Monthly Mix: Just Don't

In which we brusquely offer you all sorts of advice on what not to do, and then finally remember to say "Please" in the last song.

This mix is divided into several Acts.

Act I: The Beautiful:
Don't Be So Cynical - I've only heard this song and one other, but I think The Arrogants will be getting some more attention from me.

Don't Be Afraid to Sing - I like Stars. You will too.

Don't Be Afraid of Your Anger - The excellent alt-country sound that I've always enjoyed from Clem Snide.

Don't Stop Believin' - Normally I don't go for acapella covers, but this one's an exception. Instead, think of it as a license to do what you would do with any version of this song: sing along with the guitar part.

Act II: The Synth and their Contemporaries
Don't Forget Me (When I'm Gone) - and yet we did, Glass Tiger.

Don't Say Your Love is Killing Me - But it is! It is killing us, Erasure!

Don't Let Me Down Gently - Oh Wonder Stuff, we let you down rather hard I'm afraid.

Don't Go Back to Rockville - Seriously. Who would live in Rockville? (Rob, that's who. 'Nuff said)

Don't You (Forget About Me) - Sister song to the Glass Tiger one above. Same outcome.

Don't Go - You know I love Yaz. You know you do too.

Don't Change - But we did, INXS.

Don't Dream It's Over - But, I'm sorry to say this Crowded House, but it's pretty much over.

Don't Get Me Wrong - I was a teenager when I discovered I already knew most songs by The Pretenders just from hearing late 80s radio.

Don't Let's Start - Who could with a clear conscience omit TMBG?

Act III: The Rock Ballads
Don't Marry Her - This song is not OK for kiddos - omit it if you need to. I am a big The Beautiful South fan, which is why this is the only non-approved CD I bought and repeatedly listened to on my mission. (Well, that's not strictly true, I bought some Spanish rock too, but that was "language study")

Don't Let Me Get Me - I actually think this may be the only song by Pink that I like.

Don't Be Cruel - My Elvis-fan sister would be angry if this didn't make the list.

Don't Stop Me Now - You know you rock out to some Queen.

Don't Cry - I'm not a huge GNR fan, but I know some huge GNR fans and my friend Jeff married one of them, so this seemed appropriate.

Act IV: We Give Way to Anger (or at least Punk)
Don't Stop Living in the Red - I have a soft spot for Andrew W K.

Don't Drag Me Down - It's almost certainly the case that you don't have enough Social Distortion in your collection.

Don't Call Me White - NOFX's angry anti-rascism rant.

Please Don't Tease - See, I told you we'd remember our manners eventually.

Act V: A Bonus Track
Don't Touch Me - There was a time when friends and I would pull up at stoplights and blast this Brak classic just to watch the faces of the people around us. Try it sometime.

It's all here.

Monthly Mix: Midnight in Istanbul

Istanbul at Night, by Yoav Lerman

Years ago, I made a mix for my sister called "Nightfall at the Arabesque" full of songs that were at least mildly Arabic-sounding. I never gave her a playlist. But a few months ago I had her describe each song, and it was an embarrassment. Dreadful stuff. Like reading 'poetry' you wrote in high school. I won't go into details - it's too horrible. Anyway, I'd been jonesing to put together a new middle eastern mix, but I only had a few bits and pieces of stuff I liked hanging around. I finally decided I would do it in a manner that allowed me to fill gaps with some instrumental scoring, and therefore it became a movie soundtrack in my head.

Now, this sort of thing isn't unusual for me. As in that conversation I had with Patriate Jeff (read about it here), it comes back to the fact that I am, at my core, an Ideas Man. The potential artwork is quite often more beautiful than the finished work. That's why I make random generators - they are little idea seeds floating past in a river of entropy, and they are often as beautiful as the other seeds that grow up to be trees, albeit more ephemeral. I brainstorm ideas for web applications I'd like to see all the time, but rarely am I interested in the work necessary to bring them to completion. I have an idea for an intensely interesting TV series, but I don't think I'm capable of writing a script I'd accept. Likewise, this month's mix is a soundtrack for a movie that I'm not sure could be made at all. It certainly couldn't be made by me. But I can come up with a soundtrack.

Elevator pitch goes like this: A tale of youth, drugs, hip-hop music, and violence, but not set in LA or Chicago - this is mainly in Istanbul, with occasional narrative side trips to Algeria or elsewhere in the Maghreb. It could only be made (to my satisfaction) by a brilliant, angry, young Turkish filmmaker, probably living in Berlin.

I'm not going to tell you who does the score tracks here, but I will give you their original titles.

1. Ceza - Araturka Fasli
2. Revenge
3. Ayben - Benim O
4. A-500
5. Fuat - Okyanuslar
6. Zara - Kesik Çayir
7. Kolera - Irtifa Kaybi
8. Shadows
9. Ceza - Yerli Plaka
10. Refinery Surveillance
11. Cartel - Cartel
12. Bakara
13. Sagopa Kajmer - Al 1'de Burdan Yak
14. Rumble City
15. Ceza - Shinanay
16. Rachid Taha - Barra Barra


Get it here or, if that doesn't work, here

I hope you can picture it.

Monthly Mix: Vote!

So, dear readers/listeners, for April's Monthly Mix would you rather have:

1) "Just Don't.", a mix in which we brusquely offer you all sorts of advice on what not to do, and then finally remember to say "Please" in the last song. Lots of 80s goodness like "Dont Forget Me (When I'm Gone)", but some great songs you probably don't know as well.

or

2) "Midnight in Istanbul", which is a mix of Turkish rap, foreboding soundtrack scoring, and French-Algerian-Arabic electronica, and is intended as the soundtrack for an awesome Anatolian/Mahgreb gangster epic - Boyz in the Hood meets The Battle of Algiers meets The Long Good Friday.

Voting closes Saturday at 7PM EST/Midnight Harrogate time. The loser will probably feature as another month's mix.