Today, March of 2018 comes to an end, and with it my ’31 Numbered Songs’ series. Thirty-one songs named after numbers, by 31 different artists, spanning multiple genres, decades and levels of popularity.
My final selection comes from British modern jazz ensemble Lydian Collective. ‘Thirty One’ is the lead-off single from their new album Adventure, which in a nice bit of timing was released just yesterday.
As I near the end of my ’31 Numbered Songs’ series, here’s another artist with a decent amount of talent but almost no digital footprint.
VanSwan’s ’30’ has 17 views on YouTube, and apart from his Apple Music and SoundCloud playlists, I can’t find a trace of him online. I found a lot more references to VanSwann, a St. Louis-based marketing and consulting firm, although it seems to have shut up shop.
Most of the tracks in this ’31 Numbered Songs’ series fall into one of two categories: songs I’d never heard of or songs I already knew very well.
Today’s SOTD is the lone representative of a third group: songs I knew very well once upon a time but had forgotten about entirely.
Gin Blossoms’ New Miserable Experience is a touchstone of one of my most formative years, 1992. That’s the year I met my wife, and a half dozen or so alternative rock albums soundtrack that era for me to this day.
’29’ is one of my niftiest finds of the ’31 Numbered Songs’ series. This track, written and performed by multi-hyphenate Lorene Scafaria, played over the end credits of director Drew Barrymore’s 2009 film Whip It.
For the uninitiated, Whip It is a great film starring Ellen Page as a young woman who finds herself through roller derby. I’m guessing it’s the only great film about a young woman who finds herself through roller derby.
Prior to discovering today’s SOTD, my knowledge of Machine Gun Kelly was limited to his performance as rapper Kid Culprit in the 2014 film Beyond the Lights.
That film, written and directed by Love & Basketball‘s Gina Prince-Bythewood, is one of my favorite romantic dramas, and a stellar showcase for my favorite actress, Gugu Mbatha-Raw.
Paramore’s latest album After Laughter has been on steady rotation in my household lately. It’s the rare record all four of us like.
The tracks are mostly upbeat pop songs but today’s SOTD, ’26,’ is an exception. Written by lead singer Hayley Williams as a message to her younger self, the song celebrates the power of hope. In earlier songs, she wrote about staying grounded and not getting lost in the clouds, but here she calls out that worldview as cynical.
Chelsea Rae is another singer with a little-heard song on YouTube (211 total views) and almost no other web presence. In fact, when you search for her name, Google asks if you meant to look for “American pornographic film actor” Chelsie Rae.
That’s a shame because, based on this song, Rae (the singer, not the porn star) has some talent. I’m sure the porn star has talent as well, but that’s for a different blog.
