There's no theme for this playlist, either for my 250th list, or the nation's anniversary, but it's always good to look back. In March 2024, 27 months ago, I decided to try a new approach to playlist composition: I created a meta-playlist in Tidal of candidate songs for future playlists, called Next and Next. What went in there? Many classic favorite songs I'd liked for ages, but never appeared in a playlist before; songs I recently discovered and liked, and singles from bands I liked that I hadn't listened to yet. The idea was to listen to this playlist on shuffle and find combinations of songs that could go together on a playlist, and get to know new songs, for better or worse. In 2024, that meta-playlist, aka Next And Next, aka The Hopper, had 70 songs in it. Quickly it ballooned to 600.
In 2024 I wrote "There's no hurry to create new playlists. I'm going to wait however long it takes until I'm ready to pull together an organic playlist." I thought this system would slow down my cadence. In practice, my cadence hasn't slowed, but the track selections have improved: I'm creating ~12 playlists per year, my fastest rate in 30 years (save one), but I'm finding places for my favorite bands again, so my playlists aren't dominated by good songs I don't know well.
- The Pointer Sisters "The Shape I'm In"
- "Voulez-Vous" the second-ever ABBA song on one of my playlists, after "Waterloo" on playlist 72, twenty-five years ago.
- Paul Simon with Good Rockin' Dopsie and The Twisters "That Was Your Mother" I loved the Graceland album when it came out in 1986, but as a 14-year-old, I didn't get that while most of the record was heavily influenced (and performed) by African musicans, this song was a Zydeco song, and "All Around The World" was a (uncredited) Paul Simon / Los Lobos collab.
- Bruce Springsteen "One Love", from the Streets Of Philadelphia sessions.
- Mobb Deep "Got It Twisted"
- Stevie Wonder "Too High"
- Beck "The New Pollution"
- Sade "Your Love Is King"
- Fleetwood Mac "Little Lies"
- The Beatles "We Can Work It Out"
- Rilo Kiley "The Execution Of All Things"
- The Rolling Stones "Mother's Little Helper"
- Pete Rock and C.L. Smooth "They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y.)"
- Ruby Johnson "If I Ever Needed Love (I Sure Do Need It Now)"
- Pete Yorn "Ransom"
- The Smiths "Cemetry Gates"
- Alison Krauss and Union Station "Teardrops Will Kiss The Morning Dew"
- Aimee Mann "You Fall"
- Chris Difford "Cowboys Are My Weakness"
- Suzanne Vega "World Before Columbus"
- Sinead O'Connor "I Am Stretched On Your Grave"
