Josh asks Georgia:
What was the genesis for the Mix CD Social?
I’ve always loved the Mix CD as a vehicle for discovering new music – a mix is like a message in a bottle. I thought it’d be fun to organise a massive lucky dip, and maybe spark some new musical crushes in the process. The gig is also a celebration of the remarkable bounty of talent we have in our local music scene.
Will you be putting your own Mix into the Lucky Dip?
Hellz yeah! Get ready for some S-Club-7 followed by Tom Waits.
You recently performed Bowie’s entire Ziggy Stardust album, completely re-arranged for string trio. Is ‘Apocalyptic Boogie’ a genre you’re interested in pursuing for your next record?
Bowie is the master of the apocalyptic pop song. For my next album, the band and I are pursuing a genre we like to call ‘disco pagan’ – part low-fi bounce, part dream-pop swoon; glitter and dirt and chaos and casios.
If Ryan Gosling made you a mix tape but it was awful, just all your most hated bands, would you still go on a date with him?
I think I would have to bail on principle, but I’d arrange for the waiter at the restaurant to deliver a cassette Walkman and headphones with a mix tape of decent music to the table, not so much as punishment, but as a learning exercise. I think that also means I’m an asshole.
Georgia asks Josh:
Who was the last person you made a mix tape for?
The last mix “tape” I made was for my wife; I tried to get her to like Jonathan Richman so I put a whole bunch of him on there. I wasn’t successful. (Except for the song As My Mother Lay Lying, she likes that one.)
It’s been said that “every mix tape is a love letter”. Do you agree? What would you put on a mix tape to somebody you don’t like very much?
I don’t think it is necessarily a love letter, but you’re definitely doing it to make them like you. For someone I didn’t like, I would put Everybody Loves You Babe (Except Me) by Billy Bragg and hope they get the message.
As an ex-librarian, is your music collection arranged alphabetically or in genres, or a constantly mutating state of chaos (like mine)?
My music collection is arranged alphabetically, unless there is more than one artist, and then it is in chronological.
You’re DJing at the Mix CD Social – will you be airing any secret shames from the Vault of Earl?
I thought about playing Tag Team’s Whoop There It Is but decided against it, unless on the night someone requests it, and then it is ON. Or I’ll play Merril Bainbridge’s Mouth. It’s up to the crowd.
