Jude Rogers is a music writer (Observer, Q Magazine, The Word) who kept a record of her music listening on 16th May 2013 as an example post ahead of Harkive 2013
8.30 – Turn Today programme over to 6Music, to have it on in the background while starting work, having breakfast. Love a song, assume it’s a post-punk/indiepop song from the early ‘80s. Find out it’s Bleached’s Dead In The Head. (I love how radio doesn’t give you context until you hear the presenter – it allows you to make must more honest judgements.) Nearly consider turning it off when Vampire Weekend’s Diane Alone (not a fan) and Lionrock (bad end of the ‘90s) come on…but then love something else, which turns out to be Gaz Coombes’ One Of These Days. Haven’t listened to 6 in the daytime for a while, because I can’t usually work to lyrics – I end up typing them up.
9.30 – Working on a script for a Radio 4 programme, for which I have to provide music. Need a song which represents drunkenness or intoxication, and currently have Jefferson Airplane’s White Rabbit (which I play three times on Spotify). Ask Twitter, who recommend others. Watch videos for Queens Of The Stone Age’s Feelgood Hit Of The Summer, Electrik Red’s Drink In My Cup and A Pair Of Brown Eyes by The Pogues on YouTube. Decide to stick with Jefferson Airplane.
10.45 – Stream of Pet Shop Boys’ new album arrives on email. Spend next hour playing it and live-tweeting excitement like a teenager. Play track 3, Love Is A Bourgeois Construct, five or six times, plugging Mac into main speakers to listen to the discoed-up sample of Michael Nyman’s Chasing Sheep loudly. Pause several times to write down lyrics about Tony Benn and the penal code.
11.45 – Stop Pet Shop Boys to do some work. Accidentally spend hour-and-a-half in silence.
13.30 – After lunch, watch trailer for new Franz Ferdinand album (sent by email) then play Michael off the band’s first album through YouTube.
13.40 – Play new Maps single sent by email from publicist, on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/muterecords/maps-a-m-a/s-q1qhG
13.50 – Turn Radcliffe and Maconie on on 6Music while sending invoices. Gaz Coombes again. Look at his website and think about buying a limited edition 12-inch of the song – decide not to when it’s £11.99 (£8.99 plus £3 p&p).
14.20 – Writing all afternoon. Put on favourite writing album, Roedelius’ Wenn Der Sudwind Weht on Spotify, three times.
16.00 – Break for cuppa. Play John Grant’s Sigourney Weaver and Sensitive New Age Guy on Spotify (saw him last night at the Shepherds’ Bush Empire). Add Sensitive New Age guy to my Spotify DJing playlist. Make it my thisismyjam pick of the week, and tweet/Facebook this.
16.15 – Play Pet Shop Boys’ Love Is A Bourgeois Construct again through the record company stream, twice.
16.30 – Carry on working. Play Talk Talk playlist on Spotify. Bit obsessed with this at the
moment. Only have six tracks on it – Taphead, April 5th, Such A Shame (original), Such
A Shame (1997 remaster), Chameleon Day and Have You Heard The News. Particularly
obsessed with Such A Shame (Original)’s chorus, after the line “eagerness to change”.
Melody makes me well up every time. Still can’t work out how a musical interval can do
this. Something to do with chemistry, possibly. You feel it in your bones.
16.50 – Click on Spotify Artist Radio. Have found this a great way of liking similar artists
to ones I like – the algorithm seems to work usually. Not great to *do* work to today,
however. Shamefully skip Bronski Beat’s Why? as it pops up while I’m on a bit of
writing roll and it’s too obtrusive. Ditto Depeche Mode’s Enjoy The Silence. Roxy
Music’s More Than This and The The’s Twilight Hour better.
20.00 – Few hours off, now listen to husband’s iPod through the kitchen door while making dinner. Taylor Dupree, record called Faint, from 2012. Nice ambient electronics – make mental note to Spotify him on weekend.
21.45 – Car races down our road blasting out loud/bad EDM/R&B song. Google lyrics on iPhone and it’s Chris Brown’s “Turn Up The Music”. Realise how odd it is for him to be in the news all the time and me not really know any of his songs. Fight back by turning telly up.