The mixes of Christmases Past.
Just a quick note–if you’re looking for past holiday mixes, they can all be found here.
If you’re looking for the specific track lists, hit the archives links on the far right, click December of whatever year, and you should find them.
Finally, some random thought that occurred to me: one of my favorite tracks on this year’s mix is “Song For A Future Love” by the Irish band The Frank & Walters. I think that song came out in 2010. I thought about using it last year, but it seemed so…mawkish, maybe? That big, over-the-top chorus with the strings and associated over-production is sort of the modus operandi of the Franks. It’s what they do.
This year, though, I didn’t feel that way about it. It felt right. Weird how that works; let a little sentimentalism in and yikes!
At any rate, they made a cool, appropriately sentimental video for the song, and I like it and so I’m sharing. So there.
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The Popnarcotic 2012 Christmas Music Mix Is Finally Here.
This one is…different.
This mix I mean. It probably “feels” different. As I mentioned in another post, I had a goofy mix set to upload last Friday…and then, well, the world intervened. I started from scratch at that point, although a few songs from that mix made it through to this one anyway.
I can’t rightly say why the events in Connecticut affected me so deeply. Perhaps it’s because I remember sort of getting lost on I-84 8 years ago in the middle of winter and stopping off in Newtown to ask directions. Maybe it’s just the season, and thinking about all those Christmas presents that won’t ever be opened. I don’t know. Something.
What I do know is this. I’m not at all a “kid person”. I like the idea of little kids, and I loved being one, let me tell you what. I have zero paternal instincts, though. I like kids, they just make me feel like a big, clueless doofus most of the time, and I’m pretty sure they can sense that discomfort.
Last Friday I was picking up some carryout and there were about 5 of us in line and this lady in front of me had two little girls who were somewhere between 3 and 6 years old. They were running around, despite Mom’s best abilities to keep them corralled. They were laughing and giggling and being little kids. One of them was jumping around with this ragged-looking stuffed horse.
Mom, looking a little exasperated, looked up at the rest of us in line and apologized for her amped up little daughters. All I could think was “No no no. Today of all days, two weeks before Christmas, let ’em play all they want.”
The sound of their laughter was like magic. Even so, I had to excuse myself from the line to go wipe some tears from my eyes.
I have no idea what any of that has to do with Christmas, other than establishing the frame of mind I was in while reworking a Christmas mix in a few days. If there’s less of my lame sense of humor and holiday goofishness in this year’s mix, well, now you know why.
What I will say is that when I see twitter and facebook posts with folks talking about what they want for Christmas, I already know exactly what I want, and I’d like it every year.
What I want is for all of us–myself, family and all you friends–to be safe and sound, and happy. Get me even close to an approximation of that gift, and I’m all good.
Merry Christmas!
(Either right-click the title and “save as” to download or left click to stream…but you knew that.)
…As Long As We Have Hands To Clasp (2012 Holiday Music Mix)
1. Vince Guaraldi Trio, “What Child Is This?”
2. The Attic Lights, “Why Does Christmas Have To Be So Hard?”
3. Emmy The Great & Tim Wheeler, “Home For the Holidays”
4. Luna, “Egg Nog”
5. Big Dee Irwin & Little Eva, “I Wish You A Merry Christmas”
6. Vashti Bunyan, “Coldest Night Of The Year”
7. The Frank & Walters “Song For A Future Love”
8. Teenage Fanclub, “December”
9. Tracey Thorn, “Snow In Sun”
10. Fountains Of Wayner, “Valley Winter Song”
11. Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, “Christmas Eve”
12. Tender Trap, “Leaving Christmas Day”
13. Magic Theater, “Christmas Lights”
14. The Quarter Afer, “Winter Song”
15. The Clumsy Lovers, “Welcome Christmas”
16. Best Coast & Wavves, “Got Something For You”
17. Ex Cops, “Wonderful Christmas”
18. Foxtails Brigade, “Winter’s Feat”
19. The Primitives, “You Trashed My Christmas”
20. Calexico, “Green Grows The Holly”
21. The Pogues, “Fairytale Of New York”
22. Richard Hawley (Live At The Devil’s Arse) “Silent Night”
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Christmas (music) Is Coming.
I’ve had a few very polite email inquiries if there was going to be a Popnarcotic Christmas mix this year.
The short answer is “Yes.” I hope to have it available tomorrow.
The longer, more complicated answer is that I finished the mix on Thursday night, December 13th. It was full of bubbly, silly, surpassingly goofy Christmas and holiday-themed songs that really didn’t get introspective until the Pogues kicked in at the end, per tradition.
And then Friday happened. Like a whole lot of you, I was simultaneously glued to TV coverage and disgusted and despairing and depressed beyond belief at the events in Connecticut.
Not only did I not feel like posting that Christmas mix, I have to say that it almost felt inappropriate.
This year, then, I almost gave the Christmas mix a rest.
I scrapped two months of work on it on Sunday morning and started over from scratch. I must’ve been in an awful frame of mind, because I thought I’d cobbled a good mix together…and then upon listening to it Monday night, I realized that I might as well call the mix “Morrissey Presents An Existential Christmas Featuring Emily Dickinson and Ian Curtis.”
Yeah, it was pretty bleak stuff.
I took another stab at it, and I think I found a middle ground between introspection, hope, renewal, nostalgia, and, yeah, even a healthy dose of joy for the holiday season. Give me a day and I’ll share it with you.
2012 In Fifty Songs
There are many things I am not good at doing. One of them is telling people how much I appreciate the posting links to videos and songs and whatnot in twitter and facebook posts, or just dropping me a line about something they’ve heard. What you all may not realize is that I make a point of listening to each and every piece of music I’m hepped to in those ways. No really, I do! I figure if someone is moved enough by a song or an artist to post about it that there’s probably something there worth my five minutes to listen to. I’ve heard a lot of music that didn’t click with me by doing that. The great thing is, I’ve also heard a lot that did move me.
What this is is a summary of 50 songs from 2012 that moved me enough to want to hear more. They’ve become representative of my favorite records and artists of 2012.
I could spend days telling you about the music so many of you have told me about this year (in what was a rich and amazing year for great tunes), but instead I’d like to show you. Better yet, I’ll let you listen to them!
I won’t use the same words and phrases you’re used to hearing from me to say how much I liked certain stuffs in 2012. Rather, I figured I’d get back to my roots and just do a music mix of my favorite songs and artists from the past year. Been about six or seven years since I’ve done this, but I’m pretty happy with the way things turned out. Additionally, thanks to Spotify, Turntable.fm, and Twitter I feel like I heard so much good music by so many great artists in 2012 that trying to pare things down to just 20 records would be an impossible chore.
So what’s all this then? Let me try to explain.
1. I broke the 50 tracks down into two separate mixes of 25 songs each. The mixes are interchangeable. I just separated things by how the flow goes. Each one is about 90 minutes. Each is crossfaded and normalized and one big mp3 file. The idea is, listen to all of it or come back to it, do whatever. That said, the object isn’t “Hey, how can I grab these songs?!?!” If you try, you’ll be stuck with the crossfaded bits and bytes from the beginning and end to each song. Instead of going to that trouble, throw some worthy artists some money, huh?
2. These go in order. That order has nothing to do with chronology or perceived quality. The order is: these mixes need to flow, one song into the next. Each one is autonomous. There should be a beginning, a middle, a few peaks, a few valleys, and then a wrap up. When you get to the end of one of the mixes, it should feel like you’re at the end, y’know?
3. Finally, thanks are in order: everyone who contributed to the “What are you listening to” 2012 thread at Quarter To Three, anyone who’s ever pm’d me or emailed me with a song or record or artist to listen to, anyone who’s ever posted a music video on my Facebook timeline, anyone who’s ever DJ’d in a room in Turntable, anyone who’s contributed a record to our Bitches Brew Spotify playlist….THANKS!!!!! This mix is as much all of you, and a tribute to all your good taste, not mine. I just manage to occasionally shut up long enough to listen when someone says that they like a song and then find the time to go see if I like that song, too.
These are the songs I liked off records I liked by artists I liked this year. They’re probably not the “best” of 2012; there’s probably not much crossover in the venn diagram of “stuff I really liked” and “stuff that sits on most critics’ lists”. I didn’t always choose the “best” song off a record I liked, either, necessarily. I picked songs in a lot of cases that I thought were representative of an album I liked a lot, and gave special consideration to songs that fit with a mix better, too. At any rate, I hope y’all will hear a few tunes you like, too!
“50 Smash Hits From 2012!”
Gangnam Style:
(Right click and “save as”…or just click to stream)
1. Japandroids “The Nights Of Wine And Roses”
2. Ty Segall and White Fence “Easy Ryder”
3. The Brian Jonestown Massacre “Viholliseni Maalla”
4. CaveofswordS “Ghryme”
5. Disappears “Replicate”
6. Weird Dreams “666.66”
7. A. C. Newman “I’m Not Talking”
8. The dB’s “Send Me Something Real”
9. Frank Ocean “Bad Religion”
10.Lee Fields “You’re The Kind Of Girl”
11.The Bamboos (Feat. Tim Rogers) “I Got Burned”
12.Rodriguez “Can’t Get Away”
13.The Dum Dum Girls”Season In Hell”
14.The Human Eyes “Born To Die”
15.Diiv “How Long Have You Known”
16.The Delta Spirit “California”
17.The Blakes “Narwhal”
18.Sharon Van Etten “Serpents”
19.The Cheatahs “The Swan”
20.I Was A King “Indiana”
21.The Mark Lanegan Blues Band “Leviathan”
22.The Cloud Nothings “Wasted Days”
23.Jack White “Hypocritical Kiss”
24.Euros Childs “These Dreams Of You”
25.George Harrison “All Things Must Pass (Demo)”
Call Me Maybe:
1. The Men “Open Your Heart”
2. Ex Cops “The Millionaire”
3. Lotus Plaza “Eveningness”
4. Sinead O’Connor “The Wolf Is Getting Married”
5. The Resonars “Sit Right Down”
6. Snake & Jet’s Amazing Bullit Band “Black Egg”
7. Randy Michael & The Well Dressed Lads “The Face”
8. Sleepy Kitty “Don’t You Start”
9. Toys That Kill “Stye”
10. Giuda “Number 10”
11.Nada Surf “Jules And Jim”
12.Tame Impala “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards”
13.The Allah Las “Don’t You Forget It”
14.Twelve Thousand Armies “Darling Let’s Breathe”
15.Nude Beach “Some Kinda Love”
16.Redd Kross “Stay Away From Downtown”
17.The Mountain Goats “Cry For Judas”
18.The Amazing “Flashlight”
19.Lightships “Silver And Gold”
20.The Royal Headache “Down The Lane”
21.Bob Mould “The Descent”
22.Richard Hawley “Down In The Woods”
23.Aimee Mann “Soon Enough”
24.Woods “Is It Honest?”
25.Spiritualized “So Long You Pretty Thing”
Popnarcotic 