March 2021 Challenge Thread

March 6: National Day of Unplugging - Play an album that is acoustic or very nearly so.

Dashboard Confessional - Swiss Army Romance

File this album under ‘Wow Teenagers Are Super Serious About Their Feelings’. Not just because of the content of the album itself, but also how seriously my circle of friends and acquaintances took every little encounter with the opposite sex. What an overly earnest time it was. I remember getting drunk and belting out these songs. Now, I feel slightly goofy even listening to them.

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March 7: Soundtrack Sunday!!!

2001: A Space Odyssey

I know a lot of the music on this soundtrack is supposed to make you uncomfortable and seem off-putting, but holy hell was this giving me the creeps today. I was in the kitchen trimming chicken breasts and something about the music playing from the other room, being alone in the apartment, and cutting into raw hunks of meat was just....unsettling.

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March 9: Daft Punk just announced their break-up as I am writing this. Play some Electronic music in their honor.

This could have been spun yesterday as well as tomorrow.

Clozee - Revolution

Limited to 1000, through now defunct Feedbands label. Clozee is still making music, though. I have four of her records.

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March 8: International Women's Day



The Shaggs ‎– Philosophy Of The World
Red Rooster Records/Rounder Records ‎– 103, 1969/1980

Cut at Sterling
Pressed at Wakefield Manufacturing

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March 9: Daft Punk just announced their break-up as I am writing this. Play some Electronic music in their honor.

I was still buying mostly CD's when I was into electronic music, so my collection of it on vinyl is a bit limited. This is one I got back when it was originally released.

µ-Ziq ‎– Royal Astronomy
Astralwerks ‎– ASW 6275-1, 1999

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March 8: International Women's Day - We love women, play something that is from a woman, or from women, or is about a woman, or is about women.

Taylor Swift - folklore.

I went with an obvious choice for Women's Day. Taylor Swift who is, arguably, the most important single musician of the past decade. I say "arguably" only because people have their own opinions and anyone can be important to anyone else for any reason. Needlessly confusing sentences aside, Ms. Swift has stayed relevant for her entire career while putting out a run of albums with consistent quality to match even the all-time greats. I mean, her awards and nominations have their own Wikipedia entry. List of awards and nominations received by Taylor Swift

Who knows if I never showed up what could've been....
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March 9: Daft Punk just announced their break-up as I am writing this. Play some Electronic music in their honor.

Steve Hauschildt - Nonlin

I don't remember how I heard this or when I ordered it. I just know it showed up one day and it is now in my collection. I spin it every once in a while when I'm in a particular mood. It seemed like a pretty fitting choice to bookend the trio of 2001: A Space Odyssey with it's mix of classical and dread-inducing sounds, Taylor Swift as the palette cleanser, and Nonlin with it's ambient electronic sounds to round out the night.

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March 10: IT'S A LIMITED EDITION!!! Play something marketed at limited.

OK, I have to do this. So the record itself isn't marketed as a limited edition. It's OOP now and I wouldn't be surprised if it gets 10th anniversary pressing in the future but it's not in itself limited. However, something included in it WAS marketed as limited....the goshdarned download card. For real.

With that said, it's easily the coolest download card I've gotten in an album that I remember. They did deliver on that part.

Matt and Kim - Sidewalks (with download card and marketing buzz)

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Day 4 - SURPRISE!
Operation Ivy - Hectic EP

Sorry if a 7" is cheating. I would play Energy if I had it. I never got introduced to much music outside standard classic rock when I was growing up, but got decent at "file sharing" music like everyone else. On a youth group camping trip or something in 8th grade, a girl I new kept singing Room Without A Window and said she had a hard time getting the whole album, so I offered to download it for her. Was surprised at how different it was from her acapella version. Did not get it or like it at first, but after sorting through all the crummy shared versions of the tracks and finally putting a decent version of the Energy+Hectic EP together for her, I loved it. Definitely a beginning of sorts for musical exploration for me.

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Day 10 - limited

Gyedu-Blay Ambolley - The Message

I rather blithely thought I didn't have many limited releases until I looked at Discogs and discovered I had hundreds. And I'm not sure many of them were what I'd really think of as a limited edition. Anyway, this is one that sums up the pros and cons of limited releases - the music is fantastic (funky Ghanaian highlife), the vinyl is coloured, it's limited to (ahem) 2,000 for a pretty obscure release, the cover is silkscreen printed. I'd frankly be happier with a non-limited, black vinyl, standard cover but so goes the vinyl world these days.

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