First Listen: Stephen Kellogg And The Sixers - Gift Horse

Artist: Stephen Kellogg And The Sixers

Album: Gift Horse

Genre: Singer-Songwriter / Indie

Will I Keep?: Oh my gosh, yes. I was fooling around on Spotify (my favorite program ever) and was clicking on "similar artists" to add some new faces and names to my Spotify collection. When I came upon this band, I wanted to listen to their entire album Gift Horse instead of moving on to find another artist to discover. I love his voice, I love the lyrics, I love the music. I can see myself listening to a LOT more of this album and the rest of their discography. My only pet peeve is Spotify has them listed AS Stephen Kellogg AND The Sixers, which is clearly their name, but last.fm has them as Stephen Kellogg & The Sixers, so every song I play by them has that annoying green asterisk next to it because they think I'm spelling their name wrong.

What I listened to last week.

A lot of what I listened to this week was soft stuff because I listened to it overnight or early in the morning when I was battling insomnia. 50+ plays for Bruce is a weekly trend. Listened to one of Zac Brown Band's albums early in the week and loved it; need to listen to it again. I screen capped this last night before I went to bed - Joshua Radin might have kicked out one of the artists with 15 plays; I listened to a couple of his tracks Saturday evening and listened to one of his albums to go to sleep.

First listen: Newton Faulkner - Hand Built By Robots

Artist: Newton Faulkner

Album: Hand Built By Robots

Genre: Acoustic, Singer-Songwriter

Will I keep: Absolutely. His album was recommended to me when I posted on a forum and asked people what albums they fall asleep to. He's a little too upbeat to fit that category for me, but he's incredibly talented and catchy. He fits nicely into my Jason Mraz/Jack Johnson chill mix, so that's where some of his songs have gone. This album is a very easy listen. I'd recommend it to anyone who likes soft acousticy stuff. 

Albums I fall asleep to.

I haven't used this blog in forever, and that will change in the near future. My life has been busy lately, but my music collection is growing and changing and I should document that.

I used to have an episode of Friends or I Love Lucy on when I'd close my eyes at night and try to fall asleep. Listening to voices seemed to help. But I realized relaxing music would probably be a smarter choice. I've been having trouble sleeping for about a month now, and for the last solid week I have had music playing - usually just an album's worth - over my Spotify app as I try to fall asleep. I thought I would compile my list here and add on as I discover more. I hope to have a different album about every two weeks so I don't get bored.

Jack Johnson - In Between Dreams
Jack Johnson - Sleep Through The Static
Jack Johnson - On And On
Jack Johnson - Inaudible Melodies

Yeah. Jack is great. Any of his albums are relaxing and work nicely.

Iron & Wine - The Shepherd's Dog
Iron & Wine - Around The Well

I assume the rest of their discography would work as well, these are just the two I've tried so far.

Moby - Hotel

I'm going to explore his other albums to see if they are as soft; I'm not familiar with him but this album came up on someone's "top 5 albums to sleep to" that I found.

It's 8am and I had a horrendous night's sleep last night again; will put on one of Jack's albums and hope I can relax for awhile. It is Saturday, after all.