03-14-19 | Songs for Listening | Laura Ballance
Merge Records co-owner and Superchunk bassist, Laura Ballance, picked tunes for Thursday, March 14 at Songs for Listening. Laura and Mac McCaughan co-founded Merge in the summer of 1989. The label, celebrating 30 years this summer, has been home to bands including Neutral Milk Hotel, Magnetic Fields, Spoon, Arcade Fire, Lambchop, Waxahatchee, the Mountain Goats, amongst dozens of others.
Laura has diverse, but exacting, musical taste. She's drawn to bands with a clearly articulated voice, where the ideas that animate the music are effectively and expertly executed. She likes bands that snarl, as well as those that know how to have a good time. She's engaged sufficiently in the politics of today to know that art has got to balance between voicing rage and providing comfort. Finally, Laura's been running a label for a long time now, she knows at some point you have to trust your taste and then work like hell to get the music out into the world.
'Compared to What' by Roberta Flack from 'First Take'
'Out for Blood' by Telekinesis from 'Effluxion'
'Nice for What' by Drake from 'Scorpion'
'WTF (Where They From)' by Missy Elliott & Pharrell Williams' from 'WTF (Where They From)'
'Normal People' by Fucked Up from 'Dose Your Dreams'
