Mixtape 114 • Can't Do Much
Katie Crutchfield, performing as Waxahatchee, has been slowly and steadily building her repertoire and now her talent is overflowing her banks.
Katie Crutchfield, performing as Waxahatchee, has been slowly and steadily building her repertoire and now her talent is overflowing her banks.

It was a peaceful suburban street, and they had taken great care to select a vehicle that would not stand out when parked along its sidewalks, a gold Taurus wagon. The very familiar nature of the setting — the shading trees, the mottled but well-kept asphalt, the toys scattered on lawns — made it feel like one of the most exotic places they’d been to in a while. The cartographer checked the coordinates on the fancy device strapped to their wrist, but any web search could have found them Brewster, New York. The ethnomusicologist leaned against the mailbox, labeled “Marie”, and scanned the canopy of the tremendous spreading oak planted square in the middle of the lawn, eyes peeled for that squirrel.

Caravan Palace uses old-fashioned swing music for its digital building blocks and emerges with something like audio caffeine

There wasn’t enough room on the narrow boat for the botanist to take out a handkerchief and wipe their brow. The square head vessel, slicing through the water on its way to the Phong Dien Floating Market, looked to be laden with mangos, but that was a ruse. The pyramids that piled the boat only a had a skin a single mango deep. Underneath were piles of something with about the same density as mangos, but much much more valuable. The captain twisted the knob on the cabin radio on hearing some narcopolka, the device’s limited capacity making the sound increase not in volume, only in distortion. The sun sparkled off the water, a thousand heat lasers evading the shade thrown by the wide straw hats they wore.

The keypad beeped softly as the astronomer keyed in the coordinates. It was deepest darkest night on the altiplano, the stars above an unfamiliar configuration for those born to northern skies. The physicist tapped their pencil against their favorite clipboard (the metal one), the coffee-stained papers clipped to it showing the revised calculations for the Hole In The Sky. Over the tinny intercom, hacked because both had forgotten to bring a speaker, a particularly ironic song choice began to play, making them instinctively share a knowing glance.

Snow was expected, but never showed up. Suits me fine. Surprisingly, this is the third episode of 2019, and I’m warming up to the hectic weekly pace. Thanks to Mark, Generoso, Lily, and Robin for tuning in and triumphing over the depths of midwinter midnight.

This is my first time seeing the sun rise from the studio. There's been plenty of sunsets, and plenty of times when I was on the air at the time but in a windowless studio.
Since I was guest host The Orbit Lounge and this was not The Lacking Organization, there was more selection and sequencing going on than usual, with the end result being a good hill climb from warm sleepiness to aerobic panic. Thanks to Lisa from Florida and Geoffrey from France for checkin

After a long absence, the RockaTeens return with their trademark sonic assault, but with the reverb turned down a bit. They kick off this week's show with "Turn and Smile".

Cross-cultural collaboration mixes up a Balkan frenzy with dope beats and MC’ing