Winter Indie Music Playlist 2017

Lately I'm being encouraged to back up these playlists on Spotify for those who listen in their cars and don't want to download or use memory in their phones. I'll try it out this week. Since I sift through thousands of songs a year with my harsh critical ear, my apprehension is that many of the songs will be too obscure and unavailable and I'll just get frustrated. Let's find out. If the experiment works, I'll probably be found under the handle BLANCONADA.

Here's the annual winter playlist, with the artists written out below. It was fun seeing the reappearance of former playlist faves Elbow and Charlatans UK, and to be able to include a relevant track from the new Robert Plant album. Can't believe how young he still sounds. Hope you enjoy.

Winter Indie Music Playlist 2017
1. Foxygen - On Lankershim
2. Wolf Alice _ Don't Delete The Kisses
3. Elbow - Magnificent
4. Pavo Pavo - Ran Ran Run
5. Boy Pablo - Everytime
6. Michael Kiwanuka - Cold Little Heart
7. Austra - I Love You More Than You Love Yourself
8. Mondo Cozmo - Plastic Soul
9. Melody's Echo Chamber - Cross Your Heart
10. Robert Plant - The May Queen
11. Porcelain Raft - Kookaburra
12. Spaceface - Sun Kids
13. Gingerlys - Turtledoves
14. Emmecosta - A Mountain From Us
15. Moon Duo - Lost In Light
16. Aldous Harding - Imagining My Man
17. Lo Noom - Once In A Million Years
18. Thee Oh Sees - The Poem
19. Lost Horizons - The Places We've Benn
20. Charlatans UK - The Setting Sun

I Love The Summer: Best Of Blackbyrds & Donald Byrd

Here's a playlist I made of a 1970s band I only recently discovered (I know I'm late). Led by Donald Byrd and combining soul, rhythm, funk, disco, and smooth jazz, this music has informed my entire summer so far and given me the most groovy joys. As we move toward sweltering temperatures, just remember hot weather is what the sun was meant to do. We're lucky to live in the Goldilocks zone of Earth. Put on some headphones and find some A/C.



Best of Blackbyrds & Donald Byrd
1. Hot Day Today
2. Gut Level
3. Rock Creek Park
4. Unfinished Business
5. Do It, Fluid
6. Walking In Rhythm
7. Mysterious Vibes
8. The Baby
9. Hash & Eggs
10. Life Styles
11. Love's So Far Away
12. You & Music
13. Enter In
14. Flying High
15. Stepping Into Tomorrow
16. Love Is Love
17. Change Makes You Wanna Hustle
18. Places & Spaces
19. Blackbyrds' Theme
20. One-Eyed Two-Step
21. Just My Imagination

Summer Indie Music Playlist 2017

I'm pleased to say I found enough happy and/or uptempo songs to complete my playlist before the actual start of summer. Usually I'm still scraping the barrel around August. I hope we're all finding more opportunities for joy and dancing in the face of adversity and negativity.

The track list is included below (in case YouTube deletes any of the videos). Here's to a beautiful fun-filled summer for you and those you love!




SUMMER INDIE MUSIC PLAYLIST 2017
1. Spoon - Can I Sit Next To You?
2. STRFKR - In The End
3. The New Pornographers - High Ticket Attractions
4. Portugal. The Man - Feel It Still
5. Phoenix - Ti Amo
6. Ginger Root - Belleza
7. Sir Sly - High
8. Shadowgraphs - Scarlet Tunic
9. Weezer - Feels Like Summer
10. Toma - Going Nowhere
11. Goldfrapp - Anymore
12. Two Door Cinema Club - Fever
13. Moon Duo - Creepin
14. Grouplove - Good Morning
15. King Gizzard & Lizard Wizard - Sleep Drifter
16. Ruby Empress - Escapism Deluxe
17. Bleachers - Don't Take The Money
18. Temples - Born Into The Sunset
19. Japanese Breakfast - Everybody Wants To Love You
20. Babe Rainbow - Peace Blossom Boogy
21. BNQT - Real Love
22. LCD Soundsystem - Call The Police

Blanconada's Grab Bag Vol. 1

Sometimes I'm in a department store or a restaurant or in my car, tuned to an obscure radio station, and a song will come on that I don't know (or I've forgotten about) and it'll strikes a chord with me. I'll pull out my phone, turn on my Soundhound app, then I'll completely forget about them later. Today I went back through my history and assembled all these songs to see if they fit together somehow. I think they do.

Here's my first grab bag:

My Favorite Movies Of 2016

Usually by April I've gotten around to seeing the bulk of every critic's year-end lists. This year I felt most of the lauded films were overrated, and films from earlier in the year were overlooked. These are my favorites in order:

1. 20th Century Women (perfect script, stirring performances, especially by Annette Bening)
2. Captain Fantastic (totally relevant to today's issues, and Viggo deserved the Oscar)
3. Green Room (where was Patrick Stewart's supporting nom?)
4. Little Men (criminally overlooked coming-of-age tale told with depth and sensitivity)
5. Don't Breathe (ridiculously intense)
6. Other People (Molly Shannon deserved an Oscar nomination)
7. Moonlight (moving and brave film, but an almost silent protagonist seemed awkward)
8. The Witch (amazingly realistic acting and vivid locations)
9. Bone Tomahawk (terrifying western with florid dialogue and sublime work by Kurt Russell)
10. Sing Street (another great coming-of-age tale set in the punk 80s)
11. Dr. Strange (surprisingly profound and eye-dazzling Marvel film)
12. Arrival (despite a somewhat trite ending, this film is alive with unique ideas)
13. Zootopia/Moana (both feature spectacular imagination and almost psychedelic palettes)
14. Deadpool (another brilliant Marvel film, and a memorable turn by Ryan Reynolds)
15. Nice Guys (way funnier and smarter than I expected, though not much character arc)
16. Ouija (surprised again by some great scares despite board game premise)
17. Pete's Dragon (I know at least 3 grown men, myself included, who cried during this)
18. Girl On The Train (can't believe Emily Blunt didn't get a nom for this lurid thriller)
19. Eye In The Sky (relevant premise about the ethics behind drone strikes vs civilian casualty)
20. Hail Caesar! (hands-down the best art direction I saw all year)
21. 10 Cloverfield Lane (creepy flick, and John Goodman deserved a supporting nom)
22. Under The Shadow (weird tale about Iraq war bombing and hungry evil spirits)
23. Edge Of Seventeen (absurdist teen girl rebel flick with hilarious dialogue)
24. La La Land (good-looking movie, nice songs, didn't deserve all the noms)

UPDATE: Having just seen Paterson by Jim Jarmusch, I'd say it's a tie with Little Men for #3. Such an inspiring and gentle film, it casts a type of spell, and left me more creative and hopeful than I've been in a long time.

The most overrated films of the year, in my opinion, were Manchester By The Sea (where everything was emotionally-detached, rendered in forced Boston accents, and the lead character muttered his way toward an anticlimactic non-ending), and Kubo & Two Strings (where the animation was unusually dark, and all comedy was sapped from the dialogue by some of the worst voice-over work I've heard in an animated film).