5 Songs We Can't Stop Listening To is a collection of our newest favorite songs. Every week we ask an artist that we love to tell us about the music they love.
Listen to the whole segment and all the songs below.
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1. Louis the Child picks "Westworld" by Evan Giia
My guests today is Louis the Child. Louis the Child is actually two people. It’s made up of Freddy Kennett and Robby Hauldren. They’ve been making electronic music for a couple of years now and they have been headlining festivals around the country, most recently Jawbreaker Festival here in Milwaukee. We are playing their new song “Dear Sense,” my guests today is Freddy Kennett and Robby Hauldren, who are Louis the Child.
Justin Barney: What is one song that you can’t stop listening to?
Robbie Hauldren: It’s a song for me, that was in heavy rotation and then I sort of forgot about it. Then I heard it again and was like, “Oh Sh**” I forgot how good this song is. It’s the song, “Westworld” by Evan Giia.
Justin Barney: Alright!
Robbie Hauldren: It’s like a female singer that, I don’t know is just a very fun, bubbly, happy pop song.
Justin Barney: Where did you hear this song the first time and how did it come back to you?
Robbie Hauldren: The first time I heard it one of our bigger fans had asked me if I ever heard of Evan Giia, and you should check this girl out you guys could make a cool song together or something and I was like sweet. Then I listened to the song and was like, damn this is awesome.
Justin Barney: I love that!
Robbie Hauldren: Then we were in New York for the weekend and I was hanging out with a friend and we were in an Uber and my friend was using her phone to play music and was like you should pick a song so I was scrolling through her Soundcloud likes and stumbled upon it and was like, oh sweet I’ll play this one.
Justin Barney: That is amazing, what is the name of the song?
Robbie Hauldren: Westworld. The artist is Evan Giia, and “Giaa” is like “G-i-i-a” !
Justin Barney: That’s so awesome that you heard that from a fan and then listened to it. I love that.
Freddy Kennett: We find a good amount of music from fans sending us stuff.
Justin Barney: Do you really? That’s so cool.
Freddy Kennett: Yeah we definitely like send a good amount of messages back and forth of people who message us on Instagram or whatever social media. It’s fun to talk to them and get their taste right now, or whatever it is that their listening to for the moment.
2. Kurtis Blow picks “Mans Not Hot” by Big Shaq
Every week for the first song we ask one artist we love to tell us about a song that they love, and today we have hip-hop royalty.
Kurtis Blow is the bonafide hip-hop legend. Before 1979 no major record label would take a shot with this new genre, but Mercury Records did by signing this guy Kurtis Blow to a two-song deal. The thing was that both songs needed to be hits and in order to have a better shot at making hit, Kurtis Blow wrote a Christmas song; a hip-hop Christmas song called, “Christmas Rappin’.” It ended up selling more than half a million copies and his next single, the B-side, “The Breaks” sold half a million copies as well. The entire genre is indebted to the fact that these were hits and hip-hop might not have survived without Kurtis Blow.
Tuesday, November 27, Kurtis Blow is bringing Hip Hop Nutcracker to The Riverside once again.
It is my honor to have Kurtis Blow as my guest on “5 Songs We Can’t Stop Listening To.”
Justin Barney: Kurtis Blow, what is one song right now that you can’t stop listening to?
Kurtis Blow: Oh my gosh it’s a song out right now. It’s really a funny song made by a comedian, his name is Big Shaq and he’s actually from England. The song is called, “Man’s Not Hot” and he comes out with this accent and the chorus goes like, “She asked me to take off my jacket. I said babe, man’s not hot.” It’s just so crazy and stupid and along with the accent… “Man’s not hot.”
Justin Barney: That’s so funny. What do you like about it?
Kurtis Blow: It’s just stupid and it makes no sense at all, but I can see myself saying that. I can just see my wife saying, “Take off your jacket” and saying, “Hey babe, man’s not hot.”
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3. Cat Power picks “Ain’t It Fun” by Peter Laughner
Our guest today is Chan Marshall who is Cat Power. Cat Power is bit of an indie rock mainstay. She’s from Atlanta, Georgia. In 1998 she released, "Moon Picks," in 2006 she released the album, "The Greatest" and this year she’s got a brand new release which is fantastic, it is called, "Wanderer."
(Chan Marshall was super generous with her time, she called me from her hotel in New York the day after recording the Late Show with Stephen Colbert. So, I just wanted to thank her extra here.)
Justin Barney: What is the last song you couldn’t stop listening to?
Chan Marshall: You mean in general?
Justin: In general and it can be anything.
Chan: Okay, umm recently it’s “Ain’t it fun” by, it was recorded by The Dead Boys. I think Rocket from the Tombs did it, but you know what, Peter Laughner’s version, Peter Laughner’s version has just been on the tip of my tongue lately.
Justin: Why is that?
Chan: I just love it! Just love it!
Justin: I don’t really know Peter Laughner, who is he?
Chan: No one does!
Justin: haha! Why is that?
Chan: It’s just old school, they were never huge you know?
Justin: Yeah, but what do you like about the song itself?
Chan: Mmm, the story, the tone of his guitar, the tone of his voice, yeah and his attitude.
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4. Jim James picks “Like a Bridge Over Troubled Water” by Aretha Franklin
My guest today is Jim James. Jim James is the lead singer of My Morning Jacket. He’s also had a long solo career too, he just released an album called, “Uniform Distortion” and we’ve been playing the song, “Throwback” from that album. We caught James on his “Future is Voting” concert at UW-M. Check the video we made together here.
Justin Barney: Jim, what is one song you can’t stop listening to?
Jim James: So the song I haven’t been able to stop listening to is Aretha Franklin’s version of, “Like a Bridge Over Troubled Water.”
So I had heard it a long time ago, but hadn’t heard it in a while. And the night Aretha passed I called around. I was in Los Angeles and we just wanted to go dance to her music, so I called probably every bar in Los Angeles trying to say,
“Hey, are y’all having like a dance party?”
Nobody was. And there is this roller skating rink that we go to. I called them, “Y’all having anything for Aretha tonight?” and the woman was like, “No, but we’re having something…” I don’t remember the date, but it was like a month later. So I put it on the calendar.
A month later we went to this roller skating party. It was all Aretha music. We were all skating around. And when you’re skating it’s like you’re hypnotized by the round and round and round of the rink. But you also have to remember the rules of skating. Like you can’t just start dancing or you’ll fall.
But one moment I had, they were played her version of, “Like a Bridge over Troubled Water.” And I was just lost. Completely lost in it.
From that day, I literally have not listened to anything else but that song.
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5. Toro Y Moi picks “Reflections” by Steve Roach
My guest today is Chaz Bear aka, Toro Y Moi. Chaz is from Oakland, California. We’ve played just about everything that this guy has released. He’s got a new album coming out in late January called “Outer Peace” and we’ve been playing his new jam “Freelance.”
Justin Barney: Chaz what is the last song that you couldn’t stop listening to?
Chaz: “Couldn’t?” As in I wasn’t allowed to stop listening to? I don’t know, cause I was just in rehearsals for the past ten days for ten hours a day learning all of the album, so that’s all I have been into right now. Thats all thats been entering my ears is all this new Toro stuff. But other than that I’d say I have my staples I usually go to in between practices and stuff. I’ve been really into this guy I found, his name is Steve Roach. It’s really weird ambient electronic type stuff from the ’80s and ’90s. Yeah, it’s just some stuff to decompress to.
Justin Barney: That’s interesting. Why do you like him and why do you like ambient music?
Chaz:: Ambient music is so far out that it’s almost not even a genre. I guess it’s surprising that they had to just name it that, but like it can be so many different things. And that’s the thing, there’s not just long sustaining notes of pad sounds and stuff, it can be textures if it wanted to be. That’s what really draws me to a lot of the music I make. I usually start with the space first. Say I have the drums and the next thing that’s coming up for the chords or the notes – it’s usually the ambient notes that come to me first instead of the bassline or just straight forward chords.
Justin Barney: Could we cue in on a specific song?
Chaz: I think I’m gonna go with “Reflections” just because the title and really they all have the same sort of vibe, you’ll feel like you’re falling in slow motion. But “Reflection” is a great title, that’s probably the song I’d choose.
It’s actually playing right now in the background of this phone call… I don’t know how that happened but that’s pretty tight.
Justin Barney: (laughing) That’s awesome.
Toro Y Moi: I can do totally anxiety free phone calls now.