Midweek Crisis #2
This post was originaly published as the issue of my music newsletter, which you can subscribe here: https://midweekcrisis.substack.com/welcome ✌️
Hi there,
For starters: thank you all for the warm welcome and feedback on my first post. You’re awesome ✨
I’m soooo freaking excited to begin this music trip with you! Creating a safe space for the song recommendations exchange and sharing good vibes was my longtime desire. And I’m glad the first steps were taken 🥾.
Today I come to you with a playlist full of different flavours. Colourful and unpredictable as the spring outside 🌿🌼🌦
This time, next to the main playlist, I’ve prepared something extra. Searching for some interesting info about one song, I’ve come across “Wakeup Calls”. It’s a special NASA tradition 🚀. For nearly 45 years, till the year 2011, Mission Control had been playing songs to astronauts currently on a mission to kick off their daily activities. Each song had been selected by the shuttle crew members or their closest ones and had a deeper meaning or was related to the current missions’ daily agenda 👩🚀👨🚀. NASA astronauts had even been given live-streamed concerts! First-ever by sir Paul McCartney in 2005. A couple of times the shuttle crew was greeted by the most famous musicians in the world, such as Elton John, Michael Stipe (R.E.M. frontman) or Beyonce. Over the years, astronauts had been requesting songs from every genre possible, from hard rock and classical music to country and soundtracks from iconic movies like “Star Wars”, “Rocky” or “Jungle Book”. If you want to know more, look up here: NASA history (pdf).
I’ve felt so inspired by all of this, that I’ve created two separate playlists. The first one is filled with a selection of NASA Wakeup Calls & Space Shuttle Music. The second one contains NASA Mars Rovers Music, with songs played for each rover on a mission. Every rover had its own soundtrack — it has started as a joke, but was such a fun idea, that it became a tradition. Typically the music was picked by the Mission Managers and had a connection with activities planned for each “Sol” (a term for Martian day).
Enjoy Midweek Crisis #2 and happy listening!
Hugs,
Stygi
Feel free to check out my Spotify profile for other playlists 🎧
If you’re not yet a subscriber, feel free to join the Midweek Crisis club 💌
Something For The Chill 🤙
Wooden Shjips — Staring At The Sun
The purely psychedelic and trippy vibe from the Californian quartet of Wooden Shjips. It begins in a cool way, resembling “You Sexy Thing (I Believe in Miracles) by Hot Chocolate” mixed with For What It’s Worth by Buffalo Springfield in a groovier version. Dope thing 👌
It was inspired by the forest fires outside of Portland in 2017. At the time, there was a kind of apocalyptic aura there, with smoke and ashes floating around. The lyrics are about this strange mixture of desire and anxiety towards the sun and nature. Like an antidote, this song was meant to bring some calm and peace to the listener ✌️
For more songs like this one look up to my separate playlist 🤙Vape State / Inhalation Station💨
Something in Rock flavour 🎸
The Black Keys — Crawling Kingsnake
Garage rock from the Grammy-winning blues-rock duo. The cowboy-ish vibe and the sexy electric guitar moaning. “Crawling Kingsnake” is a song of many covers. The most famous by John Lee Hooker and The Doors. The original one was by Big Joe Williams — true country blues from 1941.
“Delta Kream” is the newest album from The Black Keys. It shows bands’ musical roots and deepest inspirations.
Something Crazy 🎢
Glass Animals — Space Ghost Coast To Coast
With this song Glass Animals, as usual, are serving us something musically and lyrically intriguing. It’s about a childhood friend of Dave Bayley (lead vocalist of the band) who attempted a school shooting. Luckily he was caught and didn’t harm anyone. A lot of early 00’s symbols are mentioned in this song (GTA, Quake, Doom, Dr Dre, Pokemon etc.). Dave is wondering about possible motives for attempting mass murder by his former friend. In the end, Bayley just wishes him to heal from all of his shitty experiences and possible traumas.
Videoclip to this tune is a true must-watch! It’s weird, kind of creepy and from the first seconds, you know it will be an experience. So obscure that you either will love it or hate it. Worth forming an opinion.
Something from the TV Series 📺
Maps — Let Go of the Fear
If you haven’t already seen the “Brave New World” TV series on Netflix, I strongly recommend you do so. Fresh faces, engaging storyline, great music and it’s not that long — only one season with 9 episodes was released. It’s based on the iconic novel of the same title by Aldous Huxley. A bittersweet story showing a beautiful dystopia in contrast with the old “savage” world. Everything is presented here with amazing camera work, visual effects and sounds. I was blown away by it.
And here’s one of my favourites from the “Brave New World” soundtrack. This beat & lyrics combination is a quintessence of revolt in utopia, which happens in this series.
Something from the Game 🎮
Everyone You Know — She Don’t Dance
I’m not a fan of “FIFA”, but I always look up to soundtracks from this series. This time in “FIFA20” there was this gem 💎.
I like its calm beat and early 00’s vibe. The lyrics are melancholic and catchy, and we can interpret them in many ways. One is quite obvious, telling us about this girl who used to be a wild party cat and then she stopped. On the other hand, we can think of her as if she was a representation of this huge amount of people, who love to dance and how their freedom to do it was limited by the pandemic.
Something Energetic 🚀
Everyone You Know & Joy Anonymous — Just for the Times
This time the sibling duo of Everyone You Know collaborated with artist/producer Joy Anonymous and as result, we have this song filled with nostalgia, hope and good vibes ✨ It’s a hymn for every one of us — “We’re all going through the samе thing”…
We all miss those carefree, pre-covid times when we freely hugged our friends, danced under the same roofs and enjoyed a happy crowd of strangers. We all look up to that all in the nearest future. Better times are just around the corner. So let’s all get vaccinated and fight this virus thing away 💉🦠
*If you’re looking for more dancing tunes see my playlist For the private festival under the night sky 🚀🌲🌑
Something Old But Gold 👑
April Stevens — Teach Me Tiger
Back in the ’50s, it was quite a controversial, filthy song. Supposedly it was even banned from the radio. It’s playful, sexy and giggly. It’s one of those songs which gets stuck in the head.
It was one of the famous NASA “Wakeup Calls” on STS-6 in ’83. It was a historic mission with Space Shuttle Challenger launched on its maiden flight. On Day 3, the astronauts requested this song 👩🚀🚀👨🚀.
*Check out my related playlist: NASA Wakeup Calls & Space Shuttle Music 🛰 & NASA Mars Rovers Music 🚀
Something From The Childhood Movie 🎞
Phil Harris & Bruce Reitherman — The Bare Necessities
All the 90’s kids for sure remember the iconic Disney movie — “The Jungle Book”. I haven’t heard songs from it for a long time and suddenly I’ve come across “The Bare Necessities” going through the NASA Wakeup Calls list. If you miss Baloo 🐻 and his stress-free attitude you have to hear it and see the cut scene I’ve put in the YouTube link. It will for sure bring you a little tear in the eye 💧
🇵🇱 PL version
Something Recommended By You 👈
Gidge — I Fell In Love
A truly relaxing, nostalgic song from my cousin Ela 💛 Calming ambient house by the Swedish duo of “Gidge”. Satisfying sounds of rain and distant thunderstorms, delicate piano chords… Just a dreamy vibe for this springs’ unpredictable weather.
That’s all I’ve planned for this week. I’m thrilled if you made it this far and you’re reading this.
Here you have a complete playlist from this post:
Don’t hesitate to let me know which tune you liked and share some songs with me.
