Sunday Song Survey

Today’s edition of Songs That Played During My Meditation Time¹

1. The Besnard Lakes– Disaster

   
   The Besnard Lakes Are The Dark Horse

   Like this pulsing bass line a lot, and actually this song is really growing on me. The band has a new album coming out early next year, I’ll probably pick up a copy.

2. Destroyer– European Oils
   2006 Pitchfork Music Festival Sampler
   I went to the Pitchfork Music fest this year², I think, but I don’t remember seeing Destroyer. Probably would have been fun, as I like the album this song is taken from.
3. Louis Jordan & His Tympany Five– You Will Always Have A Friend
   Disc E: 1949-1950
   you will always have a friend, as long as you have money to spend. True, cynical, but true. Recently picked up a 5 disc box set of Louis Jordan: a slightly forgotten, R&B jump blues jokester from the 1940s and 1950s. Highly enjoyable. This is a danceable calypso-esque song, with horns, drums, piano and percussion.
4. Beastie Boys– Get It Together

   
   Ill Communication

   With Q-Tip providing additional vocal contributions, one of the better tracks on Ill Communication, the last great album the Beastie Boys released, so far anyway. Ma Bell got the Ill Communication. Indeed.

5. Stone Roses, The– Made Of Stone

   
   The Stone Roses

   from one of the many golden eras of British pop, now reissued and remastered.

6. Marley, Bob & The Wailers– Duppy Conqueror

   
   Burnin

   speaking of ululation, this track from one of my Desert Island discs³ has some funky background vocal effects. I suspect Peter Tosh is making sounds with his mouth emulating a cat purring, but who knows. Lovely track, not my favorite on this album, but every song by the classic edition of the Wailers⁴ is excellent in my estimation.

7. O’connor, Sinead– All Apologies
   Universal Mother
   and speaking of trills and spills, love how O’Connor’s Irish brogue is noticeable on words like marriage, buried. Also imagine she sings in the son I feel as one, instead of the Kurt Cobainin the sun I feel as one, but I could be wrong.
8. Callahan, Bill– Diamond Dancer

   
   Woke On A Whaleheart

   Bill Callahan’s⁵ decent, observational song about a girl who danced by herself so hard she became a diamond, gave the world her light. His baritone is so emotionless, he probably irritates you or enthralls you, depending upon your mood.

9. We The People– You Burn Me Up And Down

   
   

   Nuggets: Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era, Vol. 4
   Florida based garage rockers, a favorite song from my favorite compilations of garage rock, the Nuggets series.

10. Butthole Surfers– Mexican Caravan

    
    Psychic … Powerless … Another Mans Sac

    I came of age in Austin during the Butthole’s heyday, so of course I love this song and this band. Not everyone loves psychedelic punk rock songs about scoring Mexican heroin, that is their loss.

11. The Black Keys– Stack Shot Billy

    
    Rubber Factory

    Modern garage rock, slightly derivative⁶ but still quite fun. One could compile an eclectic mix of Stagger Lee songs, ranging from the original recorded versions of bluesmen from the 1920s and 1930s, to the R&B versions in the 1950s to the 1960s British blues-rockers to The Clash to Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds to The Black Keys. That Stagger Lee is a bad motherfucker.

all in all, a pretty good meditative soundtrack

Footnotes:

1. no playlist today, just a shuffle [↩]
2. 2006 [↩]
3. an album I would theoretically take with me if I had foreknowledge I was going to be stranded on a desert island [↩]
4. before Bunny Wailer and Peter Tosh left [↩]
5. aka Smog aka (Smog) for some reason [↩]
6. but then what rock music isn’t? [↩]