Monday Mixtape, Vol. 103

The message of this band's first track on their first album of a decades long career of classic albums, legacies, inhibitors and other drugs, is as clear as moonshine: we're gonna rock and fucking roll. Ladies and gentlemen, allow them to introduce themselves: The Allman Brothers Band. 

Now that both Allmans have passed, I've dug more into their albums, and I had forgotten how IN YOUR FACE this first track is. There's so much swagger there while also teasing the listener that THIS IS JUST THE FIRST TRACK. These guys are legends. And if you think it's all swashbuckling rock, please see Exhibit B, the beautiful acoustic ballad, "Little Martha."

I thought we'd just continue to rock this whole mixtape. I went for a run other day and had Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever's "Write Back" blasting through the headphones, and the pounding guitar solos deliver some serious punch. What a song.

Jank is my newest discovery, a band that harkens a bit to the grungy, distorted sound of the 90s. I get hints of The Used, a bit of The Deftones, and some great melodies. Their new album has been spinning on repeat all week. 

Lord Huron's new album is pretty darn good and listenable, though I can't say it's great. Something about the rock songs sounds just a smidgen of forced, but I still put my favorite songs from the album with a rock hint on here for you to judge on your own. Again, I think it's pretty good, I'm just not in love with it. 

Anyways, have a good week!

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 102

Happy Monday all! And apologies to all, I haven't posted for at least three weeks, so I'm sorry for my absence because there has been a TON OF MUSIC released in the past month or so. There's been so much music to camp to that I have musical ammo for many weeks :)

Let's start with Shakey Graves. I can't get his new album out of my head, one I keep coming back to. It's atmospheric, it's raw, it's rock, it's its own animal. But it's not for everyone. I'll post a few of my other favorite tracks in the next couple weeks. 

Childish Gambino's "This Is America" is the topic du jour, a piece that's generated a ton of publicity and analysis and misinterpreted by god knows how many people already. The video is one of the best music videos I can remember (cue the Grammy music for Single of the Year and Video of the Year), an intentionally uncomfortable and symbolic video of the representation of Gambino's  America.    

Speaking of lyrically poignant rappers, Wale released his second EP this year, both of which I've thoroughly enjoyed. This recent one's got a more political lean, particularly "Salary Kaep," but Wale's flow has improved dramatically over his (now) long career as evidenced best by "Negotiations."

LOVE the new Leon Bridges album. It's a bit more pop and dancey than his debut album which was too much exactly like the Sam Cooke / Marvin Gaye sound. "Shy" is easily my favorite song on the album.

A few other notes: Janelle Monae has made her best album, Young Fathers continue to get the award for weirdest yet interesting band, and DJ Koze with the feature from one of the dudes from Arrested Development (the band - not the show)!

Enjoy the week. 

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 101

It's time to enter into a new century of Monday Mixtapes, and we'll be doing it with beats and rhymes. Starting off is Tom Misch, an English multi-instrumenalist, who created a pretty cool album spanning and blending all sorts of genres. These first two tracks on the Mixtape are the first two tracks off his album, featuring a guest verse from DC's own, Goldlink. 

Pac Div hasn't released an album in a few years, so it was a great surprise to see their new album pop up on my Spotify feed. Extra bonus points if you can remember what the song the chorus pays homage to. A 90s classic. 

So Cardi B has taken over social media, and I listened to this track because SZA was on it, but Cardi B kills it too. She's a good rapper. 

I stumbled upon Kali Uchis because a guy I follow on Spotify (who is sort of my music doppleganger) listed this as one of his favorite albums this year. It's a pop-fused R&B/Rap album, and it's definitely an enjoyable listen. Don't think it'll be making my top list, but these tracks are a couple of the standouts. 

A.A.L. made a pretty cool instrumental album that I've been listening to as background music. Cool album. 

Happy Monday all! 

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 100!

We did it!! 100 Monday Mixtapes! All I can say is I'm happy I got Layers & Sounds to this point. I initially started this blog in the hopes that I could share my musical tastes and potentially become somewhat of a quasi popular music blogger whose range of musical tastes brought all sorts of different people to the fray. I knew that was always a stretch, but I did get a press pass to a My Morning Jacket show and almost got Michael Rapaport to tweet links to my playlists of my Best of Jay-Z and Best of Nas to see which playlist was better. Rapaport couldn’t figure Spotify out at that point so it all fell through :( We’ll always have the laughs  

But I started this blog as Spotify and all the other streaming giants began to really gain steam, and it seemed like humble blogs became irrelevant because Spotify and others would recommend music to listen to (and TBH Discover is a pretty cool playlist!).

Nonetheless, I kept writing and sharing stuff because it helped me keep my creative mind alive while I slaved away at a job that was very stressful and not exactly creative. A few blog posts got a lot of views for some weird reason: An Intervention for...The Weeknd maybe the most so because I wrote about "I Can't Feel My Face" before it became a huge hit so my SEO came up on a lot of people's searches (or something like that.)

Of the hundreds and hundreds of poems I've written, I've shared about five of them since those are the only ones I think are worth a damn. I'm proud of them and glad I was able to find an outlet to say those things.

I wish I wrote more stream of conscious musings on books I’ve read since I ultimately forget so much of what I liked in books. I only have two books on my blog but better than none, I suppose.

I shared photographs and other things, it's all been an adventure and great to look back on as I hit this numerical milestone since Layers & Sounds started three years ago.

(We won’t talk about the fashion blog. A bit misguided but still glad I tried).

Anyways, here's some more music, my 100th Mixtape, god knows if I'll be able to do another 100 of these, but I can promise you the music will always be playing. 

Cheers!  

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 99

I'm blown away. Kacey Musgraves just released her fourth album (if you count her Christmas album), Golden Hour, and it's a stunning album from the sultry, smokey soul. This will end up as one of my favorite albums this year, a must listen for all because it's so damn universal. 

I was trying to find a comparison for this album because it's easy listening in the best possible way. You turn it on and do whatever you gotta do - run, walk, drive, party, have a drink or a smoke, talk, you name it.

In an album review by Rob Harvilla from The Ringer, he noted it was an album to smoke a joint to (as Musgraves notoriously loves to do - amongst some other psychedelics that clearly influenced the album), as you float away in the slow burn of Musgraves' music.

Back to the best comparison: Some might think of this as a dig AND OF COURSE IT'S NOT IF YOU REALLY KNEW ME, but the album reminds me (though a bit more country and twangy) of John Mayer during his Room For Squares days. Every song is beautiful, listenable, different, and buoyed by a flow that never gets too fast or lulls you to sleep. Songs have different tempos and keys and instruments, nothing is boring. There’s highs and lows and in betweens, Musgraves gets all my emotions, just as Mayer could do but Musgraves comes more authentic to me. Though Mayer obviously wins the guitar battle.

John Mayer even gave his own post two cents on the album on Facebook:

Her voice goes straight to the soul. You stick to her siren in "Golden Hour," or her melodies in "Butterflies," or her balladry in "Rainbows," or her sexiness in "Slow Burn."

And you might think her voice sounds too perfect (or produced, as they say, like all the no talent ass clown pop stars who can’t sing but fourtunately have computers that fix their inability to sing and writers that fix their inability to pen a song). Well, I give you Exhibit A from her performance on Colbert, where she crushed it:

This album should be ingested whole and given a lot of time to sink in. It only gets better. 

Enjoy :)

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 98

This week's writeup is all about the band I just discovered, Khruangbin. I'm not exactly sure how to pronounce their name, I'm not exactly sure that you can pigeonhole their sound, but I do know it's one of my favorite instrumental albums I've heard in years and years. 

They're almost like what I'd dream of if I could imagine a modern day version of my favorite jazz records. There's a rhythm to their sound that is immediately infectious, and I can't get enough of that bluesy guitar! 

I hope you can dig into these guys from Texas as much as I have - this is their second album, and I've only listened to their debut a handful of times, so let's listen together.

Have a good week! 

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 97

This first track by Jonathan Wilson is far out. Starting off in a Pink Floydish spacescape floating as galaxies slowly pass by, the guitar slices repeatedly weaves with a Grizzly Bear-esque and then the track turns to distorted guitar and a beat like it came straight out of Dazed & Confused - and that's the first two minutes!

This dude is wild, and I just started listening to his album, so I'll have more to relay next time around, but he's got one interesting sound/s.

As you know, any Tame Impala song will be ingested by me and listened to numerous times. This one is more of a "Featuring Tame Impala" kind of song given it's pretty EDM-like, but I'm sold because I get hypnotized in the rhythms and vocals. Kevin Parker does it again!

I keep reading about Charlotte Gainsbourg's 2017 album, so I've finally given it a whirl, and I highly recommend it. With no apologies to Lana Del Rey, she's a more talented Lana Del Rey with that sultry voice. If Lana mixed with Robyn (with all compliments to Robyn, whom I love), their hideous music-child would produce something like Charlotte's latest album, one that weaves through in French and English and is pretty captivating the whole way.

For those who don't know, S. Carey is a part of Bon Iver (he has the second most angelic voice of the crew) as shown here (which I think I've posted about before):

I LOVE his voice. So pure.

ANYWAYS, he released his second solo album. It's good, and I'm not sure if it goes beyond that, but it's very easy to listen to, perfect background music. I'm going to continue to listen to him as I think this album will grow more and more, but right now they all sound pretty similar, and I'm having a tough time figuring if I love any song or simply like most of them. Time will tell, but this is the one I think that strikes me the most so far. 

If the chorus of Dega's "Mirrors" doesn't remind you of one band of the 80s, then we just don't know each other. Because it's clearly Hall & Oates! Such a catchy chorus that I find myself singing over and over. "She's thinking about it!"

Not exactly sure who the hell "Hibou" is or what the hell "Hibou" means, but this song kinda reminds me of Smashing Pumpkins. Or 90s music in general. So I'm a sucker for this stuff. 

Sir Sly to end the mixtape, a band that reminds me a bit of Foster the People but not as original or good. Sorry, Sir Sly, just giving my thoughts. Still a pretty good song, buoyed by the chorus. 

Have a good week, all! 

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 96

Natalie Prass is back! And boy is she ever with this knockout catchy jam, a departure from her more subtle and delicate (and amazing) debut album (that I talked incessant about back in 2015 and was my #2 Album of 2015 - so yeah, check it out!). I just love this song, and I can't imagine not bopping your head to that beat! 

The remainder is a hodge podge of artists, some of whom I've recently discovered and really been digging their albums (particularly Dega and Surf Harp) and others who have been on the mixtape before (Wye Oak and Little Dragon).

Regardless, it's an "indie music" (yeah yeah, whatever that means, right?) kinda feel to the mixtape. Enjoy!

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 95

Happy President's Day all! Hopefully two or three of you have the day off or are playing hooky. 

There's a ton of "new" music that I'm pretty excited to share with you. New is in quotation marks because this first song, "Grace," by Future Generations is from 2016, but goodness, I LOVE this song. What initially sounds like some futuristic EDM track abruptly shreds into a distorted guitar and a lonely wail "over something small like me." 

Future Generations formed at Fordham University and look to be releasing the follow-up to their 2016 debut (a good but not great album, one that screams with their potential but sometimes get lost in repetitiveness) this year. If "Grace" has anything to do with it, these guys got a lot of promise for their sophomore album!

My wife and I saw Lord Huron a handful of months back at The Independent, an intimate venue akin to The Black Cat (to all my DC peoples out there!) in San Francisco. They played two or three nights in a row, and they played a couple new tracks. One song instantly grabbed me, it's soul-filled, bluesy, and retro sound reverberating throughout the hushed audience. The slow, plodding bass line hooked me, and the lyrics were so simple and beautiful: "If we can't stay together / What's the point of life?" 

Ladies and gentlemen, "Wait By the River" by Lord Huron.

Enjoy the remaining stuff, a hodge podge of sounds, and check back next week for more!     

Monday Mixtape, Vol. 94

Kendrick Lamar was tasked with creating a soundtrack to the recently released Black Panther, and the results aren't exactly surprising. It's great. It's varied in sounds and production yet stays cohesive, and Kendrick pastes hooks, verses, and his imprint over most of the songs. Featuring appearances by Future, The Weeknd, Ab-Soul, Jay Rock, SZA, Schoolboy Q, Khalid, Vince Staples, Anderson .Paak, James Blake, and Travis Scott, it's like rap's All-Star Game. The album is one of my fave soundtracks I've heard in quite some time. Check it out!

I was watching (the movie) Whiplash again, and it prompted me to get on a jazz kick last week. I stumbled upon this track from John Coltrane and Duke Ellington, a beautifully rhythmic song strolling through a wintry evening.

And finally, MGMT released a new album which goes way back to their pop-like ways. I still need to digest it, and I'll get a couple more tracks.