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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 …
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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
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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
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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
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Spanning the ages in 3/4: OMD’s Maid of Orleans
Beethoven to Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin to Funkadelic, Joe Cocker to Cocteau Twins, it’s time to waltz into a set of lists that swing across time and genres, picked expertly by guest playlister DJ Bear from a mass of nominations
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In the open: Houston demonstration, Tiananmen Square, Monument Valley, John Constable’s Stour Valley
City squares to vast wildernesses, parks and stadiums to commons, fields of solitude to peaceful demonstrations, to locations of violence, revolution and change, this week we find space to breathe in songs about places where society expresses itself
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Robert Smith has already been kept up with songs that whisper
Rockabye? Close your eyes, but open your ears. This week let's expand the idea of the lullaby beyond children to any song that uses the term or encourages, whether loudly or softly, a state of drifting into the unconscious
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A cartoon postcard at home that could be applied to most weeks
As restrictions loosen in some countries, it's time to reflect on these last three months with titles and lyrics from any time that could now be applied to lockdown experience, as well as more recent songs specifically about the situation
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It’s the most famous town in the world. This week our songs are about the place itself – its famous streets, landmarks, studios as well as the fascias, finery, or fakery of its people – their hopes, dreams, triumphs, failures, feuds and fantasies
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Bootsy Collins. The bass line being he ticks more than one star box
From astronomy to celebrity, shapes to symbols, this week we escape earthly concerns and reach into the musical firmament for a rich lyrical topic that will cover all aspects and life as well as death. It’ll be stellar production
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Slaves get stuck in, but it could get messy …
The many paints have been mixed, ladders climbed, and wallpaper glued. Now stand back, and admire the decorous musical result of these perfect playlists, as put up on our extensive walls, as chosen by guest George Boyland
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Turn it up to 11? Some decor is, well, quite loud
It’s time to take some artistic licence through enforced isolation, and pick from your palette of musical paints to harmonise, fix up, adorn, and help create playlists that decorate the Song Bar, as well as the mind
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Can’t put down. The self-deprecating Keanu Reeves walks the street absorbed in The Government Inspector
Humorous or serious? Self-defence mechanism, attention-seeking, of self-aggrandisement? This week’s lyric topic is richly nuanced, ironic, and covers a range of emotions, often fuelled by love and ambition, tempered by self-belittling
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SInging. Part of our evolution …
It’s time to sing out suggestions on this lyrical, meta-topic – from the perspective of singer or listener, by humans, animals or birds, whether for love, warning, fear, joy or despair, or singing simply to exist, make others aware
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Jimi Hendrix. Fan of the flames
What happens when we do it on purpose? This week’s sparky topic might well be illuminating, fanning the flames of human life in all its creativity energy and destructive tragedy, from hearth to ritual, entertainment to war
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Some people have no time to sit …
New Year resolutions, revelations or revolutions? Whether it’s from or for love, money, survival, fear, self-respect or more, let’s open 2020 with songs that may motivate, but ideally also tell us where that comes from
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Jarvis Cocker and Chilly Gonzales are furnished with inspiration by a certain room at Hollywood’s Chateau Marmont hotel
Tables, beds and daybeds, chairs to desks, sofas and all sorts, this week’s playlists, not only have legs, but give us the full suite of emotions, moods, settings and styles, expertly chosen this week’s guest Marco den Ouden
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Nose. We all knows … what lies, above. And below, look out for capo alert …
There’s a UK general election today, but here it’s also time to vote for songs about trust, that fragile but vital hub around which the world spins, in love, family, friendships, the self, creativity, religion, but also played in politics and business
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Two of the greats. Ray Charles, also a great arranger as well as performer, with composer and arranger Quincy Jones
From full orchestration to carefully stripped back, this week let's consider work where in originals or later versions, added instrumentals, vocal parts, melodic fills, changing tempo or keys, have made a great song even better
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It’s like dancing about architecture
Used in literature and everyday speech, it’s the verbal tool that compares one contrasting thing to another, by using the words ‘like’ or ‘as’. But where do they come up in song lyrics, and where, ideally, are they effective and original?
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