What’s This Playlist All About? This 221-song mix compiles just about every 2019 GRAMMY nominee into one nearly 16-hour package, from pop’s guiltiest pleasures to rock’s most bombastic ventures to hip-hop’s hardest-hitting commentaries. One major thing to note this year: the four big categories—best new artist, record of the year, song of the year, and album of the year—will all have a whopping eight nominees each versus the previous five.What You Get: Kendrick Lamar leads the pack with eight nominations, followed by Drake with seven, then artists like Brandi Carlile, Cardi B, Lady Gaga, Childish Gambino, and H.E.R. close behind. On the playlist itself, nominees from the biggest categories are logically featured first, including Cardi B, Bad Bunny, and J Balvin’s sizzling party-starter “I Like It” and Gaga and Bradley Cooper’s cinematic tearjerker “Shallow.” Keep scrolling down, and you’ll find Janelle Monae at her funkiest, Kacey Musgraves at her sweetest, and Tony Bennett and Diana Krall at their suavest. In between, catch Australian producer Fisher dish out maddening beats, jazz guitarist Julian Lage unleash killer licks, and Greta Van Fleet resurrect ‘70s rock.Greatest Discovery: The smoky, soulful blues of Kansas City powerhouse Danielle Nicole, whose ‘Cry No More’ is up for Best Contemporary Blues Album.Is a GRAMMY Playlist Necessary? Eh, not really. I mean, unless you’re a real GRAMMY nerd—or just a music masochist—there’s a good chance you won’t care about many (or possibly any) of these categories. That said, it is worth clicking around the list to check for artists and songs you may have missed this past year.
What’s This Playlist All About? Following the release of her fifth album, Miss Anthropocene, dark-pop provocateur and AI enthusiast Grimes has declared “ethereal” an official music genre. While the word typically means “extremely delicate and light in a way that seems too perfect for this world,” Grimes describes her playlist a little differently: “We agree that there is a long lineage of auteur artists, often producing their own music and/or directing their own music videos. Oft with a heavy visual component and fantasy, sci-fi, or literary elements…” Either way you see it, there’s certainly an indefinable, maybe even otherworldly, softness coursing through this three-hour-plus playlist.
What You Get: A decades-spanning mix high on the energy of the Divine Feminine with sensual selections from “ethereal” legends like Cocteau Twins, Kate Bush, and Enya, plus woozy electro-soul dreams from newer artists FKA twigs and Lolo Zouaï, and spacey dance delights from Purity Ring and HANA, the latter of whom often collaborates with the playlist maker herself. Grimes’ own music is strategically placed amid this eccentric bunch, such as when her hazy, funereal hymn “Before the fever” seamlessly follows Burial’s surreal, fizzy fantasy “Come Down To Us.” And what would a sci-fi-inspired collection be without Vangelis’ Blade Runner classic “Rachel’s Song”?
Greatest Discovery: Jon Hopkins’ blissed-out journey through a mind-warping, body-numbing mix of ambient glow and frizzling beats on his 2018 track “Singularity.”
Most Ethereal of Them All: It seems that nothing—not even through all of our technological advances—can quite top the stunning elegance of Claude Debussy’s “Clair de Lune,” a beauty “too perfect for this world” that we earthlings may not even deserve anymore.
What’s This Playlist All About?: Canadian electro-pop visionary Claire Boucher (a.k.a. Grimes) makes a mood playlist capturing the tracks that inspire her to draw. As a point of reference, here are her drawings.What You Get: A bunch of the least-cluttered tracks by ‘90s IDM trickster Aphex Twin, punctuated by wispy, ethereal songs from Lana Del Rey and other (generally female-fronted) electro-pop/rap acts. We’re not art critics, and we have no strong opinions about how this impacts her visual art, but it does reflect the general aesthetic poles in Grimes’ own music——the mixture of fairy-tale balladry, empowerment anthems, and smeared electronic atmospherics. Biggest Surprise: Grimes still rides for Azealia Banks and Salem in 2018!Greatest Discovery: The blurred, sludgy, nightmare pop of Ginger Blossom, who is exceedingly difficult to Google.Does This Make Us Want To Draw?: Not really, which is probably a good thing for our friends and loved ones. It does, however, make us want to take a nap.
Claire Elise Boucher—a.k.a. Grimes—has always been transparent in her restlessness. Her 2012 breakout album, Visions, was sonically gauzy and thematically thorny, exploring issues of identity, sexuality, and empowerment over smeared, floating electro. It drifted through your headscape like an autumnal fog, but her lyrics—once you understood them, at least—were piercing in their honesty and vulnerability. She painted her follow-up, 2015’s Art Angels, in the bold neon hues of modern electro-pop, echoing her own confidence on entering an increasingly elevated stage. But, still, there was a negotiation taking place—a messy but honest/beautiful evolution of aesthetics and personality —that felt universal.It makes sense that her Spotify mix, the faé list, feels both all over the place and a cohesive product of her roaming gaze. Artisophanes conjures a metallic slab of transhumanist pop on the aptly titled “Humans Becomes Machines,” and Grouper’s “I’m Clean Now” is all somatic romanticism. The playlist’s lead-off track, Yukaris “Am I Dreaming,” floats by in a haze of gentle synth sounds, feeling like the theme song to a narco-fueled Japanese remake of Twin Peaks. But, elsewhere, Claire rocks out with Cardi B and Lil Uzi Vert. She even includes Taylor Swift’s “Look What You Made Me Do,” because why not? Ultimately, like the best playlists, it feels like both a cultural and personal artifact, a flickering glimpse into one of our generation’s most mercurial and talented artists, and an apt reflection of where we all are in this weird, fucked-up, awesome, shitty world.
Whats This Playlist All About? The writer and director of the superhero saga finally shares this "secret, personal mix" that he would play on the set of the first Guardians of the Galaxy film, "especially for the drunken partying scenes in the Boot of Jemiah." For those unfamiliar with the franchise, the Boot of Jemiah is a rowdy steampunk bar located on a space colony.What Do You Get? A quick, well-calculated mix of riotous party bangers, including the requisite Andrew W.K. cut "Party Hard," alongside some spazzy electro-punk, freaky gypsy-punk, funky hip-hop, and… My Chemical Romance.Biggest & Best Surprise: "Timebomb," the speedy, punky finale of both this mix and any Old 97s show.What Did He Forget? Beastie Boys "Intergalactic." Duh.Is This Better Than Awesome Mix Vol. 1 (i.e. the Movies Official Soundtrack)? Not even close—not when Vol. 1 boasts Bowie, The Jackson 5, and Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell.
What’s This Playlist All About? The author behind such modern-day classics as Norwegian Wood and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle is a well-known music fanatic. In fact, he recently announced he would be donating his entire vinyl collection of some 10,000 records to Tokyo’s Waseda University. To showcase his voracious musical appetite, one of Murakami’s faithful followers has taken on the task of compiling songs that the writer has mentioned in various interviews and Q&As, as well as on a website no longer available called, Murakami San No Tokoro.What You Get: Murakami’s collection is almost exclusively jazz; he did, after all, open a jazz bar in Tokyo well before he began writing novels. So, here, you can dive into nearly 250 hours (and counting) worth of jazz titans like Sonny Rollins, Oscar Peterson, Billie Holiday, and Thelonious Monk, alongside classical masterpieces from great minds like Mozart, Bach, and Chopin.Best Surprise: Hearing a few Beach Boys gems (from 1965’s The Beach Boys Today!) between all that heavy-hitting jazz and classical is a nice little distraction. But this also makes us wonder: Where are The Beatles?Where Does One Even Start With This Playlist? Since there seems to be no organization to this mix, it’s probably best to just press play and let it shuffle. And if you’re looking to write your own novel, this may be your perfect writing companion.
What’s This Playlist All About? The Irish singer-songwriter behind massive hit “Take Me To Church” is returning after nearly five years with his sophomore album, Wasteland, Baby!, out March 1. In anticipation of the release, he has just dropped buoyant folk-pop single “Almost (“Sweet Music),” his “dedication to some of the greatest musicians of our time.” This mix features the tracks referenced throughout the song.What You Get: A whole lot of old-timey icons, starting with the Queen of Jazz herself, Ella Fitzgerald, with moody classics like “Night and Day” and raw bursts of passion like a live rendition of “It’s All Right With Me.” Swing masters Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong also come charging through with “Dancing in the Dark” and “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain’t Got That Swing,” along with Ray Charles in his jauntiest (“Let the Good Time Roll”) and saddest moments (“Am I Blue”).Best Pick: John Coltrane’s four-part jazz suite A Love Supreme, a challenging, haunting, majestic must-listen.Should Hozier Just Go Jazz or What? Probably not, and we don’t think he plans to—“Almost” is simply a sweet ode to the masters. Hozier remains best at his own style of bluesy, devotional rock, which is even better alongside Mavis Staples on Wasteland, Baby’s leading track “Nina Cried Power.”
Whats This Playlist All About? The Danish noise punks rise back up to the surface after four years of silence with a new single—the scuzzy, sludgy saga "Catch It"—and some inspirations in the form of “luxurious rockers, serenades, howlers, and cruisers."What Do You Get? Bookending the set with two of their own moody doozies, Iceage take several left turns here. Karen Daltons haunting banjo-pickin’ sidles up next to T. Rexs sax-kissed glam rock, CANs funkiest groove, and heady avant-garde journeys from artists like Pharoah Sanders and Sun Ra. Still, each song has its own strangeness—and timelessness—that somehow connects them all.Greatest Discovery: The slithery, nimble guitar layers and urgent rhythms of "Feeling High" from Japanese psych-rockers Les Rallizes Denudes.Whats the Best Way to Listen to This Playlist? Lying on your bed, headphones secured, lights off, lava lamp flowing, slightly dazed and confused.
Whats This Playlist All About? The LCD Soundsystem mastermind and pals David & Stephen Dewaele of Soulwax and 2ManyDJs got back to spinning vinyl (and only vinyl) at their 2018 Despacio party residency at Queens Knockdown Center. If you were there, you may have enjoyed the set while sipping on wines from Murphys restaurant, Four Horsemen. If you werent, Brooklyn Vegans Arielle Gordon graciously compiled this mix featuring highlights from the first of three nights.What Do You Get? A whole lot of classic disco, New Wave, and house, all on the headier end of the dance spectrum. It kicks off with one of Paul McCartneys weirdest (and best) synth experiments ("Check My Machine"), then digs into classic Bowie, Byrne, and Carly Simon, alongside a few Soulwax remixes of French artistes Charlotte Gainsbourg and The Peppers. In between, theres just enough dance-floor cheese sprinkled about (including some "Jungle Boogie") to keep the mood pleasantly lighthearted.Greatest Discovery: The 1983 collaboration between French composer Hector Zazou, Congolese singer Bony Bikaye, and electronic duo CY1, who mixed analog synths, krautrock, funk, and African influences into entrancing tracks like "Lamuka."Guiltiest Pleasure: Lyn Christophers slinky, sexy funk-pop sizzler "Take Me With You."Best Surprise: Black Sabbaths psychedlic slow-burner "Planet Caravan." It glues together the surrounding disco beats and funky grooves surprisingly well.Toss Up: James Murphy Spinning This Mix or an All LCD Soundsystem Set? Were going to go with the former here, if only because were getting a little older and hearing these classics alongside a couple glasses of that wine sounds pretty nice right about now.
What’s This Playlist All About? On the heels of releasing his first memoir, Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back), the Wilco frontman (who also just released his first collection of original solo material) put together this mix of songs and bands mentioned in the book.What You Get: The irrepressible storyteller kicks off the mix with sounds of a steam locomotive “pulling into the yards,” before hitting us with some of his own works with Wilco, Uncle Tupelo, and on his own. In between, he shows his respect to the greats—David Bowie, The Clash, Bob Dylan—as well as indie rock heroes like The Replacements, J Mascis, and Dinosaur Jr., and punk provocateurs like X and Minutemen. He then ends it all with the train “leaving the yards.”Greatest Discovery: Cult hero Carla Bozulich’s surreal and sublime take on Willie Nelson’s “Red Headed Stranger.”Is the Playlist Better Than the Book? Well, you’ll just have to listen and read it for yourself!
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.
