Weekly Playlist 4/24

Every Friday, I share the highlights of what I’ve been listening to over the course of the week, from old favorites to new discoveries. Playlist best enjoyed in order.

It’s another short-ish one this week, focused heavily on older artists and some of their best. We start with some fun pulled from a quarantine playlist, Ween’s “Bananas and Blow.” I think we can all relate to being stuck — maybe not in a cabana and maybe not with bananas and blow, but hey.

Paul Simon’s Graceland is a classic for a reason, packed with a lot of fantastic songs, “You Can Call Me Al” probably the most famous of them. But there’s so much great stuff here with such great mixes of different sounds and influences, and “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes” is a great example with its tempo shifts. It moves into a great catchy one from R.E.M., “The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight,” followed by Cheap Trick’s big “Dream Police” that should feel much cheesier now than it does. And Cheap Trick, at least in the pre-coronavirus days when concerts were a thing, still puts on a hell of a show, including a solid, intense “Dream Police.”

And finally, a song by Toto that isn’t “Africa” and may not be as good as “Africa” but is deserving of attention nonetheless — “Rosanna.”

For your weekend reading, take a look at how Mumford & Sons took steps to reduce their carbon footprint on tour — and what venues, fans, and other artists are doing to make concerts more environmentally friendly.