Eric Carmen - Hungry Eyes
9) Eric Carmen - Make Me Lose Control
10) The Raspberries - Go All the Way
11) Badfinger - No Matter What
12) Badfinger - Baby Blue
13) Badfinger - Day After Day
14) Corey Hart - Never Surrender
15) Corey Hart - I Wear My Sunglasses at Night
16) Animotion - Room to Move
17) Animotion - Obsession
18) Go West - King of Wishful Thinking
19) Go West - Faithful
This happens to me all the time. I find my musical fixes are based on seasonal needs. That is, with weather changes, as my mind shifts gears, my musical taste morphs. This time last year, I was really getting into one of the songs in this mix, Howard Jones' "No One is to Blame." Here it is, spring again, and my HoJo fix grows. The best way to describe this week's collection of songs is as more of a historical list than a beginning to end cohesive playlist.

After Dirty Dancing alone in my shoebox apartment for much of last week, I watched Dirty Dancing Live in Concert, a live performance of the music from the film which toured in 1988, and I found myself on the edge of my couch. The footage was so dated, so silly, and it showed what a phenomenon D Squared had become in this country.

I vividly remember the car trips to Wichita, Kansas that year with my brother, the perpetual backseat DJ, asking dad to "Weewind! 'Hungwy Eyes!'"

You see, my chubby, chubby, little brother was under the impression that Eric Carmen's massively successful single "Hungry Eyes," was about a man obessesed with sweets, as he was; a chocoholic from a young age, my brother'd stuff any sugary concoction into his ruddy cheeks with sweeping fistfuls, his babyfat arms like crescents blithely swinging through bags of Hershey's Kisses or Nestle Tollhouse Morsels.

I've tangented from the oh so wonderful Dirty Dancing Live in Concert. In it, Mr. Carmen, ever the diva, fits the role well. It's clear he's looking past the fact he is a burnt out former frontman for a respected pack of rockers, The Raspberries. It's clear he's upset he'll be known as much for crafting a song from a movie as he would one that could stand on its own, like his other massive solo hit, "All By Myself." What isn't clear is why he looks like a bloated, valium-addicted, Long Island housewife. For some reason, he opted for blown out bottle blond lion's mane, smoky eye shadow, burgundy blush, and the tiger print gold lame' evening jacket. His blanched tapered jeans, black leotard, skinny suspenders, and what look like white lace-up Keds, all fitting about two sizes too small, make him look more like Streisand than Springsteen.

His look so startled me that I found myself researching the man as only I can. I learned about his breaking into music with his Mentor, Ohio buddies, helming the steering wheel on the crash-friendly Raspberries. His move to California to become one of the early eighties best songwriters (mostly known for his soundtrack help; see Footloose and Dirty Dancing).

And then I expanded, looking for sounds that immitated Carmen, contemporaries, finding the following music suited a certain nostalgia I had for heavily produced songs of the latter day new wave saints. Badfinger made its way in becoming one of the Raspberries major chart competitors. Badfinger was the only successful band to come out of the Apple Records debaucle them Beatles put together.

As for Boy Meets Girl, let's just say, they rule. Without them, there'd be no Whitney Houston. That's right. No Whitney. And without "Waiting for a Star to Fall" there'd be no title sequence to Three Men and a Little Lady, at least not one I'd remember.

Animotion was fronted in its final days by Cynthia Rhodes, the blonde dancer/actress in Double D who played Penny Johnson, the would be dancer extraordinaire if not for her fated run-in with Robbie "I Get My Thing Stuck in Other Things" Gould. Oh yeah, and she's Mrs. Richard Marx. Chicagoans just call her Mrs. Dick Marx.

This mix was solidified when, while shaving at school, we in the men's lounge had an impromptu dance party to "Never Surrender" complete with fist pumping and towel snaps. My Quebecois amigo, Conrad, confirmed that Corey Hart, Canada's pride and joy, now lives in the Bahamas with his wife and kids. Rough life you Canadians lead.

Oh yeah, and there's Matthew Wilder AKA Matthew Weiner, the one time consumate ladies' man and now he who lays claim to unearthing the talent of No Doubt. Love. Angel. Music. Baby.
We all know.

For 100 points and the game, what two films mentioned here are related by director? What is his name? For the Big Ben Jammin' bonus point: How did he die?

A rare move for me, I'm posting this mix before I've had a chance to listen to it from beginning to end. I had to remove Bill Withers' cover of "Let It Be" due to length constraints, but this mix is relatively representative of the kind of time I've been having lately. It's all over the place.

1) James Taylor - Oh Baby, Don't You Loose Your Lip on Me
2) The Hollies - Jesus Was a Crossmaker
3) Jimmy Castor Bunch - It's Just Begun
4) Mickey & Sylvia - Love is Strange
5) Otis Redding - Try a Little Tenderness
6) John Prine - Angel from Montgomery
7) Neil Young & The Band - Helpless (Live at the Last Waltz)
8) Townes Van Zandt - My Proud Mountains
9) Kathleen Edwards - Away
10) Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - It'll All Work Out
11) Hem - Night Like a River
12) Low - Nowhere Man
13) Josh Ritter - Kathleen
14) Josh Ritter - Snow is Gone
15) The Marshall Tucker Band - Can't You See
16) I Nine - Same in Any Language
17) Jon Brion - Strings That Tie to You (It's in there. Trust me.)
18) Leonard Cohen - Sisters of Mercy
19) Solomon Burke - Cry to Me
20) Rachael Yamagata - Jesus Was a Crossmaker
21) Elton John - Ballad of a Well-Known Gun

I suppose it's impossible to miss that my mixes take their inspiration from films, friends, and funk (Don't ask about that last one).

This week, I'd like to thank two pretty terrible movies: Elizabethtown and Dirty Dancing. Don't get me wrong: I love D Squared. I love it only for its soundtrack and imagery. Elizabethtown's only redeeming quality is the ten or so seconds of the lush landscape of the heartland which steal away from the over-indulgent amount of screen time given to the face of Mr. Orlando Bloom, a Kentucky native, I believe. Oh that, and the twelve dozen or so "Dad Rock" songs Cameron Crowe manages to elbow into each of his films. I'm a sucker for dad rock, and this film which tries to be about fathers and sons - apparently, among other things - delves deep into many of the dad rock trappings: Tom Petty, early Elton John, and of course The Concretes.

I'm kidding, of course, but then again, so is this movie. Right? This was just some silly inside joke on the part of Crowe and his cronies as if to say, "Watch this.... No really! Ha, ha! We're going to convince you guys this is actually our second sub-par follow-up to Almost Famous, and you're going to buy tickets. And the movie will blow chunks, and then we'll all sit around, drinking Ale 8 One, and have a hard, heartful laugh." I'm still waitin' on the beverage, Crowe. You owe me.

As for my friends: Erin and Mike are to thank for a few of these selections. Both are a constant source of amusement. Erin seems to think that Mandy Moore and I have similar taste in music. Admittedly, I check the iTunes "Celebrity Playlists" every Tuesday. I was impressed with Miss Moore's selections. She seems to be rather level-headed lately, considering.... As for Michael, some people just have good taste. Monsieur Tres Simple is one such person. Merci, Mike.

Until next time, a bien tot.

Stream Neil Young's new album, "Living with War."

Sufjan Stevens

I've culled some hard-to-find tracks of Mr. Stevens from Mike's blog. His does with one what I try to do with two.

Enjoy. And thanks, Mike.

Sufjan Stevens - Dear Mr. Supercomputer
Sufjan Stevens - The Star-Spangled Banner (Live at the Bluebird Theatre)
Sufjan Stevens - Adlai Stevenson
Sufjan Stevens - Chicago (Acoustic)
Sufjan Stevens - The Avalanche
Sufjan Stevens - Casimir Pulaski Day

This mix is simply entitled "Yeah," in my iTunes. I think it was given that name to match up with my sort of downtrodden state this weekend. Most of these songs are middle emotion, midtempo; they've hit me in the way I feel certain circumstances in my life have been hitting lately, but certainly they've struck my so-called metaphysical chords quite harmoniously.

Apologies to those of you reading this to find new music as some of the songs appear on old mixes found here. This week, I was definitely going for music to match a mental state. Hopefully, you understand.

1) The Little Willies - No Place to Fall
2) Jeff Tweedy - Be Not So Fearful
3) Pink Floyd - Wish You Were Here
4) Elton John - Come Down in Time
5) Sufjan Stevens - Chicago (Acoustic)
6) Chaka Khan - Love Me Still
7) The Rolling Stones - I Got the Blues
8) Van Morrison - Beside You
9) The Beatles - Cry Baby Cry
10) Corinne Bailey Rae - Like a Star
11) Bill Withers - Can We Pretend
12) Carla Bruni - Quelqu'un Ma Dit
13) The Weepies - Gotta Have You
14) Rosie Thomas - Since You've Been Around
15) Lyle Lovett - If I Needed You
16) Townes Van Zandt - Flyin' Shoes
17) Bill Withers - Stories
18) Luz Casal & Carlos Nunez - Negra Sombra
19) Bill Fay - Be Not So Fearful
20) Townes Van Zandt - High, Low, and In Between

The Weepies, not The Weebles, have stolen much of this weekend from me, and I'd like it back. It's either that, or I am going to have them steal your week. You may resist, but this song's infectious chorus will stick to you like gum to a shoe's sole. That's too nice. I'll say this: it's like walking into a spider's web of harmonies - ok, ok, maybe not a web, but something that clings to everything and makes trying to do anything else futile. It's like the schadenfreude involved in the inexplicable joy of watching someone attempt to parallel park a six foot long car in four feet of space. But it's not malicious. Ok, I'm prefacing this song too much for what it is. Give it a listen and get back to me. It may follow you home like it did me - staring up at me with those eyes, that lost, sorta cute, but definitely mutty dog that it is. It's a dog. I love this song, even though it may pee on my shoes.

The Weepies - Gotta Have You
If that link doesn't work, you can view my plagiarism and get the song here.

Oh, yeah, and Deb Talan and Steve Tannen, the pair who make up said Weepies, have the sweetest story.

The Brooklyn Vegan has posted a New York Summer Concert Preview. It's going to be a good summer!

Oh, and according to Pollstar, Wilco's playing in Prospect Park on July 13th.

So there! I've wanted to see Wilco for about five years now, and I am finally going to be able to see them, I'll be able to afford this show, and I'll be outside in the park drunk with friends. What more could a guy ask for? A double kick drum by The Landing would perhaps be nice. That's right, Chicago - The Landing.

Here are two videos of my favorite comedian, Aziz Ansari. The first one is from a show I saw in February of '05. The second is Aziz's contributions to The Mix Tape for this week. Also, check out Eugene Mirman. And Happy Easter.... totally unrelated, I know.

The Best New Album of 2006 (Thus Far)

I can't believe I haven't posted anything about Josh Ritter's new album. "The Animal Years" is at the same time grown organically and with painstaking care with its raw, sublimely picked strings, warm, full drums, and well thought out, wonderfully crafted, smart, biting lyrics. I've connected to his words more so than I have any other artist in recent years. And with the e-card above, you can listen to the entire album online for free!

The first time I heard Josh Ritter, I had just ended a relatively passionate relationship which managed to waiver on being the most honest and dishonest encounter I have ever been party to. Honest in all the flushes and rushes being in love can do to two people. We'd spend hours together just to be together. We'd spend all our money to be able to do so. It was dishonest in that when we were apart, the relationship delved into a lie so absurd I will spend my life trying to understand it. I suffered a series of whacks to my esteem: backhandedness, cheating, lying, and pure abuse. I'd returned from California where she was living, and for reasons I won't go into now, we'd both been watching HBO's "Six Feet Under" somewhat incessantly over those ten days. The first episode after our break-up ended with "Come and Find Me" by Mr. Ritter accompanying the credits. I immediately went out and found all the Josh Ritter I could, and became somewhat obsessed for the latter part of my senior year of college. His music seemed somehow to mend the pain she'd caused in all her lies. It recreated in me the desire to love, to find it again, if not for a moment.

The summer after college, I moved on from Josh Ritter to Damien Rice, Jeff Black, and Patrick Park, and that fall, I moved to London where as I continued to love Mr. Ritter's increasingly potent songs, I found out that while an Idaho native, thanks to major support from Glen Hansard and his band The Frames, Mr. Ritter'd gained a lot of leg in Ireland - where I would move next. Just prior to my arrival, he announced a Valentine's Day concert. My very close friend and roommate Blake and I leapt with excitement. We went. It was a wonderfully scattered show, and the Irish truly love him, especially, the rotund gentleman who'd heckle, "Keep playin', John."

Why I am telling you all this, I have no idea - just to lay out my coming to find the man who asked that we "come and find" him. So, do so now. It's never been a better opportunity.

I am in the midst of watching Be Here to Love Me for the fourth time since Sunday. This movie, this music, this man have engulfed me, part or whole in a big way. First time director Margaret Brown has crafted the best movie I have seen since The Ballad of Jack & Rose with a plethora of old footage, cool new shots of Texas roadsides, and hundreds of songs worthy of being called "perfect." Among Townes' more popular songs are "If I Needed You" and "Pancho and Lefty."

His songs tell the stories life handed him. They aren't necessarily big, they usually aren't beautiful, and they definitely aren't popular, but man, they become more than the sum of their parts - sorry to use a cliche.

What has stung me is his notion that in order to succeed he needed to abandon everyone and everything in his life - wives, kids, friends, jobs, homes, everything. But what can you expect from a man whose first serious song was "Waiting Around to Die." I'm passing a new milestone on my life's road, and with this one, I'm at a similar crossroad. I could very easily blow everything off, forget about everybody else and just take off and do it for myself, but I think I'm choosing to do it completely differently.

I'm going to pursue this artist's life, I'll be poor, down and out, malnourished, unkempt, as long as it means I get to do what I want. Wish me luck. Check out this movie. Check out "Marie," "Tecumseh Valley," and "Dead Flowers" a cover of The Rolling Stones' song made famous in The Big Lebowski.

Oh, and Margaret Brown's interview on WFMU is worth a listen if you have oodles of time or desire.

3 Discoveries for This Week

Track a Tiger - Sound as Ever
Ian Love - The Only Night
Gnarls Barkley - Crazy

Thanks to Mike for the third one. Cee-lo's back with DM in tow!

I'm on a major Bill Withers kick right now.

1) Donny Hathaway - A Song for You
2) Bill Withers - Let Me in Your Life
3) Roberta Flack - Killing Me Softly
4) Marvin Gaye - Mercy Mercy Me
5) Lauryn Hill & D'Angelo - Nothing Even Matters
6) Bill Withers - Can We Pretend
7) Prince - Starfish & Coffee
8) Neil Young - Don't Let It Bring You Down
9) Bill Withers - Use Me
10) Jungle Brothers - I'm Gonna Do You
11) A Tribe Called Quest - I Left My Wallet in El Segundo
12) William Bell - Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye
13) Neil Young - The Painter
14) Dooley Wilson - As Time Goes By
15) Bob Marley - Turn Your Lights Down Low
16) Procol Harum - A Whiter Shade of Pale
17) Joni Mitchell - California
18) Billy Joel - Vienna
19) Bill Withers - Stories
20) Bob Dylan - My Back Pages

Selections from Grey's Anatomy - Season Two

Pardon me while I exude what's left of my Grey's Anatomy load.

After scouring all that I care to scour of Alexandra Patsavas' selections from season two, I have found these nineteen tracks to best suit my recent mood. I won't bore you with any links, photos, etc. I just ask that you consider listening to a couple 30 second clips on iTunes, or Googling these bands. I've really enjoyed each of these tracks this week, a week - for me anyway - filled with music.

1) Slow Runner - Break Your Mama's Back
2) Monotypes - Dead Streets
3) Ben Lee - Catch My Disease
4) Anya Marina - Miss Halfway
5) Mark McAdam - Too Hard
6) Inara George - Fools in Love
7) Rosie Thomas - It Don't Matter to the Sun
8) Foy Vance - Homebird
9) Kate Earl - Someone to Love
10) Kendall Payne - Scratch
11) Corinne Bailey Rae - Like a Star
12) Jim Noir - I Me You
13) Moonbabies - War on Sound
14) Gemma Hayes - Two Step
15) The Headlights - Everybody Needs a Fence to Lean On
16) Keren Ann - Not Going Anywhere
17) Joe Purdy - Far Away Blues
18) Tegan and Sara - Not Tonight
19) Merrick - Infinity

A curmudgeonly old woman who once babysat me while my parents were out of town said, "Never trust a Greek." Ms. Patsavas and a few other Greek-Americans I'm more closely associated with here in New York are beginning to break my Greek-weary spell. So, to those of you untrustworthy, miserly, moody, greasy Greeks out there who read this meek web log, please thank Ms. Alexandra Patsavas in your bedtime prayers for helping me to begin trusting Greeks again. And pardon the "greasy" tag; it was admittedly a low blow. Being of German and Irish descent, there was more than one summer's day I was nicknamed "the sweater."

Still to come... a review of a musical review starring yours truly.

Three Free Downloads

I found these today when checking out the music used in season two of Grey's Anatomy. I don't even have TV, and yet I'm checking out TV show soundtracks.

Regardless, these three songs are free for you to download. The first two are notable because they're quite good. The third is notable because one of my classmates and good friends, Robyn, was a Wienermobile Girl for an entire year after college, and Grey's Anatomy is one of her favorite shows, odd coincidences for odd February afternoons.

Slow Runner - Break Your Momma's Back
Monotypes - Dead Streets (you may have to follow the "music" link to download this one)
Mike Tarantino - Wienermobile Girl

Also, for whatever reason, I found it important to note that Salon.com's Audiofile is an awesome place for some free music. They offer everything from James Taylor to Cat Power.