Hello, friends.
How are you holding up? What is life like where you are? Do you like the new font? Do you even know what I'm talking about?
Things Around Here
Things continue to be okay here. In many ways, things are even better than ever. Back-burner projects are cooking on the front burners now. Possibilities abound. And all of us feel more connected with each other than at any time in history, probably. Lots of good shit is happening!
I've been performing on Instagram. That's been a lot of fun! I've got some of those performances over on my YouTube Channel, in case you're interested in checking out the archive. I feel like I'm getting better and better. Getting my chops back. Finding my voice again. Relaxing into the thing and not forcing it. That's always the lesson for me. So yeah, go follow me on Instagram if you want to see that sort of thing. I really appreciate it.
I'm also getting closer to completing a music-related project I am VERY excited about. I am looking at a 4/20/20 release, but that may change. Stay tuned!
"The Matt Kollock Show" podcast is getting closer to becoming something you can listen to, too! I'll be dropping the interview segments (by themselves) on my Patreon later this week, so watch for that. I'll begin putting out complete, fully produced episodes next week. So that's very exciting! As always, stay tuned to this space for more info.
Back to the Music
All right. I'm here today because I made another one of these here quarantine playlists.
I feel like 66 songs is the sweet spot. So once again, this playlist contains exactly 66 songs. It's just under five hours of music. Perfect for sitting around and making masks out of your old Poison and Mötley Crüe T-shirts or whatever!
Today's edition of the playlist is kind of sad. It contains songs by three individuals who, in their own ways, exemplified songwriting excellence. Those three individuals have exited our world.
We lost Bill Withers last week. Goddamn. A towering force of subtle, soulful power. And a pretty cool guy, too, from what I understand.
We also lost Adam Schlesinger, who was probably best known for being the frontman of Fountains of Wayne. Sadly, I never got too into Adam's music, but I'm eager to check it out some more. People are really hurting from his loss. He seemed like a really genuine person in addition to being a master craftsperson of songwriting.
Last night news came down that John Prine (JOHN MOTHERFUCKING PRINE!) is gone now, too. Jesus. All he did was write great songs. I'm sure he had quite a few more left in him, too.
Adam Schlesinger and John Prine both died of Covid-19 complications. And I'm sure in the coming days and weeks and months more of our beloved creators will succumb. So fucking stay home. Don't go to your fucking friend's house. You don't need to be with your stupid crew as much as we need to save the lives of people who are vulnerable right now.
So yeah. We lost those guys and it's pretty sad. I added a ton of Bill Withers to this playlist. I added one Adam Schlesinger song – "That Thing You Do" – which is the title song from the soundtrack to the film of the same name by the fictional "The Wonders." I love that song. It's, like, one of those perfect-gem pop songs. I didn't realize Adam Schlesinger wrote it until I read his obituary. Damn. And I closed out the playlist with some John Prine from his first two fantastic albums.
Those are the highlights. But there's other great music in there, too. I continue my path down the gospel road. Friends, let me tell you: If you are looking for that deep, deep funk, gospel music is where it's at.
There's some new stuff, too, from artists like Orville Peck, Waxahatchee, Thundercat, Megan Thee Stallion and more. I keep up. I try to.
Oh yeah, and there's some awesome, funky Freddie King stuff from a new live thing that came out recently. I don't get excited about listening to too many other guitar players these days (my ears go to the drums and bass), but I will always make time for Freddie King.
I hope you dig it. And I hope you continue to keep on keeping on. We're in the most difficult, challenging part of the thing right now. But it's going to get better. For real.
All right. Here's the playlist. Let me know what you think, okay? Great!