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My 2005 Mix CD

I think there are three kinds of music listeners. There are people who just shuffle their entire CD collection, people who create tailor-made playlists for every kind of circumstance and occasion, and people who listen to Michael Bolton because they like his hair. I happen to fall into the first category. When I use Windows, I use an old Winamp weighted-shuffler plugin RoboDJ (alas, no longer being maintained, but it still works fine). Similarly, when I use Macs, I use smart playlists to create a Do-It-Yourself Smart Radio Station. And if it happens to be 4:20 (which seems to be fairly often for some reason), I generally turn on the G-Force visualization (although, now that I have a new PC that can handle it, I’m giving Milkdrop a try).

Anyway, this was always reflected when I made mix CDs or tapes. I’d just pick a bunch of my favorite songs, mostly alternating the slow and fast ones to provide for a more shuffle-like variety. I never really put too much thought into the order or picking songs specifically to fit with each other, and I had no idea there was a whole art to that. And I suppose this showed on My 2004 Mix CD (although it still single-handedly propelled Howie Day’s “Collide” and the Killers’ “Mr. Brightside” into big hits).

Well, two things taught me that there was more to a mix than picking songs: Buzz’s 2004 mix CD and that episode of How I Met Your Mother where the gang hops from one New Year’s party to another listening to a mix CD made by Barney (Neil Patrick Harris’s hilarious character). Not just any mix CD. You see, as Barney says, “People often think a good mix should rise and fall, but people are wrong! It should be all rise baby!” Which is pretty scary considering the first song on the CD is Bon Jovi’s “You Give Love a Bad Name” (the show didn’t play any other tracks, but apparently there are two conflicting versions of the entire playlist).

Anyway, armed with the knowledge that the order matters, I actually put some thought into it for my 2005 mix (no, it’s not all rise — the structure is a bit more complicated). I don’t know if that means I actually did a good job, but I figure some thought has got to be better than hardly any. And this was probably necessary with a mix that runs the gamut from folk pop to post-hardcore to psytrance to prog metal.

Yeah, I have a pretty eclectic taste in music and love to inflict it on other people who give me funny looks and then try to sidle away without me noticing out of the corner of my eye, but then I do notice unless they were sneaky enough to distract me with… hey, where do you think you’re goi… ooooh, chocolate and peanut-butter cookies!! munchmunchmunchmunch!

Mph gralpho mphaorlp… sorry, Erika keeps having to remind me to not to talk with my mouth full. Anyway, I also explored a lot more new music this year. As I had mentioned, I didn’t add too much music to my library last year because I was short on hard drive space on my primary music-listening machine. But this was rectified early in 2005. Also, not too many of my favorite artists released albums in 2004, but in 2005, four of my top five artists (according to last.fm) released new albums this past year, as did several other long-time favorites of mine.

And the ridiculously low pricing of allofmp3.com also helped tremendously. Ten cents a song in MP3 or Ogg Vorbis at the bitrate you’d like, and with no DRM. Yes, it is legal — due to a loophole in Russian law that isn’t likely to be closed anytime soon. Still, the songwriters and artists are required to get a cut through the Russian Organization for Multimedia & Digital Systems (ROMS) — but the record labels don’t. Which is fine by me. Let’s not forget that copyright law was intended to protect the creators in order to foster creativity, not the publishers, who are nothing but middle-men becoming increasingly marginalized by the Internet.

Anyway, I’ve rambled on long enough, so witness my Best of 2005 Mix CD. Click on the image at the top of the post for a larger view and to see which picture is which artist. Note, I didn’t spend as much time arranging the images cuz I spent more time on picking the songs. And here’s the playlist. Let me know if you’d like a copy of the CD. I’ve also made an iTunes iMix, so if you want to buy any of these songs from the iTunes Music Store, use that link (although note that they don’t have the Feeder and Kate Bush songs). Enjoy! Or don’t. But if you don’t enjoy it, it’s not cuz the mix sucks, but because you do, you music snob you.

1. Jonatha Brooke - It Matters Now

From Back in the Circus. I’ve been a fan of hers for a couple of years, discovering her listed by AMG as a similar artist to my fave folk pop artists, Shawn Colvin and Dar Williams. Her expressive voice has a quirky character, and she sometimes uses exotic chords (which was something I liked about Liz Phair), which sets herself apart from the more mainstream Lilith-Fair-ish folk sound (which I’m also fond of). This song is probably not the best example of the latter, but it’s easily the best song off the album, which I think is her best one to date (her albums can be uneven).

Also check out the electronic-tinged “Less Than Love is Nothing” and the title track. She also does an absolutely awesome cover of “Eye in the Sky” that was the impetus for my cover song CD.

2. Death Cab for Cutie - Different Names for the Same Thing

From Plans. Darn, this one was my one collision. Courtney also included this song on her mix. Indeed, the other two Death Cab songs I considered were “Marching Bands of Manhattan,” which is on Rich’s mix, and “Brothers on a Hotel Bed,” which is on Andrew’s. Well, when there’s that much consensus about the band, it’s not too surprising that everybody also likes the same songs by them. Oh, and “Soul Meets Body” is also a great song, but y’all knew that already. I liked how this song goes into double-time and decided to mirror that later in the mix (not that anybody would’ve noticed, but that’s why I’m mentioning it now).

3. Tori Amos - Cars and Guitars

From The Beekeeper. In case you don’t know me, Tori is, by far, my all-time favorite musical artist. I discovered her music in college when my roommate gave me his copy of Little Earthquakes (he thought it would be religious because her father was a preacher and the first song was titled “Crucify”). I was instantly hooked (as well as smitten, what with her being a quirky redhead), and she’s the only artist for whom I’ll rush out and buy new albums the very first day they’re released.

And The Beekeeper was no exception. Suffice to say that it was a given that I would include a song off of it on the mix. Since she always seems to promote just one song off of every album (presumably just make sure everybody in her sizable fan base notices the new album), it’s never hard to find gems that haven’t had airplay. To be sure, this album is a notch below Scarlet’s Walk but is still a great album (in addition to “Sleeps with Butterflies,” also check out “Ribbons Undone” and “Parasol”). Thus further confirming my theory that To Venus and Back and Strange Little Girls sucked only because she was trying to fulfill her record contract with minimal effort before jumping ship. A double album with live tracks and b-sides and an album of covers? Think about it.

Okay, I suppose I could have confirmed all this much earlier if I had simply checked Wikipedia — even if its salad days are almost over.

4. Jill Sobule - Jetpack

From Underdog Victorious. Not strictly 2005. She released the album late in 2004, and I didn’t have a chance to listen to it enough to pick a song for last year’s mix (so I squeezed in an older favorite instead). Yeah, she’s not the flash-in-the-pan that she appeared to be after “Supermodel” and “I Kissed a Girl,” but a consistently good artist who has a knack for witty lyrics about interesting characters. This album is not quite as strong as Pink Pearl, but still a solid outing (and it comes with a real crossword puzzle!). Check out the title track as well as “Strawberry Gloss” and “Cinnamon Park.”

5. Dar Williams - You Rise and Meet the Day

From My Better Self. I absolutely adore Dar (she’s not a redhead, but she is quirky), and have ever since Mortal City. Even though she’s toned down her quirky humor over the years, she’s concentrated on improving her songcraft, and with simply beautiful results. Her lyrical wit is still put to good use on this album in the song “Empire” that skewers the Bush administration (not that this is exactly hard to do these days).

I originally was going to select the catchy “Echoes,” but then decided she’d be a good candidate to end the mix with something stripped down (which would be more representative of her style anyway). This song was the best candidate, but since it didn’t end with the finality I wanted, I decided to use it as a breather point before the mix slowly ramped up.

Other songs to check out include “I’ll Miss You till I Meet You,” her cool cover of Pink Floyd’s “Comfortably Numb” (featuring Ani DiFranco), “Teen for God, and the country-tinged “Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere.”

6. Athlete - Twenty Four Hours

From Tourist. Okay, tossing a bone to the crowd with a pair of britpop songs, since britpop seems to be all the rage among the geek crowd for some reason. Or is it the pretentious hipster crowd? Whatever. I’m not sure how I discovered these guys, either via the AMG or through last.fm. Their stuff isn’t anythinig particularly special, but this song just kept growing on me and insisted that it appear on the mix. So who am I to deny it? Other good tracks include “Half Light” and “Yesterday Threw Everything at Me.”

7. Feeder - Feeling a Moment

From Pushing the Senses. And I know I discovered these guys via a Last.fm recommendation. I suppose we’re getting into ear candy territory here, albeit a bit harder rocking (and I suppose you must have noticed by now that I tend to like soaring vocals). Good to see these guys releasing another solid album despite their original drummer, Jon Lee, committing suicide a couple of years ago. A similar sound to the band, Embrace, featured on Buzz’s mix. I think they’re both going become faves of mine. Also check out “Pilgrim Soul,” “Morning Life,” and the title track.

8. Thrice - Of Dust and Nations

From Vheissu. Thrice is an interesting band (and another Last.fm recommendation). I suppose they’re categorized as post-hardcore, whatever that’s supposed to mean (until MP3s support sub-genres — a good idea for Flickr as well — I’ll generally throw everything into rock just to separate it from jazz and classical). They read a lot of literature and the album title comes from Thomas Pynchon’s V (which I haven’t read). The vocals on some of their songs descend into screaming, but this is one of the exceptions. Another standout track is “Between the End and Where We Lie” which features some complex time signatures (hey, I’m a big Rush fan, so I really dig that stuff).

9. Nine Inch Nails - The Collector

From With Teeth. This wasn’t a particularly outstanding album or song, but I thought that this spot in the mix was a good place to put a familiar face while keeping the sound harsh. So far it seems to be a better album than The Fragile, anyway.

10. Dream Theater - Panic Attack

From Octavarium. Dream Theater is the ultimate prog metal band. I’ve been a big fan of progressive rock (Rush, ELP, Yes, Pink Floyd, and Genesis) for almost as long as I’ve listened to music. I never got into heavy metal beyond the pop-metal hair bands of the 80s and Metallica after they went mainstream. I was fine with the crunching guitars, but I never liked screaming so much. But since James LaBrie’s singing is closer to classical than metal (and his incredible voice is one thing that sets this band apart), this band quickly became one of my all-time faves after I first heard “Pull Me Under” on KFOG in college. And fortunately, they released an album in 2005 that was not a concept album, so it wasn’t too hard to pick a suitable track.

John Petrucci (guitar) and Jordan Rudess (keyboard) have to be heard to be believed (although I still feel kinda bad for Derek Sherinian), and this song features one of Dream Theater’s signature instrumental breaks where the two of them run through a thrilling (and obviously technically challenging) passage in unison. Yes, I know the song clocks in at 8:13 (largely due to said instrumental break), but I think the 4-minute song structure is just as creatively stifling as the 800-word column. While you can accomplish a lot within the structure, a multitude of possibilities open up when you free yourself from those constraints (just look at Green Day).

And so it’s not surprising to me that the two best songs on the album clock in at 10:43 and 23:59 (and believe me, I was tempted to pick one of them).

11. Infected Mushroom - Horus the Chorus

From IM the Supervisor, which is listed as released in 2004 in some places and 2005 in others. Whatever (it’s not like the Grammy’s stick to the calendar year). I started listening to some psytrance two years ago and decided early in the song selection process for this mix that I wanted to somehow squeeze a track in. Some of you might think it might have something to do with this discovery, but I will deny it (albeit a little bit too emphatically). But really, the main impetus was that if I was going to have such a diverse mix, I might as well go all out. No, really. Okay, now you’re just imagining things.

Anyway, although psytrance is definitely best listened to while dancing and/or on drugs (err… not that I condone either behavior, just stating a fact), I’ve found it actually is also good music for me to code and write to. Being a long-time Rush fan, I used to have a bias against non-human drummers, decrying all dance and electronica as repetitive. Well, I’m finally over that. And really, psytrance isn’t really that repetitive at all. Plus, like many prog-rockers, these guys are classically trained, so there are (thankfully) chord changes, plus always something interesting going on to mix things up.

I’m probably crazy to put two eight-minute songs on a mix CD, let alone put them back-to-back. Indeed, I thought of setting the Dream Theater and Infected Mushroom songs apart to be the dual peaks of the mix, with a lull in between. But when I picked a Dream Theater song that transitioned so well into electronica, I couldn’t separate them.

12. Imogen Heap - The Walk

From Speak for Yourself. She’s the lead singer for Frou Frou, and indeed, had a solo career before she joined the group. Usually solo work will stray quite a bit from the group work, but in this case, much of the album sounds quite a lot like Frou Frou. It’s an excellent album, though — considerably better than Frou Frou’s debut. Practically every song is a gem. You may have heard “Hide and Seek” already, and I’m sure “Goodnight and Go” will be a smash hit. I chose this one instead to try and get off the beaten (or soon-to-be-beaten) path. Its intro also happily provides a better transition to help you come down from the Infected Mushroom song. For those of you who really disliked the prog metal and/or psytrance, I imagine her voice will sound like an angel breaking through the clouds.

13. Aimee Mann - She Really Wants You

From The Forgotten Arm, which is her attempt at a concept album, a love story between a John, a drug-addicted boxer, and Caroline. The title refers to the boxing tactic of attacking with one arm while leaving the other one unused but in full view, ready for a surprise strike when your opponent has forgotten about it. Personally, I don’t think it’s one of the best concept albums (hmm, maybe that would be fodder for a future blog post), but it’s still a solid Aimee Mann album — definitely a marked improvement over Lost in Space but perhaps not quite as good as my fave, Bachelor No. 2. And despite being a concept album, all of the songs stand on their own quite well, although it takes several listens to really get into them. Other tracks to check out include “Goodbye Caroline,” “Video,” “That’s How I Knew the Story Would Break My Heart,” and the track Andrew included, “I Was Thinking I Could Clean Up for Christmas.”

14. Coldplay - Fix You

From X&Y — which was released with DRM (albeit easily circumventable DRM, but still… DRM is bad). This was a big strike against them, never mind the fact that they’re ridiculously mainstream, and I’ve always considered Coldplay to be a poor man’s Radiohead anyway. Still, I really liked the new album, which is good enough for me to stop calling them that. This song immediately jumped right out at me as a good climax to the mix (well, at least until my inclusion of Dream Theater and Infected Mushroom relegated this to more of an aftershock). But if that bridge doesn’t send chills up your spine, you are dead. Dead, I say!

15. Kate Bush - Sunset

From Aerial. Whoa. Kate Bush released another album! And, unlike The Red Shoes, it doesn’t suck! Life is good. I think I discovered Kate back with The Sensual World but was really grabbed when I explored her earlier stuff. Aerial sounds like a throwback to that era, with maybe a mellower touch. I liked the jazzy feel of this song, which I thought would be good for the “chill-out” part of the mix. The whole album is more of a mood piece, so it’s hard to pick individual songs, but another good track to check out is “Nocturne.” I would’ve included that one instead if it weren’t for the double-time section of this track, which I though would nicely echo that of the Death Cab song that helped lead us into the mix

16. Sheryl Crow - Wildflower

From the album of the same name. As I mentioned earlier, I originally wanted a folky Dar song to end the mix, but when that didn’t work out, I went with the prettiest song off of Sheryl Crow’s new album. Don’t be turned off by the overexposure of “Soak Up the Sun” (from her last album, C’mon C’mon). Sheryl is the real deal, and this is one of the best albums of the year.

And that’s the disc. Hope you enjoy it (if you have a copy, of course — and if you don’t, let me know if you want one).

Stuff that almost made it in (aka Honorable Mention)

Ani DiFranco

Gotta love somebody who thumbs her nose at the record industry and comes away on top. Of course, Ani seems to release an album every day, so I don’t even try to keep up. But since I haven’t featured her on a mix yet, I checked out Knuckle Down. I like it a lot better than the eclectic Evolve, but not nearly as much as her earlier stuff (I think Out of Range is my favorite by far). And besides, she does make somewhat of an appearance on my mix CD of cover songs doing the backing vocals for Dar’s cover of “Comfortably Numb.”

SXSW

I never quite finished getting through all of last year’s SXSW tracks they made available via BitTorrent, and so far I’ve flagged a whopping 63 songs that I liked. Since I haven’t finished, I also haven’t gotten around to listening to any of these a second time, let alone exploring more work from those artists.

Antwon and the Antwonettes

These guys are soooo overrated, being a one-hit wonder with the gimmicky “Naked Bea Arthur.” They don’t even have real drums! That drum-like sound is nothing but Antwon banging on Rich’s laptop.

Okay, I’m just being bitter because I didn’t think of it before Elke did.

Liz Phair

Yeah, everybody knows what a seminal work Exile in Guyville was, but then how she decided to “cash in” by hiring Avril Lavigne’s songwriters, The Matrix, for her 2003 self-titled album. I, for one, didn’t mind her adopting Avril Lavigne’s sound since I actually enjoy Avril’s music, but nothing from the new album grabbed me enough to make the cut (maybe cuz she wasn’t working with The Matrix anymore). “Return to Innocence” was close, though.

Bloc Party & Depeche Mode

I enjoyed Bloc Party’s latest album, but judging from their stats on Last.fm, they already have a much wider following than many of the other artists I was considering. Ditto for Depeche Mode, which I wanted to include in order to add some more electronic sounding songs in the leadup to Infected Mushroom. I don’t know either artist that well anyway.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

I loved the soundtrack by Danny Elfman and really wanted to include “Veruca Salt,” but I think it would’ve stuck out like a sore thumb. Besides, this song really belongs on a mix that also includes “Seether.”

Idlewild

Discovered Idlewild as a recommendation from Last.fm, so I checked out their 2005 album, Warnings/Promises. I enjoyed it, but nothing jumped out at me, as it mostly sounded like a cross between REM and Morissey. I like REM, but not overly so, and I never liked Morissey much. I hear their earlier stuff is supposed to be much better, though.

Others

I’m fond of the Foo Fighters, but like Coldplay, they’re a mainstream artist who released their album with DRM. Grr. Coldplay’s album was too good to deny, but I don’t think this is one of the Foo Fighters’ better albums. I also like Alanis Morissette a lot, but her 2005 acoustic redo of Jagged Little Pill didn’t actually sound as interesting as the idea did. What I would’ve liked to see would be for her to redo “Ironic” with lyrics that actually described ironic situations. I really love the Bloodhound Gang’s “Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo,” especially the video, but I decided this time around to only include songs if I’ve sampled the entire album. As for Beck, I was never a big fan of his, but I do appreciate his talent and creativity. Still, it seemed like practically every track off of Guero got plenty of airplay, so it seemed kinda pointless.

There was some other stuff as well, but I’ll add them to this post later as I remember them.

Other mixes:

Yes, this was a mix CD exchange, so there were other people there:

• Rich Thomas created a data disc of MP3s this time so that he wouldn’t have to burn a gazillion discs per person.
• Elke likes Elvis Costello more than I like Tori Amos.
• Courtney’s mix gets a bit more exotic than your typical pretentious hipster material.

Also, Andrew Thomas (no relation to Rich) and Buzz also made End of Year mix CDs but haven’t yet blogged about it as far as I know. I’ll post their playlists later if they don’t do it themselves.

And there you have it. Again, if you want to buy these songs from the iTunes Music Store, check out my iMix. And as always, if you’re curious to see a bigger picture of the music I listen to, check out my last.fm profile.

February 13, 2006 08:28 AM in Music | Permalink