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The eyes have it: Great horned owl
Nocturnal, silent, spooky and mysterious, or curious, wise and cute? Owls represent richly contrasting associations in culture, but how are they used and portrayed in song, whether in lyrics or in sampled calls. Let’s explore and have a hoot
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Musical vision: double-bass player Charlie Haden and friends gets eyes and ears firmly on the topic
Protective sunglasses to corrected vision, what songs are in the frame? They are often about what is hidden, but also what is revealed, especially in love, and guest Marco den Ouden brings everything into focus with fabulous playlists inspired by last week’s topic.
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Lost Horizon (1937), based on James Hilton’s 1933 novel
Heaven can wait, so they say, but there’s no longer a need, but a musical utopia is here in a fabulous collection of playlists picked by guest of the week Nicko, taking us to a better place and inspired by last week’s topic
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One man’s personal paradise … what is yours?
What is yours? From Arcadia to Utopia, how can we create or find it? Where is it, and what does it look like? This week, after previously doing the impossible, we find the unfindable in the form of song, inspired my many books, art and films …
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Evel Knievel attempts to jump 13 buses in London, 1975. What could possibly go wrong?
Love, death, survival, creativity – at times they all seem impossible or insurmountable. After a seemingly inconceivable recent world history, it’s time to play with the idea of impossible in song, and work out what really is from what isn’t. Is it all down to perception?
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What time will love flower? The Foundations 1968
Something changed around the Enlightenment, with the advent of universal timepieces, but how did that affect human relationships? Inspired by last week’s nominations, Marco den Ouden clocks in with perfectly timely playlists
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Better late then never?
It’s something attempted to be trained into us from school to to the work place, and appears to be both necessary, but perhaps also unnatural. This week it’s time to pin down the essence of punctuality in song, with all the tensions and consequences of being early or late
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Sweatiest video? Alewya
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
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What will pour out into this week’s hot landings? Meanwhile here’s Ted Striker
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?
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Dive in …
Come on in, the music’s lovely. Inspired by all the many excellent nominations from last week’s watery topic, guest of the week Severin makes big splash with a set of playlists perfect for all the rules of the pool. Take a delicious dip
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Get your swimming high: Sky Pool at Embassy Gardens, Vauxhall, London
It’s time to dip into your music collections and then immerse more deeply. From bubbling tub soaks to cold water swims, Turkish baths to rubber ducks, hot springs to icy adventures, let’s soak up this topic in lyrics and sounds
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Tribe 8 have got themselves into an awkward position. Explore the playlist to find out where …
Inspired by last week’s history of royal awkwardness and a host of songs nominated, guest of the week Loud Atlas presents a superb Musical Self-Help Guide on How To Be Awkward. Follow its 14 steps and beyond for further entertaining embarrassment
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Waving or drowning?
As Queen Elizabeth II reaches a record Platinum Jubilee, what has it all been about? Aside from any royal references, this week’s song theme is all about awkwardness, awkward moments, anything mortifyingly cringeworthy, or just a bit unseemly, bumbling, blundering and embarrassing
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Part hidden: one of this week’s artists revealed …
What is revealed? From cloaks of invisibility to unseen superpowers, mysterious animals or scents to the people who are never spotted, guest playlister Noodsy picks some outstanding songs that are truly out of sight but well in earshot
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Otis Redding - cut down in his prime
Relationship breakdown, devastating loneliness to shocking bereavement, from a huge response to last week’s topic, it’s all here in a set of supremely powerful playlists picked by guest magicman, where despite all the sorrow, the music brings release
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It’s a fragile thing, but we still drink it in
Sudden or slow-motion tragedy, from breakup to sudden loss of a loved one, or any other of life’s soul-destroying events, this week it’s time to drown all sorrows in the bar and find the most potent selection of heartbreak songs
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Bumblebee: music collected from many sources
So what’s buzz? Literal or metaphor, and collecting nectar from a wide range of sources from last week’s topic, guest musical beekeeper Alaric gives takes on a world of the bluesy, folky and much more as his playlists fully bloom
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Bumblebee
Time to get busy! From honey to nectar, pollination to special dance moves, lyrics literal or metaphor, or in sounds, with World Bee Day coming up, it’s time to feel the musical buzz of these inspirational insects in all that they mean to humans, and how we should protect them
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Results are in the air tonight
Applications have been made, papers marked, but from last week’s many entries, which made the grade and will reach graduation to make the playlists? Examiner Marco den Ouden reveals the full results …
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Jarvis Cocker’s student pass for the art course he took when aged 25
Days of college, university, polytechnic, art school, institute or more, this week we examine education after secondary or high school and graduation, what it all means, from learning to social experience, captured though the prism of song
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