Saturday, May 19, 2012

In My Ears

Running is about the only time I have where I can really listen to music, so I almost always have my ipod shuffle with me. Typically I have a mix of jazz, country, and something soul/funk/r&b. I almost always have Michael Franti, Cassandra Wilson, Nina Simone, and Miranda Lambert on there.

Here are the albums I have on there now:

Michael Franti - "Everyone Deserves Music"
"Hunger Games" soundtrack
Miranda Lambert - "Four The Record"
Vijay Iyer - "Historicity"
Ellington/Mingus/Roach - "Money Jungle"
Nine Simone - "Silk/Soul"
Allen Toussaint - "The Bright Mississippi"

And then my running mix. The master mix stays on my laptop and has about 70 songs on it; I typically put about 40 of them on the shuffle. This includes disco, pop, and rock.

I've been listening more closely to music in the past few years, really listening, piano and bass mostly (guitar too, thanks to my rock star husband). I've even been putting on monster headphones at home so I can get a good listen in while I sew. The other day I was listening to a Starbucks compilation from the 60s - Curtis Mayfield, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, etc., and was just blown away by the backing bands. I mean, I've always known they were good but on this day I was really listening carefully and could really appreciate it. Unfortunately, all this careful listening meant that later in the week I was out running and one of my favorite go-to running songs came on --- and I was disappointed in the piano part, it was completely rote and uninspired. And of course then that was all I could hear, even though the piano was really one of the least parts of the song. Dang.

Any favorite running songs?



4 comments:

  1. I think five thousand miles is a good one by the proclaimers and secondhand news by Fleetwood Mac.

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    1. Oh, you're so right! And now I have 5000 Miles stuck in my head. Time to go out and run 5!

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  2. My friend turned me onto DubStep as a genre to run to. Check out The Black Keys, the Von Ehrics, and Dropkick Murphys.

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    1. Thanks! My husband loves The Black Keys and I've been familiarizing myself with their albums so I can put them on the shuffle. I'll check out those others. And you are so right about DubStep - any particular recommendations?

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