Sunday Swoon. July 14th 2013.

1. The original Sugababes line up, now Mutya, Keisha, Siobhan have released the full length Dev Hynes produced track Flatlines to the world. My pop tart side definitely coming out.

2. Leaving aside the fact that the video creeps me out slightly Julia Holter has released another clever and complex track In The Green Wild.

3. Phoenix were a Glastonbury highlight for me. I couldn’t have asked for any other band to officially close the Sunday night and if I tell you how many times I’ve watched their set back on iPlayer in the space of two weeks you’d worry. The video for Trying to be Cool gets the point of the track entirely.

4. Time to bring out the inner hipster. Ariel Pink featuring Jorge Elbrecht track Hang on to Life. Track of the week for me.

5. I’m not a fan of the Manic Street Preachers but adore their latest track Rewind the Film featuring Richard Hawley (that man probably being the reason why I’ve connected with this). The video is beautifully shot, bleak and melancholy.

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2013 So Far (In A Playlist)

My blog is now in its third year of posting the music that’s grabbed me the most, floated my boat, captured my heart during the first six months of the year, in a historically strict twenty-five tracks. (I fully expect the person who first made me think of doing this will, as usual, come up with a far superior list).

You can play my 2013 tracks so far via YouTube or Spotify.

1. Mount Kimbie – Made To Stray
2. Daft Punk – Lose Yourself To Dance
3. John Grant – GMF
4. Kurt Vile – Was All Talk
5. Public Service Broadcasting – ROYGBIV
6. Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Despair
7. Daughter – Youth
8. Suede – It Starts And Ends With You
9. Vampire Weekend – Diane Young
10. Boards Of Canada – Reach For The Dead
11. Haim – Falling
12. David Bowie – Where Are We Now?
13. Wolf Alice – Bros
14. Darwin Deez – You Can’t Be My Girl
15. Disclosure – Latch
16. Local Natives – Wooly Mammoth
17. Villagers – Passing A Message
18. Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds – Mermaids
19. Jessie Ware – Imagine It Was Us
20. Phoenix – Trying To Be Cool
21. Fuck Buttons – The Red Wing
22. Gaz Coombes Presents – One Of These Days
23. Foals – My Number
24. Kelis – Jerk Ribs
25. Queens Of The Stone Age – I Sat By The Ocean

A Happy Easter Glastonbury Mixtape

I never sleep well during a full moon. So if you add that to Tinnitus playing its wicked part in a lack of a peaceful nights sleep regardless of the lunar cycle, this week has been restless. At some point around 4am Wednesday morning I started trying to compile an Easter mixtape but all that kept popping into my head was songs from Jesus Christ Superstar and Blue’s All Rise (blame a catholic upbringing and drinking a lot of cider in a town that loved pop, tacky boy bands and R&B). Despite the fact that the mere mention of these songs runs the risk of creating unwanted earworms to anyone foolish enough to be reading I didn’t want to actually put you through hearing them.

Last night as I was sat sinking pints listening to my male colleagues talk golf and scrolling through my phone the Glastonbury line up was partly announced (I know there’s more to come because Thom Yorke in some guise wasn’t listed so I am still hopeful for John Grant and Yeah Yeah Yeahs in my wildest dreams). So instead of Easter this mixtape is based on those first knee jerk excitements as I glanced through the stages. I can smell the petrichor, sloe gin in hip flasks and the mud already.

You can play this on either YouTube or Spotify. Have a very merry Easter. ♥

1. Phoenix – Girlfriend
2. Tom Tom Club – Wordy Rappinghood
3. Solange – Losing You
4. Villagers – Becoming A Jackal
5. Foals – Milk & Black Spiders
6. The Rolling Stones -Ruby Tuesday
7. Devendra Banhart – Can’t Help But Smiling
8. Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Nobody’s Baby Now
9. Nas – The Message
10. The Horrors – Still Life
11. Vampire Weekend – Diane Young
12. Haim – Falling
13. Local Natives – Breakers
14. Rodriguez – Inner City Blues
15. Peace – Bloodshake

Sunday Swoon. December 9th

All about the tunes…

1. Darwin Deez has returned this week with a track of his forthcoming album The Editorial Me. His videos always somehow strike a beautiful balance between humour and forlorn reality, his video for DNA always inducing a heartfelt sigh from me at the very end. A joyous, bizarre and uplifting Glastonbury highlight in 2011. Can’t wait to see him again in February.

2. Scott Walker has come out of his somewhat reclusive life to release Bish Bosch this week. Irrespective of how accessible some of his albums may be (I had a gloriously bizarre night at the Barbican celebrating his albums Tilt and Drift) he is a rare musical genius. Listen alone with open ears… it made me feel strange, in a way that only Scott Walker can.

3. This somehow escaped me last week. Veronica Falls with Teenage. A sort of upbeat song about giving up, I adore it and they should be in every music lovers record collection.

4. As if Darwin Deez cheering my life wasn’t enough Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds also made a return this week to keep me firmly grounded with We Know Who U R. How this man manages to make dark and menacing sound like the most inviting place in the world I’ll never fathom.

5. No new track to play you but just old-fashioned excitement that Phoenix are set to release a new album in April 2013 as reported by Pitchfork this week. Strangely I had been playing Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix pretty much on repeat this week. Some cosmic sign was telling me they would be back.

The Letter ‘P’ Mixtape.

The Letter P Mixtape. Brought to you on a day I feel illogically positive.

Therefore I wanted to avoid maudlin and tragic songs where I could. Except that Perfume Genius sneaked in there because the album this is from is one of my recent favourites. Along with Polica it’s a contender for my album of the year. The video below is for the very special and beautiful friend that I sat with extremely drunk on cheap wine, holding hands, watching it on repeat. I want her to get married looking like the dancer in green next year.

There is no greater motivator in my life right now than Public Enemy’s Harder Than You Think, thanks to the Paralympics. This replaces Paul Weller’s Brand New Start which was a sadder song to make life changes too. You can’t double fist pump to Paul Weller, the mods would frown upon it.

You can play my letter O mixtape on Spotify or YouTube. ♥

1. Pulp – Pink Glove
2. Polica – Wandering Star
3. Peaking Lights – Beautiful Son
4. Perfume Genius – Dark Parts
5. Prince – Strange Relationship
6. Phoenix – Too Young
7. The Psychedelic Furs – Into You Like A Train
8. Patrick Wolf – The Magic Position
9. Peaches – I’m The Kinda
10. Public Enemy – Harder Thank You Think