Hot Mix Fridays (August 29th, 2014) - Tuck Your Whole Summer In


One Leaf Fell....
....Then It Was Fall....

As I’ve written about numerous times on this blog, and mentioned in the podcasts that we no longer do (whoops, sorry), the concept of nostalgia is both a beautiful and a horrible thing.

This time of year—summer turning into fall—has been weighing heavy on my mind lately. I’ve been thinking a lot about this same time, in years past; where I was in my life, and more importantly, who I was at that time.

For a while now, I’ve looked to the ending of the summer and start of the fall as a time of promise, or of beginnings. I think about all those Augusts when I started a new year in college; or when I moved out onto my own and it was an incredibly exhilarating but terrifying time. I think about all of the times I’ve started a new job—many of them were in the fall.

I think about when times were different for me. When times were better.

I guess that’s what I want this tape to do for you—to evoke memories of a time, a place, and a feeling.

Many of these songs I associate very closely with a specific memory dealing with the fall—autumn in Dubuque IA in college, and people I knew many years ago; about the visual of leaves falling in slow motion, swirling in a cool breeze; about walks from a rental house you used to live in to the bookstore where you worked.

In putting this together, it made me thing of two specific years—specific autumns—when I was confident that things were going to be better. And they were, for a while, anyway.

This summer, like many that have come and gone, went by both incredibly quickly, and also incredibly slowly. I spent many days sitting in the library, or in a coffee shop, plunking away at this keyboard, writing things for this blog, or for my humor column, but also looking for a new job. But now, like so many autumns before, there is so much promise. And like years before it, I want this to be a time when things are going to be better.

I don’t know who reads this blog. It may just be my mom, or my friends, or total strangers. But I hope that the fall means even a sliver of the same to you as it does to me and I want things to be better for you, too.

Making these mixes every week was a nice distraction from all of the things that usually consume me. This certainly won’t be the last one forever, but it has to be the last one for a while. I hope that it’s a fitting ending for the time being. And I hope it’s a satisfactory way to tuck your whole summer in.



1. (intro)
2. September Already by Blinker The Star
3. Life on A Chain by Pete Yorn
4. The Winds That Blow by Duncan Sheik
5. Coke (original 2000 recording) by Flickerstick
6. Body Talk (parts one and two) by Wheat
7. Seven Day Mile by The Frames
8. Wasp Nest by The National
9. Judas by The Verve
10. Lie in The Sound by Trespassers William
11. Coronado II (slight edit) by Polaris
12. This Time of Year by Better Than Ezra
13. Shinin' by Brad
14. Heartbeats by Jose Gonzalez
15. Silence by The Autumn Defense
16. Summer's Gone by Placebo
17. Indian Summer/Stokkseyri (Anhedonic Custom Mix) by Riceboy Sleeps
18. Farewell Summer by The Band in Heaven



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