Neither Nor

Instead of burying the lede, I’ll just cut to the chase.  I’ll shoot my mouth off after the jump.  (Apologies if the files don’t actually play in order; I’m a Grade A noob when it comes to iTunes / real world interoperability.  If shit stinks, gimme a buzz through whatever channels are available, & I’ll try to make things right.)

SO MANY OPALS (15 tracks; 1:01:39) [DOWNLOAD]

1. The Mountain Goats - “Heretic Pride” (from Heretic Pride)
2. The Breeders - “Off You” (from Title TK)
3. Bowerbirds - “Ghost Life” (from Upper Air)
4. Broadcast - “Long Was the Year” (from The Noise Made By People)
5. Harry Nilsson - “The Moonbeam Song” (from Nilsson Schmilsson)
6. The Heartbreak Scene - “Love Outside Movies” (from The Szabo Songbook)
7. Ida - “Gladiolas” (from The Braille Night)
8. Joel RL Phelps & The Downer Trio - “Mother I’m Missing” (from Customs)
9. Nina Nastasia - “A Dog’s Life” (from Dogs)
10. Liz Phair - “Alice Springs” (from Whip-Smart)
11. Straitjacket Fits - “Down In Splendour” (from Melt)
12. The Places - “Program Ten” (from Call It Sleep)
13. The Verlaines - “Black Wings” (from Way Out Where)
14. Pernice Brothers - “Cronulla Breakdown” (from The World Won’t End)
15. Randy Newman - “That’s Why I Love Mankind” (from Sail Away)

I got to conduct my first face-to-face interview a few weeks ago, with Marissa Nadler. Despite my turbo-babbling (it’ll be a dark day in hell before anyone besides me hears the actual recording of the interview), it went really well; I only wish I could’ve used the stuff about MP3 blogs and 7-11s and postage costs in an organic way for the profile I wrote up.  Instead, I figured it’d be more prudent to keep the digressions to a minimum & just write about how great her new album is.  The thing I wrote should be in the Village Voice in time for her NYC show at the Mercury Lounge on 7/27.  If you happen to be within spitting distance of CT, however, you can catch her opening for Wye Oak at the Wadsworth Antheneum (in Hartford, not New Haven as it’s listed on her website) this Friday (7/15), courtesy of Manic Productions.  I’d be there twice, except I’m going to be in Chicago with all the other (much younger) hipsters, PForking it up. But I digress.

During our conversation, Ms. Nadler mentioned that she was in the midst of recording songs for a second collection of covers, one of the Kickstarter incentives she offered folks that helped fund the recording of the album.  (You can purchase copies of the first covers album, along with lots of other stuff, at her Etsy store.)  She also asked if I had any suggestions of songs she could potentially cover, and as is the case whenever anyone asks me out of the blue for a list of anything, I came up capital-B blank.

And, as is the case when I have time to think (and a ninety-minute drive lends itself to lots of thinking), I started thinking of some possibilities.  And that’s where this list of songs started.  It didn’t actually end up as a List of Songs For Marissa Nadler to Sing, but I definitely wouldn’t mind seeing her give any of these a go.  I wanted to wait & post this until I had a blabby song-by-song rundown of the playlist done, but if I did that, it’d get posted by the 12th of Never (my favorite month).  So: songs now (if you’re interested), words later (hopefully by this time next week), more mixes whenever.

PS - the reason I nicked a Liz Phair lyric from the song I chose instead of thinking of an actual name for the mix is that the only name I could think of was “Bummershoot,” & that dog wasn’t going to fly.  Obviously.