Monday Morning Mixtape 080: Songs

Welcome to Monday Morning Mixtape, a PoYB Contributor-curated playlist of songs, made just for you at the start of each week.

"Songs"

Songs that have a title like this: "____ Song"

chosen by Joe

Spotify

YouTube

"Apology Song" by the Decemberists

from 5 Songs EP, 2001

Sorry. If it was my fault, I mean. I don't know if it was, but it probably was. The Monday Morning Mixtape, and its teetering on the brink of blog oblivion, I mean. Possible reasons it doesn't work as a weekly activity anymore: because I don't do enough to get people involved; because I don't have my finger on the pulse of what would be considered interesting in terms of themes; because I let it fade into the background; because I let what I thought would be a nice replacement for a worthy blog project become this sort of inessential shadow of the thing it was going to replace; because I misread the room in terms of what people actually want from music, which is maybe not "to write about music"; because I didn't think about how disparate all our musical tastes are and how that might lead such a mixtape to feel sometimes like a bunch of siloed music-listeners lobbing musical suggestions over the prison walls and never hearing anything back in reply; because, I don't know, because I'm still forcing a blog into people's eyeballs at such a late time in our lives. I go through cycles, like sometimes I wonder what the point of all this is, and I'm sorry for that too, that it means that you have to read about it yet again on the blog that I'm sorry for. I'm not sorry for this song, though. It's a good song, and I'm glad to have this mixtape as a vehicle to give it to you.  —Joe

"Total.Fucking.Gone.Song" by Dillinger Four

from Versus God, 2000

Not my favorite song off of Versus God, but certainly one of the top twelve songs on the twelve-song album. I might just fuck around and find a way to worm every song from this record into future mixtape lists. Since the air is coming out of this particular recurring recommendation engine, I might as well help speed it along by throwing all the tracks from what I have come to understand as the pinnacle of Midwestern punk music in increasingly esoteric and tangential ways. Versus God! Normally I would say "you had to be there," but I really don't think you do. You can be there now, baby.  —Nate

"Unhappy Song" by Swamp Dogg

from Swamp Dogg Contemplates the Afterlife, 2026

I wouldn't say I'm unhappy. See, this is why it's good to document your feelings in writing somewhere (even if it's, oh lord, on a blog). I can trace the weeks and months of my life in which I truly felt unhappy. And I can compare and contrast what I was feeling then to what I'm feeling now. I don't think I'm unhappy now. There is, of course, the overarching truth that the is "no reason for me to be unhappy," which is a constant truth, but we all know that's not really how the brain functions, typically. Depression, for example, doesn't need an external reason, you're just unhappy because of your brain chemistry. But without a reason pretty much ever, I still find myself unhappy sometimes, during certain periods of my life. Right now, though, I'm okay. I think any negative feeling I have right now could possibly be described as: disconnected. I feel like I'm losing grip of certain things that I've held close during this stage in my life. Perhaps the blog is one of them, I don't know. This is the longest sustained slump I've ever felt about this thing. That's not unhappiness, it's just a disconnect. Like, why is this thing that has been so important to me for so long sort of drifting in the background so often? I don't know. It's not unhappiness though, I know that.  —Joe

"The Lazy Song" by Bruno Mars

from Doo-Wops & Hooligans, 2010

I always associate this song with Lamson, because he played it constantly when it came out. It's not really that good of a song, but it's got a very certain vibe. When you're on that wavelength, it's like an old armchair or your favorite roach clip.  —Sean E.

"Drumming Song" by Florence + the Machine

from Lungs, 2009

Well... I made a mistake when picking a song and blurb for this week...

So instead of writing a whole new blurb, here's the blurb for the song I would've picked for last week's clapping theme:

"Here Come the Sixers" by Reed Streets

a single, 2019

Philadelphians across the city are clapping their hands at the news that the Sixers have traded for Jaylen Brown. The Eagles have a couple great Jalens (different spelling, but still...), so there are high hopes for Brown, a champion with the Boston Celtics in 2024. Add in the rumors that LeBron James is considering the Sixers are his next team, and there's plenty to be excited about after a few disappointing seasons out of the Sixers.

(Joe, feel free to leave it all in.)

                —Batts

"Midnight Song" by Wild Nothing

from Nocturne, 2012

I don't often make it till midnight. If I'm up at midnight, like especially on a weeknight, I know I'm fucked the next day. At the very least, it means I won't be able to wake up early enough to hit the gym, and I'll feel sluggish and weak the rest of that day. At worst, I'm so tired I can barely get out of bed. And if I'm eating Taco Bell after midnight? Fucking forget it. I've been going to a club semi-often recently that takes your phone before you go in, and gives it back at the end of the night. Unless you find a dude wearing a watch, there's literally no way to know what time it is. So I've made a little game of it, trying to guess what time it is as the coat check gal searches for the phones and brings them back to the counter. I can usually get it within the right hour, but I also am usually underestimating. The reaction when I see the phone and it says 1:30 AM is: "ohhhh noooooooooooooo."  —Joe

"Bird Song" by the Men

from New Moon, 2013

The Men touched the sun for approximately three years there in the early 2010s depending how you feel about Leave Home (an exciting suggestion of what's to come, but not yet the real thing). There's a clear arc from the band's three best records; Open Your Heart is a rip-shit punk band that can seemingly do anything, New Moon is that rip-shit punk band slicing off the shag and polishing the diamond, Tomorrow's Hits is the final form, in which the punk band reinvents themselves as the Rolling Stones circa Sticky Fingers. This track is right in the murky middle, the butterfly coming out of the crystals; boozy pianos, slide guitars, harmonicas-a-honkin', all this energy reigned in, waiting to blow the fuck up. Great rock song.  —Nate

"'Cello Song" by Nick Drake

from Five Leaves Left, 1969

Isn't there a movie or TV show that makes a joke about a cello that's like the character saying it says "cello?" instead of "hello?" I forget. Tough to remember stuff like that when I'm listened to Nick Drake. It's also tough to remember that, before Nick Drake made music so sad that it killed him, he was making this ornate chamber music that really scratches an itch within me sometimes. What an artist. I could listen to him any— oh! It's School of Rock, isn't it? Jack Black makes the cello player play bass guitar? "Cello?!" Ah shit, I was gonna write about School of Rock in the next blurb. Fuck. Sorry for the repeat.  —Joe

"Immigrant Song" by Led Zeppelin

from Led Zeppelin III, 1970

If there's a good song in a Family Movie Night movie, I'm all over that shit. I'm rushing off to the nearest computer to download an mp3 of that song and uploading it to the kids' iPod. We watched School of Rock a few weeks ago, and the kids really liked it (their first Linklater!). And I was able to get a total of three songs off the screen and into their consciousness: the title track with Jack Black and the kids, obviously (it's a classic!); the AC/DC version of "It's a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll)" (the Jack Black version during the end credits is a little too much for me, i.e. decidedly NOT a classic); and "Bonzo Goes to Bitburg" by Ramones. "Immigrant Song" is a great one too but would've been pushing it. But I am 100% confident that there's gonna to be a moment in the future, even years from now, when "Immigrant Song" is playing, and my middle child is like, "Daddy, is this from School of Rock?" That's how her brain works. She is genetically the closest to me, it seems.  —Joe

"Travel Song" by Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin

from Broom, 2005

Do people take a break from their hobbies when they are traveling? This is a sincere question, I have no idea. I feel like the only things I've called a "hobby" in the past 20 years were blogging and drinking. I am taking a permanent break from the latter, but I haven't taken a break from the former in at least eight years. The next Monday Morning Mixtape is going to be in three weeks, when I'm in Wildwood. It would never occur to me that we would take a break for that reason. (I mean, I know we're taking a break from MMM, but not for the specific reason of traveling.) I'm trying to picture a scenario in which I'm not bringing my computer on vacation. Maybe an all-inclusive or something? But we have none of those on the horizon, and I guess I would probably try to publish everything in advance? Back to my original question though: for people who have normal hobbies, are they something you forget about when you're away for a short while? Like all you knitters, gamers, painters, athletes, are you just forgetting about your passion while you chill on a beach chair? There is no judgment in this question, I'm legitimately curious.  —Joe

"Pop Song" by STRFKR

from Starfucker, 2008

I've been kicking it with a new friend and she seems to know some famous people. I've made it pretty clear from the get-go that I am not a starfucker. I don't think this was even something she needed to hear from me, it just makes me more comfortable if I'm upfront about it. I did tell the story about Mike Scott at the birthday party (with the subsequent punches thrown toward the South Philly plumbers in the Linc's tailgating parking lot) to illustrate my point. I'm the anti-starfucker. I will ignore any celebrity that gets in my way. Except maybe STRFKR. I should look up what this dude looks like so if I recognize him I can make a very funny exception to my rule.  —Joe

"The Whale Song" by Modest Mouse

from No One's First, and You're Next EP, 2009

I have a core memory of being [REDACTED] out of my mind on [REDACTED] in my living room with [REDACTED] and [REDACTED], listening to this song so loudly that our neighbor threatened to call the cops. For a good long while there, this was the last good Modest Mouse song, but the new album that came out earlier this year is quite good. It ain't Lonesome Crowded West or The Moon & Antarctica, but it's potentially the best album since that era.  —Nate

"Alabama Song" by the Doors

from The Doors, 1967

So many layers of my understanding of this song have been added since I first heard it, in my youth, in the nascent stages of my musical discovery period (which is, decades later, still ongoing). The attachment to and falling out of the Doors, the constant reevaluation of the irony of Jim Morrison as my own understanding of what irony is ebbed and flowed, the experience with Record Club and how it acted like a relitigation or perhaps even like picking at an old wound, the evolving understanding of character and fiction and how they inform art, the way that art then informs our understanding of the world, the understanding that things can be many things at once and we can use those things like tools in a toolbelt to be deployed only when we need them........ I mean, all of that is true, but sometimes I wish I could just be a little kid in my parents' basement listening to the Doors for the first time and gathering the very simple notion that this song is weird even for these guys.  —Joe

"Dancing Song" by Washington Social Club

from Catching Looks, 2004

Much ballyhoo made over the notion that it is impossible to dance while sober, both from external sources and within my own head. I think maybe we need to consider the fact that I just don't like dancing, as opposed to the more loftier idea that dancing is reserved only for those who are able to let themselves free, out of the cage of societal norms, reaching the ideal of human nature in which we find ourselves fully unencumbered by all expectations and are thus able to finally achieve the art of dancing, of moving your body, and that only then can you reach your full potential as a human being. Listen—in sobriety, I've danced. Or tried to, anyway. I just don't like it. I'd rather chill at my assigned wedding guest table and chitchat with the other guests. I don't need to dance. I won't feel anything. Just let me relax with my club soda in peace, please.  —Joe

"Ferry Song" by Twin Peaks

from Lookout Low, 2019

Think about how a ferry and a bridge are mortal enemies. This is a profoundly stupid idea, something that maybe I'd only come up with if I was reaching for something to write in 20 different blurbs for a mixtape that itself feels like a sinking ferry. But, like, think about what would happen to the ferry if there were bridges everywhere. And think about how many ferries would be born if a bridge were to collapse. A mark of progress, a bridge, but also a harbinger of doom, depending on from whose perspective you view it. I think that was a Shel Silverstein poem, wasn't it?  —Joe

"Wayward Song" by the Earlies

from These Were the Earlies, 2004

There are some albums in my life that I stumbled upon and fell in love with and hold dearly and ALSO, crucially, keep isolated from everything else, or sheltered maybe, sheltered from my natural impulse to explore, more and more, to carve out room for more art like it, especially from that same artist, and my love for these particular albums is so that it shields me from that impulse. E.g. the Earlies and their beautiful album These Were the Earlies. One of the only true random impulse buys in a record store in my lifetime, imprinted in my heart during formative years, held fast and true through most of life's journey now. I love it, but the question remains: would I love it like I do now if I tried to listen to other Earlies albums? My fear is no, I would not. I would like or maybe even love other Earlies albums if I tried, but somehow, that love would pull from the love I have from this first one, and make it seem more pedestrian. I don't have to know everything. I can leave some things under the shroud of mystery. Who are the Earlies? Where were they from and where did they go? I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, and I don't want to know. Let the mystery be.  —Joe

"The Authority Song" by Jimmy Eat World

from Bleed American, 2001

I have no memory or impression of this song even now re-listening to it. Bleed American is perhaps a front-to-back, no skips record, so I do not mean it as an insult when I say this is potentially the worst song on that monumental record. Best song is "A Praise Chorus." When I was using a four-track recorder to cut demos in my bedroom and dorm room, I'm pretty sure I scratched something out and titled it "A Craise Phorus." I did this because I am an American visionary and soon-to-be recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for Naming Cassette Demos.  —Nate

"Prison Song" by System of a Down

from Toxicity, 2001

There's comfort in knowing that, in anyone else's hands, a song called "Prison Song" would almost assuredly be speaking to the figurative idea of a prison, like say you are typing furiously on a blog while stuck in a windowless office in between notes about children who were in situations so unsafe that they were in the news, and how you can feel a prison here in this situation and then look up at the high walls and barred windows of the prison that the clients must find themselves in, and thus in comparison scoff at the idea that this cushy office job could ever be a prison at all, the comparison somehow both soothing and agitating all at once, but in System of a Down's hands, it's literally about prison.  —Joe

"Apartment Song" by Really From

from Really From, 2021

I've never lived in an apartment. Unless I'm constricting the definition of "apartment" too much? Are dorm rooms apartments? I lived in two different dorm rooms. I think apartments need their own kitchens, so I'm not counting it. Are extended stay hotel rooms apartments, then? I lived in one for six months, but there was no landlord and we weren't paying rent. This isn't something I need to do, live in an apartment, by the way. This isn't a checklist, just a stray thought. We own a home and I intend on living in it long enough to pay it off and actually own it instead of "borrowing" it from the bank for 30 fucking years. But you never know where life brings ya, right? If I ever find myself living an apartment, I will think back to this blurb, on this mixtape from July 2026, attached to a jazz-emo song.  —Joe

"SHOWER SONG" by Tierra Whack

from WORLD WIDE WHACK, 2024

Sometimes I think about water shortages. These thoughts manifested from a confluence of a too-close reading of Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler and some disparate blog ravings by our very own Nate Dogg. But I also read something on Reddit the other day—no more or less reliable than a science fiction novel and a blog, I'd argue—that there is more than enough fresh water to last the inhabitants of earth a very long time, it's just that we have a distribution problem. And whether that's true or not, I really do trust the ingenuity of humanity, and how if water started getting low, we'd figure out a way to make more of it. Will I eventually not be able to shower as much as Tierra Whack wants me to? Maybe! But I think we—our generation and our children's generation—are going to be spared from widespread thirsty dystopia.  —Joe

"Pain Song" by Yatta Bandz

from Scars, 2021

The new Effie song, I fear, is not very good. Little too far in the rage-rap direction, trying a little too hard to freak out the squares, huffing a little too strongly on the gecs gas without having the gecs movement. It might be a 5 or a 6 out of 10. Even at her most mid, she's still got juice, check the pre-chorus on that badboy. Song is called "Red Horse," I should say. Also, you may have noticed I am not writing about Yatta Bandz right now. This is out of kindness and respect. If you can't say something nice, and so forth.  —Nate

"Road Song" by Sleeper's Bell

from Clover, 2025

We have two pretty big blogging milestones coming up in the next month or so. On August 4th, we'll be celebrating exactly five years of PoYB posting something every single day. And then sometime around there, we'll be publishing our 10,000th blog post. I don't have anything planned for either one. I mean, the way things are looking, there's a greater than 0% chance that these things are going to happen on the same day, so that would be cool. We're also gonna hit 1.5 million views around that same time, but I don't think that's as likely to happen on the same day. A sane person would see the confluence of these milestones as a sign that maybe things should slow down or even stop around here. Ya know, hit the road, and take that road away from here (he says, in a sweaty attempt to somehow connect these meta thoughts with the song they're sitting under).  —Joe

"Anniversary Song" by Glocca Morra

from Just Married, 2012

The fifth anniversary of the blog posting every day is something that I'm pretty proud of. It's interesting to think back to the years leading up to that, and how I had tried to keep streaks going, and would never reach a month straight. And now here's the end of month 60 in a row. It's weird how something like that can become normal. I wouldn't say I'm thinking about Puke on Your Birthday all the time, but it's always in the back of my mind somewhere, either 1) when I'm like "ah shit it's Friday, I better start working on the mixtape," or 2) when I'm like "oh damn, that thought that I just had, that would make for a pretty great blog post."  —Joe

"Walking Song" by U.S. Girls

from Scratch It, 2025

There's nothing better than that feeling when something clicks into place in my mind re: the blog (okay, there are plenty of better feelings, but stay with me). Like I'll be listening to the Record Club album for a few days, for example, and then all of a sudden, I'll be making dinner or getting out of the shower or walking to the train and BAM, it hits me. The whole goddamn blog post just arrives in my head. I have to get it out of my head and onto the screen, and that takes time, but that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the moment when it arrives. The crux of the blog post. I can envision it. Does this happen to anyone else? Maybe it happens to everyone else but most people just don't have the means or motivations to get it out in this particular way?  —Joe

"Surf Song" by Fenix*TX

from Fēnix★TX, 1999

Monday Morning Mixtape is interesting in that context because so rarely does my writing in this space have an overarching theme or hook (with a few exceptions over the past 80 weeks, though nothing good enough to make me want to revisit it), and so there is by design no eureka moment. It's just me sitting down for x amount of time, typing whatever comes to my head in that moment. Most of the time, the writing is pedestrian. Every once in a while, there is a small moment of stardust that makes the words in the blurb sparkle, but mostly I'm typing just to type in this space. I think that's okay. Not everything has to be worthy of exaltation. Sometimes it's nice to just practice typing, and practice getting your thoughts into words on the screen. It better prepares yourself for the task when inspiration does truly arrive in all its glory. You don't wanna miss it.  —Joe

"Heart Song" by Fust

from Big Ugly, 2025

I wonder if that's partially the reason why MMM's attendance has slowly tapered off over the past eighteen months—people just don't feel like writing. I mean, that is the biggest difference between PoYB's Monday Morning Mixtape and WXPN's Friday Morning Mixtape, right? The XPN listeners aren't being forced to justify their songs' inclusions in that mixtape. They just think of a song and send it in. And I enjoy XPN's mixtape just as much. Oh, I won't lie, the thought has crossed my mind, to try it that way here. To take away the writing aspect, to juice the numbers for the mixtape. But I can't bring myself to do it. That would be ripping the soul out of this blog. This is a writing blog. We write here. If you're looking to get together with friends and put together songs onto a playlist, there is ample opportunity to do so. This is something different. We're exchanging ideas here. And plus, let's be fucking real, the only thing sadder than one dude putting together a six-song mixtape with six disparate little blurbs about each song is one dude putting together a six-song mixtape and not writing anything about it. And you know that eventually it would devolve back into that, even after the initial surge of interest. That's how it goes with everything, both on this blog and in real life. You get excited about something, it's fun for a while, and then it gradually tapers off. Are there exceptions to this in real life? Sure. But generally, you have to work at something in order for it to not wither away and die. You can't just be comfortable with stasis. You need to help something grow and change and adapt. I couldn't do that with MMM.  —Joe

"Okkervil River Song" by Okkervil River

from Don't Fall in Love with Everyone You See, 2002

This is probably the most beautiful song I've ever heard. I'm happy to share it with you, just in case you've never heard it. I'm happy to share it within the context of a mixtape, put together by two or more friends, together. Maybe you've picked up some cool songs along the way. Have you? I have. I am thankful for that. And I am thankful that I'll be hearing some good songs in the future too, on the mixtapes after this. We're not ending, we're just slowing down. At worst, things stay the same, and I only have to suffer through the playlist-making mechanisms of that dastardly Spotify once a month instead of once a week. At best, a worthy blog endeavor gets a little room to breathe, and it survives as a gentle pulse controlled by the heart that is the gift of blogging. It's just some fucking thing. "And I searched and stared, but only the river stared back."  —Joe

NEXT WEEK: We're taking a break next week! Come back on the first Monday of each month for some more MMM!