Mystery Train Playlist 11 November 2010

Ok so this is the inaugural blog post detailing my playlists on Three D radio. At present I am on the Mystery Train with three other hosts, so the number of tracks I can select each week is limited. The purpose of this blog, however, is to discuss the importance of the tracks I play to me. The less tracks I play, the more I can write about each I suppose.

Track 1- Bapa by Geoffrey Gurrumul Yunupingu.
I fell in love with Yunupingu's singing a few years back while I was working for the State Government. I would turn his cd up loud in my office. Saw his performance at Womad which was haunting. I chose this particular track firstly because it was only 2 minutes 20, amongst the few short tracks on the album. The song, it turns out, is about the death of his father (his Bapa), which also has relevance to my life.

Track 2- 13 by Elliott Smith
Of course I had to play an Elliott Smith song on my first show, given that he is probably my favourite artist. The Three D Elliott CD collection is not complete, but it does have some singles that I don't have. I felt that the accoustic finger picking and mournful singing of Elliott would tie in nicely with Gurrumul. This song is a Big Star cover, with lovely lyrics about teenage love "Would you let me walk you home from school, would you let me meet you by the pool". I suppose if Marilyn Manson covered it, he could make the lyrics seem inappropriate.

Track 3- Sometimes I Still Feel the Bruise by the Mountain Goats
Another one of my favourite artists, and another cover version. Coincidentally the original was by the Trembling Blue Stars, so in fact there was a clever segueway between the tracks, but that was not intended. My interpretation of this song is about a failed relationship which still slightly hurts the songwriter "I'm under no illusion, as to what I meant to you, but you made an impression, sometimes I still feel the bruise". He is saying that he may not have meant much to her, but she certainly meant something to him.

Track 4- Lived in Bars by Cat Power
Cat Power is probably my favourite contemporary modern song writer, and only second to Joni Mitchell in the all time favourite list. I regret having not seen her live in concert yet, but I suppose there is still time. Sometimes I like songs just because of one particular line or two. The lines in this song are "There's nothing like living in a bottle, and nothing like ending it all for the world." Also this song began slowly and ended more upbeat, which was a useful track to transition from the melancholy previous three into a more upbeat feeling.

Track 5- I want the world to stop- Belle and Sebastian
This was a track that I had never heard before off their new album. I like the scene in High Fidelity where Jack Black comes in and berates the music being played (Seymour Stein by Belle and Sebastian) as sad bastard music. I am prone to playing melancholy music on occasion, so I need to be aware of that and mix things up. This song has a bleak title but was quite upbeat.

I am programming 30 minutes of radio this week. Tune in on 93.7 at 6:30 to hear what I play