Gazing at My Shoes
I can’t remember when exactly, but a few years ago something in my brain switched and I suddenly began listening to a lot of Shoegaze music. I still have no idea why. I wouldn’t even say I’m a big fan of Shoegaze. Many of the songs are forgettable.
On thing I figured out quickly, though, is that it’s possibly the best music to listen to when you’re doing something else. That can be driving, cleaning, or working at the office. Background noise that isn’t white noise. Or one of those studying playlists.
Whilst searching youtube for a shoegaze playlist one day, I encountered a user that uploads compilations of Shoegaze tracks, goldentony111. I went through the catalogue and saw that there were already 60+ compilations created, most over two hours long. And the special uploads were almost ten hours. That’s a lot of damn Shoegaze!
I listened to every single one. And I found a favorite.
Shoegaze Compilation Vol.91 is the pinnacle of goldentoney111’s work.
It’s even better than Shoegaze Compilation Vol. 60.
It’s one of the few compilations that I can hear a song that’s so good that I need to check who the artist is. The first song, from chirrp, is great. There’s an Aseul song in there that’s absolutely magical—and the album picture is mesmerizing. ‘Somewhere’ is followed by a Moon Worm track that’s perfectly dreamy. Sleep in the Class’s track Please Love Me drops in the compilation as the perfect change up. Honeywave follows shortly after with a powerful voice. New Politicians appears with a great punk song. Daydream Review with a psychadelic pop song comes a bit later is fantastic. And that’s followed by a Stars song! There’s a great track from Echo Beach, the album art for Cats of Transnistria looks like it was painted by Georgia O’Keeffe, and a great finish with a State of Grace song.
So many great tracks on this compilation, and they work so well together.
Except one song. One song almost completely derails the entire compilation. It’s Fifteenth’s Walk in the Garden at nearly the 2 hour mark. This song is so bad, so jarring, so awful that I nearly skip this compilation when I’m replaying these compilations. It’s a garbage song, and it just doesn’t fit it in with the other tracks. It fits in even less than the Sleep in the Class or the New Politicians songs mentioned above. It hurts my hears. Even the first time I listened to this compilation I skipped through this track because it was so bad. If I really get into a zone at work, I stop hearing anything, even any music that’s on—but this song comes on and it sucks me right out of my reverie. Concentration, gone.
That’s the way it goes with compilations, I guess. You’re going to have a compilation that introduces you to the Drop Nineteen or Dengue Fever, but sometimes you’re going to need to step in shit to get there.