Bradford Coxs music with Deerhunter and Atlas Sound has been rooted the more noisy sectors of modern American indie music, but his playlist for Spotify is much more expansive. It draws from everything from the classic pop of Dee Clark and Elvis Presley to the Cuban fusion of Bola De Nieve and Lo Borges. The African balladry of Ballaké and J Omwami is particularly beautiful. This is delicate and sublime music, and while it doesnt necessarily reflect Coxs specific aesthetics, it does reveal something of the emotional texture he sometimes injects into his music, especially his "solo" work with Atlas Sound.
Fun shit I learned while reading The Quietus amazing Andy Gill playlist: at one point, Nile Rodgers was slotted to produce a Gang of Four record; John Cale hit on Gills girlfriend; and he doesnt think The Beatles groove!As a note, I couldnt find the specific Erik Satie recording he mentions.The Band, Music From Big PinkBob Dylan, Blood On The TracksJimi Hendrix, Band Of GypsysWild Beasts, WanderlustGabriel Fauré, RequiemThe Camarata Contemporary Chamber Group, The Music Of Erik Satie: The Velvet GentlemanThe Velvet Underground, The Velvet Underground & NicoBig Youth, Dread Locks DreadCulture, Two Sevens ClashChic, Good TimesJames Brown, "Get Up (I Feel Like Being A) Sex Machine"Marvin Gaye, "I Heard It Through The Grapevine"Kanye West, "Hold My Liquor"
Gangsta rap is supposed to be all about bravado and bluster -- a fantastical playground of platinum-plated pistols, barely dressed women and John Woo worthy shootouts. Houston emcee Scarface provides a dose of realism to the genre with his finely detailed narratives of guilt-ridden murderers, sorrowful drug dealers and disposed "civilians." First as a member of the Geto Boys and then throughout a lengthy solo career, Scarface is one of the Souths most respected and enduring lyricist. For a 2013 Complex feature, he picked his favorite tracks from his extensive. Its a comprehensive playlist that covers hits such as "My Block" or "Mind Playin Tricks," but also dips into deep catalog picks such as the excellent "A Minute to Pray and a Second to Die," a stand-out song from his debut that hinted at the narrative nimbleness and moral complexity that would become his calling card.
The ’90s have never sounded better than they do right now—especially for modern-day indie rockers. There’s no shortage of bands banging around these days whose sound suggests formative phases spent soaking up vintage ’90s indie rock. Not that the neo-’90s sound is itself a new thing. As soon as the era was far enough away in the rearview mirror to allow for nostalgia to set in (i.e., the second half of the 2000s), there were already some young artists out there onboarding ’90s alt-rock influences. But more recently, there’s been a bumper crop of bands that betray a soft spot for a time when MTV still played music videos and streaming was just something that happened in a restroom. In this context, the literate, lo-fi approach of Pavement has emerged as a particularly strong strand of the ’90s indie tapestry, and it isn’t hard to hear echoes of their sound in the work of more recent arrivals like Kiwi jr. or Teenage Cool Kids. Cherry Glazerr frontwoman Clementine Creevy seems to have a feeling for the kind of big, dirty guitar riffs that made Pacific Northwestern bands the kings of the alt-rock heap once upon a time. The world-weary, wise-guy angularity of Car Seat Headrest can bring to mind the lurching, loose-limbed attack of Railroad Jerk. And laconic, storytelling types like Nap Eyes stand to prove that there’s still a bright future ahead for those who mourn the passing of Silver Jews main man David Berman. But perhaps the best thing about a face-off between the modern indie bands evoking ’90s forebears and the old-school artists themselves is the fact that in this kind of competition, everybody wins.
It may be that 2019 was the best year for ’90s metal since, well, 1999. Bands from the decade of Judgment Night re-emerged with new creative twists and tweaks: Tool stretched out into polyrhythmic madness, Korn bludgeoned with more extreme and raw despair, Slipknot added a new drummer (Max Weinberg’s kid!) who gave them a new groove, and Rammstein wrote an anti-fascism anthem that caused controversy in Germany (and hit No. 1 there too). Elsewhere, icons of the era returned in unique ways: Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor scored a superhero TV series, Primus’ Les Claypool teamed up with Sean Lennon for some quirky psych rock, and Faith No More’s Mike Patton made an avant-decadent LP with ’70s soundtrack king Jean-Claude Vannier. Finally, the soaring voice of Linkin Park’s Chester Bennington returned for a moment thanks to Lamb of God guitarist Mark Morton, who released a song they recorded together in 2017.
Taking a look at the playlists for my show on Boston’s WZBC might give the more seasoned college-radio listener a bit of déjà vu: They’re filled with bands like Versus, Team Dresch, and Sleater-Kinney, who were at the top of the CMJ charts back in the ’90s. But the records they released in 2019 turned out to be some of the year’s best rock. Versus, whose Ex Nihilo EP and Ex Voto full-length were part of a creative run for leader Richard Baluyut that also included a tour by his pre-Versus outfit Flower and his 2000s band +/-, put out a lot of beautifully thrashy rock; Team Dresch returned with all cylinders blazing and singers Jody Bleyle and Kaia Wilson wailing their hearts out on “Your Hands My Pockets”; and Sleater-Kinney confronted middle age head-on with their examination of finding one’s footing, The Center Won’t Hold.
Italian guitar heroes Uzeda—who have been putting out proggy, riff-heavy music for three-plus decades—released their first record in 13 years, the blistering Quocumque jerceris stabit; Imperial Teen, led by Faith No More multi-instrumentalist Roddy Bottum, kept the weird hooks coming with Now We Are Timeless; and high-concept Californians That Dog capped off a year of reissues with Old LP, their first album since 1997. Juliana Hatfield continued the creative tear she’s been on this decade with two albums: Weird, a collection of hooky, twisty songs that tackle alienation with searing wit, and Juliana Hatfield Sings the Police, her tribute record to the dubby New Wave chart heroes (in the spirit of the salute to Olivia Newton-John she released in 2018). And our playlist finishes with Mary Timony, formerly of the gnarled rockers Helium and currently part of the power trio Ex Hex, paying tribute to her former Autoclave bandmate Christina Billotte via an Ex Hex take on “What Kind of Monster Are You?,” one of the signature songs by Billotte’s ’90s triple threat Slant 6.
