Music to soothe my partner's troubled soul.

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Please recommend me some recent-ish music (Jan 2006 onwards) that I can safely play at weekends without having my boyfriend freak out on me. ("What's that SHIT?") He's been through a bereavement and a load of other stress recently, so I'm trying to find some common ground: namely, music that's soothing but spirited, tuneful but not bland, musicianly but not dry, grown-up but not boringly middle-aged.

Examples of the sort of stuff that has worked: Joan As Policewoman, the new Ali Farka Toure, Lindstrom & Prins Thomas (played to death now) Sufjan's Illinoise (double ditto). Also loads of Mali desert blues, Caetano Veloso, Al Green, Ray Charles, classic Stax/Atlantic - but I'm after new stuff, not old.

The Big No-no's: it can't be bleak, angular, morbid or twee.

Stuff that has failed Big Time: Guillemots, Richard Hawley, Phoenix, Hot Chip, Corinne Bleeding Bailey Sodding Rae. Imogen Heap was a near-miss.

(I'm just trying out Cat Power's The Greatest, but it might fail the Bleak Test.)

Thoughts, please?

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 16:58 (nineteen years ago)

Pipettes?

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:01 (nineteen years ago)

Hah, I've just recently bought that! Not wishing to be overly awkward, but it's a bit too perky fun-fun-fun. Excessively happy music makes him miserable, you see - it's a fine balance.

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:04 (nineteen years ago)

Jenny Lewis: Rabbit Fur Coat
Neko Case: Fox Confessor Brings The Flood
Amy Millan: Honey From The Tombs

― kornrulez6969 (TCBeing), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:04 (nineteen years ago)

Maybe he needs something other than music...

― The Brainwasher (Twilight), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:05 (nineteen years ago)

sad to hear this mike. i take it you already have (or have tried) the PSV's back to mine comp? (neil tennat's disc?)

Tape - Rideau
the Kelley Polar album
the idjut boys' "press play" compilation (mostly old stuff but very good)
Max Richter - The Blue Notebooks
The Books - Lost and Safe

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:12 (nineteen years ago)

missed the bit in your post about ja. 2006, sorry. i think that Tape album may do the trick.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:16 (nineteen years ago)

Roger Dean Young & the Tin Cup - Casa? Calexico-ish countrystuff
The Neins Circa - Sufjan-meets-MtnGotez-meets-Neil Diamond

― Huk-L (Huk-L), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:25 (nineteen years ago)

so many typos.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:28 (nineteen years ago)

Aha! Although he loathes the PSBs (too studied, too mannered, too arch, too gay-with-a-capital-G), he does indeed like the Neil Tennant disc of the PSBs Back To Mine. I need to pull that one out again.

The Kelley Polar album is another tried and tested good one, and still played a lot.

I haven't heard any of the others, but shall investigate. Calexico-ish sounds good. Sufjan-meets-Darnielle-meets-Diamond sounds good.

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:40 (nineteen years ago)

I've also just got hold of Grupo Semente & Teresa Cristina - O Mundo É Meu Lugar (Ao Vivo), and am fairly sure I'm onto a winner...

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 17:44 (nineteen years ago)

Hmm. Of the ones I can find & preview on iTunes, I'd say they were leaning a little too far either to the melancholy or the soporific (but in a good way, a good way). Neko Case probably leads the pack so far.

(Except... it doesn't. He says he doesn't want gloomy folky women.)

Something a little more spirited, then. It's a tricky balance...

― mike t-diva (mike t-diva), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 18:08 (nineteen years ago)

What about something giddily cornbally, like the forthcoming Barry Manilow Sings The Sixties?

― Joseph McCombs (Joseph McCombs), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 18:32 (nineteen years ago)

hmm mike, yr right about some of my rec's being soporific. try the idjut boys mix tho, i think it could be a winner.

― jed_ (jed), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 18:37 (nineteen years ago)

Peter, Bjorn & John - "Writer's Block".

― Clumsy Colin in ACTION BIKER (coach_mcguirk), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 21:13 (nineteen years ago)

Joy Division and Nick Drake (sorry I just couldn't resist)

― douglas eklund (skolle), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 23:51 (nineteen years ago)

Might not be soothing enough, but the Futureheads' new one is a good balance in other ways, spirited but sober.

― Lukas (lukas), Wednesday, 9 August 2006 23:59 (nineteen years ago)

brian wilson's "smile".

― Emily B (Emily B), Thursday, 10 August 2006 00:46 (nineteen years ago)

Ochre - Lemodie. Blissful melodic electronica.

― Andrew (enneff), Thursday, 10 August 2006 00:52 (nineteen years ago)

Maybe Sondre Lerche's Duper Sessions?

― brittle-lemon (brittle-lemon), Thursday, 10 August 2006 01:03 (nineteen years ago)

El Perro Del Mar?

― Brock! (Brock!), Thursday, 10 August 2006 01:23 (nineteen years ago)

Merzbow - "Aqua Necromancer"

No, for serious. What about some Aimee Mann? The Magnolia soundtrack is brilliant. Or Beth Orton's "Trailerpark", or
OMG I KNOW!!! William Orbit's "Hello Waveforms"!!!!!! Just go to http://www.williamorbit.com/ and it'll automatically start playing the best track on the album ("Sea Green"). If that's not soothing I don't know what the fuck is.

― less-than three's Christiane F. (drowned in milk), Thursday, 10 August 2006 01:31 (nineteen years ago)

Let the boyfriend pick the music for a while.

― Whitman Mayonnaise (Rock Hardy), Thursday, 10 August 2006 01:40 (nineteen years ago)

Give him my condolences mike.

Freda Payne's fairly unfuckwithable.

― Son of Spam (noodle vague), Thursday, 10 August 2006 06:19 (nineteen years ago)

He seems like a real queen. You need to get yourself a nice healthy bear.

Pedro Veral is nice.
http://www.abearslifemag.com/images/home/images/home1_12.jpg

― less-than three's Christiane F. (drowned in milk), Thursday, 10 August 2006 06:44 (nineteen years ago)

He's been through a bereavement

Lindstrom & Prins Thomas (played to death now)

...

― StanM (StanM), Thursday, 10 August 2006 06:47 (nineteen years ago)

certain Tom Waits stuff really cheered me up when I was depressed, though mortality is one of his main themes.
other stuff that cheers me but is also engaging:

Judee Sill
lots of dub (esp King Tubby)
early Pink Floyd
a cowboy in sweden by Lee Hazlewood

― spectra (spectra), Thursday, 10 August 2006 07:49 (nineteen years ago)

Jeff Buckley?

― Mordechai Shinefield (Mordy), Thursday, 10 August 2006 16:03 (nineteen years ago)

Brainwasher and Will Crumpw OTM.

I think music suggestions are a lower priority here.

Save the music money, and get him a professional massage somewhere.

― wrapped up like a DOUche in the middle of the NUT (donut), Thursday, 10 August 2006 16:08 (nineteen years ago)

definitely Calexico!

― ChiaroScuro (chiaroscuro), Thursday, 10 August 2006 17:11 (nineteen years ago)

ihttp://www.discogs.com/image/R-150-414844-1111791228.jpg

― Alicia Titsovich (sexyDancer), Thursday, 10 August 2006 17:35 (nineteen years ago)

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