Your Custom Text Here
Austrian Krampus … where paganism does a Christmas album …
Ritualism, celebration, sacrifice, worship of nature, sex and food? Ancient and 20th-century traditions come a procession of all kinds of colourful characters in this week’s theme that heralds horror or pleasure in equal measure
Read more
Correspondence captures time, place, culture and emotions …
Love letters to rejection replies, friendship, work or leisure, written correspondence are the preserved leaves of history, revealing human nature in all its states and culture, but how does it come up in songwriting? Reply here …
Read more
Class act: John Cleese, Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett in 1966
On the move or stuck in one place? Class snobbery to pride, social control to aspiration, it’s a hugely potent part of human life, something that never seems to disappear in stories, situations, and above all the feelings it generates
Read more
Float your ideas, and nevermind the cost. From the Nirvana album …
For crying out loud. This week’s topic is all about those beautiful and cute bundles of joy that we all once were, miracles of wide-eyed wonder as well as guzzling, selfish, exhausting, sleep-sapping, puking bags of expensive energy extraction
Read more
This week’s lists will leave you beaming
As the days grow shorter, and especially for those who live in the further northern hemisphere and Nordic countries, guest DiscoMonster chooses lists from last week’s topic to more than brighten your day, brain, and mood
Read more
Frank Sidebottom, aka Chris Sievey
From Ancient Greeks to pop personas, they are a fascinating indication of what it is to be human – wearing them, looking at them, putting on or removing, and what they do to the self - projecting, hiding or expressing. Here’s some inspiration …
Read more
Go towards the light. Inside James Turrell’s Roden Crater
This week is all about transition, contrast, and comparison. Less what’s always bright, such as stars or shiny objects, more the changeable things perceived through the prism of song – from places to people, seasons, atmosphere, moods and emotions
Read more
Leading actors, but is the evening leading them? Thompson and Hopkins in The Remains of The Day (1993)
As dusk falls, and the day changes clothing, there’s something about the light fade and mood. This week we are all about the evening, after work, and songs that mark that time in emotions, activities, sights and sounds
Read more
The Red Army Choir gives it some welly
Time to sing out! This week, in any genre, music and songs featuring choirs, whether they are the main performers, or come alongside other musicians or singers and then play a prominent or pivotal role
Read more
They get down and do it. Earth, Wind and Fire your inspiration …
You got it, get down on it, it goes on, maybe it’s a wonderland or perhaps there’s blame pinned on it. This week we’re seeking songs where in whatever genre, in lyrics, one or more of these words are spoken, shouted or sung
Read more
Egg-centric playing style?
Please add your song egg-samples to this rich and delicate topic, whether in the context of eating, idioms, metaphor or the full cycles of life. Once the all the song suggestions are unscrambled the results will no doubt be egg-cellent
Read more
Let it all hang out …
It’s partly perception, partly physical reality, an ongoing health and cultural issue affecting mind and body. So let’s go large on the lyrical portrayal of fat in people, with a dishful of tragedy, humour, self-consciousness, cruelty, pathos, and glory
Read more
Fantastic blend: Esperanza Spalding and Gretchen Parlato
Beatbox to talkbox, talky wah-wah to chatty mbalax, flutes that pant, buzz and wail, these playlists based on last week’s nominations and chosen by guest pejepeine, are a truly wonderful, international interchangeable blend of human and instrument
Read more
Leon Theremin demonstrates his new instrument in 1927
Brass, woodwind, string or electronic? From the gruffest, grumbliest, deepest, growl, mid-range yowl of a wah-wah vowel, to the purest, highest angelic tone, let’s explore where instruments seem to ‘sing’ or ‘talk' and voices play
Read more
Something to reflect on …
Lens me your ears! This week we take more than a passing glance at eyes in song lyrics, whether as metaphor, as objects of beauty, as windows to the soul, and especially in the mystery of how what they see differs from how they are seen
Read more
Made of soft rock? Far better to come on this week’s musical shoreline …
Songs about sand is a lot more than soft rock. These playlists, picked by skilful guest beachcomber George Boyland from waves of nominations, features a beautiful coast of styles from rock to reggae, postpunk to flamenco and electronica
Read more
Jimi Hendrix sandcastle. It was bound to appear here eventually
This week’s lyrical topic offers a broad, varied landscape of metaphor and colour, of passing time, of instability and mutability, of the solid and the fluid, of the barren and the beautiful. Let’s dig deep for some treasures …
Read more
Spread of styles? Swan Lake Madness …
Intercutting genres with anything from musical saws to theremins, from electric to acoustic, jazz to hip hop, this week’s playlists, picked by guest Nilpferd, inspired by last week’s topic, truly traverse the ages
Read more
Carrying the ages, via The Simpsons. Insert any music you like …
This week we seek strange combinations from starkly different times – old songs covered on new instruments, new songs played on old instruments, traditional musicians playing with younger, or old styles mashed up with the new
Read more
Joseph Stalin: hero turned villain. Statue torn down in 1956 in Budapest during Hungary's October Revolution
Whether it’s figures of public renown in music, film, politics or history, or private – mentors, relatives and even lovers, this week we look into songs about how the once admired and revered can seriously disappoint and fall from grace
Read more