[PLAY THE PLAYLIST] BEST FUCKING MORNING ☕️

Recently I’ve trying to be more thoughtful with how I start my day. With all of this time in quarantine I’ve taken the opportunity to observe how impactful tiny thoughtful adaptations can be. Not just on a daily basis either, as I’ve found that sometimes the change can be so swift it’s often within an hour or even a matter of minutes, depending on the situation.

We all know music is a major mood shifter. Unfortunately, sometimes it feels like because we’ve gotten so accustomed to the habit of recklessly consuming things to make us feel better that we do this with music a lot more than any of us would like to admit. I know I’ve certainly been guilty of that myself. Additionally, when you’re already not giving too much thought of what you’re consuming, it’s hard for me to believe that it means that all that unused thoughtful energy is shifting to what you’re putting out into the world and any subsequent side effects, either positive or negative.

I intend to take more ownership of how this space factors into this consumption habit equation for everyone, so of course I felt the need to make a fucking playlist about it. 🤪

I took some time thinking about not just what makes me feel good, but exactly what makes me feel my ⚡️fucking best⚡️. IMO, there’s truly nothing better in this life than the opportunity to identify how your talents/strengths can help people, throwing all of your energy into that thing, and then witnessing the magic that comes from those efforts. To be clear, I’m not just talking about ways that earn you money from doing this either. It can also be little things like knowing you’re a good personal cheerleader and being able to notice when someone could need some pom-poms waved in their direction and seeing their reaction. It’s ✨ literally the fucking best✨ ESPECIALLY when all parties involved decide that shit is going both wayyysss.

Community.

Connection.

Intention.

These are the things that BEST FUCKING MORNING☕️ is made of to the best of my ability. Sometimes you’ll get ✨a feeling✨ from the music, but as often as I could, I wanted the words ringing through your ears to make you feel fucking great, too. Additionally, I wholeheartedly believe that it’s equally important that the people making the good vibes you ingest should absolutely coming from good fucking people and I can say with a great level of confidence that these are all really good fucking people. I took a lot of care to make sure that even if one were to treat this playlist like a LoFi Chill Beats To Study To kinda deal where it’s mostly going to be background noise, that the few times that your brain decides to focus in on what’s actually happening that hopefully in that moment you feel empowered to remember that you always have the opportunity to choose happiness in spite of whatever bullshit gets thrown at you.

Let me be very clear that this is not me tryna shove some toxic positivity on your ass. That shit is annoying as fuck and not welcomed in this house. You always are entitled to however you feel, absolutely.

BUT

When you wake up feeling meh and decide you deserve to feel at minimum a little bit better.

Or you wake up feeling fucking great and want to hold onto that feeling as much as you can, possibly even going next level with that shit.

I promise you this shit will take you there, wherever that may be.

Although this collection of vibes was arranged in a way to be uplifting incrementally, feel free to let The Algorithm™ move you and shuffle this shit if you are so inclined. That said, I def invite you to see if you can notice a different if you listen both ways. Additionally, I intend to honor the inspiration behind this playlist and occasionally implement tweaks every now and then, hopefully to further enhance this vibe. Mostly likely additions only, no removals or substitutions.

As long as this playlist is in your life may you never forget that you deserve the fucking best. 💖

#diSKOAverweekly: week of February 26, 2020

Here is your Wednesday update on a Friday. My bad. But I love you, so. There’s that.

1. Bamily - “Katata”

   This song feels like bottled sunshine. You’re welcome.

2. The Undercover Dream Lovers - “Chardonnay”

   This whole album is so chill. Oh yeah, that came out today. Go listen to It’s All In Your Head.

3. Disq - “Daily Routine”

   Looking forward to their debut album Collector, which drops….next week(!!!)

4. Little Hurt - “It’s Okay Not To Be Okay”

   Just in case you need the reminder. 💖

5. Example - “Back On The Wreck”

   Not for nothing dude is crushing it on the self-releasing game. Also like that the pop sheen has kinda worn off and he’s back to making cooler jams like this.

6. Firstworld - “Groove Is In The Heart (feat. Delia Dane)”

   This is one of the best covers I’ve heard in a long time. I was really skeptical with this at first but they really nailed it.

7. Spencer Ludwig - “Just Wanna Dance”

   Just making sure you listen to Spencer while I wrap up this interview so you can love him like I love him.

8. Niki Black - “The Other Man”

   Very happy to see Niki is back with more music. She dropped a really cool video for this too that you should check out.

9. Madame Gandhi - “Bad Habits”

   Had this song on a lot lately to remind myself to be better so passing this along to y’all in case you missed it. Gonna see this bad bitch on March 10th at Elsewhere. Think we’re doing an interview, too!

10. Joe Publik - “Military Minded (feat. Scorzayzee)”

    Missed that his new record Stubborn Vectis dropped last week. Dropped this in as a mental note to check it out.

11. RJD2 - “Pull Up On Love (feat. STS, Khari Mateen)”

    First single from RJD2’s upcoming album The Fun Ones out on April 17th! I’m so happy he’s back I’m not sure if my feet are touching the ground when I walk around listening to this.

12. Juice - “DiCaprio (Love Me All The Time)”

    Juice just shared the music video for this track and announced a headlining tour! Also the clip at the end lololol

13. LOVER - “Waiting Up (feat. Cult Shøtta")”

    Still loving on LOVER. Liked the video a lot for this too.

14. Ry X - “Oceans (feat. ólafur Arnalds)”

    I don’t know how else to explain it but this song feels like you’re coming up for air.

15. Black Books - “In The In”

    Oh shit their EP Cheer Up dropped today! It’s great. Definitely worth a spin.

16. Grivo - “H.D.C.”

    Sad to have missed these guys open for Slow Crush at Saint Vitus earlier in the month. They remind me a lot of old school Starflyer 59, which is why my obsession is slowly intensifying.

[NIGHT OUT] Spencer Ludwig @ Mercury Lounge 2/13/2020

images courtesy of Some Kind of Awesome

Last week I finally had the pleasure of catching rising singer-songwriter and trumpeter extraordinaire, Spencer Ludwig. I’m thrilled that the Brooklyn can claim the Los Angeles born poptastic performer as our very own. It was a special treat for longtime fans because it was the first time that Spencer shared some new material that he’s been working on. Prior to the sold out show, I was fortunate enough to grab Spencer for a quick interview (which is coming in the next few days) and not to throw you too many spoilers from that, but he wasn’t exaggerating about how his newer material explores a much broader range of emotions than any of the work he’s released to date.

Another semi-spoiler from the interview: there was a moment during the interview where Spencer casually semi-downplayed his abilities as a singer, citing something to the effect of he didn’t have have a lot of vocal training yadda yadda yadda. I remember chuckling to myself a few songs into his set at that very thought. Granted, if he thinks there’s room for improvement in his vocal performance, I will always encourage someone to better themselves, obviously. All of that to say for only a few years into his solo career he’s already leaps and bounds ahead of a lot of performers that I’ve seen grace the same stage. He certainly had that audience in the palm of his hand from the moment he stepped on stage.

I should also relay that during his set, the Latin Grammy award winner announced that he will be making a return to The Freehold for another residence this coming March. Details should be rolling out momentarily on that. With regards to the aforementioned new music, there are no official details on any of that just yet. That all said, while this is the first we’ve seen of Spencer in 2020, it’s obviously not going to be the last. How often he’ll grace us with his presence is still up in the air, but rest assured I’ll be passing along every last update.

Spencer Ludgwig @ Mercury Lounge 2/13/2020 SET LIST

• Helium

• Welcome Party

• Right Into U

• Best Life

• Can We Just Stay

• Us

• Summertime With U

• Falling Out

• Growing Up In LA

• Hard

• Day That I

• Just Wanna Dance

• Diggy

• Made To Love You

• All Night Long