Tone Deaf Vet – a playlist for recovery

feel so close – Calvin Harris (this is why people still buy good headphones to get right under these vocals. it is a great song anyway but well and properly produced)

the boys light up – Australian Crawl (once upon a time a bloke said that if you have awesome dualling guitars in extreme stereo and a killer vocalist no one will bother with the lyrics. Instantly and continually a nation agrees)

black chandelier – Biffy Clyro (I met these guys last year and it was almost spiritual. really nice lads, awesome musicians and they include a maths lesson in the music but you don’t even know it)

lullaby – The Cure (included just to hear the word spider man in a song)

no air – Jordan Sparks (one of the first song I ever crammed into an iPod around 2008 so the tong keeps it place-mark/headstone)

Budapest – George Ezra (just appeals to my love of strange words becoming hits other honourable mentions go to Africa by Toto, Milky Way by the Church, a boxcar full of pixies and some mention of aurora by some seagulls)

Enola Gay – Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (winner of the two thousand and never most mis understood dance anthem, but a little creepy in the lyrics. side note I LOVED recording this on my EP in 2018)

boys don’t cry – The Cure (couldn’t give these guys only a sympathy vote so chucked this in)

when my baby’s beside me – Big Star (OMG guitars guitars guitars, met Jody when we were in the states and stood in the studio that this was recorded in. amazing story behind the band and the perils of supply chain issues with overall success)

rumour has it someone like you – cast of Glee (Adele is great, but this version is better)

bombers bay – Echo and the Bunnymen (read this as a pair with enola gay, but not as clever of a song. but it was the sign of the times in very passive protest song; they were supposed to make people think and talk, today this would have just been tweeted into a backwater lane of history without any change in society knowledge)

graceless – The National (this band are huge fans of maths lessons in the studio, but it comes with long socks. this is a very beautiful track from a great album)

don’t save me – Haim (eye candy, oops I meant ear candy. This is one of the most well produced family bands since M-Bop)

trembling hands – Temper Trap (keith introduced me to this album and i just like this song)

at my funeral – Crash Test Dummies (they had bigger hits, this one is not that well known because it says stuff no one wants to talk about. actually so does the big hit they had, but just people chose not to talk about it. kind of great wordsmithing, even as a band name, you know it is going to end, but you gotta learn in the moment and strangely that is there music also)

only the horses – Scissor Sisters (just loved this clip, really well produced pop music)

free fallin’ – Tom Petty (this guy has done a few things in his career, the simplicity of this is magic in the same line as many others)

heartbeat – Carrie Underwood (really like her personality on TV so grabbed the album. it is great but man could you here the producers burning cash in the back ground to make the album)

the heart shaped sea – Roxette (the tourism album is one of the most sincere and thorough lessons in audio and sound craft. given a time machine these guys would have erased abba and unsettled the Eurithymics)

home again – Michael Kiwanuka (saw him live in Melbourne and this is just one of his extensive collection of good nourishing music)

hurt – Johnny Cash (not his song but makes it his own; i don’t see myself in the lyrics but always get lost in the voice. a truly inspired concept)

I am I said – Neil Diamond (just strangely wonderful lyrics. kind of imaging it as a drunken conversation and he just penned it down. saw him live once, James’ first proper rock show)

one – U2 (I still love this band. have seen them twice since UWC where they scored my last years at the school)

the sidewidner sleeps tonight – REM (I still love this band. have seen them once where he had a crack at the audience for wanting to hear SHP. I was not impressed but really there is much more to this band than one song… )

the one I love – REM (…. so I put two song on the list)

breaking the girl – Red Hot Chili Peppers (seriously one of the greatest ‘coulour outside the line’  bands ever)

a soapbox opera – Supertramp (I have an amazing qantas CD with a long interview with this band and tells the story, I think this is the best song of this band, but certainly biographical)

bitter sweet symphony – The Verve (this is that hidden track amongst a lot of other carefully curated compositions)

solitary man – Neil Diamond (need a song of heart break even if it is fundamentally cynical)

Be – Neil Diamond (there is a very short list of single word titled songs. I see it as an unwritten rule that if you gunna use a mono title it better be a good song. maybe there is some board chaired by Vangelis and Andrew Loyd Webber that approve the title use. This one is the example they use when describing the process to other)

need you now – Lady Antebellum (fundamentally cynical song of heart break updated for the 24/7 access to communications)

if you want me – cast of Once (people that have not seen RENT and ONCE live on stage are not allowed to comment on modern musicals, I should make a wallet card for this reason)

knots – Lisa Hannigan (just like this song, saw it on rage one day)

live like you were dying – Tim McGraw (this is the ‘lesson music’ part of the episode)

rainbow connection – Kermit (this keeps us stargazing)

wrong – Everything But The Girl (boy has songs, finds girl, finishes album, goes on tour, marries girl, starts family and they remain hidden from google)

lego house – Ed Sheeran (first of many ear worms)

stay – U2 (with such a long and varied career, had to give them another song)

you and me – Pink (wow such out of the box work from her)

lanterns – Birds of Tokyo (makes me think of canberra as it was used in the power company adds)

holly holy – Neil Diamond (this guy, this song, sounds like church but not)

September morn – Neil Diamond (I still think it should be a function on every iPod that this song and Love on the Rocks are pre-loaded and you can shuffle them from your dating app as a kind of premonition)

hole in the river – Crowded House (never saw them as a band, but have seen both Finn Brothers perform in other iterations, not the best song, but a real connection to water/land/spirit/air)

how to make gravy – Paul Kelly (well this really was my first ever cooking class, he is not a bad singer for a Master Poet hey…)

Joelene – Dolly Parton (won my vote last year as the best song ever, mainly for the guitars)

Walt Grace’s submarine test – John Mayer (this is a version of the ‘went for milk and never came back’ only that he gave multiple clear notices that those around ignored)

wicked game – Chris Isaak (he said in an interview about lost love that it’s like stepping in dog poo on the side walk, once you clean your shoes you walk another path…)

blood buzz Ohio – Julia Stone (better than the original. I met her after her gig. actually there was a moment in her show where she made a comment about feeling low and I stood up walked to the stage and gave her flowers. sure I had them for after the show but there was a time once when I had the lack of regret factor to do these things

blood buzz Ohio – The National (complicated version of a great cover)

rocky world – Daniel Lanios (U2 would not have made it out of the shade of the Joshua tree without this gent even though from just a listen it is hard to link the DNA…)

PLENTY OF OTHERS WHO COULD MAKE THIS LIST; ELTON, BILLY, VANCE, ROXY MUSIC, GAGA ETC…