Milestone: it has now been fifty thousand songs and, nearly, four years of last.fm for me. The 50,000th song was Werewolves of Chessboxin (ELLIOT Scratch Mix), and I don't want particularly to make a big metaphor out of that, on the symbolism it makes for my musical kitsch and taste as it's grown to be.

Once muxtape is back from RIAA purgatory (fingers crossed) I dearly intend to throw up a new mix of my August soundtrack, including "Werewolves of Chessboxin".

A newfound love of dance music has taken me in a few directions; towards better vocal melody writing…

Just as useful as sharing a bit of information about my life may be sharing the recent soundtrack. I made a mix tonight of all the songs that have been most stuck in my head, symbolically significant, and just plain ubiquitous for me this past month or two. Let me know what you think, and I hope you enjoy this music as much as I have.

geographr.muxtape.com

Silly insight alert: I feel like the Jackson 5 could never have come along without Judgment . The duet works really powerfully, and it's so unexpectedly aggressive. This music feels wonderfully fresh to me, and maybe (grandiose and unfounded statement alarm:) at the core of the uniquely american musical identities we have now.

If pressed, I have been saying The Microphones are my favorite band, but I sort of wonder sometimes if that's just because it's music that a) is rich and very deep with meaning, b) is something real cool and intelligent to be obsessed with and c) it…

It is unclear to me why I have listened to less music, so clearly, this semester. Theories range from a changing social and emotional role for it in my life, to base physical calculations of available time, to changes in my living situation. But it is still on my mind as much as ever, and if anything, I feel like my connection to individual songs grows only deeper.

I have had many things stuck in my head this semester, and to list a handful: "Freshman Thesis" by Thee More Shallows, "A Chicken With Its Head Cut Off" by the Magnetic…

I feel this is a very markarodgers-like statement, but I think I would be totally happy with my songwriting abilities if I could write a song as intensely beautiful as Balance. I heard it last night in a car and was shocked again by how dark and fierce it feels, and wanted to now why, and I just learned how to play it. Sometimes I want to write off the mountain goat as a clever but repetitive folk-songwriter who speak-sings too damn much, but when he sings "I am too slow to catch you now" I have no idea…

I don't usually go on big kicks of a certain artist anymore, no marathon listens of a hundred sufjan songs in a week or anything like that.

What this means is that I don't usually associate a certain artist/song with a time period/season anymore. Which is definitely a somewhat negative development. Almost like a smell, I love the way a song can bring you right back to a certain time, that tone or chord just so evocative.

However, two times in the past week, I've had nice surprises where I found a song really really taking me back to a…

I think this is kind of a dumb thing to say, but I really really like cool vocal melodies. I think it was why I always liked motown from afar when I was younger and why I started to get a little into hip hop. But right now, I'm liking Belle and & Sebastian a lot for just this very reason. The song "Marx & Engels" gets stuck in my head very often, and I love it. It's so interesting and exciting to me! So much of "Push Barman to Open Old Wounds" is like that, too, where I think…

Has anything changed in all this time? For the first time I listened to the Smiths while reading their lyrics, and it was great. I listened to Ys for the first time in a while today after a bit of the "Sawdust" song got stuck in my head, and that was great too. I was pissed at first that everybody loved The Knife so much, but then I really gave them a serious try, and dude, pretty cool. The way "Silent Shout" opens I really, really like. Max Richter has grown on me a lot too. OTC also, a lot.…

Little Whirl is very strong on me right now. It was the first thing I listened to in the train from the airport.

I haven't really listened to wu-tang's 36 chambers until tonight, and man, I can't believe how good it is. I'm such an awful music listener. I seriously don't really hear something until maybe the third or fourth time through. Before that, it's like, "Oh, this is hip-hop music!", or maybe a little more specific even. But god these songs are so intense and the rapping is so, so good and interesting and unexpected and the beats create a world and a feel with their sound better than just like, anything I can think of.

I rarely treat music like I…