By the Numbers
1,506 plays across 1,194 unique tracks by 781 distinct artists — about 9% above a typical month over the past year. About 127 hours of music (7590 minutes). Busiest day was March 11th with 122 plays.
Deep Dives
This one was predictable: M streamed this, said there was hardly a misstep in the entire box set (it’s a big box set). She was right. It’s always a little odd when I have this kind of a massive influx of a single artist–it’s both engrossing and a little fatiguing, and it can take a few months to even out. Not Art Tatum‘s continued presence as proof.
Roberta Flack
32 plays across 15 tracks — well above usual
With Her Songs: The Atlantic Albums, 1969-1978
32 plays · 15 tr
Top Artists
I did want to take a moment to strongly recommend My Dearest Darkest Neighbor, Hurray for the Riff Raff‘s latest studio album and their recent live album. They’re building up a spectacular body of work, and the craftsmanship just continues to get better and better. One warning: MDDN downloaded from Bandcamp–at least for me–with all of the tracks mis-named. Easy enough to resolve.
- Art Tatum · 40 plays across 26 tracks (3rd time in top 10, 3 months running)
- Roberta Flack · 32 plays across 15 tracks
- Iron & Wine · 31 plays across 22 tracks (3rd time in top 10, 3 months running)
- Mogwai · 25 plays across 24 tracks (3rd time in top 10, 3 months running)
- Hurray For The Riff Raff · 16 plays across 8 tracks
- Carolina Chocolate Drops · 14 plays across 7 tracks
- Balmorhea · 13 plays across 7 tracks (2nd time in top 10)
- Habib Koite · 12 plays across 8 tracks (2nd time in top 10)
- Yara Asmar · 10 plays across 5 tracks
- Sam Wilkes, Craig Weinrib, and Dylan Day · 10 plays across 4 tracks
Top Albums
Roberta Flack
With Her Songs: The Atlantic Albums, 1969-1978
37 plays · 19 tracks
Art Tatum
Blue Skies
14 plays · 10 tracks
Hurray For The Riff Raff
My Dearest Darkest Neighbor
15 plays · 7 tracks
Carolina Chocolate Drops
Genuine Negro Jig (15th Anniversary Edition)
14p · 7tr
Art Tatum
Jewels In the Treasure Box
14p · 7tr
Jill Scott
To Whom This May Concern
15p · 5tr
Iron & Wine
Hen’s Teeth
13p · 5tr
Yara Asmar
everyone I love is sleeping and I love them so so much
10p · 5tr
Aho Ssan & Resina
Ego Death
9p · 5tr
Blue Lake
The Animal
7p · 6tr
Art Tatum, Bill Douglass & Red Callender
The Tatum Group Masterpieces, Vol. 8 (Remastered)
7p · 6tr
Top Tracks
- Javi Lobe — Alba’s Winter Night (Winter Vol. 2) · 7 plays
- Madala Kunene & Sibusile Xaba & Fakazile — Tisha (kwaNTU) · 5 plays
- La Sera — Queens (KEXP Song of the Day) · 5 plays
+ 16 more tracks at 4 plays
First Encounters
Artists whose first-ever play in the library happened this month. It’s interesting to me trying to sort out the query for this one: this is not the first encounter with Ana Tijoux, but it is with those particular collaborators.
- Javi Lobe · 7 plays across 1 track · from Winter Vol. 2
- La Sera · 5 plays across 1 track · from KEXP Song of the Day
- Madala Kunene & Sibusile Xaba & Fakazile · 5 plays across 1 track · from kwaNTU
- Ana Tijoux & Hordatoj & Toly Ramírez · 4 plays across 1 track · from SERPIENTE DE MADERA – EP
- Victoria Port · 4 plays across 1 track · from Two Syllables Volume Twenty Two
Anywhere, Anytime
19 of my 5★ tracks surfaced this month. Three whose previous play was furthest back:
Last heard March 2023
- Clocks — Coldplay (A Rush Of Blood To The Head)
- This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody) — Talking Heads (Speaking In Tongues)
- All Blues — Miles Davis (Kind of Blue)
From the Vault
Tracks I hadn’t reached for in over a year, returning this month. These all were last played in 2014.
- V. Kamala — Kronos Quartet (Uniko)
- Officer — The Human Experience (Harmonic Transformation)
- Laydou — Filany (Kenedougou)
- The Sea [Live] — Exitmusic (Live @ Glasslands)
- Rock Star — Fishbone (Chim Chim’s Badass Revenge)
- The Sermon — Jackie Hairston (My Kind of Music)
- I Need You — Eric Legnini & The Afro Jazz Beat featuring Krystle Warren (The Vox)
- Long Gone — The GOASTT (The Ghost Of A Saber Tooth Tiger) (Live @ Mountain Jam X, Hunter, NY)
- Hasret Rüzgarları — Müslüm Gürses (Kral Arabesk)
- Morning — Iron & Wine (Live @ Seattle, WA [090505])
Coda
I’m working on expanding this for dataviz related to a single artist. It’s an interesting challenge: what information is interesting? A simple graph of plays over time, sure, but what else?