I’m back again with my next playlist! I’m pretty excited about this one, as I’ve been in a sort of “golden age” with my music the past couple weeks. A lot of great music has dropped recently, as you’re about to see. Anyways, enough talking, let’s get to the playlist! Twenty amazing songs are waiting for you.
The playlist starts off with my current favorite song, Rhythm Of Love/Can’t Help Falling In Love (1), a mashup by a cappella group Straight No Chaser. I stumbled across this song a few days ago in Spotify and absolutely love how they blend the songs. Definitely a catchy one. The next song, Barcelona (2), as well as What Do I Know? (13) and Perfect (18) are all off of Ed Sheeran’s new album ÷ (Divide) that was released three days ago. While I’ve always like some of his music, I’ve never been a giant Ed Sheeran fan; this is the first album of his that I’ve taken a huge interest in. Barcelona is an upbeat tropical-sounding tune that features steel drums and makes one think ahead to the summer. What Do I Know is extremely minimal, featuring just a guitar, some basic drums, and Sheeran’s vocals as he sings about using the power of music and love to improve the world, which is a great song if not a bit mushy. Perfect is one of Sheeran’s signature ballads that he’s made his name with. I had a hard time picking out which songs off the album to include, and definitely recommend a full listen to the album if you have the time.
This playlist’s mixture of house and tropical music includes the new Kygo/Selena Gomez single It Ain’t Me (3), Cheat Codes’Queen Elizabeth (6), and the Chainsmokers’ Something Just Like This (9). These are all fairly popular so I’m breaking my own rules a bit, but I really like them. Especially that new Chainsmokers song, it’s been on repeat (along with the Straight No Chaser song) for a solid week.
4Her (4) is a song by a local Cincinnati band, Public. I discovered Public two years ago when they opened a Walk the Moon concert and I fell in love hard with them (just ask my friend Andrew, I was playing their EP every day in the car that summer). They released this single at the end of 2016 but I just discovered it recently. In a similar vein, Unknown (7) is a single by Ruen Brothers, another band I discovered that same summer that also opened for another concert. I also really like the Ruen Brothers, a rockabilly band that sounds straight out of the 50s like Roy Orbison or Johnny Cash. Both Public and the Ruen Brothers are super small but worth keeping an eye on in the future.
Another album I’ve been big into recently has been Nü Religion: Hyena, the debut album by hip-hop and R&B duo THEY. I included Africa (5), Motley Crew (8), and U-RITE (11). THEY. hit the scene partnering with DJ Zhu (who I also have wrote about in my playlists) and his song Working For It last year. This genre of R&B is something I wrote about last month and it was a perfect time for the album to come out. The token Spanish songs this month are SUBEME LA RADIO (10), the newest Enrique Iglesias single, Estrella (16), my favorite song of Nicky Jam’s recent album Fénix, and Blanco y Negro (17), a slow love ballad by pop singer Malú, who’s from Madrid!
The next couple of songs are off Glass Animal’s album How To Be A Human Being. When released last August I initially didn’t like the album much, but recently I started listening to it again and it’s been growing on me, so I threw Cane Shuga (12) and Season 2 Episode 3 (15) on the playlist. The playlist finished up with three miscellaneous songs; Dizzy On the Comedown (14) is an indie song I found last week on my Discover Weekly playlist on Spotify, Rhythm Inside (20) is the second single from Britain’s Got Talent singer Calum Scott, and Hide and Seek (19) is a guitar cover of the famous Imogen Heap song. The Hide and Seek cover is one of the most beautiful songs I’ve ever heard and extremely technically difficult on the guitar. I found this song back when I was in high school and I’m still impressed every time I listen to it.
Anyways, that’s all for now! I hope you enjoyed the playlist, and as always, feel free to leave a comment below about what you liked, disliked, or something you want to see done differently. Have a great March!