Set 1

“Summer Babe (Winter Version)” by Pavement

Not their most well-known song, but one of them. From their seminal debut, Slanted and Enchanted. Apparently the “Winter Version” means something, because there’s a version on the Westing (by Musket and Sextant) compilation that doesn’t have it, but I don’t know what the differences are.

“Wake Up” by the Walkmen

More Walkmen? Yes.

“Stoned and Starving” by Parquet Courts

I’ve been wanted to play Parquet Courts for a while because they’re probably my favorite band of the past decade, and here I finally got to. This was the first song by them I heard, and probably one of their most famous; Pitchfork named it one of the best of the decade “so far” back in 2014. The lyrics are fun, but they don’t give the full scope of the intellectualism behind a lot of the band’s songs. Still, it’s a good song.

“The Weather Song” by Ought

From More Than Any Other Day. Not much to say about this one.

Set 2

“Blacking Out the Friction” by Death Cab for Cutie

Again, a band I’ve wanted to play for a while. DCFC were my first favorite band, and this is probably my favorite track from the album it’s on, The Photo Album. I was really into this album in particular around the time of Hurricane Sandy, so it always brings back memories of that time period for me.

“Murder Me Rachael” by the National

This is from their second album Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers, which is often overlooked because it came out before their breakthrough, Alligator. At the time they still had some vestiges of the country sounds from their first album, but as you can see from this song, they were on their way to finding themselves. I think it’s an unfairly overlooked piece of their catalog.

“Wet Hair” by Japandroids

From Post-Nothing. I still haven’t gotten to play anything from Celebration Rock; hopefully that will change.

“I Was Born (A Unicorn)” by the Unicorns

From their only album, Who Will Cut Our Hair When We’re Gone? Lyrically this is probably my favorite of their songs, although like I said on another broadcast, my favorite song overall of theirs is “Sea Ghost”.

“I’m Not Part of Me” by Cloud Nothings

From Here and Nowhere Else from 2014. Pitchfork named it one of the best songs of the decade.

“New York City Cops” by the Strokes

This song has a bit of a story behind its release. It was included on the original track listing on the UK release (with the butt album cover) that came out in July 2001, but it was replaced with “When It Started” for the American CD release. They did that because of 9/11, which, coincidentally, was the day the album was originally slated to be released. The band felt it was inappropriate to include a song disparaging the NYPD in the wake of their response to the attacks. They haven’t disowned the song though; it was still released as the B-side to “Hard to Explain,” and thy performed it recently at their concert for Bernie. It’s also available on the American vinyl release, because that came out earlier.

Streaming