Statesman > XL Blogs > Archives > 2005 > January > 20 > Entry
Mixing it up, ‘02-style
About two weeks ago, I started working on a mix CD to send out to friends as a sort of late holiday gift because I was so lax this year on cards and gifts given the flurry of moving we went through in December.
I know what you’re thinking: “A mix CD as a gift? How very 2002 of you.”
Yep, that was the year that just about every new computer sold included the means of burning your own music CDs and boy did people take advantage of that for like 20 minutes two years ago. I remember getting CD-Rs for Christmas, CD-Rs from blogs my friends were writing, CD-Rs from dudes wanting to sell me insurance. They would all have the HP-Inkjet-printed folded-paper label with Microsoft Word Clip-Art and some cheerful personalization: “Monster Janie’s 2002 Arbor Day Mix!” for instance.
I still have a stack of them on my CD shelf. I’ve extracted all the songs I really liked off those discs and the discs jewel boxes themselves remain encased and undisturbed husks, like old fruitcakes tins you keep around in case your aunt were to visit.
Still, it occurred to me about two weeks after Christmas that I should do a mix collecting a song each from my favorite albums of 2004. It would be an eclectic collection — rap and rock, Spanish and English, funky songs next to a mainstream hit or two, the kind of legendary CD mix that would turn all my friends and associates into fans of all the people I’ve been listening to for the past 12 months. I’d get friends asking me, “Hey, what’s up with that Lila Downs lady? She’s AWESOME!” or telling me how hearing PJ Harvey’s “The Letter” changed their life and made them give up booze and dope. I was ready for greatness.
Can you think of anything so self-centered?
Really, I think since the advent of CD-Rs and iPods, the fantasy of being Coolest DJ on the Planet — the person who turns everyone in your Friendster chain on to the artists only you are cool enough to listen to — has officially supplanted the one where you’re the star of your own 24-hour, seven-day-a-week TV show.
Did I let that stop me? Hell to the naw.
The now-interminably delayed CD has gone through several revisions. I asked my brother for some backup when I realized I couldn’t fill up an 80-minute CD without duplicating artists. He shot me some Talib Kweli, Modest Mouse, Unicorns and Death Cab for Cutie (I’m really on the fence still about that last one). I re-ordered songs, creating neat pairings of song themes, genres (maybe two rap songs followed by two mid-tempo alt-rock numbers) and, in one flash of short-lived pride, song titles. (You’d think I won some sort of sweepstakes when I drag-and-dropped Green Day’s “Jesus of Suburbia” next to Kanye West’s “Jesus Walks.”)
Not to get all Nick Hornsby about it, but there’s something very powerful about putting together something you think people might actually listen to. I think about the time I spent in my car with music, the hours locked to the iPod while writing — to know that the songs you choose might be in someone else’s, even for one listen, makes you feel like you’ve got the weight of the world’s taste in music on your shoulders. The mix stops being about you and more about your perception of what your friends and family might enjoy.
Then it does come back to being about you — your biases and misperceptions about the musical tastes of those closest to you.
Still. I think we can agree: Loretta Lynn and Jack White on “Portland Oregon”?? That should totally be the first track.
I’ve had some late work nights, so I’m woefully behind on TV, which sounds like a really good thing probably to everyone except me.
I missed “American Idol” this week when seemingly everyone in the country and their foreign-born cousins were watching.
I’m not really sure what’s going on in politics because even though I work at a newspaper, I get all my real news from “The Daily Show”, which I haven’t caught this week.
And it pains me to say that after catching the first episode of VH1’s “Strange Love” last week, I missed Sunday’s episode, so now I don’t know if Flavor Flav and Brigitte Nielsen are officially a couple yet. What will I do!?
The side effects of my week without TV seem to be improved motor skills, better memory retention and improved night vision. But who needs all that junk? I want my Flavor Flav!
What? A track listing for the CD-R?
(Deep breath.) All right. But it’s a little embarrassing. Promise you won’t giggle at me, all right?
Here goes:
- Loretta Lynn (+ Jack White) — “Portland Oregon”
- Lila Downs — “Dignificada”
- Bjork — “Oceania”
- Bebel Gilberto — “Aganju (Latin Project Remix. Yes, I used a remix)”
- Franz Ferdinand — “Michael”
- Modest Mouse — “Float On”
- Green Day — “Jesus of Suburbia”
- Kanye West — “Jesus Walks”
- DJ Danger Mouse (+ Jay-Z + The Beatles) — “What More Can I Say?”
- PJ Harvey — “The Letter”
- Pixies — “Bam Thwok”
- Death Cab for Cutie — “Tiny Vessels”
- U2 — “Sometimes You Can’t Make it On Your Own”
- Courtney Love — “Mono”
- Unicorns — “Jellybones”
- Talib Kweli — “Beautiful Struggle”
- Brandy — “Should I Go”
Bonus tracks (not released in 2004) 18. Davíd Garza — “La Malagueña Curreña” 19. White Stripes — “One More Cup of Coffee”
All right, fine. You can giggle now if you want.
Permalink | | Categories: By Omar Gallaga
