Playlist By Committee is a subdivision of the Institute of Idle Time dedicated to the preservation of the mixtape format. Each month, four governing members and one guest contributor choose a theme and each pick five songs that best correspond to that theme. The songs are then reviewed and ranked by the committee, with the the top songs being added until an 80 minute blank CD is filled. The list is then published via Mixcloud for the listening pleasure of all who seek it. This is our 4th playlist.
Idle Timers are a group of people who value escapism, it’s part of the reason we all came together (okay, and to assert our opinions). While the earliest PBC lists were about individual artists/bands, we quickly moved onto themes. While different from one another, they always had a quality of music that took you somewhere be it a cave or a drug induced coma.
With our guest this month, GWC decided to pick one theme that reached into the whimsy side of IT. Those songs that have such an otherworldly feel, that you can’t held but be transported to another world. So here we have an assortment of various songs that will take us all over the places all over our mind. We’ll start with a little psychedelic explosion before cruising over to an electronic dreamscape and finally ending in the haunting world of your mind. We hope you can stay with us the entire flight.
Playlist By Committee is a subdivision of the Institute of Idle Time dedicated to the preservation of the mixtape format. Each month, four governing members and one guest contributor choose a theme and each pick five songs that best correspond to that theme. The songs are then reviewed and ranked by the committee, with the the top songs being added until an 80 minute blank CD is filled. The list is then published via Mixcloud for the listening pleasure of all who seek it. This is our 3rd playlist.
Whether you love him or hate him, Kanye West is one of the most influential figures in music today. In the last fifteen years, he’s released seven solo-albums, all received with acclaim. In addition to his own catalog, Kanye has had his hands all over the music landscape, producing songs for other big artists, contributing verses alongside the likes of Beyoncé, Jay-Z, and Rick Ross, as well as producing for his own independent label (music he later releases for free). Continue reading PBC #3: Yeezy Taught Me→
A1. Side one, track one. How do you put your best foot forward?
I’ve been harboring a personal fascination with opening tracks for a while now, so when I saw that this Playlist By Committee theme was still up for grabs, I had to take it.
This was a tough playlist for us to come up with, as there are enough glaring omissions to create multiple volumes of Best Opening Track playlists. Our thought process behind building this was what opening track does the best job at making you want to keep listening to the rest of the album. These nineteen tracks all do fantastic jobs at opening the door to their respective albums, ushering you in to whole new worlds with plenty to explore.
We hope you’ll enjoy!
PBC: Steak Sauce
1. Prince – Let’s Go Crazy
Even before this mix got started, I knew this would be my number one pick. I was threatening any other PBC member who voted it down. Then the unthinkable happened and I knew it had to be here. The iconic opening shot of Purple Rain with Prince giving a EULOGY TO LIFE with his back turned shrouded in smoke is forever burned into everyone’s mind. With that it turns into the greatest “fuck it, I am partying until I die” song. – BC
Being creatures of free will, human beings don’t need a reason to celebrate, but boy, do we sure love an excuse to party. Think back a few weeks ago to St. Patrick’s Day: this is a holiday that commemorates a figure of a specific cultural heritage that makes up just a slice of the world’s population. Yet Irish or not, everyone loves to swill green beer, sing Irish shanties, and be surrounded by their friends and loved ones. We persistently come up with arbitrary holidays, either with legitimate cultural origins or simply for the sake of themselves, just to have an excuse to bring people together to laugh, love, and to enjoy. To further illustrate, we here at the Institute of Idle Time are gearing up to celebrate 15 years of obsessive list making and other asinine, pop-related pursuits with a beach bonfire that required months of preparation and planning. Why?
Because why not?
So happy April Fool’s day, perhaps the most pointless of all celebrations! In the tradition of the Roman hilaria, the medieval Feast of Fools, and the Hindu celebration of Holi, The Playlist By Committee has decided to celebrate this most frivolous springtime tradition with a special mixtape. These are not funny songs, or songs about being fools. In fact, these aren’t really songs. PBC’s “All Fools” is a compilation of our favorite skits and interludes on albums. These are the tracks that you never hear on Pandora, and that you more likely than not skip through when listening to full-albums on your iPod or CD player. They’re neglected because they rarely ever reach pop-song length, and in some cases are derided by critics, but we here at PBC think nothing is too unimportant to spend hours of our lives debating and organizing. The result of our labors is a series of intermissions that add up to about the length of an episode of Seinfeld, the best metric for time, and hopefully you’ll find it equally entertaining.
You may think this is a pointless endeavor. That thought crossed our minds too. But maybe we just wanted a reason to get together and make another list before our next official playlist. We built this for the same reason you’ll hopefully give it a listen.
Because why not?
PBC: All Fools
Wiz Khalifa – Slim Skit
It’s been ten years since Wiz Khalifa debuted, and finally people seem to care as little about him as I do. I won’t say I’m immune to his hits; “Say Yeah” and “Black and Yellow” are undeniably infectious, but “Slim Skit” off his Kush and Orange Juice mixtape is my favorite thing he’s ever produced. The bongos and whining guitar imitate a Curtis Mayfield track, then Slim’s monologue sounds straight out of a 1970’s exploitation movie. His lamentations are funny, semi-sympathetic, and littered with pieces of casual wisdom (re: “you gotta stay cool”). – RF Continue reading PBC: All Fools→
We here at PBC are obsessed with making mixtapes. What began as infrequent debates about what we would consider various artists’ best songs, became a structured and rigorous method designed to create the best possible mixtapes. The process begins by the nomination of a theme by the current PBC Chairman, a rotating position that changes monthly. Next they nominate a guest to join the group in curating that theme’s mixtape. Once a theme and guest is chosen a draft occurs. Each member nominates a song to join the playlist. After everyone has picked five songs the PBC ranks the songs based on how well they fit the theme, and how well they contribute to an amazing mixtape. Sometimes we determine that a single song is so integral to the theme that every one of us would pick it; we deem that a “bonus song” that automatically skips the draft and gets to the final mix. The other songs with the highest voted position join the “cut” until the mixtape reaches 80 minutes, the maximum length of a CD.
The PBC is dedicated to preserving the tradition of the mixtape format, therefore part of our process includes tailoring the list to fit this beloved, yet antiquated format. However, we are forward thinking and publish our list through our Spotify account, “instituteofidletime”. Lastly, accompanying each song on the list is a short blurb written by either a PBC member or current guest. This week’s guest is the esteemed DH, who seemed a most appropriate choice considering he is a musician who has composed and performed multiple songs about space, as well as the fact that as a cliff dweller he spends his nights closer to space than any member of the PBC.
PLAYLIST #1: SPACE IS THE PLACE
Upward has always been the most formidable direction in which one could wish to travel. The energy required to elevate a human body only a few feet above the ground is beyond all but the most agile people. Most simply elevate a few thousand feet every now and again, comfortably staying in the soft, nurturing atmosphere of Earth. Those brave few that venture upward though, beyond our nest and into the vastness of space, they are hailed as heroes. Space is the place for them to engage with the new frontier of humankind. Space is the place for us to manifest our dreams of exploration and wonder. Space is the place where possibilities are as limitless are they are improbable. If space is the place for you, then we have some hazy cosmic jives to set your radio radiating positive vibrations into the void. Good luck travelers.Continue reading PBC #1: Space Is The Place→
The Institute of Idle Time 