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Altogether now ....
The lyrics are about dark matters, but they are played with extremely contrasting upbeat music. This week let’s explore songs that, through stark contrast, can unlock humour, tragedy, comedy and empathy
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Ghetto blaster beach bag. What? You don't have one?
Welcome to the left luggage office. Baggage to boxes, trunks, baskets or handbags, look inside this clutch of music with two wonderful playlists by this week’s playlist writer takeitawayGuru opened from last week’s theme
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Cassettes? What a carry on.
Travelling to shopping, fashion houses to homeless hobos, suitcases to handbags, briefcases to guitar cases, bags are the performer’s constant companion carried out in many songs, but it’s also about the contents …
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A voice everlasting: Mahalia Jackson
Want to achieve immortality? After a fountain of youth of song nominations last week, guest playlist writer treefrogdemon takes amusing musical solutions via reincarnation to science, Neil Young, Bob Dylan to David Bowie
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The Immortal Jellyfish, Turritopsis dohrnii, which can reverse the life cycle process
Gods to vampires, myth to religion, nature to the supernatural, or simply need to preserve yourself in song, this week we explore that age-old obsession with living forever, or at least a mighty long time
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Neneh Cherry's taking a confident Buffalo Stance
From the plucky and cocky to the bold and brave, Beyonce to Blondie, Sparks to Stevie Wonder, this week’s guest Severin has picked two superb playlists from the nominations that will have your striding down the street
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Paws for thought: is confidence is what you see in yourself?
It's cleverer and sexier than brains or beauty. Musicians and performers have it spades – but in equal measure to insecurity. So this week let's explore songs all about wanting it, getting it, using it or losing it
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The paradise tanager, an exotic songbird
Cuckoos to chickens, geese to gulls, a host of exotic birds and ascending on high with the lark and nightingale, this week's aural aviary expert Hoshino Sakura spies a beautiful set of musical calls from last week's topic
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The nightingale. A star singer of the bird world.
Spring has finally sprung, and to celebrate, let’s look at, from science to poetry, how the most natural and winged songwriters have inspired humans to make reference to their work in their own through music or lyrics
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Wake up ... with Sudan Archives
Dawn in India to Donovan, Bacharach-David to The Beatles, this week's wonderful selections by guest playlister ParaMhor from last week's nominations will have you feeling wide awake and refreshed
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Don't be alarmed. Something to whet the whistle, darling?
From gloom to horny joy, scary or strange surprises to dire straits, this week let's explore all the lyrical and musical sides of regain consciousness in song, with some stimuli here from other forms – film and books
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That's not us.
Who are you? Who are they? Hackers to the hidden, secret societies to strangers in crowds, masked meetings to sexual liaisons, this week's playlists are superbly assembled by a famous but Anonymous figure
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A scene from anonymous hacker thriller series Mr Robot, starring Rami Malek as the complex central figure
Whether feeling like a nobody, or actually being anonymous, from hackers to the lonely and helpless, from fame to unknown heroism, let's explore this contradictory feeling as expressed in lyrics, from spotlight to the shadows
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Toots Thielemans
Take a deep breath – you are about to experience a selection of sublime and moving music from film soundtracks, blues and soul greats. Guest playlist writer magicman blows two beautiful lists from last week's nominations
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The sublime Stevie Wonder
It plays out like the voice, beautifully expresses emotion, can wail like a train and is popular across blues, rock, pop, jazz, classical and other genres. This week it's time to inhale deeply and get harmonious with the harmonica
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Set the controls for 1972, but where next? It's the Mighty Two, Errol Thompson in Joe Gibbs' studio, and off on a musical journey from Kingston, Jamaica …
Who are the Mighty Two, and why are they in a tardis? Inspired by last week's nominations, guest playlist writer Uncleben takes us on fantastically influential musically journey through space and time
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The Wailers that global star, Bob Marley
This week we're searching out the effect of these core styles of 1960s Jamaican music on other genres across the globe, from punk to pop and rock, African to dance, and how they evolved. It's a very sound system …
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Multiverse or multiple verse? Read on to travel and transcend musical dimensions …
Multiverse or multiple-verse? This week our playlists, from last week's topic, are presented a by time-travel scientist, who with skilful manipulation of reality from guest writer EnglishOutlaw, puts on a timeless playlist gig
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Who, what, where shall we go this week?
This week it's time to set the musical controls - to suggest songs that about time travel in the sci-fi sense, but also those that might move to another period in past or future in metaphor, memory and the imagination
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Song post from space: a 1959 Romanian stamp depicts Laika the Soviet canine cosmonaut
Dogs, cats, foxes, trucks, museum relics, or lighthouses, this week's playlist writer barbryn hasn't just collected songs, but a supremely illuminating story of alternative voices and perspectives
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