Lonely Christmas Eve...

Holiday Mix #1

With Thanksgiving behind us, we have entered upon the time for holiday music without shame. Holiday music is a bit of a guilty pleasure for yours truly, and so it’s not uncommon for me to burn a number of different variations on the holiday mix over the course of December.

This first incarnation features the more melancholy side of the holiday season. There are two main reasons why I appreciate sad winter songs. First, there’s a feeling of nostalgia for childhood—this isn’t to say that more recent holidays haven’t been good, but they’re certainly different from those past, and this season has a unique way of harkening back to family, friends, lovers and whatnot long past. The other big thing is that with the December holidays comes the end of the year. If it was a bad year, what better way to cap it off than with comparably downtrodden music? If it was a good year, this is the music that can facilitate a wistful look back at what was.

That’s not to say that this mix is all sad, but I do want to reassure you that some more jovial holiday mixing will be on its way. For now, though, I give you the first iteration for 2009:


01. “Winter Song” by Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson
02. “Pretty Good Year” by Tori Amos
03. “Winter” by Tori Amos
04. “December” by Weezer
05. “A Long December” by Counting Crows
06. “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)” cover by U2
07. “Snowed Under” by Keane
08. “All Alone on Christmas” by Darlene Love
09. “River” cover by Sarah McLachlan
10. “Christmas Day” by Dido
11. “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” performed by Barenaked Ladies and Sarah McLachlan
12. “The Christians and the Pagans” by Dar Williams
13. “Silent Night” performed by Lifehouse
14. “Hating You for Christmas” by Everclear
15. “Lonely Christmas Eve” by Ben Folds
16. “Wintersong” by Sarah McLachlan
17. “Happy X-Mas (War is Over)” cover by Maroon 5
18. “Put a Little Love In Your Heart” by Annie Lennox

This is a song about Thanksgiving...

Thanksgiving Mix

There aren’t many Thanksgiving songs in a traditional sense, but over the last few years, I have burning mixes dedicated to the day. Beyond my general excessive mix-making, there are two major reasons for this practice: 1) Thanksgiving tends to be a memory making holiday for me, and so I like to recall my personal history with the day and 2) Thanksgiving journeys have meant long drives for a while now, and long drives tend to mean new mixes for my car. In any event, these mixes usually include songs like those below, plus whatever I’m listening to at the time. Enjoy, and Happy turkey day!

01. “I’m Going Home” by Hootie & The Blowfish
02. “Lullaby” by Ben Folds Five
This was the opening track to a mix I drove home to for Thanksgiving 2005, and has been linked to the holiday in my mind ever since then.
03. “The Boys Are Back In Town” cover by Everclear
This song harkens back to Thanksgiving2001. That Thanksgiving eve marked the first reunion of sorts for me with my closest friends from high school, which led to a long day of basketball at SUNY IT, to be capped off by an ill-advised viewing of Martin Lawrence vehicle Black Knight.
04. “Thank U” by Alanis Morissette
05. “The Christians & The Pagans” by Dar Williams

This is really a Christmas song, but with the references to pumpkin pie and whatnot, it always sounds right to me around Thanksgiving as well.
06. “Fire Water Burn” by Bloodhound Gang
This song recalls the night after Thanksgiving 2007, which found me in the basement of the Converse house. It was the first time I had really hung out with those guys in quite some time, and the first time I had heard this song in who knows how many years.
07. “High School” by Jeremy Fisher
This is a nod to Thanksgiving eves in general, an unofficial high school reunion night at bars across the country, the last few of which I experienced at Cavallo’s back in Utica.
08. “November Rain” by Guns N’ Roses
09. “The Thanksgiving Song” by Adam Sandler
10. “Alice’s restaurant Massacree” by Arlo Guthrie
This is the ultimate Thanksgiving song. I doubt I’ll ever forget listening to this one growing up, as my folks began the preparations for that night’s dinner. I don’t think I’ve ever gone a Thanksgiving without listening to it at least once since.

The Piano Man

Billy Joel Mix

Though he has faded in and out of cultural relevancy over the last three decades, Billy Joel has remained one of the iconic players in my personal musical repertoire for the two and half decades and counting of my life. He has played with different styles and meanings, penning carefree love songs (“The Longest Time”), superficial social commentaries (“Uptown Girl”), harder message songs (“Good Night Saigon”), not shying away from a dab of introspection (“River of Dreams,” “Keeping the Faith”), and hitting many points in between. But what Billy may remain most well-known for is one of his earliest hits, which probably best be described as a universal bar song—“Piano Man.”

I hadn’t listened to Billy Joel for a while. I got to see him perform in Syracuse a couple years back. It was a great show, but at the same time, it sort of felt like a capstone event for my fanship—I didn’t run home wanting to listen to more of him so much as I got the sense I had just enjoyed the culmination of that piece of my musical life and could put it to rest. In the spirit of this blog, and as I think other mixes posted here would attest, the appreciation of a particular musical act, at least for me, never truly dies. It may rest for a bit, but there will be a revival, and that point, perhaps a reinterpretation or flat out reinvention of how you understand an artist and his songs. And with that, of course, comes new mixes.

Billy Joel returned to my consciousness upon a recent read of Chuck Klosterman’s Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs, in which Klosterman has the following to say: “Joel is the only rock star I’ve never wanted to be … Every one of Joel’s important songs—including the happy ones—are ultimately about loneliness … like the way it feels when you’re being hugged by someone and it somehow makes you sadder.” I’m not sure I agree with Klosterman’s assessment completely, but I will concede his companion point, that Joel is, for all his fanfare and his prolific body work, still not cool. And perhaps it is that vaguely dopy quality, coupled with an understanding of the lonely hug that has made him so accessible, memorable, and ultimately important for myself and others like me.

Without further ado, the mix:

01. “Christie Lee”
02. “This Night”
03. “Uptown Girl”
04. “All About Soul”
05. “And So It Goes”
06. “Summer, Highland Falls”
07. “Just The Way You Are”
08. “New York State of Mind”
09. “Only the Good Die Young”
10. “River of Dreams”
11. “Scenes from an Italian Restaurant”
12. “She’s Always A Woman”
13. “2000 Years”
14. “Keeping the Faith”
15. “We Didn’t Start The Fire”
16. “Baby Grand”
17. “Piano Man”

More Eclecticism

Eclectic Mix 2

I'm still decidedly in the honeymoon phase with this mix--burned it a week and a half ago and it hasn't left my car's CD player since. It's an amalgamation of stuff I rediscovered when I started the long overdue process of normalizing the naming conventions in my iTunes (Badly Drawn Boy? Aimee Mann? it has been far too long), and stuff I just recently downloaded. Props to The Droge and Summers Blend for the love theme from Zombieland and to Vampire Weekend--I'm really not sure why I hated you so much the first time I heard you, but you're pretty catchy. All this and the usual stand bys, like The Crows and Eels makes for a good one.

01. “Crucify” by Tori Amos
02. “On the Radio” by Regina Spektor
03. “Two of the Lucky Ones” by The Droge and Summers Blend
04. “Dry Your Eyes” by The Streets
05. “I Will Follow You Into The Dark” by Death Cab for Cutie
06. “Superhero” by Jane’s Addiction
07. “M79” by Vampire Weekend
08. “Something To Talk About” by Badly Drawn Boy
09. “All the Beautiful Things” by Eels
10. “Facebook Manifesto” by The February
11. “You Could Make A Killing” by Aimee Mann
12. “Oh My Sweet Carolina” cover by Counting Crows
13. “Alibi” by David Gray
14. “Better Man” by Pearl Jam
15. “Praise You” by Fatboy Slim

New York, Matchbox Twenty

New York City Mix

In recognition of the New York Yankees, who have been dominating my Facebook mini-feed of late, and the Knicks who may have just started the season that will mark their return to the playoffs (na, I don't think so either) I post this mix, a tribute to the Big Apple. One of the things I like about this collection songs is the diversity of moods and messages, despite (or perhaps because of) the common thread. Even among artists you get some of the most upbeat and melancholy of both Simon & Garfunkel and Counting Crows. Good times.


01. "Marching Bands of Manhatten" by Death Cab for Cutie
02. "New York State of Mind" by Billy Joel
03. "Goin' Down To New York Town" by Counting Crows
04. "New York, New York" by Ryan Adams
05. "Love Song/New York" by Lucy Kaplansky
06. "59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin' Groovy)" by Simon & Garfunkel
07. "The Only Living Boy In New York" by Simon & Garfunkel
08. "Chelsea" by Counting Crows
09. "City of Blinding Lights" by U2
10. "Manhattan" by Kings of Leon
11. "Leaving New York" by REM
12. "New York City" by They Might Be Giants
13. "New York, New York" by Frank Sinatra


Matchbox Twenty/Rob Thomas Mix

I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with Matchbox Twenty. If I'm in the mood for them, there are few bands I like more. Oftentimes, I dismiss them for being on the pop side of pop-rock, but trying to pass for legit rock (is that musically elitist enough for you? enough to redeem me for posting a mix devoted to this act?). Anyway, I tend to lump most of Rob Thomas's solo work with the Matchbox stuff because it sounds much the same. Here, I present a compilation of some of the band/man's best, paying homage to a lot of popular stuff, but snubbing some radio songs along the way (I'm sorry, unless I assemble a Boring Mix "Back2Good" and "Mad Season" are not making it onto one of my CDs; "Disease" and "If Your Gone" might have made it were time and flow not factors), and giving proper recognition to the band's very best if lesser known stuff ("Hang," "What You Want To Be").


01. “How Far We’ve Come”
02. “Angry”
03. “Ever the Same”
04. “3 AM”
05. “Problem Girl”
06. “Kody”
07. “Shame”
08. “Push”
09. “Bent”
10. “Bed of Lies”
11. “This Is How A Heart Breaks”
12. “Streetcorner Symphony”
13. “Little Wonders”
14. “Downfall”
15. “Hang”
16. “What You Want To Be”
17. “Bright Lights”