Podcasts | CMGcasts

CVIII

By Scott Reid | 8 January 2012

Art: Derek Erdman, “Riders #1”

What better way to ring in the new year, a full week late, than with CMG podcast #108: a mix totally oblivious to how 2012 promises us nothing but months’ worth of fantastical death fantasies and then actual death, or maybe just arbitrary height restrictions, depending on which prog-rock you listen to. I mean, just check out 2012’s Wikipedia page, pockmarked with “predictions” of what we have to look forward to this year:

The song “2012 — Demise of the 5th Sun” by the melodic death metal band Scar Symmetry is a reference to the year 2012. “For the lines on the fractal wave / Fit the course of history / They’re created to work as one till the end / When the winter solstice comes / Actualizing the prophecy / The demise in 2012 realized”

The lyrical theme of Brain Drill’s 2010 album Quantum Catastrophe is the destruction of humankind in 2012.

You know things are serious when Brain Drill and Scar Symmetry have given up hope.

Genesis’s song “Get’em Out By Friday” from their 1972 album Foxtrot, sets “18/9/2012” (on the printed operistic-dialog lyrics) as the date when “Genetic Control” would set a height restriction on human beings so that twice as many people could fit on real estate properties.

Quoth Peter Gabriel, expect “a four foot restriction on humanoid height” this September for improved stackability. If you think about it enough, and Genesis clearly did, this makes all kinds of sense.

Things get worse still. This is also the year that Incubus’ “A Certain Shade of Green” starts to sound silly. And what a loss:

“The time has passed for hand-me-downs
Choose a new, please evolve
Take flight!

Are you gonna stand around till 2012 A.D.?
What are you waiting for, a certain shade of green?
I think I grew a gray watching you procrastinate”

Strong stuff, once.

So who could blame us for giving up on 2012 already, just one week in, considering the best case scenario is a Logan’s Run_-esque fate awaiting everyone taller than a vacuum cleaner. Take _some solace, at least, in new music from Grimes, .L.W.H., Chad VanGaalen, Green Ova, Teebs, and Pete Swanson, plus a tiny island of Danny Brown guestspots. And, best of all, with thanks to all of the artists involved, enjoy zero songs about how you can and will die this year:

Download mp3 (192kbps)

Cover jpeg

[52:22]

1. Grimes: “Oblivion”

2. Julia Holter: “Goddess Eyes”

3. Teebs: “Red Curbs Loop (Stuff I Dream About)” / “Cook, Clean, Pay the Rent (New House version)”

4. .L.W.H.: “Bureau of Compliance Part 1 (f/ Julian Wass)”

5. MondreM.A.N.: “Suffocation (f/ Danny Brown & Squadda B)”

6. Quelle Chris: “Shotgun (f/ Danny Brown & Roc Marciano)”

7. Mozart’s Sister: “Don’t Leave It To Me”

8. Zomes: “Stark Reality”

9. Pinch & Shackleton: “Selfish Greedy Life [intro]” / “Rooms Within a Room”

10. Sepalcure: “Eternally Yrs”

  • (33:40 – 38:40)
  • from Sepalcure (Hotflush; 2011)
  • sepalcure.com

11. Pete Swanson: “Misery Beat”

12. Sandro Perri: “Love & Light”

  • (46:01 -49:42)
  • from Impossible Shapes (Constellation; 2011)
  • sandroperri.com

13. Chad VanGaalen: “Absorbed by the Night”