Music Diary Project: Sad Boys with Acoustic Guitars

(Full song lists at Tumblr )

Music Diary Project, Day 6: 
I heard the Style Council’s “My Ever Changing Moods” in the supermarket earlier this afternoon. This is the same store that regularly plays Wilco, Rufus Wainwright, Rilo Kiley, and a whole bunch of other Triple A (do people even use this term anymore?) artists, which is simultaneously comforting and making me feel old and irrelevant. 

Right now I’m listening to some sort of neighborhood sing-a-long which is annoying the fuck out of me. I have no idea what’s going on outside.

Okay, now they’re singing Gaga’s “Edge of Glory.” Like, a fourth grade choir of little monsters.

Music Diary Project, Day 7: 
More unexpected background music: this time it was the Kinks in Shop ‘n Save. Maybe this is just indicative of my age, but most of the supermarkets around here have been transitioning from the usual Lionel Richie-esque, adult-contempo rock to something dare I say hipper?

Music Diary Project, Day 8: 
This is pretty typical of my daily “background” music — nothing too incredibly jarring or progressive: just a lot of “aging hipster” rock, or something. Recently I added back to my music library a bunch of stuff I deleted in a fit of self-righteousness. I know the Stones are problematic, but damn it, I like them. (Even if Mick looks like Don Knotts and sings like that old joke, ‘hold your tongue and say ‘I was born on a pirate ship.’” )

Music Diary Project, Day 9: 
I tend to respect singers above all else. And that doesn’t necessarily mean technical proficiency as much as means some kind of connection to the lyrics, whether you wrote them or not. (This is one of my primary issues with shows like American Idol.) Okay, I joke about the Cher love, but she is ridiculously consistent. Paul Weller has long been one of my favorite vocalists, too. His vocal attack is unique in that it’s simultaneously soulful and brash. Merrill Garbus I’ve written plenty about already, but I love that she doesn’t try to “pretty up” her voice, and that’s it’s not one I’ve heard before, though I have echos of it in everything from reggae to jazz.