I thought I might do a half-year songs report, but I'm only up to March 20th listening through my 2026 queue -- and my listen-to-again playlist is already over 600 songs. someone who is good at the economy help me winnow this my family is dying

Incredible to see historians demanding professional standards and adequate compensation for their work from cartoonists, who have about as much experience with those things as a hummingbird

#TheN0ughtie5 Day 26 25. Tati Quebra Barraco, “Sou Feia Mais Tô na Moda” (2004) The first half of my list was dominated by songs that represented my taste at the time. The second half will have some too, but more of what represents my taste now: like this funk carioca anthem. youtu.be/7GXCyh9W7Ds

Individual panels by B. Krigstein (colored by Marie Severin)

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Duke Ellington, "Black Beauty" (1928, New York) Most of what I posted under this hashtag was random suggestions from my old-music YouTube profile; this, one of my all-time favorite records, I specifically looked up to close out the month. Cheers! youtu.be/ycyhuLFO8AA

#TheN0ughtie5 HM 5 Trina, “Pull Over” (2000) Couldn't have a rundown of Southern rap without acknowledgment of the queen. Like most of the rest of these, the video's audio is censored to comply with FCC broadcast standards -- one way things have improved in the internet era. youtu.be/grmJsiGf5Bk

It was really my cousin's computer while she was going to college, but she would let us play Zork on it sometimes.

finally put my ac unit in the window yesterday, now i just need to switch out the flannel bedsheets for linen and i’ll be ready to ride out summer

good EP too, made the red line to addison on a game day tolerable

Another weeks-late report on the live show I saw at the beginning of the month. Might be my last. buttondown.com/jonathanboga...

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Vesta Tilley, "When the Right Girl Comes Along" (1907, London?) youtu.be/qtZoj0dmLfo

#TheN0ughtie5 HM 4 Petey Pablo, “Raise Up” (2001) Could and maybe should have chosen "Freek-a-Leek," the more popular PP song a quarter century on, but giving preference to my lived experience, "Raise Up" was the song that bridged the gap for me between Miami bass and crunk. youtu.be/tHnA94-hTC8

#TheN0ughtie5 HM 3 T.I., “Rubber Band Man” (2003) For such a major single in the history of trap, it sure sounds very little like what trap became: the triumphant bombast would fade into slinkier minimalism, but the vulnerable, sing-song delivery is there already. youtu.be/xjDT3rMSQLQ

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Memphis Five, chorus by Billy Jones, “Walk, Jenny, Walk!” (1923, New York) youtu.be/Mjrg8QYJChg

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Orchestre antillais Alexandre Stellio, voc. Léona Gabriel, “Oué oué oué oué” (1931, Paris) youtu.be/JDh3s6k4FlA

#TheN0ughtie5 HM 2 Bubba Sparxxx ft. Ying Yang Twins & Mr. Collipark, “Ms. New Booty” (2005) Booty booty booty booty rockin everywhere booty booty booty booty rockin everywhere booty booty booty booty — To quote a priest I knew at the time, if it’s too loud you’re too old. youtu.be/znUS2KqPYCw

welcome to bluesky: our eric alper has a trans flag in her display name

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Marika Kanaropoulou, "Neva Manes (Tinos na po ton pono mou)" (1933, Athens) youtu.be/xKq4QgePGcA

#TheN0ughtie5 HM 1 Lil Wayne, “A Milli” (2008) Using the HMs for a short reverse-chronological hit of classic Southern rap songs that haven't received any votes yet (afaict). A different Weezy is on my list proper, but this "last rap song" holds up, homophobic verses and all. youtu.be/1Vf4mMCpNY0

looks like youtube has started to annotate videos that use* generative ai with a little bug just below the title, but only once you've already clicked onto the video. not in shorts, of course. *disclosed using during upload, or used an ai generator youtube can detect, i.e. a google ai product

contemplating my Honorable Mention options for #then0ughtie5 and after checking the spreadsheet the dearth of southern rap standards is so noticeable that i think i'm going to have to devote all my picks to the genre

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Ma Rainey & Her Georgia Jazz Band, "See See Rider Blues" (1924, New York) youtu.be/he9T0R0OCIA

#TheN0ughtie5 Day 25 26. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, “Maps” (2003) Sometimes I just want to feel big feelings while guitars swell indiely like I'm in the final third of a downbeat, tasteful melodrama. Not often, which is why this is a rare Big 00s Indie song here, but sometimes. youtu.be/oIIxlgcuQRU

posting for no other reason than that it's running through my head at the moment: youtu.be/EHjdrqvicN4

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Blue Rhythm Boys, "Blue Rhythm" (1931, New York) youtu.be/zGHAlq75i90

#TheN0ughtie5 Day 24 27. Lil Mama, “Lip Gloss” (2007) On the heels of "Crank That (Soulja Boy)," another insurgent/insouciant minimalist youthful rap anthem, serving notice that the ramp up to the 2010s would not resemble the early 2000s: the future belonged to odd kids. youtu.be/S5ck6TJQ5Ow

(current running top 5 albums of the 2020s, top of my head: 5. Wampi, El Rey de la Habana 4. RaiNao, Marcriá 3. Bad Bunny, Debí Tirar Más Fotos 2. Cazzu, Latinaje 1. IZA, Afrodita)

Port of Cleveland, by Kalman Kubinyi (American, 1906-1973) published by the Works Progress Administration 1937 More info: https://www.artic.edu/artworks/127114

it occurs to me that my early interest in the pre-album 78rpm era of music was excellent training for swimming around in the post-album profusion of global mictogenres on streaming.

going to pull out a few highlights to discuss in a thread below

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Carmen Miranda, "Os Hôme Implica Comigo" (1930, Rio de Janeiro) youtu.be/j8Rkkn4hwv8

#TheN0ughtie5 Day 23 28. System of a Down, “B.Y.O.B.” (2005) By middecade I had mostly lost my taste for the heavy man-angst rock I'd dutifully embraced as a teenager anxiously playing catchup to headbanging peers, but this steel-sharp beach-funk agitprop got between my ribs. youtu.be/zUzd9KyIDrM

For your #PPP96 consideration: 40 songs from 1996 by Caribbean, Latin American, and African artists, grouped roughly by language and region. I mostly chose streaming tracks instead of videos for ease of porting to other platforms, sorry if they're region-locked for you. youtube.com/playlist?lis...

For your #PPP96 consideration: 40 songs from 1996 by Caribbean, Latin American, and African artists, grouped roughly by language and region. I mostly chose streaming tracks instead of videos for ease of porting to other platforms, sorry if they're region-locked for you. youtube.com/playlist?lis...

something i read (and re-read, and re-re-read over and over again) in adolescence that i still think about minimum once a week. it's weak epistemologically, but it sure is descriptive of subjective experience

Recorded 100 years ago today Carl T. Sprague - O Bury Me Not on the Lone Prairie (The Dying Cowboy)

The Clive Davis aesthetic, distilled and concentrated: youtu.be/6Whgn_iE5uc

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Fanny Brice, "Second Hand Rose" (1921, New York) youtu.be/mxEwMcJ8GXc

#TheN0ughtie5 Day 22 29. Sean Kingston, “Beautiful Girls” (2007) My preference has been for songs I knew at the time; this is an exception, but dug its way under my skin after I found it when searching for songs to fit a suicide-themed mix. (My early 2010s were, uh, blatant.) youtu.be/MrTz5xjmso4

buckled down and wrote a complete 5K word piece tonight. not for public consumption now or ever, but i had begun to worry that anything longer than one of these here skeets was in my rearview. now to see if it unlocks any of the writing i actually care about doing.

the nyt bee’s ongoing beef with music writing continues

#EarlyRecordingsInJune Henry Whitter, “Rain Crow Bill” (1927, Bristol) youtu.be/GgrM5mcyv8A

#TheN0ughtie5 Day 21 30. Lady Gaga, “Bad Romance” (2008) Toward the end of the decade the half-life of my ability to appreciate a new pop girlie began to shorten, so that Gaga had only been triggering a rockist sneer for a year before I admitted that this was actually great. youtu.be/qrO4YZeyl0I

i suppose this is more biography than bluesky account but

a longish read for the weekend. The first way of looking at Iggy Pop's "The Idiot": back and forth in time, in a haunted (honky) château: www.patreon.com/chrisoleary/...

after reading one too many reddit threads about any tv show, book, movie, musician, or comic of significant notability:

That's enough Death of the Author. It's time for Death of the Audience. Start running fools

#EarlyRecordingsInJune July Paka, “Kawaihau” (1915, New York) youtu.be/vnHajX31GUg

#TheN0ughtie5 Day 20 31. The Strokes, “Hard to Explain” (2001) At this remove it’s easier to detach from all the “rock is back and will save us from all this horrible pop/rap/dance” claptrap and hear this as just another, unusually disaffected, kind of pop. A cute boy band. youtu.be/BXkm6h6uq0k