Alright, as we near year’s end (crazy) and nearly a year of doing this series (also a little crazy), we aim to hone our skill in curating these monthly mixtapes. To that end, the goal is making them less simple, crude lists of 15 new songs by new (to us) artists and more sincere, sentimental nods to the cassette tapes we spent so many hours making so many years back. In those days, we sought to impress friends and hopeful girl-/boyfriends with thoughtfully arranged songs from sometimes obscure bands, being careful to never repeat a band on the same tape, and dedicating considerable time and energy to tape covers (like this one).
Today, technology’s made most everything in this aspect easier, but it’s also flooded our collective creative consciousness with an immeasurably deep field of artists, making the simple act of appreciating music daunting at times. Which leads me to another goal of these mixtapes—highlighting and sharing new sounds from new artists that might otherwise go unnoticed.
…okay, true, Santigold‘s on this mixtape and I don’t think there’s any fear she’d ever go unnoticed these days, but we just couldn’t resist her brand new, awesome single. Same goes for the new Miike Snow + Kate Boy—we’re suckers for good pop.
But, digging deeper, we start off this month’s mix with a magically beautiful new track from Stockholm-based songwriter, Johanan (highly recommend also checking out his other new track, “Holy Spirit”) before moving on to an amazing song from British multi-instrumentalist Georgia—think Missy Elliot meets the Knife—one of two female rappers this mix features, the other being the stunning Little Simz out of London. We’ve also got a new song from Canadian duo Majical Cloudz—a band we’ve never been into live but who’s wowing us with their new material—one from longtime favorite Computer Magic off her debut full-length (you can read an interview we did with her back last February), a bizarrely beautiful song from Dublin’s Cloud Castle Lake, and a ton more. Er. Six more. Math. Not our strong suit.
Give it a spin below or on our SoundCloud page and feel free to catch up on previous months’ entries.
