I'm fairly well and relaxed.
José González - Fold
A hand on my neck. September sun in splotches all over the lawn. Everything touches everything. Inappropriately. Wine and warmth enfold my waking dreams. Apprehensively I sink into a web of comfort and small pleasures this month.
Christine and the Queens - Tilted
When a radio hit wears your resistance down, it is always, it seems, with one of those peculiar little details in the mix. One of those "weep-woops". And then you learn to wait for it each time you hear those suctioning introductory notes, like a slavish pet of Pavlov's, with an expectant smile on your face. weep-woop... There it is! I am actually good!
bob hund - bob hund 2020
Don't talk to me about the Swedish election. Don't talk to me about badly camouflaged proto-fascism and dishonestly argued defences of ignorant xenophobia and a futile clinging to a centre that's sliding to the right. Talk to me about how we care. How the weak are still weak and worthy of support. How we are always, at long last, capable of unquantifiable generosity and humanity.
Sizzy Rocket - Girls to the Front
The signature music to the Hysteria podcast provides weekly tiny fist-pumping moments at work.
Led Zeppelin - Trampled Underfoot
A memory of our local library when I was 16. The special collections section at one end where you'd enter a narrow corridor between the short ends of rolling archival shelves. To get to the shelves at the back you'd have to turn one heavy large wheel after another, shifting years of old magazines in progression, until finally there was an opening just wide enough to squeeze in between the sections you'd scouted out, with your nose right up to that seductive odour of old paper, leather binders and dust. And there, the treasure trove: an odd assortment of vinyl records, available to borrow for those who knew where to find them. Worn, dog-eared sleeves sometimes held together with tape, containing heavy black LPs. One of them, a double gatefold, 70s brown toned, with die cut window slots through which different historical icons peered out. I took it home, renewed the loan again and again, hypnotised by the swampiest, head banging groove I had ever heard. Digitally, it's lacking some of that full experiential heft, but under the right circumstances I can still catch a shiver of the visceral delight of listening to Physical Graffiti on borrowed vinyl, in my parents living room as a teenager.
