Lipstick, eyeliner, powder and more, it's all going in these beautifully made-up lists by guest of the week Suzi capturing all the looks, identities and the emotions and dreams behind the creams, inspired by last week's nominations
Read morePlaylists: songs about fabrics
The needle might normally drop on to spinning vinyl, but it’s also embroidered a wonderful tapestry of songs in playlists – superbly knitted together by guest of the week Tatanka Yotanka, who picked up the threads from last week’s topic
Read moreTip of the iceberg: songs about the id, ego and superego
It’s time to wrestle with the conflicts and complexities of the conscious and sub-conscious mind captured in song lyrics. From that famous paper published by Freud a century ago, there’s also inspiration here in film, literature, comedy, musicians and more …
Read morePlaylists: songs with androgynous vocals
Who is singing? It’s a magical moment of uncertainty. In a highly subjective topic, not only with non-binary artists but with those whose gender is better known, guest of the week ParaMhor picks perfectly balanced playlists of excellent and ambiguous gender vocals from last week’s topic nominations
Read moreHow does it end? Songs with notable outros and codas
The end has to come, but how, in an outro or coda, does a song or piece offer something different, original, unusual or memorable, musically or even lyrical form, a twist, a mood change, upbeat, downbeat or even a sense of unresolved mystery?
Read morePlaylists: songs about using your imagination
Childhood dreams to grownup fantasy, emotional flowering to practical, creative necessity, this week’s playlists, picked from last week’s topic by guest Shiv Sidecar, perfectly stimulating our brains and ears, cerebrally and musically
Read moreThese foolish things: songs about memorabilia and souvenirs
Whether music, sport, film, travel, or wider culture, they mean different things to different individuals, but all are items that trigger or preserve memories, personal or more universal. Let’s explore these specific objects in song, overall or in specific lyrical detail
Read morePlaylists: songs about the colour pink
Flowers, champagne, the moon, and even an elephant, it’s a colour that covers many shades and contexts, and from many blossoms of nominations, you’ll be tickled pink by the playlists perfectly arranged by guest of the week Severin
Read morePlaylists: songs about orgasms
Yes! Yes! Yes! After days of non-stop, multiple orgasmic musical nominations, it’s time to have a cigarette, sit back and relax as guest of the week magicman presents more than pleasurable playlists that reach even more climaxes …
Read moreSign here, please: songs about formal agreements
Contracts, bonds, anything to employment to marriage to loans, record deals and other business, putting our signatures to things governs personal and public lives. But how do any formal agreements get referenced in song?
Read morePlaylists: songs about perspiration
It’s more than warm in here. Sexual arousal to hard labour, cold sweats to night sweats, picked from all the nominations from last week’s hot topic guest of the week pejepeine’s playlists will leave you perspiring with excitement
Read moreSweat bands: songs about perspiration
As heatwaves spread around many parts of the world, it’s time to turn the perspiration into inspiration. Sweating covers many contexts, from work, to exercise, fear to sex, but how are its process and emotions expressed in song?
Read moreFor the permanent collection: songs about eternity
How to we capture or express it? Through love, art, death, heaven, hell or other forms? Particularly song. This week’s largely lyrical topic ponders on the forever, the permanent, the endless and goes to infinity and beyond …
Read morePlaylists: songs about elephants and mammoths
Huge size, unusual grace and beauty to how humans behave towards them, reggae to rock, pop, folk and jazz, classical and traditional, guest Severin took on a mammoth task from all the nominations to create great playlists to trumpet about
Read morePlaylists: songs about fun
From various locations – in the bar, on the beach, down the street, and many forms – reggae to soul, rock to new wave. From a huge wave of fun nominations guest picker Olive Butler has a blast with brilliant set of playlists
Read moreMake your Song Bar Fifth Birthday selections! Songs about jukeboxes
Five years! To celebrate, this special topic is both literal and metaphorical, the mechanism that makes us click, capturing the magic of the coin-operated machine that expresses our bar-based love of music in song choices
Read morePlaylists: Aeolian airs – songs with audible breaths and breeze
Inhale! Exhale! Sexy to smoky, exercise to sighs, plus bigger breaths from nature, this week’s playlists, compiled by breath-of-fresh-air guest Hoshino Sakura from a hurricane of nominations, will make you gasp with pleasure
Read moreLet's get physio: songs about bodily motion and exercise
This could be a fine body of work. Everything from stiffness to full fluidity of exercise – bending, flexing, twisting, stretching, it’s time limber up and pick up on songs that capture corporeal movement in any context
Read morePlaylists: songs with a pagan theme
The Halloween runes and the rituals rise up with plenty of antlers and feminine power as guest guru DJ Bear aka PopOff! throws many potent ingredients into the musical cauldron and comes out with playlists that are really cooking
Read moreNew meets old: songs where different-era elements combine
This week we seek strange combinations from starkly different times – old songs covered on new instruments, new songs played on old instruments, traditional musicians playing with younger, or old styles mashed up with the new
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