This is our 200th playlist since we started back in January 16, 2015. 3603 tracks, 244 hours of music, way more than those 244 hours spent reading, keeping track and listening to the hundreds of artists featured in our playlist so far. Sounds like we’re going to ask you for money, right? Of course not. We’re only going to ask you to tell a friend or two about our playlists. We do this mostly to keep ourselves updated on what’s new and avoid falling into the “music these days just isn’t as good as it was back in the day” trap (which roughly translates to “I got older and gave up my interests”). But the best part about it is knowing someone out there actually listens and values what we do. We know algorithms are pretty cool, but nothing beats a playlist that was handpicked by a group of dedicated people.
We’re back and we’re bringing you a ton of music. Unusually, August was kinda eventful, with plenty of great single and album releases. So we had to exaggerate a bit and make a 33 song playlist (and we had to leave quite a few tracks out to make it reasonable). Our focus this week is The Hold Steady’s new album “Thrashing Thru the Passion”, probably their best since 2008’s “Stay Positive”. There’s no way we’re tagging every single artist this time around, so just scroll down for the track list.
Sometimes it’s hard to be objective and unbiased when writing about a festival that is such a big part of your life. Except for two (very) unremarkable lineups that made me stay home, since I was old enough to go to college all my summers involved a trip to Paredes de Coura (and a painful trip back, too). When you’re a kid, they say you’ll eventually get older and boring, in a process they call “becoming an adult”. This usually comes with amazing perks such as ceasing to listen to any new music whatsoever, stopping seeing your (also ageing) friends, having great conversations about changing diapers with your remaining friends (yes, the other couple with kids you always go vacationing with to some shitty beach full of other couples with kids and the odd mother-in-law). Obviously, a multi-day, non-kid friendly, rural music festival such as Festival Paredes de Coura seems like one of those things that are amongst the first to drop from your newfound “adult life”. Except you don’t have to be that person; and is there anything better to remind you of that than going there and finding all your friends in the same place, same month, year after year, all over again? (Well, other than imagining the smell of those diapers.)
