Project 21: When I was 21
What were you listening to when you were 21? For most if not all of us, music had a profound effect at that age. We are re-visting the songs that were important to each of us when we were 21.
Participants are creating playlists of songs they listened to when they were 21. I’ll post the playlists over the course of this weekend as they roll in.
People who want to participate in the song making will chose songs to cover from the playlists.
All song submissions are due by 9pm CT on Saturday December 10.
Kelly Duclos covers What Did you Call It That For by Arcwelder
Great memories of friends were at the heart of this project for me. Journeys to the 7th Street Entry. Frequent covers at our Paynesville Teen Center shows. Cranking on the boombox at the hacky sack circle. The feedback. The noise and power. The brothers and the singing drummer. All of it such a huge part of our friendships. Thanks, Jacob, for picking this one. I haven't rocked an Arcwelder cover in maybe 25 years. It was a joy to make this! Here's to you, friends!
Barrett Haroldson covers Playground Love by Air
Great songs this round, I love the crossover and the range of what everybody submitted. After struggling with a few of my first choices, I did Playground Love by Air. I love this score and I tried to just give it a fresh spin but also keep it in the world of the rest of the score — playing with some of the instrumentation and the arrangement. If you haven't seen this movie recently, it's worth a rewatch with the volume cranked.
Noah Warren covers Waterfalls by TLC
Do you think people knocked boots to this song? Oh well, who’s to blame for tootin’ 'caine into your own vein?
I was delighted Colby had this as an option and I had zero time to put this together.
As I embarked I thought: there’s a rap in this, right? We’ll just excise that. Then a stupid little voice inside of me said, no, do it. I listened to Left Eye’s freestyle probably 10 times in a row to get the muscle memory and then just recorded it in a different character voice. It reminded me of when I had to memorize and perform Shakespeare monologues and work to make text somewhat accessible.
You’re right Colby, this song hails from the planet of Prince. I think the drums are what drew me to it when I first heard it, then Tboz’s raspy vocals sealed the deal. I like songs that are episodic in nature and this certainly captures the foreboding disquiet that clung to sex in the nineties. I remember Bill Murray appeared at the 25th SNL reunion as Nick The Lounge Singer and serenaded this song to Drew Barrymore in the audience, saying, “we’re all pulling for you, Drew”. I usually think of that most when I hear this song. Also how broke TLC must’ve been when they made this. Perhaps TikTok can introduce the choreography in this video to new generations. Thanks for putting up with this!
Bill Fricke’s covers
House of Cards - Radiohead
I have to be honest, I really don’t like Radiohead. Part of it stems from having a co-worker that listened to OK Computer on repeat and repeat and I grew to despise Thom Yorke’s mewling vocals. However, I did find “House of Cards” to actually be something that caught my attention.
After several different attempts, I happened to be re-reading books about New Music and composers like Steve Reich, Philip Glass and “Minimalists”. I also was re-reading a book by Philip Glass about his “operas” and it got my brain to thinking. So, House of Cards has been “Philip Glassed”. I think I got most of the tropes in there.
Misbeaten - Rocket From the Crypt
I liked this song a lot. I pretty much did a straight cover, but then was playing around with mixing options and came across “Through the Walls” as a mixing option. So, this has now been imagined as if listening to it from next door or below Neil’s college dorm room. Poor neighbors…:)
Grant Eull covers Feel the Pain by Dinosaur Jr. and What Did You Call It That For by Arcwelder
Overcome with memories and nostalgic joy when listening and trying to select songs from everyone's playlist, I eventually had to give in to my guitar playing desires. Who doesn’t want to learn how to play Feel The Pain? … never thinking about how difficult it might be to program the drums. Sounds simple on the surface; but as you can so obviously hear in the original, the tempo shifts from section to section. I had 10 make beats at 3 different tempos, export wavs and then try to stitch them back together… it’s a sloppy mess, but I was so so excited about everything else in this song that I just sort of made it work I think. Then although I really really wanted to attempt Built To Spills Carry The Zero, I was too intimidated by the guitar and vocal work of a Doug Martsch (yes way more so than J Mascis).
I had to choose something else. Lucky for me down the submission list is an ALL time favorite local act, Arcwelder! I go see them play every year to this day (and yes they still play and still rock very very hard) Wait…how far do I need to drop the tuning on my guitar to get close to this? I settled on a step and a half down. This album was in heavy heavy heavy rotation in my 20s and it was a treat to learn What Do You Call It. Thanks for everyones great ideas and for a fun playlist to choose from. Hope you enjoy my attempts to mimic. Cheers!
Ian Royal covers Earth People by Dr. Octagon
There were so many good songs to choose from,
but when I saw Dr. Octagon, it was all over.
This album is in my hip-hop holy trinity, along with Deltron 3030
(also produced by Dan the Automator) and Gza's Liquid Swords.
I sampled this album in rudimentary 4-track productions in 1997.
If you haven't caught on: I love this album so much.
Anyways, as I'm researching the samples and bassline and going over the lyrics,
something happened. When my brain read the hook ("Earth People, New York and..."),
it connected with..... Walken. I then decided to do the whole thing like that.
So, yeah. He's a cyborg clone of Christopher Walken. I even did a complete lyric rewrite.
Now with more parody!
Tom Stromsodt covers Machine Gun by Portishead
Randy Dever covers Paper Planes by MIA
Neil Fasen covers Edit the Sad Parts by Modest Mouse
Sometimes listening to Modest Mouse can feel like chewing on a pop can. There are sharp edges and ouchie things. Their music is like a thousand rusty tin soldiers marching stiffly through a field of rocks. I wanted to soften the edges of a Modest Mouse song and make it feel more like swaying on an ocean of pillows. I’m not sure it succeeded, but it was fun to try.
Brian Eveslage covers Chumming the Ocean by Archers of Loaf
I was just revisiting Archers when Neil suggested this song. So it seemed like a sign.
I was going for an old timey, AM radio vibe, but may have ended up with more of practice space boombox recording.
In the 2nd chorus, I wanted to do something to represent the chaos and despair I felt that Eric Bachmann was trying to portray in the song. So I messed with the tempo and syncopation to emulate that feeling...
Hahaha! Just kidding. I somehow messed up the tempo on multiple tracks while I was mixing/editing and couldn't fix it, ran out of time to re-record...So I submit the song, flaws and all.
Good times and great suggestions!
Colby Heston covers Waterfalls by TLC
Randy Dever cut the beat for me about three weeks ago. I should have started learning the bass line then.
Like Noah, I toyed with cutting out the rap but I think that it's important to the song since it's the only part that anyone in TLC wrote.
Anyway, here it is...late as usual. Hope that you enjoy it!
Andrew Charon covers Daydream by Smashing Pumpkins
This time around I had to select my own song as I'm a bit sensitive to The Smashing Pumpkins. The Album Gish was so meaningful to me...I lived in Chicago back in 1991-1992 and they played around town all of the time. I remember seeing them fall of 1991 at the Cabaret Metro and I had felt that they were larger than life, yet as I was leaving I remember James Iha getting on his bike to head home after the show which made it all tangible. And, the last show that I saw before moving back to Minnesota was when they played an acoustic set with a band called Catherine and it was so nice to hear the translation and it was a good-bye to living in Chicago. Gish was the anthem for the year. Fast forward thirty years and they had just played live in Minneapolis and I didn't want to see them since they're a new band now. I had a difficult time connecting with anything after Siamese Dream and even now that album seems new to me and, in addition to everything else, the dynamic just isn't the same without D'arcy. Regarding Basement Sketches, my track turned out ok. I wanted to keep it simple and spent time working out the guitar. The vocals never really worked out for me and I eventually removed them. I had a great time recording Daydream, but I think it netted out a bit unfinished. I'd definitely consider this one a bit of a sketch for me.
Bill Fricke’s Playlist
I turned 21 in 1986 and it was a time of transition. I finished school in California and returned to Minnesota with the woman who would become my first wife.
I always had a pretty broad interest in different music. If it caught my attention, I liked it.
I chose the following songs based on the guitarists and their influence on me then and still now.
REM - I Believe. Several albums in and I still couldn't figure out how Peter Buck did it. Love this song.
Chris Isaak - Fade Away. I first heard him on a San Francisco radio station. Guitarist James Calvin Wilsey turned my head around with the sounds on this one. F#7 sus is the best chord ever.
David Sylvian - Taking the Veil. I was a huge fan of Japan, and his first solo album was amazing. This song features Robert Fripp.
The Smiths - The Headmaster Ritual. This is the first Smiths song I ever heard. It blew me away. The bass line is also stunning.
The Cure - Primary. My first ex had all the old Cure albums and I had never heard this until 86. A Forest is also awesome, but who, besides Spinal Tap, would write a song featuring only bass guitar?
Kelly Duclos’s Playlist
This project sent me way down memory lane! It was a super fun look back and now I'm looking forward to all of the submissions and doing a cover or two!
In 1997, about a month after I turned 21, my friend Joe and I set out on a questionable 3000+ mile road trip to San Francisco. The great young man's On the Road adventure! In preparation for the trip, I made a mixtape that is now a time capsule of some of the music we were into at the time. It has plenty of Beatles, Dylan and Zeppelin but some other interesting nuggets sprinkled in including spoken word snippets of Jack Kerouac himself from a cassette Mike Lenz had given me around that time. Damn good times. This playlist mostly features some sweet ones from the tape.
"San Francisco, San Francisco, you're a muttering bum in a brown beat suit." -Kerouac
1. Strolling Down the Highway - Nick Drake, Tanworth In Arden '67/68
Great tune for the road trip. It's on a collection of home recordings made before any of the Nick Drake studio albums. I got the Italian import CD from Cheapo back around this time. Inspiring old school basement sketches.
2. Train Round the Bend - Velvet Underground, Loaded
This is another great road trippin' tune. Pretty sure I foolishly sold it, but I had the sweet '97 reissue CD with a fancy lenticular cover. Heard about Loaded from a co-worker at Colorworx where I made 3M Matchprints that year.
3. Sugarcube - Yo La Tengo, I Can Hear the Heart Beating As One
This one isn't on the mixtape but came out in '97 and I'm pretty sure I went out and got it on vinyl right away some time after the roadtrip. This is one of the greats released that year.
4. Smile Away - Paul McCartney, RAM
We lived in a shitty apartment behind the brownstones across 4th Street from Know Name Records that year. Obsessed by the Beatles and pretty much through the entire catalog by '97, this was an amazing discovery of new Beatles-like tunes that went on heavy rotation.
5. Weed Forestin' - Sentridoh, The Original Losing Losers '82 - '91
I was obsessed with finding a Lou B cassette that somebody had titled something like "Most of the Worst and Some of the Best" - I have a cloudy memory of jealously holding the cassette in my hand at a dorm room in Duluth. This was a rare hand made thing that I couldn't find anywhere. I eventually wrote a letter to Shrimper Records inquiring about buying a copy if there was one available. Some time later, I think in '97, this double vinyl record in a plain brown sleeve showed up in the mail with a handwritten letter inside. "You can find all of the songs from the 'some of the worst' tape + more on the enclosed LP.... If this recording meets to your approval, throw $5 in the mail to me, I trust you. Dennis" So cool! Thanks, Dennis!
Click here to open playlist in Spotify
Tom Stromsodt’s Playlist
21 was a real transitional age for me. I started college. I was in a new town. I wasn’t in a band. A lot of my hometown friends were getting in adult trouble. I don’t know. It was a weird year. If I had to play song association.
Fugazi - security blanket
Ministry - design studio. Headphones. Loud.
Pavement - I’ve tried to see Pavement 4 times in my life and failed each time.
Nirvana/Meat Puppets - Man. I hope they do more of this
The rest is basically Ralph’s Corner Bar jukebox. So…$4 pitchers.
Ian Royal’s Playlist
I turned 21 in 1998. I was mostly into the punk rock at the time. The Snuff and NoFX picks are two of my favorites from that era. Got way more into the electronic stuff thanks to a great group of friends and a house called The Bakery. The Aphex Twin song is just funny af, and I'd like to hear covers of it. The Thrill Kult song because I listened to them high school ( mostly just the "Confessions of a Knife" album) and this album, "13 Above the Night", was inline with danceable stuff I was being introduced to. Man, or Astro-Man? was another band I found around this time, again thanks to wonderful, awesome people.
Snuff: Nick Northern https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTtBUOYVKUc
NoFX: Eat the Meek https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-8skzQCH0c
Aphex Twin: Milk Man https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bt5C1oLgjHw
MLWTTKK: The Velvet Edge https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUDuUB_ub1I
Man.. or Astro-man?: Anoxia https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7xh9kbtwqE
Jon Hart’s Playlist
What a hard playlist to create. I submitted 20+ songs to Neil last week before he imposed some sanity to the process and encouraged us to trim.I focused on songs that came out when I was 21. There was a lot of great stuff I couldn’t include.
Paranoid Android
I realize this makes me a certain kind of hipster of a certain age, but I vividly remember walking into the living room of the house I shared with some friends as the MTV “world premier” aired for this music video. I had kind of ruled Radiohead out as a “loud quiet loud” wannabe band with Creep. I was living out of the country when the Bends came out. This song was a bizarre revelation to me. And I was hooked.
Into My Arms
I had just returned to college after 2 years living in Russia as a Mormon missionary. God, faith, love and doubt - these were the existential topics on my mind constantly as I came to grips with my creeping agnoticism. Nick Cave had always been on my wavelength, and this album came out right when I needed it.
Where Will I Be
I came to country through the back door - thanks to producers like Rick Rubin and Daniel Lanois. This Emmylou Harris record convinced me I had missed a whole chunk of Americana. Changed my musical life.I
Seen What I Saw
Marrying up the themes of Americana with the existential pondering of one Bad Seed, I offer up David Eugene Edwards and 16 Horsepower. This was another album that was in constant rotation, and I guess realizing now just how consistently I have curated downer songs for this playlist.I promise I’m not this angsty. You should have seen the other songs on my longer playlist. I’m a pretty upbeat person, really.
Far, Far Away
I am cheating with this song. I really didn’t get Wilco back then. I heard Being There but it didn’t grab me. But… this is the song I danced to with my wife at our wedding. And it came out when I was 21. So I’m slipping it in.
Neil Fasen’s Playlist
My 21st year was electric. It was a time of profound inspiration, tremendous heartbreak, and lifetime friendships. I was living in Fargo, North Dakota, studying painting and drawing in the neighboring city of Moorhead Minnesota. Like many people that age, I had a misguided sense of invincibility. I also loved skateboarding, music, and beer.
Target by Fugazi - It’s possible that Fugazi may be my favorite band of all time, but without question they certainly were back then. Though this album had already been around for a few years by the time I turned 21, I was still listening to it a lot in ‘97.
Earth People by Dr. Octagon - I can’t recall when or where I first heard Dr. Octagon or Kool Keith, but I loved this shit in my 20s. It was such a unique and creative album. I hadn’t heard anything like it before.
Misbeaten by Rocket from the Crypt - I really loved Rocket back then. To be honest, they’re a band I drifted away from over the years, but it was so cool to revisit them through this project. I was a sucker for songs with a 50s vibe to them, and I recall really digging Misbeaten.
Buckingham Green by Ween - I had loved Ween since High School but grew skeptical of them in my early college years. That was until the release of the Mollusk. I believe the Mollusk to be Ween at the height of their powers: innovative, clever, unexpected. Buckingham Green is my favorite off the album.
Chumming the Ocean by Archers of Loaf - Archers were another of my favorites. We’d had the good fortune to play with them that year, and it left me starstruck.
KC McKee’s Playlist
So here is my playlist, representing what I was listening to in the year 2008, when I was 21 (I mostly stuck to songs that were released that year, and that I also would have been listening to regularly at that time):
Portishead - Machine Gun https://youtu.be/00PdHIPjaWQ
MIA - Paper Planes https://youtu.be/ewRjZoRtu0Y
Radiohead - House of Cards https://youtu.be/8nTFjVm9sTQ
David Byrne and Brian Eno - Strange Overtones https://youtu.be/-L7IdUqaZxo
The Kills - Black Balloon https://youtu.be/M7cXKYujE00
Randy Dever’s Playlist 1994
Sabotage- Beastie Boys https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=z5rRZdiu1UE
Zombie- The Cranberries https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=8MuhFxaT7zo
Feel the Pain- Dinosaur Jr. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JXkN3nJyWEA
Queen- Melvins https://youtu.be/qhq4hhpqdII
Pseudoephedrine Hydrochloride- Steel Pole Bathtub https://youtu.be/peUeG3lkPuA
Colby Heston’s Playlist
I turned 21 in 1994.
When I started working on my playlist for this project, I wasn't sure if I was only going to select songs that were released in 1994 or songs that I was listening to in that year. I soon realized that I needed to restrict my selections only to those released that year. I was just listening to way too much different music at that time and to pair it down to 5 songs would have taken too long. There was also a lot of great music released in 1994 so I had plenty to choose from.
TLC - Waterfalls. I wouldn't say that I was a huge TLC fan in general but there was something about this song that spoke to me. It is just infectious. I think that I like it so much because it reminds me of Prince.
Beck - Soul Sucking Jerk. Probably my favorite track off of Mellow Gold. When this came out, I was working as a fry cook at Mom's kitchen, which was a particularly soul sucking job.
Ween - Joppa Road. Chocolate and Cheese was probably my favorite release of 1994. Joppa Road is just so pleasant and soothing. I read an interview once where Dean Ween mentioned that right before the writing of Chocolate and Cheese, one of his friends showed him 7th chords. He used them as often as possible.
Jeff Buckley - Last Goodbye. I purchased Grace as a fluke from Columbia House trying to fill up my 20 CDs for a penny. It was a very pleasant surprise. I bought it because something about Last Goodbye reminded me of Zeppelin. It would have been interesting to see where Jeff Buckley would have gone if he wouldn't have died so young.
The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Bellbottoms. There was a lot of hype around this album when it came out. It was a burst of rock n roll, swagger and libido. They did not disappoint and seeing them live was a true testimony to their energy.
Click on the image above to get to Colby’s playlist on YouTube
Noah Warren’s Playlist
Playground Love - Air
Kryptonite - 3 Doors Down
Good Fortune - PJ Harvey
Wonderful - Everclear
Lucky - Britney Spears
I turned 21 in 2000. I didn’t have much of a great taste in music. Most of these songs were blaring on the radio and they would get stuck in my head. Oh Everclear and 3 Doors Down. They still haunt me.
Andrew Charon’s Playlist
When I turned 21, I had I had recently moved to Chicago to go to college and, after growing up in Moorhead, MN during the 80’s, I was finally able to be around music that I could call my own. I was so fortunate to have been this age at this time.
Ween - Captain Fantasy. This was recorded on a Tuscam Four-Track. It was the moment I realized that recording a full length album recorded in your living room is completely tangable.
Daydream- Smashing Pumpkins. Gish was so inspiring and positive in so many ways. Unfortunately they aren’t the same without D’Arcy.
Halloween - Mudhoney. This song was released before 1991, but Mudhoney was such a great band to listen to at this time.
Spine of God - Monster Magnet. I purchased this album because of the cover and got sucked into this. First taste of stoner metal.
Gratitude - Beastie Boys. This album is timeless.
Ministry - Jesus Built My Hotrod. Bonus song.
Barrett Haroldson’s Playlist
At 21 I was living in Fargo, it was 1999. Being near the end of college, friends were already approaching the end of school and getting ready to move on. It seemed like music moved slower, and you’d have to stumble onto something good, so that’s what all of these selections are. Most of these songs were things I experienced with others, which made for really memorable introductions to these bands. Built to Spill was playing over the PA in Ralph’s back room by Zespy (local sound guy and so much more) before friends came on stage. Jon Spencer’s Greyhound was heard at a house party over by NDSU and it blew me away. Anything associated with K records was bought without hesitation and considered amazing. There was a brief moment where any Modest Mouse show within a few hours, we’d make it a priority to be there. One day, standing outside the art building on campus, A Spoonful Weighs a Ton echoed through the hallways, driving us down the maze of hallways to find the source. Then sitting down for a 3 person listening party from the start to finish in total awe. The rest fall into the category of heard live, roommate and friend influence, heard at parties, mixtapes from girlfriends and friends, and so many stacks of CDs. Also memory is unreliable so these are as close to 21 as I can remember.
Place Position - Fugazi
Snowfall - The Halo Benders
Greyhound - The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
Carry the Zero - Built to Spill
Autumn Sweater - Yo La Tengo
Bottles and Bones - Califone
Edit the Sad. Parts - Modest Mouse
A Spoonful Weighs a Ton - Flaming Lips
Jacob Sharff’s Playlist
The first time I moved to Minneapolis was in 1996. I was familiar with all these hometown bands prior to moving here, but because I was 21 that year, I thought it made sense to 'keep it local' for this project playlist. 3 of these bands I certainly made a point to see live at least once in '96. The other 2 bands I obviously did not see in 96, but their music was still a pretty steady presence in my 21 year old landscape when I arrived on these shores, way way back so many moons ago...
Husker Du - New Day Rising, New Day Rising https://youtu.be/-hRCwByLb-E
Babes in Toyland - Sweet 69, Nemesisters https://youtu.be/VaGjAhqpX3k
Arcwelder - What Did You Call it That For, Pull https://youtu.be/xNrKBl6bzaQ
The Cows - Mr Cancelled, Cunning Stunts https://youtu.be/2Lo42gFgC9c
The Replacements - Swingin Party, Tim https://youtu.be/cbhQKffugNk
Grant Eull’s Playlist
When I was 21 I was super into Local rock bands Soul Asylum and Run Westy Run at the time were hero’s of mine. I was still moving on from hair metal and gangster rap and picking up more Alt and College rock via the Pixies and the Cure, but of course Grunge was HUGE at the time. Even my own band Lucky Cow at the time was classified as Grunge… yuk! Youth and inspiration were assets at the time, especially looking back with my jaded old man attitude now.