CMU Playlists

Playlist: The Maccabees

By | Published on Saturday 13 February 2010

Currently winding their way around the country with The Big Pink, The Drums and Bombay Bicycle Club on the NME Awards tour, The Maccabees released the 12″ vinyl edition of their collaboration with Roots Manuva, ‘Empty Vessels’, this week.

A reworking of ‘No Kind Words’, from their acclaimed ‘Wall Of Arms’ album, guitarist Felix White apparently had Roots in mind for the track when they were originally recording it, but only thought to mention it in an interview after the album’s release. Luckily for him, Roots saw the interview and got in touch.

We’ve been in touch with Felix, too. Before heading out on tour, he put together this Powers Of Ten playlist for us, of which he says: “Our playlist is a little example of what we’ve been listening to recently. We tend to disagree about and hold quite different opinions on music, hence the range of stuff in the playlist. Lou Reed appears three times, which might seem quite generous, but when you first discover The Velvet Underground and his solo career, you don’t need to listen to anything else for six months. I think Hugo and Orlando both had phases like that”.

He adds: “The hip hop songs are ones I listened to on repeat during the making of ‘Wall Of Arms’. It saved the experience for me a little bit, because I was always genuinely excited to listen to the songs on the way to and from the studio”.

FELIX WHITE’S TEN
Click here to listen to Felix’s playlist in Spotify, and then read on to find out more about his selections.

01 The Velvet Underground – Heroin
Not a cryptic song! It’s an empowering thing to know that you can write an incredible song with only two or three chords. Hugo and Orlando are very into it. Complete with teeth chattering screeching.

02 The Velvet Underground – Sweet Jane (Live)

Hugo loves this, too. He plays it in sound checks.

03 Adam Green – Morning After Midnight

This has the lyric, “hepatitis caught me off my guard”. That’s about as much as needs to be said about it. It’s well good.

04 Lou Reed – Sad Song

This is off ‘Berlin’. Apparently, when that album came out it didn’t get very good reviews, which is very difficult to get your head round. It’s operatic whilst retaining all the beautiful simplicity and emotiveness of his earlier work.

05 Pete And The Pirates – Come On Feet

Pete And The Pirates are definitely one of the best guitar bands to come out of Britain for a while. It’s perfect pop music. And towards the end, it has one of the best woooos I’ve ever heard. I’ve got a lot of time for a band that can cram so much fun into two and a half minutes.

06 The Shins – Sleeping Lessons

This is a beautiful way to start a record. I love the subtle and gradual build in the song that climaxes into the last minute. There’s a tenderness and other-worldliness that – although I loved their second record ‘Chutes Too Narrow’ – I don’t think they had achieved til ‘Wincing The Night Away’.

07 Roots Manuva – Again & Again

I love everything about this and the album it’s taken from, ‘Slime And Reason’. On the underground in London, soaking wet from the rain and in the rush hour, I can block it all out by putting this on, and it makes me happy. There’s probably no higher praise than that!

08 Nas – NY State Of Mind

I don’t know anything about Nas, but a friend recommended ‘Illmatic’ after I expressed an interest in listening to more hip hop. It feels believable, and I really like the monotonous loop and flow it develops that seems innate to a lot of the best modern American hip hop music.

09 Notorious BIG – Things Done Changed

Listening to the textures underneath the beat of this resulted in the very beginnings of putting together the sounds on our track ‘No Kind Words’, although it ended up sounding very far removed from it.

10 Public Enemy – Louder Than A Bomb

I was obsessed with this for a couple of months. ‘It Takes A Nation Of Millions To Hold Us Back’ was a big discovery for me a year ago. I was suddenly genuinely excited about music again. The intent is unmistakable. A good French friend of ours said he would listen to this in his bedroom and, although he couldn’t understand a word of it, he really got what they were trying to say. I think that says a lot for the music and the delivery.

Photo: Vicky Schofield



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