The B-52s: ‘My Secret Playlist’
Our favourite retro-hipsters — and the only band to make Hawaiian shirts look at least kinda fashionable — The B52s have been doing it for more than thirty years, and they’re still writing great pop music. Their latest album, Funplex, is just that: fun plex twenty. Sorry, plus twenty. We like it. And we’re not surprised given the rather old-school Secret Playlist that Kate Pierson [first six songs] and Keith Strickland have assembled.
Jane Siberry / Bound By the Beauty
Jane Siberry changed her name to Issa, sold her home and most of her possessions (although she owns a pair of fabulous boots), and sells her music — digitally only, to cut down on plastic waste — by a self-determined pricing policy. She’s an incredible, profound songwriter and singer, and is doing it her way, for sure.
Joni Mitchell / A Case Of You
I had her very first album when I was a kid and had my own folk-protest band, The Sun Doughnuts. She was a huge inspiration, and her open tunings were a real influence on Ricky Wilson’s guitar playing.
Genoa Keawe / E Mama E
Feeling uptight? Want to make it alright? Just listen to this! Known as Auntie Genoa, she recently passed away. But she was the Queen of the old-school, real deal Hawaiian singers.
Chic / Le Freak
This song contains my favorite Nile Rogers line: ‘clams on the half-shell, and roller skate, roller skate’. Check out Nile Rogers’ WeAreFamilyFoundation.org, promoting peace and tolerance. It’s just what we need right now.
Kraftwerk / Trans-Europe Express
They are so innovative and it’s a rare treat to see them live — with real robots! Ricky, Keith and I were on Ricky’s sailboat on Lake Lanier during a lightning storm and we had this song blasting on the boombox as we sailed like the wind to get back to shore. It was very exci-tatious!
Komeda / It’s Alright, Baby
You just need to check out this poppy band from Denmark. There’s not much that can be said about them.
The Patti Smith Group / Pumping
This song has everything I love about Patti Smith and her group: it’s exhilarating, intoxicating and transcendent. When our band was starting out in Athens, Georgia, this song gave me the feeling that the possibilities were infinite.
The Stooges / 1969
In the fall of 1969, I was 16 and started attending a new school where I knew no one. My parents had one of those big stereo consoles and I would put on 1969 and play it as loud as possible and sing into a make-believe microphone while flailing myself across the living room floor. The Stooges articulated perfectly my teenage frustrations, alienation and boredom. Teenage angst was never more fun.
Tagged: My Secret Playlist, pop music, rock music
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Land Of Talk’s Secret Playlist [psst, they like Bon Iver]
Red hot Montreal band Land of Talk feature Elizabeth Powell, a former punk who got her start playing her own anti-rock anthems on the local scene of Guelph, Ontario, during her mid-teens. We got the inside word from her on the tunes that inspire Land of Talk’s own high energy frock and roll. The first track she propped was, drum roll please, Bon Iver’s hauntingly evocative, Re:Stacks: ‘This song changed my course, emotionally. I can’t tell you how, but it levelled me. Everyone I’ve played it for, or who has heard it, has had the same or similar reactions. This is a song I will listen to well into my twilight years’. Read the rest of Land Of Talk’s Secret Playlist.
My Secret Playlist: Weezer’s Mikey Welsh
Former bassist of Weezer, Mikey Welsh, has since reinvented himself as a successful artist. We covered his recent exhibition at Rhode Island’s Montanaro Gallery and checked in with him to get his Secret Playlist, a rundown of the tunes that spin while he’s working on one of his canvasses. The first track on his Playlist is the frenetic Minutemen song, Search: ‘Clocking in at 51 seconds, The Minutemen lay down all the goods that made them one of the best bands in history. This track features throbbing, melodic bass from Mike Watt, glass-breaking guitar from D. Boon, and tom-tom heavy swirls from George Hurley. Watt takes the mic for this one, at times sounding a bit like David Byrne. Almost as soon as you get your head around this tune, it’s done’. Read more of Mikey Welsh’s Secret Playlist.
The music behind the new Howling Bells album, Radio Wars
The last time I caught up with London-based, Australian band, Howling Bells, was in New York in early 2007 when they played a show at one of the many seedy Lower East Side bars. Since then, they’ve recorded a new album, the aptly named Radio Wars [listen to their song, Treasure Hunt, below], a remarkable follow-up to their 2006 self-titled debut. I checked in with guitarist Joel Stein to find out what music the four-piece had been listening to around the time the album was written: ‘The Byrds’ Eight Miles High always sounds so futuristic to me. It has one of the best guitar sounds ever and really moves me with its color and power. Every time I hear the Tortoise track, I Set My Face to the Hillside, I instantly get transported to the ocean. Beautiful! Joy Division’s Isolation is incredible. I love the intro keyboard riff, in particular (the keyboard was self-built). It expresses urgency and truth. And then there’s Neu!’s Hallogallo, a truly inspiring instrumental track that I always want to go on for longer. Its fuzzy guitars are so warm and vibrant. Perfect!’ Read frontwoman Juanita Stein’s Playlist of inspiring songs.
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