Alphabet Soup Week 34: The Q Tracks

There will be no bending of the rules this week! Welcome to week 34 of Alphabet Soup where all the songs actually begin with this week’s letter!!

In last week's entry I talked about the trail weariness I was experiencing. While I'm grateful to say that that phase seems to have passed, sadly my tendonitis returned after a big day earlier this week. On Monday we hiked from Bigbury-on-Sea to Salcombe, a distance of over 14 miles with close to 3,000 feet of ups and downs. It was an absolutely stunning day, challenging, with beautiful scenery, and one of my favorite days on the entire trail so far. My body was feeling strong, the distance and the tough climbs all seemed manageable. But within the first mile of the following day's walk my tendons were barking at me quite loudly. While I was able to make it through the day, it was clear that some rest days were on the agenda.

On Wednesday I hung out at our inn as my wife Tina walked from Beesands to Darmouth. I was able to arrange a late checkout from our hotel and, after a midday taxi transfer, arrived in Dartmouth in time to meet Tina at a cafe for latte and cake before checking in to our 14th century inn for two nights. Yesterday was a scheduled rest day and we took advantage of the time, and the bad weather, to head to the laundrette and get two weeks of laundry done. Much of the rest of the day was spent relaxing and reading in our room.

Today was another big day on the trail and I decided it was prudent to take one more day of rest before giving it a try tomorrow. Last time this cropped up, about a month ago, after three rest days (one of which was scheduled) the tendonitis had responded positively enough that I was back to walking pain-free again for the better part of a month.

I'm doing my best to remain sanguine about the whole affair. I'm comforted by the fact that the last time I struggled with this issue I was back on the trail within a few days. It's also been much easier to give myself the gift of rest having already done so earlier in the trip. If I had been 45 days into the trail without having taken any enforced rest days it would have been far more difficult to invest time off for the necessary self-care.

Having an unanticipated day off does at least give me the chance to get caught up on some of my Substack reading and to write this week's installment of Alphabet Soup. We're at the "Q Tracks" and thankfully, unlike last week, no shortcuts were required in the drafting of this week's playlist. All of the tracks actually begin with the letter Q! Let's jump into it!

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ALPHABET SOUP WEEK 34: The Q Tracks

This week’s selections:

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TRACK: “Quedate Luna” from Cripple Crow (2005)

ARTIST: Devendra Banhart

I know very little about Texas-born, Venezuela-raised folk singer Devendra Banhart outside of the fact that I somehow owned his fifth album, 2005's Cripple Crow. Given his name, I'd always assumed that Banhart was of Indian descent but apparently his given name was suggested by the religious leader Prem Rawat, of whom his parents were followers. Additional fun fact: Banhart's middle name Obi is taken from Obi-Wan Kenobi of Star Wars fame.

As per Wikipedia, Banhart is the progenitor of the musical movement known as "freak folk" and his lyrics are "fantastical, idealistic, and poetic with the occasional trace of innuendos". When Cripple Crow was released it became his most successful album to date, peaking at number 69 on the UK albums chart and reaching the top 100 in Australia, Belgium, France and Italy.

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TRACK: “Question” from The Believer (2006)

ARTIST: Rhett Miller

Another prolific artist who only had a single appearance in my CD library, Rhett Miller, who is perhaps best known as the lead singer of Texas alt-country band Old 97's. While the band has released thirteen studio albums to date, Miller has also released eight solo albums. The non-single track Question was the closing song on Miller's second major label release, The Believer, released on Verve Forecast in 2006.

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TRACK: “Quick, Painless & Easy” from ApartmentLife (1997)

ARTIST: Ivy

I love love love Dominque Durand's voice which absolutely shines on Apartment Life, Ivy's second studio album, released in 1997. Ivy appeared way back in week 22 with a track from their 2005 release In The Clear. I'm somewhat shocked that this is the first time I've included a track from Apartment Life as it's my favorite of theirs and one of my favorite albums of the 90s. For me this album stands as the high point of the band's entire catalog. If any of their albums were ever to gain commercial success, it should have been this one. While the album was widely critically acclaimed and was in frequent rotation on college radio stations, and highly rated on their charts, it never broke through to the mainstream. The band would go on to release four more albums, folding after 2011's All Hours.

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As you make your way through this week’s playlist, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Do any of these tracks really stand out for you? What do you like? What don’t you like?

Please click the button below to leave a comment.

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TRACK: “Qu'avons-nous fait” from Immobile (1997)

ARTIST: Autour De Lucie

My introduction to Autour De Lucie came in the form of Chanson Sans Issue (Ne Vois Tu Pas) which appeared in the CD included with the March 1998 issue of CMJ New Music Monthly, my musical discovery bible during the late 90s and early 2000s. This track, Qu'avons-nous fait, appeared on the same release, 1997's Immobile, the band's third studio album. While I can still remember much of my high school French, I'm certainly not fluent in any way. But that didn't stop me enjoying the lovely vocal stylings of lead singer Valérie Leulliot and the breezy French pop accompaniment. This is another favorite album of mine from the 90s, one that regularly shared playtime with Ivy's Apartment Life and Stereolab's Dots and Loops in my 1997/98 rotation.

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TRACK: “Quiet Hour” from Drystar (2000)

ARTIST: Airlock

In 2000 Airlock, a trip hop band based in Belgium, released their debut Drystar, an album which sits inside the top 20 of the entire genre for me. While they could be accused of being derivative (by the early 2000s what emerging trip hop acts weren't) and perhaps not bringing much new to the genre, what they did produce was a beautiful collection of 14 songs with nary a bad track to be found. Originally a three piece instrumental outfit, the band initially began crafting tracks for soundtracks, adverts, and underground films before the addition of Scottish-born vocalist Esra Tasasiz in 1998. With the arrival of Tasasiz, the band expanded their ambitions and began composing and recording the tracks that would eventually be released as Drystar. The band would go on to release one more album, 2004's Symptomatic.

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TRACK: “Queer” from Garbage (1995)

ARTIST: Garbage

This is the third appearance in Alphabet Soup for Garbage after The Trick Is To Keep Breathing and Milk appeared in weeks 13 and 26 respectively. Queer was the band's second international single (fourth UK single) from their critically acclaimed 1995 self-titled debut. With its distinctly trip hop vibe, decorated by crunchy guitar flourishes in the back half of the track, it felt like an obvious choice to follow Airlock in this week's playlist.

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TRACK: “Que' Onda Guero” from Guero (2005)

ARTIST: Beck

While Q tracks were certainly in greater supply than Q artists, there still wasn't a huge universe to choose from. But while scrolling through the available list of songs, as soon as I hit Que' Onda Guero I knew I had to find a place for it in this week's playlist.

I've spoken before about the importance of playlist sequencing and this track's position serves as a fun(ky) transition into the trio of somewhat heavier tracks that close out this week's playlist. Guero was Beck's ninth studio album and his highest charting album at the time, reaching number two on the US Billboard 200. Personally that feels a little criminal to me, coming as it did on the heels of what I consider to be his career highlight, 2004's Sea Change, which only peaked at number eight.

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TRACK: “Quote” from The Melody and the Energetic Nature of Volume (2006)

ARTIST: Evans Blue

Evans Blue is a Canadian rock band that released five studio albums between 2006 and 2016. Their debut album The Melody and the Energetic Nature of Volume, on which the track Quote appears, has sold over 200,000 copies and reached the number one slot on the Billboard Heatseekers Chart. I don't know much about the band outside of the fact that this is their only album I ever owned and that they produced a rather crunchy rendition of Sarah McLachlan's Possession.

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TRACK: “Quicksand” from Tip (1998)

ARTIST: Finger Eleven

Our next band started their musical lives as the imaginatively named Rainbow Butt Monkeys, under which moniker they released one album before changing their name. Quicksand comes from 1997's Tip, their first album as Finger Eleven. The album, which represented a stylistic shift for the band, saw their music evolving from the more funk-infused sound of their debut to a darker and heavier rock. The album was initially poorly received and led to the band being dropped by their label. The September 1998 re-release on their new label saw more commercial success, laying the groundwork for the breakthrough of their subsequent album, 2000's The Greyest of Blue Skies, which was featured in week 11 with their cover of Depeche Mode's Walking In My Shoes.

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TRACK: “Quiet” from Siamese Dream (1993)

ARTIST: Smashing Pumpkins

We wrap up the week with Quiet from Smashing Pumpkins' second album, 1993's Siamese Dream. This was my on ramp to the band and remains one of my favorites, probably second  only to Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, although Adore is also in the running. Just about everything the band has released since 2000's Machina I & II has fallen short of my continually declining expectations, with their last few releases eliciting little more than a couple listens and an extended eye roll.

Earlier this month the band digitally released their thirteenth studio album Aghori Mhori Mei which is closer to their early form than anything they've released in a couple decades. I've given the album a few listens; while it hasn't blown me away yet, it is good and is continuing to grow on me. I want to love this album. By the end of the year I'll find out if I do. Stay tuned.

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Week 7 on the South West Coast Path

After three days of rest, I’ll be back out on the trail again tomorrow. We’ll see how it goes! Until then, here’s a batch of photos from my last four days of walking:

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Here’s the link to the running playlist which is updated on a weekly basis as each new installment is published:

ALPHABET SOUP RUNNING PLAYLIST

Tracks missing from the Spotify playlist:

• Allegory by Murray Attaway (Week 02)

• Face Me and Smile by The Lover Speaks (Week 12)

• From Your Mouth by God Lives Underwater (Week 13)

• This Can’t Go On! by The Lover Speaks (Week 23)

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