Random 10, sneaking in not quite under the radar. Crap.

I’m probably too tired to be doing this, and while it’s technically Saturday, my brain has always figured that it doesn’t become the next day until you go to bed and then wake up the next morning. Which makes it kind of weird for those days that I can’t fall asleep. I end up with one long 48-hour day, and one day that just doesn’t exist at all.

1. Nine Inch Nails – Right Where It Belongs – I’m actually a pretty big NIN fan, and love dragging out some of Reznor’s slower, softer stuff to play for people who’ve never heard him before. There’s always a “That’s Nine Inch Nails!?” kind of moment that’s fun. This is probably the best track off the “With Teeth” album which, while good, didn’t quite resonate with me as much as some of his earlier stuff (I still consider “The Fragile” his best work).


2. Nine Inch Nails – We’re in This Together – And speaking of “The Fragile”…here’s a nice, angry love song from it. And one of my favourite Nine Inch Nails tracks (my mind might be playing tricks on me at this hour, but a part of me thinks that I have a soft, almost ballad-like version of this song somewhere).


3. Enigma – Traces (Light and Weight) – I had kind of a thing for Enigma when they (him?) first appeared in the early nineties. They had this weird kind of hybrid music, mixing Gregorian chanting with synthesized bass and drum stuff, that I’d never heard anywhere before. I love listening to musical experiments, whether they work out for the best or not (although I definitely prefer the ones that work) and Enigma’s work might have been the first experience I had with an experimental sort-of musical hybrid. Having said all that, this song sounds like it was from one of their later albums that I downloaded but never listened to, because it doesn’t sound familiar.


4. Pink Floyd – Nobody Home – Ah, after a few weeks of getting overrated Pink Floyd stuff, here’s a nice little piece about self-alienation. Have I mentioned here that I saw Roger Waters in concert at The Gorge in Washington in 2000? Fan-fucking-tastic show. I don’t care how much Gilmour, Mason and Wright have tried to maintain the band since Waters’ departure, Rog really was Pink Floyd. And couldn’t begin to tell you what I would have given to see the band reunited for Live Aid (I heard some MP3s from the show, and literally got shivers). This particular version is from this very weird “Every Brick In The Wall” version of the album that mixes together stuff from the original album, from the movie, and from the live release “Is There Anybody Out There?” into some kind of massive, all-things-to-all-people version. I don’t know if it’s an improvement over the original, but it’s certainly an interesting musical experiment.


5. Depeche Mode – Black Celebration – I think I’m suffering from literary elephantitis tonight, so I’ll restrict my comments on this song to mentioning that the first time I heard it – at a concert – I thought it was a “Grand Celebration” they were singing about.


6. Depeche Mode – Dangerous (Hazchemix) – This was a B-side to one of the singles off the “Violator” album, if memory serves. A pretty good song. Not a classic, exactly, but hardly dreadful. Though listening to this remix of the song, I can’t remember if it ever had any lyrics beyond the repetition of the word “Dangerous”…


7. Milla Jovovich – You Did It All Before – I can’t even remember, for the life of me, why I downloaded this. But I have a recollection of reading somewhere that it was actually surprisingly good, for an album from a supermodel / actress – something more than just a vanity project. Don’t think I’ve ever listened to it before. And you know what? It’s actually not bad…


8. Mark Morgan – Vault 13 – I actually had to look at the songs that were next to it on my playlist to even know what this was from, and then it struck me – Fallout! Video game soundtrack stuff is great, because you reminisce about the feelings created by the game. And in this case, it was your first bits of wandering around, exploring your nuclear holocaust bunker, before wandering out into the desert wasteland to begin your adventure. The music from Fallout couldn’t really be called music, exactly – it was more ambient, mood-setting, musical textures. But what fantastic ambient, mood-setting, musical textures they were.


9. Erasure – Take a Chance On Me – Cheesy 80s techno-band takes on cheesy 70s Scandinavian fluff band. Abba was Scandinavian, right?


10. Depeche Mode – Route 66 (Beatmasters Mix) – The Depeche Modes? Two Nine Inch Nails? Wow, this playlist didn’t stray far in the musica obscura, did it? I always like Depeche Mode’s take on “Route 66” (though my favourite is the one they smushed up with “Behind the Wheel”) so it’s kind of cool to hear this again. Even if this particular mix is kind of annoying.


11. The Clash – Should I Stay or Should I Go – I actually know where this one is from – a CD titled something like “The Best Pub Jukebox Ever” which consists of two CDs. Some of the tunes from it I have heard more than just a time or two at a few pubs. Others, like this, I have yet to hear at a fine drinking establishment. Not to say that it doesn’t belong there. Just that I have yet to experience the joys of it in the pub environment.