On Warmer Music's Summer 2012 Mix

Now the thing about summer mixes is that no matter what you chose, you're guaranteed to have more good songs that you had to leave off than you could include. For someone like me, this can be vastly frustrating unless you can make yourself see it as ultimately liberating - no matter what you're gonna have to skip things so you might as well just pick what you like. It's an incredibly rich vein from which to mine pop culture as youth, America, writers and nostalgia all tend to trade strongly in summer images. Everyone loves either reliving their past glories or just reveling in the warm bounties of their present situation.

Within this mix you will hear: an "r" rolled for over five seconds, complaints about work, an ode to insects, more horns that you might expect, a great Irish song called "Dancing In The Moonlight" NOT by Van Morrison, a mind-blowing unreleased Mountain Goats song, Wilco get raunchy(ish) and probably some people expressing fondness for increased amounts of sunshine. Enjoy!

"It's A Bit Complicated" - On Art Brut And Aging

I have a depressingly bad memory when it comes to moments in my life that I really should be able to recall. Ask me about a meaningless baseball game from over a decade ago there’s a good chance I can give you the particular. However when I try to think back to the night of my first kiss or what I was thinking the first time I ever went to a funeral, I could only give you the broadest generalities. But for some reason, this night I remember well.

Six Song Six-Pack - Gone Drinkin' (Pt. 1)

Thanks Onion!

Wellsir, today's the day everyone dreams about. It's a glorious late summer afternoon and I'm off to the Midwest Brewers Festival in beautiful Plainfield, Illinois! Although, I'm genuinely excited to sample beers from across the region and the country because I'm one of those poor benighted beer geeks you've all seen stroking their beards down at the local microbrewery, I figured it was a good time to indulge in a little irresponsibility as well.


With that in mind, this Six-Pack is a musical celebration of that blessed inebriation with six songs about the (beer) bottle and why we love (and hate) it so. I've called this Part 1 because something tells me that this will be too rich a vein to mine only once. So as the Poles say, "Napijmy się! Lepiej być znanym pijakiem, niż anonimowym alkoholikiem!" ("Let's drink! It's better to be a famous drunk than an anonymous alcoholic!")