Author: Grey

Categories
Review

“Byzantium: The Decline and Fall”

John Julius Norwich

I do like this bit from the epilogue, as Norwich sums up the various rulers the empire had over its 1,100-odd years of existence:

Of those eight-eighty [emperors], a few – Constantine himself, Justinian, Heraclius, the two basils, Alexius Comnenus – possessed true greatness; a few – Phocas, Michael III, Zoe and the Angeli – were contemptible; the vast majority were brave, upright, God-fearing, unimaginative men who did their best, with greater or lesser degrees of success.

Just the word “unimaginative” in there really got to me. What a painful legacy to leave!

It is, though, pretty fitting. A lot of the events of this book boil down to “and then something else went wrong, which would’ve been quite manageable if the Emperor had been slightly better at being Emperor.” Though, admittedly, there’s also a whole lot of them where the “would’ve been quite manageable” leads instead to “if the Who’s Who of Constantinople could’ve taken a break for one month from squabbling with each other in order to keep the Empire from slowly dissolving.” So much of the decline of the Byzantine Empire feels like a testament to selfishness. The Emperor is off trying to consolidate the recapture of some of the critical agricultural heartland of the empire? Sure, that’s probably important and all, but it also means he’s distracted, and now’s your chance to stab him in the back!

I think I’ll place this book at second place of the trilogy; the first was just overwhelming, the second did a better job at storytelling, and the third did an even better job at telling the story… but by this point in history, it was a really depressing story. That said, if you want to read about the slow decline of the Byzantine Empire, this is a pretty solid way to do so, and you’re welcome to give it a try.1

  1. This is an Amazon affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I prefer Bookshop affiliate links to Amazon when possible, but in this case, the book wasn’t available there, so it’ll have to do. ↩
Categories
Review

“Byzantium: The Apogee”

John Julius Norwich

Continuing my reading of history, we’ve got Byzantium Part II. (Although, really, Byzantium is Rome 2.) I found this more readable than the previous book, which I suspect has a great deal to do with the fact that this one is covering less ground. One emperor per chapter, roughly, worked well as a way to split things up, though it did occasionally make for strange ends and beginnings of chapters when there was a great deal of action taking place in the changeover. Someone dies and their son assumes the throne with no arguments, perfectly fine; someone is assassinated by their wife and her lover who wants the throne, but wait, maybe there’s someone else who’s going to take the throne, and oh wait the Church has arrived to add some drama… less of a coherent chapter split.

I did at some point realize that I need a bit more visual of this and went to find some maps of the Byzantine Empire at various points in time, which helped; probably should’ve done that before, oh, the second-to-last chapter or so. Hard to visualize the changing borders when I’m not great at geography to start with, and all the names are different because it’s 1,000 years in the past.

Reviewing the empire itself, rather than the book, there’s still a feeling of “1,000 years, three continents, and somehow there’s only 4 first names to go around?” to it. I would not have survived as a history major, I simply cannot deal with the repetition. I’ve also got a great deal of frustration for some of the wondrous things that were built and utterly lost to history; there’s a description in the book of a throne room full of mechanical animals that I would love to see, but alas, we have yet to invent a time machine that would allow that. Science should really get on that.

Overall, this was a much nicer read than the first book, and I may actually jump right into the third as a result; I didn’t end the book feeling like I’m still interest yet need a break. So hey, this time, I’ll go ahead and recommend that you check it out.1

  1. This is an Amazon affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I prefer Bookshop affiliate links to Amazon when possible, but in this case, the book wasn’t available there, so it’ll have to do. ↩
Categories
Review

“The Flavor Bible”

Karen Page, Andrew Dornenburg

As it turns out, this book was uniquely ill-suited for an e-reader; this is a book that was written around the concept of being heavily laid out, and it didn’t make it through the process of ePUB-ification very well. Get the print edition, if you’re going to get it—while there’s something to be said, with this format, for searchability, it’s all alphabetized, so the print edition doesn’t lose much that way.

Entertainingly, the thing I kept thinking off all through the book was Pokémon type charts. (Really, go grab that link to see the example, I’m not going to be able to explain this well.) Basically, take a list, repeat it as both the rows and columns of a table, and then throughout the table mark which things go well together and to which degree. A very small example, off the top of my head:

Balsamic Vinegar Chocolate Strawberries Zucchini
Balsamic Vinegar x ★ ★ ★
Chocolate x ★ ★
Strawberries ★ ★ ★ ★ x
Zucchini ★ x

That’s kinda what the book is, on a much larger scale. Look up an ingredient, see a couple quick facts about it, where it falls in some broad categories, maybe a few recipe ideas and some anecdotes from chefs… and then get a list of which things it works well with.

Honestly, I think this would make a pretty good coffee-table book, and a useful reference if you’ve got one ingredient in mind and want some inspiration for what to make using it. Check it out.1

  1. This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Playlist

Playlist of the Month: September 2023

It’s been a month this month, but I am delighted to report that it is time for fall weather. Don’t mind me while I explode into a cloud of apple cider and autumnal vibes.

How It Was – Yoste on A Few Brief Moments – EP

twentyfive – Yoste on twentyfive – Single

Save Me – Majik on It’s Alright / Save Me – Single

Friends – Yoste on Friends – Single

Kahan (Last Year) [feat. Kodak Black] – Fred again.. on Actual Life 2 (February 2 – October 15 2021)

gatsby – Daniel Leggs on gatsby – Single

TRAP PHONE – BERWYN on TRAP PHONE – Single

Crumble – Thomas LaVine on Crumble – Single

Mike (desert island duvet) – Fred again.., The Streets & Dermot Kennedy on Mike (desert island duvet) – Single

Wisdom, Justice, And Love – Linkin Park on A Thousand Suns

If You Want Somebody – Elderbrook on Little Love

If It’s Time – Hayden Calnin on If It’s Time – Single

Oslo – Yoste on Oslo – Single

Acoustic – Billy Raffoul on 1975 – EP

White Ferrari – Isak Danielson & Alba August on White Ferrari – Single

Drive You Home – Billy Raffoul on Drive You Home – Single

Eat The Acid – Kesha on Gag Order

I Don’t Want To Lie – Yoste & Vandelux on I Don’t Want To Lie – Single

Hallelujah Anyway – Luke Sital-Singh on Hallelujah Anyway – Single

Sprinter – Central Cee & Dave on Sprinter – Single

Titanic – Atli on Epilogue Of Something Beautiful

Mourning – Post Malone on AUSTIN

Lazy – Elliot Moss on Lazy – Single

14 – Water From Your Eyes on Everyone’s Crushed

Dial Drunk – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Stay Here – Yoste on Stay Here – Single

My Old Man – Billy Raffoul on My Old Man – Single

Buzzcut Season – Lorde on Pure Heroine

Little Bit of This (feat. Vince Staples) – Good Times Ahead on Good Times Ahead

Beautiful Life – Emmit Fenn on Beautiful Life – Single

Call Your Mom – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Sea Shanty Medley – Home Free on Sea Shanty Medley – Single

the banker – Daniel Leggs on the banker – Single

Bad Dancer – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP

Fairlies – Grian Chatten on Chaos For the Fly

Rush – Troye Sivan on Something To Give Each Other

Oliveira Dos Cen Años – C. Tangana on Oliveira Dos Cen Años – Single

Into the Night – Thorin Loeks on Into the Night – Single

You’re Gonna Go Far – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

It Hurts to Love – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP

What Was I Made For? [From The Motion Picture “Barbie”] – Billie Eilish on What Was I Made For? [From The Motion Picture “Barbie”] – Single

Magic – Elliot Moss on Magic – Single

Khmerica – No-No Boy on 1975

Jericho – Iniko on Jericho – Single

Hoo Art ‘n Hevan – Moko on Two46 – Single

Voicenote 2 (LMTBTA) – Atli on Epilogue Of Something Beautiful

In My Arms – Billy Raffoul on In My Arms – Single

Hold Me – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP

Chasing Birds – Arliston on How In Heaven – EP

Feel Again – Braaheim on Feel Again – Single

El suïcidi i el cant – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

Stabat mater – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

No Time Like Now (Yoste Remix) – ILLENIUM on Awake (Remixes)

No Complaints – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Blame The Moon – Hazlett on Blame The Moon – Single

Something Real – Post Malone on AUSTIN (Bonus)

Francesca – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Tell a Lie – Ed Prosek on Tell a Lie – Single

An Arrow In The Wall – Death Cab for Cutie on An Arrow In The Wall – Single

For My Help (Rework) – Hayden Calnin on Of Collingwood (Reworks) – Single

Kaonashi – Yoste on Kaonashi – Single

So You Are Tired – Sufjan Stevens on Javelin

Abstract (Psychopomp) – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

All of the People – Grian Chatten on Chaos For the Fly

Ephemera – Vallis Alps on Cleave

Imperayritz de la ciutat joyosa – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

Caution Cares (Rework) – Hayden Calnin on Of Collingwood (Reworks) – Single

How I Fell – Elliot Moss on How I Fell – Single

I Smoked Away My Brain (I’m God x Demons Mashup) [feat. Imogen Heap & Clams Casino] – A$AP Rocky on I Smoked Away My Brain (I’m God x Demons Mashup) [feat. Imogen Heap & Clams Casino] – Single1

Bahrain – Bridges on Bahrain / Magnetic – EP

All Things End – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Anything But – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

De Selby (Part 2) – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Coal – Dylan Gossett on Coal – Single2

Neon Medusa (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

Days of Thunder (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live3

Lost Boy (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

Deep Blue (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

A Heart Beating – Mother Tongues on Love in a Vicious Way

Perfect Darkness – Fink on Perfect Darkness (Bonus Video Version)

The Comeback Kid (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

Shadows (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

All The Worlds – Vallis Alps on Cleave

Heroes (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

Fever – Sonnee on Fever – Single4

You & I – Vallis Alps on Cleave

Trauma Queen – Durry on Trauma Queen – Single5

adore u – Fred again.. & Obongjayar on adore u – Single

Want You – Yoste on Want You – Single

Been Through – Lonely in the Rain & Manil on Been Through – Single

Crazy in the Night (Barking at Airplanes) – Kim Carnes on Best of Kim Carnes6

Eat Your Young – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Vampires (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

Coward (Rework) – Hayden Calnin on Of Collingwood (Reworks) – Single

I Need You (Chill Mix) – Elderbrook on Chill Mixes – Single

This Way – Emmit Fenn on How to Fly on the Ground

Higher Than This – Vallis Alps on Cleave

Nunc aperuit nobis – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

Lune – Colouring on Lune – Single

Howl (Chill Mix) – Elderbrook & Tourist on Chill Mixes – Single7

Gloria (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

Here with Me (feat. Miya Folick) – Goodwerks & SYML on Broken Glass, Vol. 4 – Single

Good in Red (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live8

Barbie World (with Aqua) [From Barbie The Album] – Nicki Minaj & Ice Spice on Barbie World (with Aqua) [From Barbie The Album] [Versions] – EP

On Highways (aug 4) – Vallis Alps on Cleave

An Arrow In The Wall (CHVRCHES Remix) – Death Cab for Cutie on An Arrow In The Wall – Single

Unaffected – Betcha on Placebo

At Least I Tried – Betcha on Placebo

I Wish You Would – Betcha on Placebo

I’ll Be Around (Chill Mix) – Elderbrook & Amtrac on Chill Mixes – Single

Forever – OTR & Lizzy Land on Be Quiet, They’re Listening

in the dark – gavn! on in the dark – Single

American Dark – Cujo Moon on American Dark – Single

Ending Credits – By The Coast on Some Other Place

Existence – The Cave & Julian Lamadrid on The Cave – EP9

Brooklyn. Friday. Love. (Live) – The Midnight on Red, White and Bruised: The Midnight Live

RIOT (Rowdy Pipe’n) – A$AP Rocky on RIOT (Rowdy Pipe’n) – Single

Me yelassan – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

Tu ase t’urpa – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

Waves – Mr. Probz on Waves – Single

Hurricane – Thirty Seconds to Mars on This Is War

Baby Blue – Rence on Baby Blue – Single

I Believe in Something More – Hayden Calnin on A Turning of the Tide: Side B – EP

Get Up Kid – Thirty Seconds to Mars on It’s The End Of The World But It’s A Beautiful Day10

Midnight Prayer – Thirty Seconds to Mars on It’s The End Of The World But It’s A Beautiful Day

I, Carrion (Icarian) – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Peace Or Quiet – Explosions In the Sky on End

Below Water – Cal Trask on Below Water – Single

Alphabet City – The National on Alphabet City – Single

Cold Air – Brendan Scott Friel on Cold Air – Single

Driver’s Seat – Sonnee on Driver’s Seat – Single

Lost These Days – Thirty Seconds to Mars on It’s The End Of The World But It’s A Beautiful Day

Who We Are – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Avalanche – Thirty Seconds to Mars on It’s The End Of The World But It’s A Beautiful Day

For You It Was Him – Nick Wilson on For You It Was Him – Single

Call Me Back – Betcha on Placebo

The Bit Between – Hayden Calnin on A Turning of the Tide: Side B – EP

In The Rain – ODESZA on In The Rain – Single

7:1 – Thirty Seconds to Mars on It’s The End Of The World But It’s A Beautiful Day

Moving On – Explosions In the Sky on End

Laugh It Off – Post Malone on AUSTIN (Bonus)

Got Me Obsessed – Jade LeMac on Got Me Obsessed – Single

Good Things Will Come ‘Round – Hayden Calnin on A Turning of the Tide: Side B – EP

Backwards – Arliston on How In Heaven – EP

Transient – S. Carey, John Raymond & Aaron Parks on Shadowlands11

Seasons – Thirty Seconds to Mars on It’s The End Of The World But It’s A Beautiful Day

About You (feat. Evangeline) – Yoste on About You (feat. Evangeline) – Single

You Make Everything Feel Better – Vide on You Make Everything Feel Better – Single

The Home We Built – EMBRZ on In Our Own Way

9Bar – Moko on 9Bar – Single

Numb – LINKIN PARK on Meteora 20th Anniversary Edition12

  1. I love the chain of sampling necessary for this track to show up for me – it’s here because of the Imogen Heap, but boy is she ever at a remove. ↩
  2. “They say pressure makes diamonds, how the hell am I still coal” is a good line ↩
  3. This live album is excellent, I’m gonna have to keep an eye out for their next tour. ↩
  4. Kinda convinced I’ve found a fred again.. side project here. ↩
  5. I’m a big fan of this track, A+ lyrics once you tune in, and also just good for listening to. ↩
  6. This is just a childhood jam for me ↩
  7. Elderbrook feels rather autumnal to me. I don’t know if that makes sense, but it’s a thing. ↩
  8. “Kill your demons, kill ‘em dead…” very sing-along-able ↩
  9. Feels fairly Daft Punk, at least lyrically. ↩
  10. I enjoy that every Thirty Seconds to Mars album has a significantly different feel than the previous. ↩
  11. Extremely fall vibes ↩
  12. In the playlist because my roommate’s Spotify put up a cover and it was not as satisfying to sing along to as the source material. ↩
Categories
Review

“Sweet Dreams are Made of Teeth”

Richard Roberts

I have to admit, right here at the beginning, that I didn’t finish this book. Which is generally grounds for disqualification from my writing a review, because I can’t exactly have a fully formed opinion based on an unfinished book!1 I’m making an exception this time, though, both because of the quality of the writing and because the reason I didn’t finish it.

Let’s start with the latter: this book is creepy. Read the title; that alone should’ve warned you going in. It’s a book about nightmares. And I… am not at all a horror person. My sister tried to convince me to watch The Haunting of Hill House on the grounds that “it’s not scary, it’s sweet!” and she was absolutely wrong. The first couple episodes now permanently occupy space in my brain, lurking there to pop back up and make sure I can’t sleep. My brain’s repository of nightmare fodder is already much fuller than I’d like it to be, and will gladly expand to make room for more; I do not want to give it that opportunity.

But the former, oh, the former. I really wanted to read this whole book. I mentioned earlier that it’s about nightmares; what really made it shine, in the amount of creepy that I made it through before I had to give up, was how, exactly, it’s about nightmares.

Each of the characters we meet early on is a specific nightmare. They have names, but they’re shorthand, because these are conceptual characters. The protagonist goes by Fang, but really what he is is running and running, and it’s right behind you, all you can see is a glimpse of teeth, and you keep running but you can never get away. We meet him hanging out with his friend Jeff — a little boy, well-dressed, blond hair, sitting quietly eating, and everything seems fine but then you get up close and see what he’s eating, and what his teeth look like. There’s a love interest, of course, and frankly I didn’t make it far enough to know if she’s got a name, but what she is is a long hallway in a decrepit house. eyes open in the walls when you aren’t looking, but they hide when you try to catch them staring. you walk past dozens of rooms but never find an exit. sometimes, in the hall, you see statues; people, frozen in the act of trying to escape the walls. you’re never sure if there in the same place or if they’ve moved, changed positions. in the distance, faint sobbing. if you walk far enough, you find her—a girl in a dusty dress, weeping quietly into her hands. she doesn’t look up when you enter the room, doesn’t seem to hear you at all. if you get close, you can see she has no eyes.

It’s a book about nightmares, about what they’re thinking when you’re caught up in a nightmare, about what they do in their spare time. And it all has that dreamlike quality to it, that sense that you can turn a corner and find yourself somewhere completely different. That things don’t have to make logical sense, they just have to be able to string together enough of a story that you don’t realize you’re asleep.

That’s what really captivated me about the book, and what kept me trying to fight through my natural distaste for horror. I wish I could’ve finished it, and at some point I may come back to chip away at it some more, but for now I had to give up. But if you, unlike me, can tolerate being creeped out—or, god help you, enjoy it—then I absolutely recommend it. I really have no idea where the plot was going, or what happens next, but I did like the setting and the way the characters were described. It was interesting. Give it a go.2

  1. Or, at least, not one that I think is worth sharing; “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all” applies to book reviews, too. ↩
  2. This is an Amazon affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I prefer Bookshop affiliate links to Amazon when possible, but in this case, the book wasn’t available there, so it’ll have to do. ↩
Categories
Review

“Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion”

Robert B Cialdini

Another one from the book club at work! I think this is the one I’ve enjoyed least so far, frankly. It reminds me of some of the pop psychology books I’ve read, though somewhat better-researched—which makes sense, I suppose, given that Cialdini is a name you’ll see a lot if you’re looking through academic papers in this field. Where the book falls down for me, though, is that it feels like Cialdini hasn’t really considered some of the implications of his work as well as he should. Then again, I’m coming at that thought with the perspective of someone living in 2023, and the original version of this was published in, like, 1980something.

The key point where that thought coalesced for me was the chapter on authority. It’s a long discussion of the impact of authority on how we think about someone’s trustworthiness, but it somehow gets through that entire discussion without ever seeming to acknowledge the concept of a power differential. One of the key examples he cites is a study about how well people listen to someone telling them to stand in a slightly different place on the street. Some low percentage listen if it’s a random person asking that; a higher percentage listen if it’s someone in a security guard’s uniform asking. Which is, sure, something of a useful data point, but he just stops there. Do a follow-up study with different uniforms! Use something other than a security uniform—do people listen if they’re in a paramedic’s outfit? Scrubs? One of those airline pilot hats? Y’know, any uniform that doesn’t carry all the cultural baggage of “this is a person somewhat trained to and distinctly more likely to apply violence as a solution to their problems.” Is it really the uniform that made people listen, or is it the implicit threat of that specific uniform?

Similarly, people are apparently more cautious driving behind a luxury car than an “economy” model. Cialdini attributes that to the aura of authority inherent in the luxury car, but again, is it an “aura of authority,” or is it the background knowledge of who’s likely to be driving that? If you get in a fender-bender with someone driving an economy car, it’s one thing; someone driving a $200,000 Porsche, though, has the implicit weight of “they can afford a lawyer and I can’t.”

Beyond that, I feel like Cialdini didn’t do enough to dissuade people from misusing the techniques he discusses. There’s the apparent disgust with people using them as sales techniques, but it never feels like he truly considers them being used for anything worse. And, here in 2023, that feels… deeply naïve. Hindsight, as they say, is 20/20.

Still, it’s an interesting overview of the psychology of persuasion, and I did appreciate that there’s a bit towards the end of each chapter discussing how to try to immunize yourself to the technique, so it may be useful. It’s worth skimming through, at least.1

  1. This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Review

“Atomic Robo”

Brian Clevinger, Scott Wegener, Lee Black, Ronda Pattison, Nick Filardi, Anthony Clark, Jeff Powell

Atomic Robo is one of my favorite comics, one I’ve been reading long enough that I wish I had some way of figuring out exactly how long I have been reading it. It’s getting a review now, however, as I recently did an all-the-way-through reread.1

Here’s the concept of the comic: Nikolai Tesla built a nuclear-powered, fully sentient robot. He’s creatively named Atomic Robo Tesla, and generally goes by Atomic Robo, or just Robo to his friends. Being a bulletproof, super-strong robot, he gets into some adventures! Being an ageless machine, those adventures occur across a wide range of time. Being a world where it’s possible for Nikolai Tesla to build a nuclear-powered, fully sentient robot, those adventures involve a whole lot of pulp science fiction—there’s an entire comic early on where Robo spends a few hours fighting giant insects while having a discussion via radio about why giant insects are impossible.

Basically, it’s some of the most fun science fiction I read, and I absolutely love it. There’s some really interesting storylines, and there’s also some really funny storylines. Just about everything that Dr. Dinosaur shows up in absolutely hilarious—everything else in this world feels like it’s following some rules, though different ones than our world, but Dr. Dinosaur is just running around inside his own personal reality distortion field. And he shows up precisely often enough to maintain the hilarity of how well he plays off of Robo.

So, hey, if you’re at all interested in any of this, go read the comic. The nice thing about webcomics is that it’s all free online! And, honestly, I really recommend starting from the beginning—it makes the most sense that way, and while there’s some early references to stuff that shows up again later, it’s more little hints that make it better on reread.2

  1. Well, in April; these reviews aren’t exactly timely. (Which I usually avoid admitting to, but in this case, the specific things going on in the comic at the time were what set me off rereading from the beginning, I wanted to remember what was being called back to. ↩
  2. Seriously, I had a moment on this most recent reread where I realized that something really early on had been foreshadowing of a storyline that happened, in publishing time of the comic, something like a decade later. Their ‘about’ page says “Everything that happens will fit into the larger setting; everything that happens will happen for a reason” and they mean it. ↩
Categories
Review

The Family Cooper

Tamora Pierce

I generally follow a rule of “only post a review the first time I read a book,” and while that seems like a reasonable policy to stick to, I do occasionally feel the desire to break from it. In this case, it’s a little bit that I feel silly not acknowledging that I’ve just finished reading 9 books, but mostly that I want to heap praise upon Tamora Pierce, who is one of my absolute favorite authors.

This time, what I read through was all the books that, to a greater or lesser degree, focus on a member of the Cooper family. Following the in-universe chronological order, this was the Beka Cooper trilogy, the Song of the Lioness quartet, and the Trickster’s duology. It is, I’ve realized, an interesting way to read through them. My thoughts, though, are definitely in light of not having this be my first read through.

These three collections of books are a really wonderful way to get acquainted with the Tortall universe. Alanna is the place it all started, the grand fantasy telling a big story about big events. Alanna herself, the Lioness, is a hero known well beyond Tortall’s borders; from Aly’s eyes, we see that even in Rajmuat, an ocean away, people still know of the Lioness. She’s the heroine, moving in the innermost circles of power.

Beka, on the other hand, starts among the lowest of the low. She was born in the slums, the Lower City of Corus, and is desperately uncomfortable around those sorts of powerful people. It’s very nearly the opposite perspective on this universe. Alanna takes her nobility for granted; Beka knows the biggest change she can make is in the lives of a handful of people.

Aly fills out the middle, in a way. She was born into the nobility, daughter of the Lioness, but her heart lies in espionage. She’s a spy, and she winds up enmeshed in a popular uprising. Her work will change the world in a way more akin to Alanna’s than Beka’s, but she won’t be in the history books as the protagonist. Her job is to be invisible, to effect change without being the center of attention. And as she walks between those two worlds, she shows us the spaces between.

I absolutely love a well-built universe like this. You can tell that the Lioness quartet was the first written, because it’s the most compact, the least filled-out of the universe, but each additional series in that world added more. By now, it feels massive, vibrant, and alive. It feels like what the Marvel movies can never quite accomplish; the protagonists of each previous series are present in a way that cinematic universes never manage outside of the anchoring ensemble pieces. There’s no hand-waving of why the hero of the previous one doesn’t show up to help this time—they’ve always got their own lives visible in the new series.1

I love these books, and Tamora Pierce is great. That’s gonna be the end of every review I write of her work; these are comfort-reading for me. I’ll be halfway through a reread of one of her books and only then realize what I’m doing, and that’s how I tell I’m more stressed than I thought. Seriously, go read anything she wrote.2 It’s all excellent.

  1. Two examples, to compare: Aly can’t call Numair Salmalín, introduced in the Wild Mage quartet, for help, because he’s busy juggling his duties in the Scanran War (the center of the Protector of the Small quartet) and trying to help his wife through her pregnancy.

    Captain America can’t call Iron Man to help during the events of The Winter Soldier because… he can’t remember his phone number? The real answer is “because they didn’t want to pay for Robert Downey Junior and the Iron Man VFX,” but there’s no in-universe reason given in a satisfying way. ↩

  2. These are Bookshop affiliate links – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Review

“Table of Contents”

John McPhee

I’ve got quite the McPhee collection going, at this point; from the visual of the bookshelf, I think the only authors I have more of are Diane Duane and Tamora Pierce.1

A couple pieces in here that reminded me of “Control of Nature”—“Riding the Boom Extension” and “Minihydro” were both about people building infrastructure, though on a much smaller scale than usual.

There’s also a couple pieces that just felt like a great explanation of what John McPhee is right. The start and end of the book, even; we’ve got “Under the Snow,” which includes this great quote:

I was there by invitation, an indirect result of work I had been doing nearby. Would I be busy on March 14th? If there had been a conflict—if, say, I had been invited to lunch on that day with the Queen of Scotland and the King of Spain—I would have gone to the cubs. (Under the Snow, 4)

And doesn’t that just show his priorities? And then, ending the book with the story of meeting his fellow John McPhee—no, I will not elaborate—he’s also got some good lines:

On the ground as well as in the air, he does indeed some most in his element when he is out in the big woods, where he spends nearly all his wiring time and a good bit of whatever remains—“out in the williwags,” as he refers to the backcountry. A williwag, apparently, is a place so remote it can be reached only by first going through a boondock. (North of the C.P. Line, 256)

The largest one, the centerpiece of the book, was where I wanted to recommend this to a couple people I know. I’ll wait until they’ve finished med school, though, and have a bit more time for reading, although the contents of “Heirs of General Practice” may actually be a useful read when trying to decide on a focus.

Lastly, for me to mention at least, “Ice Pond” includes some names I recognize from prior research on different topics, and introduced a fascinating idea. I’ve seen discussion of thermal batteries—both the newfangled kind where you use silicates or molten salts to store heat, and the less-fancy kind where you use an insulated tank to store a lot of hot water until you need a lot of hot water.2 What was a new idea to me was building an inverse thermal battery, where you bank cold during the winter and use it over the course of the spring and summer. Fascinating idea!

As ever, I adore John McPhee’s writing, and I highly recommend it. Maybe not the best work of his to start with, but if I’ve sold you on his work before, give it a go!3

  1. This isn’t counting ebooks, of course, where my near-exhaustive collection of Discworld books gives Terry Pratchett a pretty unassailable lead. ↩
  2. Yes, your water heater is a thermal battery! See this video for a long explanation of how that works, and this one for some discussion of why that’s a super useful way to think about it as we try to electrify more and more of our homes. ↩
  3. This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Playlist

Playlist of the Month: August 2023

It’s been a good summer, but as of this morning fall has hit, and with a vengeance; a beautiful rainy day, really livened up my Pacific Northwesterner spirits.

How It Was – Yoste on A Few Brief Moments – EP

twentyfive – Yoste on twentyfive – Single

Save Me – Majik on It’s Alright / Save Me – Single

Friends – Yoste on Friends – Single

Kahan (Last Year) [feat. Kodak Black] – Fred again.. on Actual Life 2 (February 2 – October 15 2021)

gatsby – Daniel Leggs on gatsby – Single

TRAP PHONE – BERWYN on TRAP PHONE – Single

Crumble – Thomas LaVine on Crumble – Single

Feeling Whitney – Post Malone on Stoney (Deluxe)

crutches – Daniel Leggs on runaway

Mike (desert island duvet) – Fred again.., The Streets & Dermot Kennedy on Mike (desert island duvet) – Single

Wisdom, Justice, And Love – Linkin Park on A Thousand Suns

Talk It Over – Elderbrook & Vintage Culture on Little Love

If You Want Somebody – Elderbrook on Little Love

If It’s Time – Hayden Calnin on If It’s Time – Single

More the Victim – LINKIN PARK on Meteora 20th Anniversary Edition

Sirens – Sultan + Shepard on Forever, Now

Oslo – Yoste on Oslo – Single

Acoustic – Billy Raffoul on 1975 – EP

Nobody’s Nobody – The NGHBRS, Pete Shade & Riesling on Nobody’s Nobody – Single

Threads – Thorin Loeks on Threads – Single

White Ferrari – Isak Danielson & Alba August on White Ferrari – Single

This Isn’t Helping (feat. Phoebe Bridgers) – The National on First Two Pages of Frankenstein

Drive You Home – Billy Raffoul on Drive You Home – Single

Eat The Acid – Kesha on Gag Order

I Don’t Want To Lie – Yoste & Vandelux on I Don’t Want To Lie – Single

Hate Me Harder – Kesha on Gag Order

My Rajneesh – Sufjan Stevens on America – EP

Stand in Tall Ovation – Portair on Stand in Tall Ovation – Single

All of Us – SYML on All of Us – Single

Hallelujah Anyway – Luke Sital-Singh on Hallelujah Anyway – Single

Sprinter – Central Cee & Dave on Sprinter – Single

Titanic – Atli on Epilogue Of Something Beautiful

Mourning – Post Malone on AUSTIN

Lazy – Elliot Moss on Lazy – Single

14 – Water From Your Eyes on Everyone’s Crushed

Hideaway – Kiesza on Sound of a Woman

Dial Drunk – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Stay Here – Yoste on Stay Here – Single

My Old Man – Billy Raffoul on My Old Man – Single

Free – Kidswaste on Free – Single

Heartbeat – Haux on Something to Remember – EP

Buzzcut Season – Lorde on Pure Heroine

Shake – Yoke Lore on Toward a Never Ending New Beginning

Little Bit of This (feat. Vince Staples) – Good Times Ahead on Good Times Ahead

Beautiful Life – Emmit Fenn on Beautiful Life – Single

Call Your Mom – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Sea Shanty Medley – Home Free on Sea Shanty Medley – Single

the banker – Daniel Leggs on the banker – Single

Bad Dancer – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP

Fairlies – Grian Chatten on Chaos For The Fly

L.A. (‭+1.818.643.6885‬) – will hyde, tiffi & dress on L.A. (‭+1.818.643.6885‬) – Single

Poseidon – gavn! on Poseidon – Single

Gone For Good – Ashley Singh on Waiting For The Blue – EP

Healing – Fakear on Healing – Single

Rush – Troye Sivan on Something To Give Each Other

Oliveira Dos Cen Años – C. Tangana on Oliveira Dos Cen Años – Single

Chemicals – Forester on Chemicals – Single

Beelining – Lowswimmer on Red Eye Effect

Into the Night – Thorin Loeks on Into the Night – Single

You’re Gonna Go Far – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

J’VEUX D’LA TENDRESSE (MJF Spotlight Session) – LUCKY LOVE on TENDRESSE (EXTENDED EDITION)

Mysoul – Shallou on Mysoul – Single

It Hurts to Love – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP

ALL LIGHT – United Freedom Collective on ALL LIGHT – Single

I’ll Wait – Petey on USA

Coastline (Adam Hinden Remix) – Hollow Coves on Reimagined, Vol. 1 – EP

What Was I Made For? [From The Motion Picture “Barbie”] – Billie Eilish on What Was I Made For? [From The Motion Picture “Barbie”] – Single1

Ten Billion People – Explosions In the Sky on End

Magic – Elliot Moss on Magic – Single

Where Did You Go – HAEVN on Where Did You Go – Single

Winona – Yoke Lore on Toward a Never Ending New Beginning

Don’t – Yoste on Don’t – Single

Khmerica – No-No Boy on 19752

Movement – TWO LANES on Duality

how are you now – gavn! on how are you now – Single

NOW I DON’T NEED YOUR LOVE (MJF Spotlight Session) – LUCKY LOVE on TENDRESSE (EXTENDED EDITION)

Is This Love – Keanler & Luvless on Is This Love – Single

Jericho – Iniko on Jericho – Single3

The Roads – Jonah Kagen on The Roads – Single

Pretty Little Thing (feat. Jonas Rathsman & Francis Novotny) – Modern Tales on Stars Align (feat. Jonas Rathsman & Francis Novotny)

Hoo Art ‘n Hevan – Moko on Two46 – Single

Voicenote 2 (LMTBTA) – Atli on Epilogue Of Something Beautiful

Guest Room (feat. S.Carey) – Lowswimmer on Red Eye Effect

We Lost Sight of the Shoreline – Hayden Calnin on We Lost Sight of the Shoreline – Single

In My Arms – Billy Raffoul on In My Arms – Single

Black & Thunder – The Paper Kites on At the Roadhouse

Hold Me – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP

Lost Boys – Belle Mt. on Lost Boys – Single

Millenium – Lowswimmer on Red Eye Effect

Chasing Birds – Arliston on How In Heaven – EP

Feel Again – Braaheim on Feel Again – Single

Jaws – By The Coast on Jaws – Single

El suïcidi i el cant – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

Paul Revere – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Easy Money – ODESZA & Yellow House on Flaws in Our Design – EP

Stabat mater – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux4

Trust – Massane on By The River

Thinking About You – Forester on Thinking About You – Single

Steadfast (feat. Gordi) – S. Carey & John Raymond on Shadowlands

Mine – Bendo & lacey on Mine – Single

Memory Card – Lowswimmer on Red Eye Effect

Listen – Lowswimmer on Red Eye Effect

La leçon particulière – Lavern & Francis Lai on La leçon particulière – Single

No Time Like Now (Yoste Remix) – ILLENIUM on Awake (Remixes)

IOU (feat. Lizzy Land) – EMBRZ on In Our Own Way

Enough – Vide on Enough – Single

No Complaints – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Bags Theme – Petey on USA

Something About You – Betcha on Something About You – Single

Blame The Moon – Hazlett on Blame The Moon – Single

Something Real – Post Malone on AUSTIN (Bonus)

Turn On The Lights again.. (feat. Future) – Fred again.. & Swedish House Mafia on USB

It’s raining outside – EMBRZ on In Our Own Way5

Francesca – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Tell a Lie – Ed Prosek on Tell a Lie – Single

An Arrow In The Wall – Death Cab for Cutie on An Arrow In The Wall – Single

For My Help (Rework) – Hayden Calnin on Of Collingwood (Reworks) – Single6

Son of Nyx – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

Kaonashi – Yoste on Kaonashi – Single

So You Are Tired – Sufjan Stevens on Javelin

One More Song (feat. Jonas Rathsman & Francis Novotny) – Modern Tales on Stars Align (feat. Jonas Rathsman & Francis Novotny)

Tide – The Antlers on Tide – EP

Undone – ODESZA & Yellow House on Flaws in Our Design – EP

Abstract (Psychopomp) – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

All Of The People – Grian Chatten on Chaos For The Fly7

Ephemera – Vallis Alps on Cleave

Imperayritz de la ciutat joyosa – Tarta Relena on Fiat Lux

Enough to Believe – Bob Moses on Battle Lines

Lunatic – Alter. on ALTERX01 (Mixtape)

First Light – Hozier on Unreal Unearth

777 – Betcha on Placebo

Tuesday Afternoon – Wilfred on Where the Wild Ones Grow

Caution Cares (Rework) – Hayden Calnin on Of Collingwood (Reworks) – Single

Calm Down – Betcha on Placebo

How I Fell – Elliot Moss on How I Fell – Single8

I Smoked Away My Brain (I’m God x Demons Mashup) [feat. Imogen Heap & Clams Casino] – A$AP Rocky on I Smoked Away My Brain (I’m God x Demons Mashup) [feat. Imogen Heap & Clams Casino] – Single9

  1. Have you seen Barbie yet? Go see Barbie. ↩
  2. “Some kids move because their parents take new jobs/Some kids move ‘cause of napalm” ↩
  3. My sister sent me this one! I don’t have anything coherent to say about it, but it brings me joy when she finds a song that I like. ↩
  4. This whole album is strange and wonderful and I love it. ↩
  5. It’s the melody line from Neil Diamond’s Shilo, which makes this just sorta weird to listen to. ↩
  6. I’m delighted by this, because for all that I’ve continued to enjoy Hayden Calnin, this is the first thing that feels like it’s catching me as much as Fuck Collingwood did. ↩
  7. I don’t know what the vibe in this track is, but I’m here for it. ↩
  8. A nice little jazzy bit at the end; I’ve really been enjoying Elliot Moss lately. ↩
  9. Imogen Heap is so very sampleable. ↩
Categories
Review

“Plutopia”

Kate Brown

I’ve always had an interest in the technological arms race of the Cold War, which fits right alongside my interest in infrastructure. And, as with every other aspect of technological arms race, the nuclear technology race was ridiculous; where it differs is in the degree. Cyborg cat to spy on the other side? Ridiculous. Space race? Very cool, some actually good civilian uses, conceptually ridiculous if you didn’t grow up knowing it’s possible to put stuff in orbit.

Deliberately creating tons upon tons of one of the most toxic substances known to mankind, and in the process creating other incredibly toxic substances in amounts that render massive areas uninhabitable for tens of thousands of years? That’s not just ridiculous, that is obscene.

Plutopia focuses on that—the two cities, Richland, Washington, and Ozersk, Chelyabinsk Oblast, that were built around the production of plutonium. And boy howdy, does nobody look good in this story; the similarities in mistakes made would be comic, if it wasn’t a tragedy that’s going to be screwing over our great^100-grandchildren. In addition to just about everyone involved from the time the cities were founded onward.

Two anecdotes stand out in my mind. First, in what reminds me of the Uber business model, a fun fact: the third-worst radiological disaster in human history officially listed zero casualties from the cleanup. Pause for effect. Because the USSR only tracked the health outcomes of paid employees working on the cleanup, which effectively meant they were only worrying about the people managing the people doing the cleanup work. Hey, careful handing out those orders, pal, you don’t want to get any of the radioactive waste on yourself!1

Second one, which immediately feels like fodder for HBO to do a second season of Chernobyl:

A week after the explosion, radiologists followed the cloud to the downwind villages, where they found people living normally, children playing barefoot. They measured the ground, farm tools, animals, and people. The levels of radioactivity were astonishingly high. S. F. Osotin, a monitor, remembered that a colleague went up to the children and held up his Geiger counter. He said, “I can tell with this instrument exactly how much porridge you had for breakfast.” The children happily stuck out their bellies, which ticked at forty to fifty microroentgens a second. The technicians stepped back, shocked. The kids had become radioactive sources.

Overall, this book fascinated me. And horrified me! But I grew up downstream of Hanford, and this is apparently just the world we live in now, so what else can you do? Better to be informed, I suppose. Check it out.2

  1. Don’t get all patriotic about this, my fellow Americans—the Hanford site did the same thing in their statistics, as well as a repeated trend of calling anything other than “died of their skin melting off” or “died of a thyroid full of radiation” a death not caused by radiation. Grew up drinking from the aquifer that the high level waste pond was seeping into, got cancer of the everything at 20? Unrelated, we assure you. ↩
  2. This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Review

“The Dark Horse”

Craig Johnson

I’ve never been a big fan of westerns – nothing against them, really, just never got into the genre. Closest I’ve been is Westworld, which means it took a more-than-healthy dose of science fiction added on to catch my eye.

In this case, there was no such science fiction addition; knowing as little about the genre as I actually do, I suppose it’s possible that making it a mystery counts as some amount of genre crossover?

I did quite enjoy it, though. Looking at the cover now, I see that this is the fifth book in the series, but for most of the book I didn’t feel like I was missing out on anything by having skipped the first four. There’s a few references to past events here and there, and likely I would’ve known many of the characters a bit better, but Johnson did a good job of covering who everyone is as the book went that I didn’t feel left behind.

It was actually a pretty fun mystery to read, as well—having just come off a “my brain is full of COVID” Scooby Doo binge, it sure did a better job at keeping me guessing than Scooby manages. I didn’t figure out what was going on in this book until the book told me, but it’s because I wasn’t pulling at all the strings—I feel like if I’d been taking notes on the right things, I would’ve been able to solve the mystery a bit earlier.1

All in all, I had fun reading this! A nice little mystery, the protagonist is surprisingly fun given that he’s trying to be a grumpy old coot most of the time, and it does a good enough job conveying the setting that I feel like I’ve got dust on my skin. Check it out.2

  1. That doesn’t tend to be the case with Scooby-Doo, or at least not the “and Guess Who” iteration, where Velma finds a clue, shares with nobody, and builds the whole case around what we, the audience, never got to see. ↩
  2. This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Review

“Bluebeard”

Kurt Vonnegut

There’s a lot of this that feels like a parody, but if it’s a parody, I don’t know of what. Of art that tries to take itself too seriously? Of humanity that tries to take itself too seriously? That feels more like it.

It took me a while to get into this. The only other Vonnegut I’ve read was Cat’s Cradle which, I have to admit, I hated. Turns out that someone who spends a disproportionate amount of time worrying about existential threats doesn’t enjoy fiction that adds a new one.

Once I got started, though, I was mostly good; I’d call this book “barely fictional,” in that the setting is absolutely historically accurate, the only real liberty taken with actual history being the introduction of a couple new characters into the abstract impressionist movement, and done in such a way that doesn’t have much of an impact. I did, for a while, fall out of the book again—there’s a section near the middle where the protagonist’s trust is betrayed in a way that I found painful to even contemplate. Which, hey, makes this an effective piece of art!

In light of that, I feel honestly a little annoyed with how well the end of the book delivers. I was so prepared to be unhappy with the end of the book, but no, it was great. I guess there’s a reason Vonnegut is one of The Greats, or whatever.

So hey, check it out.1 I really have no idea what else to put as the call to action here; things in this ‘literary’ genre always tend to hit me that way.

  1. This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Review

“Tales from the Loop”

Simon Stålenhag

Two coffee-table-book reviews in a row!

This was a fascinating read; I wasn’t really sure what to expect going in, and it turned out to be a really lovely work of science fiction. In short, this is a coffee table book from a different timeline, one where WWII research invented some kind of magnetic chicanery that lets battleships fly. It’s all centered around a small town in Sweden, something of a company town for the largest particle accelerator ever built.

And I really love that concept. It’s not a science fiction novel, it’s not particularly interested in telling the big story. It’s a coffee table book, an art series by someone who grew up in a place, telling their own story and explaining their paintings. It just happens that the place they grew up was at the center of a lot of weird stuff.

Stålenenhag’s art style works really well for this; something about it feels like concept art that comes out of film and video game studios. That air of mystery, of cinematic effect, and the fact that it’s not a fully fleshed-out story about every last aspect of these things makes it so much more interesting. There’s a lot more room for you to come up with your own explanations.

I almost wish the cover was subtler; it’d be fun to make a version of this that’d blend in, and watch people flip through it and slowly realize “hang on…”

This is a fun read, full of beautiful paintings. Check it out.1

  1. This is a Bookshop affiliate link – if you buy it from here, I get a little bit of commission. It won’t hurt my feelings if you buy it elsewhere; honestly, I’d rather you check it out from your local library, or go to a local book store. I use Bookshop affiliate links instead of Amazon because they distribute a significant chunk of their profits to small, local book stores. ↩
Categories
Playlist

Playlist of the Month: July 2023

This month I had the thought “I’m amazed at how fast the Summer Vibes popped up in this playlist,” which was then followed by thinking “I wonder how hard it’d be to do some data analysis on my playlists and see how seasonal certain things are…”

How It Was – Yoste on A Few Brief Moments – EP

twentyfive – Yoste on twentyfive – Single

Save Me – Majik on It’s Alright / Save Me – Single

Friends – Yoste on Friends – Single

Kahan (Last Year) [feat. Kodak Black] – Fred again.. on Actual Life 2 (February 2 – October 15 2021)

gatsby – Daniel Leggs on gatsby – Single

TRAP PHONE – BERWYN on TRAP PHONE – Single

Crumble – Thomas LaVine on Crumble – Single

Feeling Whitney – Post Malone on Stoney (Deluxe)

crutches – Daniel Leggs on runaway

Mike (desert island duvet) – Fred again.., The Streets & Dermot Kennedy on Mike (desert island duvet) – Single

F**k Your Sorrys (feat. Cal Trask) – StayLoose on F**k Your Sorrys (feat. Cal Trask) – Single

Wisdom, Justice, And Love – Linkin Park on A Thousand Suns

Baby again.. – Fred again.., Skrillex & Four Tet on Baby again.. – Single

Talk It Over – Elderbrook & Vintage Culture on Little Love

If You Want Somebody – Elderbrook on Little Love

If It’s Time – Hayden Calnin on If It’s Time – Single

More the Victim – LINKIN PARK on Meteora 20th Anniversary Edition

Sirens – Sultan + Shepard on Forever, Now

Oslo – Yoste on Oslo – Single

99 – Elliot Moss on Boomerang

Acoustic – Billy Raffoul on 1975 – EP

Once Upon a Poolside (feat. Sufjan Stevens) – The National on First Two Pages of Frankenstein

Nobody’s Nobody – The NGHBRS, Pete Shade & Riesling on Nobody’s Nobody – Single

Threads – Thorin Loeks on Threads – Single

White Ferrari – Isak Danielson & Alba August on White Ferrari – Single

This Isn’t Helping (feat. Phoebe Bridgers) – The National on First Two Pages of Frankenstein

Your Mind Is Not Your Friend (feat. Phoebe Bridgers) – The National on First Two Pages of Frankenstein

Come On Home – Brian Eno & Fred again.. on Secret Life

Secret – Brian Eno & Fred again.. on Secret Life

LYTD (Vocoder Tests) – Daft Punk & Pharrell Williams on Random Access Memories (10th Anniversary Edition)

Drive You Home – Billy Raffoul on Drive You Home – Single

Eat The Acid – Kesha on Gag Order

I Don’t Want To Lie – Yoste & Vandelux on I Don’t Want To Lie – Single

Hate Me Harder – Kesha on Gag Order

My Rajneesh – Sufjan Stevens on America – EP

Can’t Be By Myself (feat. Novo Amor & Squirrel Flower) – Lowswimmer on Red Eye Effect

Stand in Tall Ovation – Portair on Stand in Tall Ovation – Single

None Of Us Have But A Little While – Lonnie Holley & Sharon Van Etten on Oh Me Oh My

Follow – Brian Eno & Fred again.. on Secret Life

All of Us – SYML on All of Us – Single

Hallelujah Anyway – Luke Sital-Singh on Hallelujah Anyway – Single

Sprinter – Central Cee & Dave on Sprinter – Single

Titanic – Atli on Epilogue Of Something Beautiful

Mourning – Post Malone on AUSTIN

Lazy – Elliot Moss on Lazy – Single

14 – Water From Your Eyes on Everyone’s Crushed

MASCULINITY (MJF Spotlight Session) – LUCKY LOVE on TENDRESSE (EXTENDED EDITION)

This Love – Harrison Storm on Wonder, Won’t You?

Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God) – Kiesza & Sugar Jesus on Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God) – Single

Hideaway – Kiesza on Sound of a Woman

Dial Drunk – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

Stay Here – Yoste on Stay Here – Single

My Old Man – Billy Raffoul on My Old Man – Single

Free – Kidswaste on Free – Single

Heartbeat – Haux on Something to Remember – EP

Kusanagi – ODESZA on In Return

Buzzcut Season – Lorde on Pure Heroine

Smile Song (feat. Bedroom) – Rusty Santos on Smile Song (feat. Bedroom) – Single

MORE OR LESS – Jordy on MORE OR LESS – Single

All the Fires You Start – Jack in Water on All the Fires You Start – Single

Shake – Yoke Lore on Toward a Never Ending New Beginning1

In The Summer – HOKO on In The Summer – Single

Little Bit of This (feat. Vince Staples) – Good Times Ahead on Good Times Ahead

My Sweet Lord – Troye Sivan on The Idol Episode 5 Part 2 (Music from the HBO Original Series) – EP

Beautiful Life – Emmit Fenn on Beautiful Life – Single

Paradise – Braaheim on Paradise – Single

Call Your Mom – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)2

The Place to Start (feat. Joshua Keogh) – Portair on The Place to Start (feat. Joshua Keogh) – Single

Sea Shanty Medley – Home Free on Sea Shanty Medley – Single3

the banker – Daniel Leggs on the banker – Single

Calling (feat. Aaron Parks) – S. Carey & John Raymond on Calling (feat. Aaron Parks) – Single

Happy (Live Acoustic From Space) – Kesha on Gag Order (Live Acoustic EP From Space)

Only Love Can Save Us Now (Live Acoustic From Space) – Kesha on Gag Order (Live Acoustic EP From Space)

Bad Dancer – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP4

Fairlies – Grian Chatten on Chaos For The Fly5

Starstruck – Santigold on Santigold

Making Time x Cycles – Sultan + Shepard, Le Youth & Julia Church on Making Time x Cycles

Sitting In Fire – MASN on Sitting In Fire – Single

L.A. (‭+1.818.643.6885‬) – will hyde, tiffi & dress on L.A. (‭+1.818.643.6885‬) – Single

Good Life – Good Life & Elderbrook on Good Life – Single

Poseidon – gavn! on Poseidon – Single

Barley – Water From Your Eyes on Everyone’s Crushed

You Don’t Ignore (Too Late) – Petit Biscuit on You Don’t Ignore (Too Late) – Single

Gone For Good – Ashley Singh on Waiting For The Blue – EP

Healing – Fakear on Healing – Single

One More Day – Joshua Hyslop on One More Day – Single

Heavier – ODESZA & Yellow House on Flaws in Our Design – EP

Overready – Zakhar on Overready – Single

Older – Betcha on Older – Single

Don’t Forget Your Neighborhood – The Avalanches & Cola Boyy on Don’t Forget Your Neighborhood – Single

Rush – Troye Sivan on Something To Give Each Other6

Oliveira Dos Cen Años – C. Tangana on Oliveira Dos Cen Años – Single7

Chemicals – Forester on Chemicals – Single

Beelining – Lowswimmer on Red Eye Effect

Into the Night – Thorin Loeks on Into the Night – Single

You’re Gonna Go Far – Noah Kahan on Stick Season (We’ll All Be Here Forever)

J’VEUX D’LA TENDRESSE (MJF Spotlight Session) – LUCKY LOVE on TENDRESSE (EXTENDED EDITION)

Mysoul – Shallou on Mysoul – Single

Long Lost Lover – Chance Peña on Lovers to Strangers – EP

It Hurts to Love – Slopes on Bad Dancer – EP

K-POP – Travis Scott, Bad Bunny & The Weeknd on K-POP – Single

Pieces – Joshua Hyslop on Pieces – Single

ALL LIGHT – United Freedom Collective on ALL LIGHT – Single

I’ll Wait – Petey on USA

Coastline (Adam Hinden Remix) – Hollow Coves on Reimagined, Vol. 1 – EP

Did I Luv U – Friends & I on Did I Luv U – Single

Last Time Every Time Forever – Grian Chatten on Chaos For The Fly

What Was I Made For? [From The Motion Picture “Barbie”] – Billie Eilish on What Was I Made For? [From The Motion Picture “Barbie”] – Single8

Ten Billion People – Explosions In the Sky on End9

How You Like Me Now? (Raffertie Remix) – The Heavy on How You Like Me Now? – Single

Magic – Elliot Moss on Magic – Single

Where Did You Go – HAEVN on Where Did You Go – Single

When We First Met – Emmit Fenn on When We First Met – EP

Heat of the Summer – Betcha on Heat of the Summer – Single

Winona – Yoke Lore on Toward a Never Ending New Beginning

Alright – Gert Taberner on Alright – Single

Fall – St. Lundi on Fall – Single

Better Days (feat. King Garbage) – Holiday87 & The Knocks on Better Days (feat. King Garbage) – Single

Haunted – Atli on Epilogue Of Something Beautiful

Encerrada (feat. Y La Bamba) – Reyna Tropical on Encerrada – Single (feat. Y La Bamba) – Single

Lovers to Strangers – Chance Peña on Lovers to Strangers – EP

Dolly Zoom – Elliot Moss on Boomerang10

Don’t – Yoste on Don’t – Single11

  1. This is the one that made me realize there’s Summer Vibes happening in this playlist. Yoke Lore just sounds like summer. ↩
  2. Honestly, one of my favorite additions this month, and I really couldn’t tell you why. ↩
  3. I don’t miss being in an a cappella group, you miss being in an a cappella group ↩
  4. Very sing-along-able ↩
  5. Does way too good a job sounding like classic UK rock for a song that came out this year. ↩
  6. Watched the music video for this and thought “wow, Troye Sivan grew up and got horny.” ↩
  7. A different vibe than the last time I was listening to C. Tangana, but I’m here for it. ↩
  8. Barbie is a very good movie and you should go see it. If you’re mad about how Ken was portrayed: congratulations, that was the point! ↩
  9. They’ve got a concert coming up here soon, I’m excited! ↩
  10. This is one of the only albums that I occasionally just decide to listen to all the way through. ↩
  11. Yoste, breaking my rule that “everything has to go through the normal process,” and instead skipping straight to being in the playlist on the first listen. ↩