Lunar Rotation was a radio show that came on my hometown rock station every Sunday night for most of my youth. It played some weird and wild and fun stuff. Pretty sure that show doesn't exist anymore, but I created this blog and an Apple Music playlist that should update every Monday (because Lunar = Moon = Moonday = Monday) with stuff that's kinda weird but that I think is fun.
Anyway, hope you like, but if you don't... maybe next week will be better for you
Playing around a bit with formatting since I seem to like doing the liner notes but maybe not fill your dash with one post. Anyway, lemme know what you think
This week’s playlist:
Holding Patterns by Rise Against
Bde Maka Ska by Atmosphere
Hanging On by Sophie Lloyd & Lauren Babic
Footsteps in the Dark by Goodnight Sunrise
Bang Bang by Momma
Speak of the Devil (feat. The Score) by Magic Whatever
When You & Me Dance by Grabbitz
Eat U Alive (feat. Steve Davit) by Marian Hill
Until I Come Home by Two Feet & grandson
Quiet Little Voices by We Were Promised Jetpacks
Lunar Rotation Weekly by Winifred Yost
Liner Notes (beneath the cut):
Holding Patterns : A playlist needs a strong start, right? Well, I don't think that there are many songs strong than Holding Patterns. I've got a soft spot for rebellion punk and this is that 10000%. Makes me want to headbutt a fascist lol.
Bde Maka Ska : Now we switch gears real hard to a Minnesota rap song about survival and going with the flow. Unlike another song I have talking about BDE, this one is referencing a lake.
Hanging On : It's an epic kinda song with a Wild West feel but also metal and scream. It's a lot. But also really cool.
Footsteps in the Dark : I think I've already written about Timesick, which is the song that put Goodnight Sunrise on my radar. Where that one is much more of a nineties garage rock ballad, this one has a Neo-eighties feel. Still rock. But like. 80s influenced.
Bang Bang : This song is about fucking. Especially as someone's dirty little secret. Mamma once again graces the rotation, this time with a song that feels like it's a bit more influenced by Hole than Verruca Salt. Basically still music that came out before most members of the band were born.
Speak of the Devil (feat. The Score) : Continuing the songs about fucking and desire, this one is about forbidden fruit and being irritatedly attracted to someone. I love a song that has guitar riffs but also a very strong dance beat. Not sure what genre that is. But it's one I like
When You & Me Dance : This song is less about fucking, but more and more about being close to someone in a moment of time. Definite dance song. The music video is wild. Fun fact, I make character playlists for all my TTRPG characters, and this one appears on one for an emotionally stunted gunslinger that sees fighting as "the dance"
Eat U Alive (feat. Steve Davit) : Marian Hill is really good a making songs that are a fusion of thirsty and something else. Most of my favorites are either thirsty and funny or thirsty and foreboding. This one has a bit of a foreboding feel to me. She does a good job of capturing the craving of stupid desire. Plus gotta love the saxual innuendo (no that's not a typo lol)
Until I Come Home : This song brings together two of my favorite artists. There's this feeling of loneliness and separation. The whole thing is very cinematic and just powerful
Quiet Little Voices : Okay, this one isn't really an indie artist or anything. Like, even I know they had radio play. But still, it's a fun song, and one that a lot of you might have missed maybe. It's that same kinda brit rock (Scottish specifically but you fall under brit rock until you're independent sorry) that gave us little lion man.
If I was better at this, I might make some kind of template that would autofill with the songs and keep a consistent format rather than just me doing a lot of copy/paste and winging it. But I'm not sure this was supposed to go on this long so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
gonna try having the playlist up near the top and the expanded descriptions below. Maybe I'll get wild and add in a cut. Nah. Not this time.
This week’s playlist:
Dancing in My Bedroom by Planet Booty
Hell of a Day by Noah and the Loners
Call Me Up by Her Head's On Fire
Corn Dog Sonnet No. 7 by Sincere Engineer
Doomsday by Neoni
Nothing Will Be Fine by The Dead Deads
Earthworms by Elliot Lee
Here Come the Wolves by Lola Blanc
All of My Ghosts by ANNABEL LEE
Maintain the Madness by The Jane Austen Argument
Lunar Rotation Weekly by Winifred Yost
Liner Notes:
Dancing In My Bedroom : This song is one of my favorite get up and go songs. It's poppy, it's catchy, it's about being anti-social and having fun. The music video is also one of my favorite things ever
Hell of a Day : this is a good classic London neo-punk song. About a really shitty day. And coping mechanisms. Big college vibes.
Call Me Up : As we've established, I'm bad at classifying genres. So this one is gonna go with a cleaned up garage band rock. Kinda has Spacehog vibes. A breakup song that goes for abstract and poetic
Corn Dog Sonnet No. 7 : Gimmie that pop-punk backbeat. Another breakup song. But this one where the song is unashamed to portray the subject of the song as a soaking wet cat. More college vibes, but for the dumped introvert crowd.
Doomsday : One of my favorite opening lines for a song. A moody dance(?) song about catastrophizing and dealing with mental illness.
Nothing Will Be Fine : Kind of a wild shift in genre of the playlist back to pretty solid rock. Still fits tonally, as the song is about loss and anger and coping in maybe not healthy ways. Def gives vibes of "well you made sure I have nothing to lose and now that's going to be everyone's problem" A song with sparks of revolution.
Earthworms : Another revenge song. This time with much more of a beat. I think bedroom pop is what it's called? But yeah it seems to be calling out a dude very specifically, and the general societal perception that it's okay for masc type folks to break the hearts of femme folks or hurt them out of "love"
Here Come the Wolves : Another genre shift, we're bringing in the piano. Kind of a an epic song that borders on cabaret pop. This one is about becoming that what chases you to protect yourself. A def sensual vibe in the "I support women's rights and women's wrongs" type way. I'm not saying it would make a great song for a wolfwren compilation but I'm not not saying it either
All of My Ghosts : Continuing the cabaret pop/rock vibe. ANNABEL LEE has a great voice and the ability to imbue a song with haunting and longing vibes. This song is about being compared to the ghost of an ex and how that can suck. And I'm not sure if it's a canonically queer song but it's got sapphic friend's group vibes. And it's got some great lines. "I don't make small impressions I make holes"
Maintain the Madness : This is full on cabaret rock. And very queer. And about dealing with loss and despair by not dealing with it at all. Self destruction set to a beautiful piano line. Would be great for intro credits of a really messy drama
Another set of songs that definitely range all over the map. I don't do notes on the whole playlist all the time, but this week I'm apparently gonna.
It's actually hard to find a place to put "I'm Gonna Tell My Therapist On You" because it, in my mind, is nearly a perfect song and anything up against it is gonna have a hard time. So, you know, I put it first. Lol.
"Fascination" builds on this playlist's character of a (gender neutral) fuckboi
"Sinner Love" and "Reveries" both kinda work together because you could put a killer burlesque routine to them, or to have like a really heavy fuck scene in a movie.
"IF U C My Enemies", "Ready for Combat", and "Superhero" all kinda hit the points of someone preparing (or not) for a fight. Very different vibes but a similar core theme.
"Punk Rick Kitty Cat" is just a song you should listen to. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ . It is especially hilarious as a follow-up/answer to "Superhero"
Sometimes the randomizer means you get two songs from the same artist two weeks in a row. Still good stuff tho.
and Thanks! I Hate It! should win awards on song titles alone, but they put out some kick ass music.
Hahaha let's pretend it's not been a month since I posted here, whoops. Anyway. The mood in this set of songs ranges from edgy kinda moldboard type songs to real high energy goofy stuff. Actually, I think that every song on here could be the basis for a TTRPG character. Some of them would be more fun to be around than others tho.
This week’s playlist:
Wicked Ones by Dorothy
Rome by Dessa
IN THREES by As It Is, Set It Off & JordyPurp
Whoa Whoa Whoa by Watsky
Wiggy by Gretel Hänlyn
New Invention by I DONT KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME & Tessa Violet
This is another scatter shot of songs by some great artists.
This week’s playlist:
the kids aren't alright by Pinkshift
Lay Low by New Atlas
California Mountain Shake by Death Valley Girls
Children's Work by Dessa
Wild by Eleventyseven
Poison & Antidote by Brenda Sue & Mikel
Shattered by Bad Cop/Bad Cop
The Night Starts Here by Stars
A Bullet Through the Heart by People Soup & I Monster
Parsonz Curse by Royal Thunder
Lunar Rotation Weekly by Winifred Yost
the kids aren't alright is probably my favorite song from 2022. California Mountain Shake would make some trippy intro credits to a southern gothic horror show. Parsonz Curse really has the feel of an old school hard rock song, including it being 7 min long. Which is why it's at the end. 7 min is long. Children's Work is a song of bond and memory and sacrifice. Shattered is a song about living and hope and sticking through the hard shit. Very different than the Trucks song of the same name that was here two weeks ago. my brains a bit fuzzy as I'm writing this, so just check the songs out and form your own opinion, but for different reasons I really like them all.
Well. Huh. Okay. This is gonna be a journey. We start with a song I just think is awesome. And then go into a high energy song about protecting yourself from heartbreak. And then we just get increasingly thirsty for a bit.
"Also there is a very horny sapphic song on here. Anyway." - this quote from a few weeks ago is also true. Except maybe more so.
Then we switch gears completely. Energy. A low key observational singer/songwriter thing. A ska song. Ending with a song from what I'm pretty sure is the Mega Man rock opera.
Yup.
This week’s playlist:
Grenadine by Dreadlight
Bulletproof by Pomplamoose
Recall by Hesta Prynn
The Rush by JJ Wilde
Let's Make Out by Dream Wife
Slumber Party (feat. Princess Nokia) by Ashnikko
Future’s Looking Bright by Halocene & ALLISTER X
Dear McCracken by Bug Hunter
Tired Bones by Mad Caddies
History Repeating Pt. 2 (One Last Time) by The Megas
As most of you know, these playlists are randomly generated from a larger collection of songs I keep. And I try to put them in an order that makes some kind of sense. Like being bookended by songs names "King", and a gradual rise from social commentary to femme empowerment. But this means you get some weird outliers. Like "Junk in the Trunk" and "Pith and Point".
But like, Planet Booty is amazing and super queer friendly, and the wildest thing about Pith and Point is that it's from THIS YEAR. Sounds like an eighty's jam. So listen to them all.
This week’s playlist:
King by Foreign Figures
Promenade by Street Sweeper Social Club
cherry (we're all gonna die) by Pinkshift
Kult (feat. Jasiah) by Steve Aoki & grandson
Pith and Point by THUS LOVE
Junk in the Trunk (feat. J-Dodd & El Gun Legro) by Planet Booty
I don't really have a theme this week. I guess I went for extreme tonal whiplash bookended by songs about nostalgia. Also there is a very horny sapphic song on here. Anyway.
I think I managed to tell a little bit of a story this week. Definitely a feel of pursuit and fighting and overcoming and then being a little silly and then just kind of living on. Also this contains two songs from my "I don't do burlesque but if I did" playlist.
This week’s playlist:
Like No One Else by Teri Gender Bender
Monsters by Foreign Air
get you by Eve 6
Raw Raw by K.Flay
Nightmares by Huxlxy
Palace of the Innocents by The Glitch Mob
Final Boss by margø
Alt3r3ddr3ams//Und3rgr0und by Twin Pumpkin, measyou & Mary More
No real theme to this set of songs, but we've got the greatest lyricist of our generation again (Dessa) as well as the greatest video game composer, a bunch of songs about feelings and a song that proves ska isn't dead and another one that shows pop punk is alive and well.
This week’s playlist:
Fighting Fish (Live) by Dessa & Minnesota Orchestra
overwhelmed by Royal & the Serpent
Miss Negativity by Night Club
Play with Fire (feat. Yacht Money) [Extended Mix] by Sam Tinnesz
The Quiver to the Bomb by U.S. Girls
Brainless by Free Kittens & Bread
Heart of Gold by Half Past Two
Don't Be An Asshole by Doghouse Rose
Setting Sail, Coming Home (End Theme) by Darren Korb
I can't even claim any rhyme or reason to this set of songs. Well, there's a lot of rhyming and reasons why I like these tracks, just nothing that binds them together. We've got a thrash-grass song that's the best capture of anxiety in song form I've ever heard, we've gangstagrass that's bluegrass + rap, we've got a bunch of songs that don't sound like the decade they were recorded in, we've got a few songs that do. We've got a white girl rapping in Japanese, and the least indie song I've ever included, but one that will bring some older folks back to angsty teenage years.
This week the songs accidentally told a story. An unsustainable situation, a strained romance, a rocky home life. Posturing, rebellion, and recovery. Plus, it features 3 of what long time followers will recognize as my favorite artists (and 1 that is in my top artists of all time but haven't been featured heavily on this blog yet)
The accidental theme of this set of songs is mostly monsters. The monsters we face, both internally and externally. The monsters we are. The monsters we set aside and the ones we gladly embrace. And then there's one song about fantasizing about your friends. Which isn't really a monster thing. More of just a whoops that happens thing.
Whoops. So I might have gotten busy and forgotten to upload the last few weeks. Back on track now, hopefully. There's not exactly a theme to these songs but it still kinda feels like it tells a story. Also, it has both one of my favorite silly sex songs, a song that feels like it was written about BoJack Horseman, and the song I am really tempted to walk down the aisle to
This week's playlist:
Seashore by The Regrettes
Tell Me the Truth by Two Feet
Favorite Color Is Blue (feat. K.Flay) by Robert DeLong