Macromix 19

// songs of 2019 //

A

20. Business of Dreams – “N.R.E.A.M.”
19. Little Simz – “101 FM”
18. Comet Gain – “The Girl With The Melted Mind And Her Fear Of The Open Door”
17. Fantasia – “Believer”
16. Joan Shelley – “Stay All Night”
15. Sudan Archives – “Confessions”
14. Christelle Bofale – “Origami Dreams”
13. Imperial Teen – “Somebody Like Me”
12. Sir Babygirl – “Flirting With Her”
11. Cate Le Bon – “Daylight Matters”

B

10. Deerhunter – “What Happens To People?”
9. Sault – “Threats”
8. Purple Mountains – “Nights That Won’t Happen”
7. Dua Saleh feat. Velvet Negroni – “Survival”
6. Girl Friday – “Decoration/Currency”
5. Hand Habits – “Are You Serious?”
4. Charlotte Adigéry – “Okashi”
3. Aldous Harding – “The Barrel”
2. Mekons – “How Many Stars?”
1. Sasami – “Not The Time”


76 minutes, streaming now. CD and/or cassette shipping soon. 2xLP shipping never.

It’s the Macromix that asks the big questions, answers with a deflecting “no,” and longs for simpler times. But hear no retreat or denial in these tunes, please. Should that longing prove too overpowering, there’s Charlotte Adigéry to curdle it with a marketing pitch: your past, restored, for a mere drop of blood. A tempting offer, but somewhere behind the benign corporate assurance, I think I hear Sheryl Lee back again in Twin Peaks, screaming out all the light in the world.

All we have is now, possibly tomorrow, so what follows that song might be the most brazenly therapeutic finale I’ve ever sequenced. “The Barrel,” and the indescribable energy of its video, settled me many mornings in 2019, and there’s much else here that meets the present with prescient calm. Paradoxically, it was the music that sounded oldest that felt the newest: the way Comet Gain bends the sensibility of a previous century to these untimes seems like it would require superhuman presence of mind.

Bookkeeping: As last year, I decided nothing from my (imminent) top ten albums would appear here, otherwise you’d likely find “In Your Head,” “I’m Me,” “Through Da Storm,” etc., on side B. And a further window into the arbitrary and personal nature of the selection process: Little Simz’ “101 FM” is here but Swervedriver’s “The Lonely Crowd Fades In The Air,” another great single from the first week of December 2018, isn’t, because I convinced myself that it feels vaguely tethered to that time. Underneath the video: “Dedicated to Pete Shelley (17 April 1955 - 6 Dec 2018).” It’s sometimes a relief to let extramusical considerations do the sorting.

“Being inundated with music just means I should be making harder choices,” says David Drake in his end-of-year intro. I relate to that (and feel further inundated by the discoveries of his 2019; Tree released three albums last year?!), but also realize that the constraints of the Macromix need not limit my list of further listening. Here’s 20 more:

Billy Woods & Kenny Segal – “Spongebob”
Charly Bliss – “Camera”
Dawn – “Dreams and Converse”
Girl Ray – “Because”
Hovvdy – “Watergun”
Julia Jacklin – “Head Alone”
Katie Dey – “Stuck”
Kelsey Lu – “I’m Not In Love”
Kim Gordon – “Airbnb”
Living Hour – “Hallboy”
Octo Octa – “Deep Connections”
Our Native Daughters – “Moon Meets The Sun”
Park Hye Jin – “Call Me”
Patty Griffin – “Where I Come From”
Sampa The Great feat. Mwanje Tembo, Theresa Mutale Tembo, Sunburnt Soul Choir – “Mwana”
The Highwomen – “Crowded Table”
The Proper Ornaments – “Song For John Lennon”
Vagabon – “Flood”
Yves Jarvis – “To Say That Is Easy”
Yves Tumor feat. Hirakish, Napolian – “Applaud”