Mixes

Mix: Let’s Break Out The Lancers!

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When I was young, my parents weren’t particularly fancy in regard to what they drank (at least before I got them into vodka martinis in my mid-late 20s.) After work, my dad often enjoyed a bottle of Michelob poured into the tall, narrow glass while on holidays and other special occasions, my mom favored an inexpensive table wine—most often, Lancers Rosé, a Portuguese variety which came in an opaque, slightly chunky, burgundy-colored bottle. I recall this as a ubiquitous presence in our house up through the ‘90s when I was considered old enough to imbibe along with my folks. Still, given its classic design, Lancers felt more like a 1970s remnant; I suspect it accompanied many a fondue pot or a helping of Steak Diane sautéed in an electric skillet.

This mix could provide the soundtrack for a Lancers-soaked dinner party my parents or their friends might’ve thrown in the years immediately before my birth. Roughly spanning 1967 to 1973, it conjures a comfortably bourgeoisie, non-rock (or at least soft rock) vibe—unhip, if you’re less charitable, if not positively square. Without fully lapsing into Muzak territory, some of these smooth sounds are directly from my parents’ record collection of the time: Sergio Mendes and Brasil ‘66 (crafting a magic carpet ride out of a Simon and Garfunkel folk-rock standard), The Fifth Dimension (somewhat forgotten gem “Last Night I Didn’t Get To Sleep At All”) and of course Burt Bacharach, both as a solo artist (“Pacific Coast Highway”) and on tunes written with Hal David and made famous by Dusty Springfield (“The Look of Love”), Herb Alpert (“This Guy’s In Love With You”) and Dionne Warwick (“Amanda” from The Love Machine soundtrack is a bit of a deep cut but its arrangement is Burt at his baroque best.) 

Other selections I remember hearing on the radio (in particular, Milwaukee’s still-on-the-air WMYX-FM), albeit a decade or so after their heyday include Mason Williams’ groovy symphonic rock instrumental “Classical Gas”; Todd Rundgren’s “Hello It’s Me” (the classiest singer-songwriter crossover hit this side of vocal-soundalike Carole King); “We’ve Only Just Begun”, arguably The Carpenters’ best, most melodically complex single (written by 1970s mascot Paul Williams); The Spinners’ syncopated-yet-still-like-buttah “I’ll Be Around”.

The title references a lyric in Peggy Lee’s novelty hit “Is That All There Is” which I do not recall hearing in my youth; other selections fit the overall vibe but were likely too quirky (Julie London’s unlikely Ohio Express cover, Minnie Riperton’s psychedelic folk hymn), obscure (Harry Nilsson pre-“Everybody’s Talkin’”, Laura Nyro’s original version of an eventual hit for The Fifth Dimension) or ephemeral (Lalo Schifrin’s soundtrack music) to encounter in the wild back then. By the mid-70s, sophistication of this sort was quickly becoming passe in pop music—Barry White’s breakthrough single “I’m Gonna Love You Just A Little More Baby” is the pivot, anticipating disco excess but not above lacing its seven-minute-long seduction suite with flutes and harpsichord. It’s placed near the end of this mix, late in the evening after the Lancers ran out with a mysterious glass bowl of all the guests’ keyrings perhaps surfacing (though not at one of my parents’ gatherings as far as I know.)

Haunted Jukebox Mix #4: Let’s Break Out The Lancers!

Mix: An Emm Gryner Primer

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Celebrating her latest album Business and Pleasure (which comes out this week), here’s a CD-length playlist of some of my favorite songs from Canadian singer-songwriter Emm Gryner. Despite the easy rhyme afforded by her last name, it is very much a primer—proceeding chronologically, it kicks off with two tracks from Public (1998), her third album and major label debut on Mercury Records. Had they appeared two or three years earlier, perhaps “Summerlong” or “Hello Aquarius” might’ve become modern rock radio staples; however, by then, female artists were struggling to get airplay in that format.  With that in mind and Universal Music’s acquisition of Mercury, Gryner was dropped from the label shortly after Public came out.

In the 20-odd years since, she has put out 20-odd albums and EPs via her own label, Dead Daisy Records (not to mention a stint in David Bowie’s touring band.) One-third of my selections overlap with her best-of compilation from 2012, including “Summerlong” and the regal, soaring “Almighty Love”, a track a figure no less titanic than Bono cited in a magazine article as a song he wished he had written. I’m surprised there wasn’t more crossover between the two track listings since one of Gryner’s greatest strengths is a knack for glorious, anthemic pop. “Symphonic”, “Young As The Night”, “Black-Eyed Blue Sky”, “Ciao Monday” (the last one’s from 2011’s Northern Gospel)—all of them are alternate world number one singles lifted by ringing guitars, effervescent melodies and Gryner’s endearingly bright and deeply emotive voice.

She’s such a talented, underheard songwriter that I was only going to include her own compositions, but it wouldn’t be fully representative to not highlight her interpretative skills. I first heard of her via Girl Versions (2001) a set of stripped-down covers of songs originally popularized by men including her radical reworking of Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar On Me” (which at the time received ample airplay on WERS, a college radio station in Boston.) Later, she recorded Songs of Love and Death (2005), another covers collection, this time of Irish artists in tribute to her paternal heritage (her mother’s family is Filipino)—likely what tipped Bono off to her. It’s represented here by a gorgeous version of “Forget Georgia” originally by late 80s/early 90s Dublin outfit Something Happens. There’s also She’s Gone, a 2012 EP of Hall and Oates covers, of which the title track (a lovingly chill rendition that gets bonus points for not changing the lyrics to “He’s Gone”) is a highlight.

In recent years, she’s moved from spare balladry (“The Race”) to heavenly psych-pop (“Imagination”) to even fist-pumping EDM (how does “All The Love All The Time” only have 2K streams on Spotify?) Appearing after an extended hiatus, “Valencia”, the lead single from Business and Pleasure makes good on Gryner’s aim to craft a yacht-rock record complete with a Doobie Brothers bounce and horns sympathetic to those on Steely Dan’s “Deacon Blues”. Fortunately, it’s not a simulation or a pastiche, just a sincere, finely honed tune brimming with personality and hooks for days like any other track on this playlist.

Haunted Jukebox Mix #3: An Emm Gryner Primer

Mix: Nothing Left To Lose

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No overarching theme here, just some songs I’ve been listening to lately that are split nearly evenly between old and new. Most mixes I’ve made for other people tend to follow this non-format with selections I think they’d like to hear; this one, however, is for me.

Much of the new-ish stuff has a retro-disco tint that is always welcome; we’re so many decades past the “disco sucks” era (it arguably vanished once Deee-Lite’s “Groove Is In The Heart” hit in 1990) that such a notion now looks not only misinformed but positively quaint. Not that it’s suddenly fashionable, give or take a Dua Lipa or Lady Gaga, but just the idea of wistful, joyous, throw-all-caution-to-the-wind dance music endures whether it’s an unlikely duet between Carly Rae Jepsen and Rufus Wainwright, a kaleidoscopic anthem from former Savage Garden vocalist Darren Hayes, or an unlikely but euphoric ode to formalwear from U.S. Girls’ just-released album Bless This Mess. A choice cut from Pet Shop Boys’ best LP of the 21st century, 2013’s Electric, fits right in with these glitterball newbies.

And yet, I reiterate this isn’t a thematic mix since most of the other new songs aren’t danceable at all. Former Go-Betweens member Robert Forster takes stock of a thirty-year relationship and the profound meaning it has given his life, Yves Tumor crafts an itchy, rhythmic, onomatopoetic earworm, the onomatopoetically named beabadoobee pays inspired tribute to a similarly-titled classic by The Cure and The National ascends towards dad-rock heaven on their latest (and maybe best?) single. Listen as they all complement older tunes such as Blossom Dearie elegantly essaying another standard, Richard and Linda Thompson exhibiting fine defiance and drollness and Sky Ferreira constructing 21st century 1980s music out of such time-honored tools as melody and urgency.

The new song that kicks the mix off and gives it a title is a musical reunion for a duo who has recorded separately since the year 2000. I always wondered if Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt would ever work together again since they’ve remained a couple all this time; the first released track from the forthcoming album Fuse seems to almost pick up where they left off on 1999’s Temperamental with its electronic fervor, chill breakbeats and Thorn’s diva-like croon. But she sounds intriguingly deeper and wearier than she did just five years ago on her own great Record. “Kiss me while the world decays / Kiss me while the music plays” she repeats near the end and for sure, Everything But The Girl are firmly standing in 2023.

Haunted Jukebox Mix #2: Nothing Left To Lose

Mix: Cold Comfort

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In an effort to live up to this blog’s name, I plan on posting a new mix/playlist at least once a month going forward. Some will have a theme of sorts, others will be centered around one artist (or perhaps a related group of them) and a few will have no connecting thread at all and consist of new and old songs that I’m into at the present moment.

I’m kicking off this series with a thematic mix mostly culled from an ongoing playlist I keep of songs I want to listen to when it’s cold outside—scratch that, when the temperature dips below freezing, the sun occasionally peeks out through the terminal gray skies and all feels blustery and raw, an invitation to sit by the fireplace with a mug of hot tea (or perhaps a glass of cognac.) When linked together, the words “cold” and “comfort” bring to mind a stark contrast between the outside world and refuge taken from it indoors.

To find solace in this bleak midwinter, I often turn to (mostly) acoustic folk-pop. The first three tracks here come from late ‘60s/early ‘70s UK-based artists in reverse order of renown—I’d likely be unfamiliar Scot Bert Jansch if not for his inclusion on The Squid and The Whale soundtrack nearly two decades ago. I could’ve made an entire playlist of such likeminded folk (in both senses), but although they did this sort of stuff very well (Fairport Convention’s Sandy Denny had an exquisite, peerless voice), that doesn’t mean Americans weren’t up to the task decades later. Sufjan Stevens, for instance, has sustained a career by defying expectations from album to album but he’s arguably never matched the stripped-down intimacy of Seven Swans (2004) and its guitar-and-vocal instant standard “To Be Alone With You”.

Most of these songs are defined by their sparse instrumentation, calm sense of wonder and general quietude. After a while, amidst an excess of acoustic guitar, other elements emerge and gain power they wouldn’t necessarily retain in isolation: the dwindling piano riff on Kings of Convenience’s “Riot On An Empty Street”, the disarming fiddle laced throughout Grant McLennan’s “Hot Water”, the harmonica adding texture to Saint Etienne’s “Former Lover”. Even when things briefly turn electric, as on Nicole Atkins’ “If I Could”, its restraint and tone is enough to sit alongside purer, acoustic-guitar-and-voice selections such as Jenny Lewis and The Watson Twins’ fable-like “Rabbit Fur Coat”, Rufus Wainwright’s campfire sing-along cover of his father Loudon Wainwright III’s “One Man Guy” and Concrete Blonde’s plaintive but effective “Make Me Cry”.

I also can’t help but place a classic hit everyone knows like Simon and Garfunkel’s “Scarborough Fair/Canticle” or even the Beatles’ “I’ll Be Back” (note that vaguely sinister guitar hook) next to a relatively more obscure and recent number like Belle and Sebastian’s “Piazza, New York Catcher”; together, they show how, through the decades, music (and folk music, in particular) may evolve but also evoke an ongoing tradition that, no matter what adjustments or mutations occur is as recognizable and heartening as a sliver of sun during a cold snap.

Haunted Jukebox Mix #1: Cold Comfort