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LAST “SHUFFLE UP'd 8” UPDATE: 29OCT2023

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When you’ve had an on & off “music blog” for more years than makes financial/logical sense, the one useful thing you do accumulate is a lot of solid bangers and/or jams that never expire (if you remember to store them correctly). And when you’ve been music blogging for as long as I will never admit to have been “music blogging” for, you eventually realize that as strong as the desire is to always be looking for the next NEW song/artist discovery (mostly for your own ears, but a little bit for whoever else might be checking in on your #content for similar hits of discovery), it’s equally nice to go back & hang out with all the songs you already know you like (besides… the ‘never-heard-before’ music pile is infinite & best approached with a measured pace).

It’s a bit like that meme that went around a lot in 2018:

Well, the YOUR WEEKLY 9(to)5 EH SHUFFLE aims to work on this struggle by putting together a fresh mix cd of 19 tracks that have been featured in some MOUN.TOWN/RADIO programming (aka HI54LOFI’s Mixcloud mixes) or in some interconnecting MOUN.TOWN/FM programming (aka HI54LOFI’s mix cd streaming playlists) at some point throughout the years (including right up to whatever year we’re in at this point in time). Each weekly update is sequenced as if I was making a mix cd and then I place that mix at the top of the YOUR WEEKLY 9(to)5 EH playlist EVERY Sun/Monday (and I remove 19 tracks from the bottom to keep things at an even 95 total tracks from 95 different artists).

Why 95? Well, that’s just a number that makes sense with another interconnected project I think out loud about called “95EH” — which is a local mountain town idea I mess about with in a cheap apartment off of Highway 95a, eh (which includes me running a local area events calendar powered thru “mutually beneficial employment” over at MOUN.TOWN/EVENTS).

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YOUR WEEKLY 9(to)5 EH SHUFFLE is a mix of old and new tunes, from the 50s right up to the present week, and the one thing they all have in common is that they’ve all been of the kind of song quality that makes my specific ears want to store for repeat-listening & telling someone else about ‘em at some point over the years, including up to today (again & probably again).

Bottomline Guarantee: you could do a lot worse when looking for something to throw on shuffle during an upcoming stretch of needing a soundtrack for whatever you’re getting up to for a 9-to-5 these days, whenever you’re getting up to that (I also try to make sure there are no ‘E’ marked explicit tracks in this playlist, aka safe for public consumption, although sometimes an “explicit” word/thought sneaks thru, as they are wont to do every now & again, such is art).

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And if you find your ears are liking what they’re hearing in the above playlist, it’d probably be a good idea to like/follow over on Spotify so you can continue to get future updates auto-magically appearing on your listening device throughout the year (because this playlist gets updated EVERY Sun/Monday). And, as always, when you hear something you like, do the universe some good and support/check those artists out further (every little bit helps).

Speaking of which, here’s a few ‘available-on-Bandcamp’ tracks from the latest shuffle update that you can buy directly from the artists/labels, at prices they set themselves (but here’s some info on how Bandcamp is a lot more artist friendly for online music consumption than a lot of the others in that field, for those curious in popping open a few rabbit holes along the way down this post):

The Latest SHUFFLE UP’D 8:

But they’re not the only tracks you could go from discovering on a streaming service that pays artists fractions of pennies to directly supporting on a site like Bandcamp, which is one of the many reasons why I keep a Buy Music Club list going for all the tracks that get added to my ongoing YOUR WEEKLY 9(to)5 EH Spotify playlist, that are also available on Bandcamp at the time of me checking (ps - I reset the list at the start of every year… so here’s the 2021 archive & 2022 archive for when you’re in the mood for doing some Bandcamp exploring). So go check that stuff out whenever you find yourself wanting to reward your ears with a gift while also sending out more direct support to those who help keep all of our lives nicely soundtracked — it especially comes in handy on Bandcamp Fridays, BUT, really, any day can be a good day to go support someone’s art with money you earned doing whatever it is you do for work, so here’s the Buy Music Club embed for anyone who fancies listening to an unshuffable™ playlist that you don’t need a Spotify account for and comes with buy links that go to the artists/labels Bandcamp (new additions tacked on to the bottom):

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Because the Corporate Streamers® of the world (and the technology they are built-on) are great for discovering and keeping track of music + streaming tools allow us to easily choose better soundtracks throughout the day than what Corporate FM™ radio stations used to drill us into submission with before the internet arrived in everyone’s pocket (trust me, I was born the year before 1984), but the way creators are paid out with streaming is just not very good / very fair at all (and it doesn’t need to be that way) —ESPECIALLY in comparison to what some are making off of providing access to other people’s art (it’s kinda like how a lot of industries are unfairly structured to enrich & empower the few at the top in a ‘profits over everything, infinite growth’ society) .

Ideally, smart artist/human-minded people will start making some more momentum towards coming up with a better/fairer streaming model (here’s a September 2020 contribution to the dialogue from me, if interested), BUT, for now, us appreciators of creativity/good things need to start doing a better job of being more mindful of making sure we’re continuing to show direct support to the creation of good things. And Bandcamp is still one of the best online places going for intentionally & directly supporting the makers of the art you appreciate with something tangible like money to help cover the costs of doing work that often gets done without a paycheque (and then you get to carry around your music collection in your pocket, so everybody wins).

But, also, money isn’t the only way to contribute support directly to the work that others do regardless because the work is needed to be done (and anything beyond passive consumption is always a notch in the good column… and there are plenty of ways to support others once you start clicking around to investigate the maker/s of the thing you found yourself connecting to). So go forth and “heart” something.

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Anyways, I HOPE YOU HEAR/D A FEW THINGS YOU LIKE ENOUGH TO GO INVEST MORE TIME WITH BACK IN YOUR PERSONAL ORBIT, BUT IF YOU FIND YOU’RE ACTuALLY IN THE MOOD FOR A DIFFERENT MOUN.TOWN/FM SOUNDTRACK THAN THE ONE ABOVE, have a flick thru this carousel of HI54 MIX CD programming & give a listen to whatever catches your fancy:

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OR SEARCH “MOUN.TOWN/FM” ON SPOTIFY TO BROWSE THE FULL COLLECTION OF #MountownFM PLAYLISTS (BECAUSE THERE’S MORE THAN what the above carousel can handle — and every accompanying blog post comes with available-on-Bandcamp embeds/archives)

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And if you’re looking for something related to all of the above, but also different:

[a part of my "shuffle update" process for this weekly updated mix cd playlist is checking to see if any of the newly added tracks, like the one above, have an accompanying music video that I can add to HI54.BLOG's ongoing 'all day music videos' rotation on FM/TV]

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And here’s hoping this week we’ll be better than the last \m/

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JEREMY / @HI54LOFI

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