THE FOLK JOURNAL
20230602
THE BEAST 1000
I started a playlist in 2017 called The Beast with the idea to add songs one at a time as I listened, instead of adding tons of songs all at once. It was called The Beast because I was also keeping yearly playlists with all these songs as well, and The Beast was ALL the songs. As I went about my normal listening over the years, usually to full albums and new music discovery, if I heard a song I really liked, I added it to this playlist. Now, in 2023, this playlist has over 1000 songs. Now I can shuffle this playlist and have a huge pool of songs that I know I like and not have a ton of repetition. I’m going to keep adding songs, but this playlist is basically all the songs I’ve loved since 2017 and basically the definition of the music I love today. 1000 songs, hand picked, one at a time.
It’s mostly modern underground country, songwriters, classic country, and bluegrass. But there’s also jam bands, soul, blues, and some other stuff thrown in.
Some of the most common artists on this playlist are some of my all time favorites:
Bob Dylan 20 songs
Willie Nelson 16
Steve Earle 16
Townes Van Zandt 13
John Prine 11
Doc Watson 11
And some of my favorites of today:
Turnpike Troubadours 20
Sturgill Simpson 14
Tedeschi Trucks Band 14
Mike and The Moonpies 13
Jason Isbell 13
Tyler Childers 12
Hayes Carll 12
Jason Boland 11
Colter Wall 11
Jason Eady 10
Josh Ritter 10
The way I listen to music has evolved over the years. A lot of what I’ve done since the rise of modern streaming services is listen to full albums and a lot of stuff that’s new to me. Instead of listening to the same artists or playlists, I would constantly be searching for new artists, new to me artists, and digging deep into the catalogs of classic artists I’ve loved and classic artists I wasn’t as familiar with. This has led me to fall in love with some classic artists like Neil Young, John Prine, Grateful Dead, and classic bluegrass, as well as current artists like Jamie Lin Wilson, Ian Noe, Zoe Muth, Josh Ritter, and Margo Cilker.
My start in this type of music came from listening to Pandora in college around 2007. I grew an obsession for Jason Boland and The Stragglers and eventually would own all of their albums on iTunes. If there was one artist I could point to as having the biggest impact on why I love the music that I love today, and why I eventually had the audacity to try to write my own songs, it is Jason Boland. I doubt that I’ve listened to any artist more in my life. His lyrics spoke to me in a way that no one else’s had at a time where I was away from home for the first time and trying to figure out where my life was going. I will always have a core memory of driving up and down I-79 between Pittsburgh and Erie listening to Jason Boland albums on repeat with my iPod plugged into my Ford Explorer radio.
Other foundational artists I had on repeat at that time were Ryan Bingham, The Steeldrivers, and Hank III. I also logged thousands of hours listening to SiriusXM Outlaw Country to get a baseline for 70s country classics from Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Waylon Jennings, and Johnny Cash. Only since the start of The Beast in 2017 and constant listening on Spotify have I dug into and rebuilt the foundation for the music I love around the likes of Townes Van Zandt, Guy Clark, Bob Dylan, John Prine, Neil Young, and Steve Earle. This is the center of my musical taste but there are certainly offshoots, probably most significantly the Allman Brothers Band and the Grateful Dead have consumed many hours on my speakers.
I really like having The Beast now because I can throw it on anytime and not be disappointed or hitting the skip button. It’s the go to when I need something easy and quick. But I’ll always be searching and exploring and loving something new. I recently started a New Top Ten playlist that focuses on new songs released in the last 4 months. So that’s a bit of a different approach where I remove songs as new ones come or they pass 4 months. Basically I’m an obsessed fan, and making playlists helps keep my obsession organized, somewhat.