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So I recently participated in the Monkeyfilter CD Swap, where everybody gets put in a group of six people, then makes a mix CD to send to the other five, and they all do the same. I sent my discs out on Saturday with the following information, and I thought I'd reproduce it here as today's entry.

As a side note to those of you with access (you know who you are) the following songs can all be found on music.westnet

It seems many are going to go for obscure songs few have ever heard. And absolutely, some of the best songs ever written are those that no one knows about, and I look forward to any incoming CDs in that vein.

But this time, I made a conscious decision not to shy away from songs and bands you likely have heard, and simply put together a mix of songs I like. I hope you'll like them as much as I, and even if you've heard them before, sit back and appreciate them anew.

1. The album opens with Aimee Mann's cover of Three Dog Night's 'One', off the soundtrack to the film Magnolia. I feel it adds quite a bit to the song, and is an interesting, somewhat stripped down interpretation, while still playing with the song and adding some new elements to it.


2. After the previous song ends, we immediately jump into the first of many 60's songs on the album, Arlo Guthrie's Woodstock recording of 'Coming into Los Angeles'. Perhaps the finest pro-drug smuggling song ever written.


3. An immediate downtempo shift to a mix of sadder songs, starting with the quiet and sweet 'Atlanta', a wonderful Scott Weiland ballad from the Stone Temple Pilots album No. 4.


4. Ben Folds' 'The Ascent of Stan' follows, telling the tale of a former hippie who has become an adult and joined the institution. It is, we are told in a neat mix of sadness and piano rock, no fun to be The Man.


5. Elliot Smith introduces the next song, one of my absolute favorites, as 'not really having a name', but fans will recognize it as a live version of what was eventually released as 'Happiness'.


6. Billy Joel follows up with another song of loneliness and loss, 'Why Judy Why', off his early Cold Spring Harbor album, an excellent and rather downcast album with very little of the pop he later became known for.


7. The theme continues but the tempo picks up with 'No Milk Today', by Herman's Hermits.


8. Next we come to 'Standing', from the musical episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a tone switch from "I've been left" to "I must leave". The context of the song is that the father-figure male singer (Anthony Stewart Head), is singing about his decision to leave to allow Buffy to grow up and 'be the adult' she needs to be, while the female singer (Amber Benson) sings of needing to leave her girlfriend because she was lied to and manipulated. I think it is a strong song on its own, and a very strong song in the context of the musical. Besides, I've always been a sucker for that counterpoint singing thing.


9. We end this mini-theme with The White Stripes' 'I'm Bound to Pack it Up' off of De Stijl. One of those songs I often find I've been whistling without realizing it.


10. Lighter tone returns with Simon & Garfunkel's 'America', a tale of two people getting to know one another on a bus trip across the country. My girlfriend and I used to debate whether the singer and Kathy were already together, or if they just met that day. I'll let you decide.


11. Paul McCartney shows that when he really really wants to, he can still pull out that old Macca magic in 'Lonely Road'. A catchy rock song that dances around a bit, getting harder as it goes on (well, it is Paul McCartney, so we grade 'hard' on a curve.)


12. Paul appears again with his former band on The Beatles' 'Hey Bulldog' from Yellow Submarine.


13. We then follow the thread through George Harrison to The Traveling Wilburys, probably the most 'super' of any 'supergroup' ever formed. Here George, Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty, and Jeff Lynne play the undeniably catchy 'End of the Line'.


14. One time my friend Kaitlin and I were at the mall, and we ended up in a pretty brutal fistfight with Irving Depeche, lead singer of Depeche Mode. Ever since then, I've never liked the guy, but no one can deny that 'Policy of Truth' is an incredible song off an incredible album, 1990's Violator.


15. Barenaked Ladies next offer up the incredibly danceable, jazzy, loungy, 'Blame it on Me'.


16. We now enter the home stretch of the album, with a faithful cover of Bob Dylan's beautiful 'Don't Think Twice, It's Alright', performed live by Joan Baez and the Indigo Girls.


17. This upbeat song however is intentionally and abruptly juxtaposed with the dark side of Bob Dylan, 'Masters of War', a strong condemnation of the businessmen maintaining the Vietnam war for their own profits. There are not many 60's-era folk songs with lines such as "And I hope that you die, and your death will come soon." It's chilling to hear it said, and know he meant every word. It's even more chilling if you listen to it and end up agreeing.


18. We return to the Buffy musical for our farewell song, 'Sweet's Song', which seems to sum up this exercise quite well.


19. And so we end. I hope you enjoyed listening to it as much as I enjoyed making it. Of course, we can't go without an encore, so we close with my favorite musician of all time, George Harrison, and his ukelele rendition of 'The Devil and the Deep Blue Sea'