Adventures in Mix Making

In an earlier post I mentioned that I'm involved with some ruffians in a mix club. The basic premise is that we're taking turns creating Spotify playlists and posting them on the Facebooks. Wild stuff. My turn finally came around this week, which is good because I've been crafting this sucker for about a month and I'm damn near sick of it.

In any case, I thought I'd post it here (since who doesn't like a little injection of new music) and tell you a bit about it. (Hiyo process story!)

One of my favorite conversations has always been about how people make mixes. For me, my default mode is finding music that matches sound-wise, whether it's jangly indie guitar, or breathy songwriter stuff, or whatever. For this mix I got stuck on what I consider to be a kind of dirty guitar sound. I went through about 4 drafts of the mix before I settled. The biggest challenge was dealing with Spotify, which sadly lacks many of the tracks that I was most excited about including, like:

A Story of Nashville by Oblio
Nice by Thisway
The Silence Between Us by Bob Mould
Sewn Together by The Meat Puppets

Bad luck, right? I think I found suitable replacements. It sounded ok when I took the final incarnation for a test drive yesterday. Oh, and that's the other thing. I test drive my mixes. Before anyone else hears one, I've heard it at least twice.  One positive turn that came from the swap outs, is that I got to put "Trouble Comes Running" by Spoon back in. The song hadn't survived the first draft edits, but somehow at the end, it was just what I needed.

The name of the mix comes from a line in the second track "Good To Be" by Backyard Tire Fire. I think basic mix protocol is to use a lyric that somehow fits the mix. In this case, I picked "I Just Don't Know When to Stop" because most of the songs are upbeat and energetic, and that violates my pacing rule of putting in two slow songs in the middle and a kind of slow song second to last. I tried. Sort of did it. But you know, I hate slow songs. I want a mix, not an Ambien.

Ok. Quick word about some of the artists. The past few years, I've had a hard time making a mix that didn't include Brendan Benson. His 2005 album Alternative to Love is a mix maker's dream. "Feel Like Myself Again" is the kind of song that'll get you through a gloomy afternoon. Suzanne Vega's "Frank & Ava" is  probably one of my most listened to songs. Her lyrics are *mwuah* excellent. I also got to work in the very first Wilco song I ever knew, one that I actually had the lyrics to in my high school locker. Then there's the Candy Butchers, the most underrated pop/rock act of the 90s. Also, let's not forget Pictures and Sound, from Nashville dude Luke Reynolds. Again, you want to talk about under-appreciated, Picture and Sound's one and only album had more than a few standouts.

Anyway, that's enough about that. If you're so inclined, give it a listen. Happy Friday.

SXSW Sampler from NPR

It's definitely a big week for music, and The Musically Inclined..... is not in Austin right now (sorry), but that doesn't mean that there isn't a little SXSW goodness to be heard back here. Mainly I just wanted to draw to your attention the free NPR Music at SXSW sampler that's available on iTunes. The track listing is as follows:

01. Written in Reverse : Spoon
02. The High Road : Broken Bells
03. I Learned the Hard Way : Sharon Jones And The Dap-Kings
04. Canadian Girl : The Walkmen
05. Girl In Love : Smith Westerns
06. Airplanes : Local Natives
07. Everywhere I Go : G-Side
08. Cleo's Song : JBM
09. Achille's Heel: IV. Shur Landing : Brooklyn Rider
10. Hannah : Freelance Whales
11. Swim : Surfer Blood

The first two tracks alone make this worth the download. In somewhat related news, I have scattered thoughts on Broken Bells and will post soon. Anyway, the sampler is again, free, so I don't really know why you're still reading this. Have at it.

Written in Reverse : Spoon

Spoon has been growing on me the past couple years. I like that front man Britt Daniel's vocals are not clean and pretty and I like that the songs I've heard have a jumpy, nervous energy. Check out "Written in Reverse" (courtesy of Pitchfork), from their latest album, Transference.

Streaming Albums-- A Good Idea!

Somewhere Chris Anderson is cackling about the value of "free" and congratulating himself for writing a book about it. Dude can have it. Free is the greatest tactic these days in appealing to a generation that gets whatever it wants, when it wants it.

I'm listening to Vampire Weekend's Contra right now. When it hits stores on Tuesday, I will probably buy it. It's good and investing $9.99 in it presents zero risk because I know exactly what I'm getting ahead of time.

That's a level of convenience you can hardly believe. In the past few months alone, hearing albums streamed in their entirety has lead to me buying Noah and the Whale's First Days of Spring, and the previously blogged about Ben Gibbard/Jay Farrar Jack Kerouac project One Fast Move or I'm Gone.

The flip side is that when The Hold Steady streamed Stay Positive on their MySpace a few years ago, I decided not to buy it.

In the long run though, that risk minimization has opened the door to discover even more music. Maybe you find something you feel like you can't live without-- that's another album purchased. That's also priceless.

*NPR's All Songs Considered is pretty much the greatest for hearing cool albums streamed, partly because they bring albums to your attention that are usually worth the time. You can find Spoon's latest, Transference here on the 11th.

TMI Mini Mix no. 2

Is there a better way to start off 2009 than with TMI Mini Mix no. 2? I can think of none. Last week my friend gave me a copy of an album called The Midnight Organ Fight by Frightened Rabbit, a group from Scotland. I've been spending some quality time with the album and I'm liking it a lot. I put a good deal of stock in what my friend recommends and he's yet to suggest a dud.

I thought I'd build the mini mix around one track called "Old Old Fashioned" which as got this awesome skiffle thing going on and that inevitably brought me to "I've Just Seen a Face" by The Beatles and things just spiraled. Anyway, take a listen. It'll be up all month.

Best of luck in 2009, here's to hoping you've sufficiently recovered from last night.

1. I've Just Seen a Face : Paul McCartney
2. Old Old Fashioned : Frightened Rabbit
3. Long Day : Matchbox Twenty
4. Turn On Me : The Shins
5. The Underdog : Spoon