NUDGE V: Music for Olds
Themed playlists for your pinball pleasure
This mix was scientifically designed to get you off
That place where good pinball happens? This mix gets you there. Not every time, and not forever — but it works. Put this shit on and do what needs to be done. It’s going to happen. That’s a Nudge guarantee. We spend a lot of time in various stupors putting mixes together. We’re really good at this. Trust us.
Spotify sucks. Why Spotify? That’s not very punk of you.
Well hey, who died and made you punk rock sheriff? But seriously, legit question. As a buncha former middling musicians and dudes who are still friends w real musicians who struggle to make money: Why are we doing a Spotify playlist? Spotify is notorious for not paying artists what they’re worth, they ruined downtown Oakland, and uh, the whole algorithm approach to liking stuff weirds us out. That said, we’ll give you a couple of reasons why we decided on this format.
It’s easy. We don’t have a team of hackers working around the clock to get you amazing content. We have a guy smoking weed at 11:30 PM and just sorta figuring stuff out. Spotify makes it insanely easy to make and embed playlists.
They have a ton of music. Do they have everything? Hell no. Not even close. They do have a surprising amount of awesome stuff.
Our goal is not to get you to support Spotify. It’s to support these artists. When applicable (and available) we’ll try and link to better, more equitable links for the artists we feature. That’s gonna include a buncha Bandcamp and other streamers who put artists first. IF YOU ARE READING THIS AND ARE AN ARTIST AND DON’T LIKE SPOTIFY, CONTACT US IMMEDIATELY AND WE WILL TAKE YOU OFF — NO QUESTIONS ASKED. That said, I hope y’all take this in the spirit with which it is intended: we wanna showcase dope artists that will make you play pinball better. That’s it. We good?
NUDGE VOL V: Music for Olds
IT IS ME, DOC MONDAY. BACK TO GIVE Y’ALL SOME DOPE ASS BANGERS FOR OLD FOLKS
Who are you?
Hey it’s me, Doc Monday! Who am I? The world wants to know. The world must know. The world will never know. For you? I’m the fella putting together this magazine! That means wrangling a bunch of super talented folks toward one goal. It means letting people be who they are when they write, but also adding plenty of swears so that it’s of the appropriate Nudge quality. It’s about printing magazines.
That’s what I was doing while listening to this playlist. Making Nudge 1. Honestly, the last few months have been the hardest of my life. Have I gone thru a transformation? A glow up? Seems not fucking likely. But you know what? That’s what we do. We just keep going. And that’s OK too. That’s a big reason why that Walkmen song is on here. That’s what life feels like.
Why should we care about you/this music?
Honestly? I dunno. I mean, every single song on here is a stone cold killer hit. How’s that? Other than that, it’s gonna pump you up on the drive to go rack up some high scores. It’s gonna pump you up when you’re on a long walk around lake altoona. It’s gonna pump you up when you’re running away from a terrible Hinge date. Trust us. Trust me. Trust.
What’s on the playlist?
The theme of this one? OLDS. This is music for people in their 30s and older. That doesn’t always mean its moldy oldys. In fact, I’ve tried to curate this to expose OLDS to new music. You’re gonna find some dope-ass indie rock, punk, and hip hop. Some of it is old, some of it is new, but either way it’s gonna move you.
And if it doesn’t? Hey, it was free! What do ya want, a refund? You don’t get them on Fathom pre-orders and you won’t find them here either. Now go hit the road, buddy. We don’t take kindly to chislers in these parts.
The Walkmen: Old white guys doing cool stuff
Dismiss The Walkmen as an aging indie band at your own peril. I’ve seen these dudes like three or four times throughout my life, and every single time it ended with the lead singer screaming his ass off. They write beautiful, washed out melancholy rock that makes you think about how everything you’ve done might be the wrong thing -- but also it’s OK.
There’s something dope about melancholy that actually rocks. This never slides into emo territory, and to me that’s the most powerful thing about it. Seriously, listen to this song -- then if you dig it, listen to the entirety of Me + You and have your life transformed into something beautiful, tragic, and epic. It’s like living your whole life with an open wound, but in a good way?
Wet Leg: The Jam of the Year
On the opposite end of the spectrum we have Wet Leg. These kids are fucking legit. Rhian Teasdale and Hester Chambers are two British twenty-somethings with the appropriate amount of “who gives a fuck” in their music. Sure, Chaise Lounge technically came out in 2021, but I’m declaring it the jam of 2022. It can span two years. I mean, how long did we have to listen to that fucking song Happy by Pharell? That was like two and a half years of my life that I’ll never get back.
But let’s keep it positive: this song is dope. It’s got it all, sexual politics, comedy, an easy to remember chorus, and fucking rad guitars. There’s a reason we opened the mix with it. It fucking rules. DUH.
The Pharcyde: Drains aren’t so bad. They happen to all of us
C’mon. You know The Pharcyde. This group was designed to make anyone feel like a badass. West Coast rap in the 1990s might actually be the pinnacle of what we do as a country. It certainly isn’t any of our social programs. Oh Shit is the unofficial anthem of untimely drains for Nudge. Those drains happen more often than we’d care to admit. The good news? When you’re rocking this song you barely care.
GOOD JOB. YOU ARE DONE READING. GO FORTH, FLIP PIN, LISTEN TO TUNES.
