Considering it’s nearly midway through the second month of the year, I thought I’d better do an update about my listening for the past few months. The last month of the year was mostly about tunes from the 80s and the 90s because my rewatch/watch of Stranger Things had me on nostalgia overload. I made my most bonkers NYE playlist ever; it was so good that it was my commute listening for weeks. Of note that I made it before the Stranger Things finale, and I’d already put Prince on it so imagine my delight! I also started my first week of 2026 listening to a whole lot of Kate Bush and Florence + The Machine. Because I needed a big loan from the feral and fey grrl zone (to misquote Tori but I’m not quite in a Tori mode these days).
Mid-January, I was hankering for what I like to call “Millennial Indie” which translates to = “bands I saw live or wished I saw live during my indie concert-going days”. This includes Metric, alt-j, Tame Impala, Death Cab for Cutie, Broken Social Scene, Yeah Yeah Yeahs (who actually belong to the category of “bands I was at the same music festival with but I was catching another act and now I kick myself”), Franz Ferdinand (band I went batshit over while dancing in the front row), and various other comfort listens. Mostly it’s been the Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Metric because they fit my current mood so well.
In other news, the past few months have been about my transition from Spotify to fully Bandcamp and Apple Music. It was not easy because not everything I’d been listening to on Spotify is available on either platform. Not easily available for individual purchase either! This includes the entire catalogue of Takashi Yoshimatsu’s compositions. They’re mostly available to listen on YouTube but it’s not the same thing. I’m putting Yoshimatsu on vinyl in my list of things to get for this year since I’m slowly returning to physical media for a lot of these things.
Speaking of Yoshimatsu: Yesterday I attended my first concert in six years. The first since the pandemic hit (my last concert had Prokofiev in it if I recollect correctly), the first in my 50s, and the first since I returned to my formal music learning journey. I nearly didn’t make it given how unwell I’ve been but the ticket had been purchased and I decided to be brave because who knows when they’ll play Yoshimatsu again (I’ve been waiting and waiting for years. YEARS.). No regrets. Would do again but when I’m feeling better. There was also Rachmaninoff who is always fun live and the MPO did an amazing job with our chaos goblin drama queen of a composer. Don’t get me wrong, I ADORE Rachmaninoff especially because he’s musically a chaos goblin drama queen. I said what I said. We all need a little musical chaos.
2026 music: so far the highlights for me have been Dry Cleaning (amazing album), Kim Gordon, and Mitski’s (!!!) new music. I also enjoyed Buck Meek’s Gasoline and feel he’s an artist I need to pay more attention to in the future.
I hope to have more to post in the coming weeks but after current deadlines (including preparing for music exams!) are met.