The Retrographer, Issue 129 (August, 2 0 2 5)

Scree, Car Culture, Physical Therapy, Pino Palladino, Blake Mills, Juicy J, Endea Owens, Black Thought, Wishy, RIP Swirl, Ydegirl, Jackie West, Dijon, JID, Earl Sweatshirt, and more!

Author

Charlie Kaplan
September 08, 2025

Bulletins:

  • I am so beyond excited to announce my fourth album, A Hat Upon the Bed. It’s a double LP out 10.10.25 - please pre-order one here.

  • The first single is called “No More Mistakes”, and I made a nutty video for it with my friend Joey Schwartzman. Watch it here!

  • To everyone who has checked out “No More Mistakes” so far - thank you so much. If you haven’t, you aren’t late! Listen to it now and you’re right on time.

Ten Songs for August, 2 0 2 5 | Listen to these songs on Spotify and YouTube

“Me Me Me”, Scree – There’s no band quite like Scree, categorically. Their music is so carefully written and composed, it seems to conjure a new film with every album, song, listen. Ryan El-Solh’s crafts movement, rising action, and then, emerging suddenly, motifs that are more like the leitmotifs of the characters that live, latent, in his works.

“Coping Mechanism”, Car Culture and Physical Therapy – Rising and falling from a slow envelope filter, dancing and warping like a distant truck through highway summer heat waves, refracted voice and piano echoing down, far along a ridge; a mirage.

“Contour”, Pino Palladino and Blake Mills – Pino has been considered one of the best living bassists for most of his life now, not because of his chops (table stakes) or his writing (which the world didn’t hear until 2021’s Notes With Attachments) but, from Paul Young to D’Angelo to sitting in as Jaco with Joni, his mood, revealed here to be more Eberhard Weber than ever.

“Please, Stop The Violence In Hip Hop”, Juicy J, Endea Owens, and Black Thought – It’s not hypocrisy that J is responsible for some of the most violent lyrics in rap history; it’s experience. This is terrain Thought has touched before, maybe most notably in 2011’s epic undun, with Owens lending a groove more reminiscent of 70s Blaxploitation than her jazz roots.

“Over and Over”, Wishy – Of the available references (Hovvdy, Lomelda, Porches, Alex G), it’s hard to find anything that is quite as minimal and trusting as this track, which gives several beats to each measure just to the resonance of a doubled acoustic guitar, letting a thin breakbeat sturdily undergird its breezy wistfulness like an unfinished suspension bridge.

“Spirals On My Tongue”, RIP Swirl and Ydegirl – Forgive the slight cursive singing here; There’s a moodiness that’s reminiscent of the blue tint photography of the late 90s, early morning airports, cold steel.

“Offer”, Jackie West – Jackie is just thinking out loud. Maybe journaling. A few seconds in, under its ambling groove, you think, “She’s in no rush”. Nine and a half minutes later, you realize you’re right: You’re riding shotgun through her subconscious, eavesdropping on a soliloquy, “looking inside a piano,” in her words.

“Yamaha”, Dijon – Very hard to pick a favorite track on Baby, but this one delivers so hard just shy of 30 seconds in, drawing both from “Take Me With U” and “Adore”. The sentiment (love, family, sex) couldn’t be more divine. Or in his words: “I’m in love with this particular emotion.”

“Gz”, JID – There are days when it’s easy to put the headphones down and think that Destin Route is the best rapper alive. Plenty of people have nimble delivery, witty lyrics, unique style; but who has his flair, his complete control, his penchant for performance? Where is his mastery supposed to go from here?

“gsw vs sac”, Earl Sweatshirt – Or; what’s the point of naming a best rapper alive? Pick a different rubric and Thebe seems to have not relinquished the appellation in years, abiding by none of the formal technical requirements (or even enunciation) and still achieving unmistakable brilliance. “Don’t race a tortoise,” he admonishes under half a smile.

MONTHLY

#128.5 “No More Mistakes”

#118.5.2 “In a Little Bit of Time”

#118.5 “Edie Got Away”

#117.5 “Mescarole"

#116.5 “Cloudburst”

#105.5 “Country Life in America”

#105 August, 2023 | “Rockaway”

#104 July, 2023 | “Gas Station Bathroom”

#103 June, 2023 | “Talkin’ French” 

#100 March, 2023 | The Feelies, “The Good Earth”

#99 February, 2023 | Judee Sill, “Judee Sill”

#98 January, 2023 | Pink Floyd, “Meddle”

#96 November, 2022 | RIP TOM PETTY

#95 October, 2022 | Cannonball Adderley, “Cannonball Adderley's Fiddler on the Roof”

#94 September, 2022 | Sheryl Crow, “Tuesday Night Music Club”

#93 August, 2022 | D’Angelo, “Live at the Jazz Cafe, London”

#92 July, 2022 | Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, “Southern Accents”

#91 June, 2022 | George Harrison, “Living in the Material World”

#90 May, 2022 | The Wild Tchoupitoulas, “The Wild Tchoupitoulas”

#89 April, 2022 | Joni Mitchell, “Taming the Tiger”

#88 March, 2022 | Young Thug, “Barter 6”

#87 February, 2022 | Stephane Grappelli and Stuff Smith, “Violins No End”

#86 January, 2022 | Nas, “God’s Son”

#84 November, 2021 | Milt Jackson with the Thelonious Monk Quintet, “Wizard of the Vibes”

#83 October, 2021 | For Against, “Coalesced”

#82 September, 2021 | Pat Metheny, “Bright Size Life”

#81 August, 2021 | The Chicks, “Fly”

#80 July, 2021 | Allen Toussaint, “Southern Nights”

#79 June, 2021 | Novos Baianos, “Acabou Chorare”

#78 May, 2021 | One Direction, “Four”

#77 April, 2021 | Bob Dylan, “New Morning”

#76 March, 2021 | Ty Dolla $ign, “Free TC”

#75 February, 2021 | Ghostface Killah, “Fishscale”

#74 January, 2021 | Minnie Riperton, “Minnie”

#72 November, 2020 | Sufjan Stevens, “Seven Swans”

#71 October, 2020 | Common, “Resurrection”

#70 September, 2020 | Herbie Hancock, “Thrust”

#69 August, 2020 | Special Issue

#68 July, 2020 | Cam’ron, “Purple Haze”

#67 June, 2020 | Jorge Ben, “A Tabua de Esmeralda”

#66 May, 2020 | The Meters, “Rejuvenation”

#65 April, 2020 | Eddie Kendricks, “People… Hold On”

#64 March, 2020 | Thelonious Monk, “Solo Monk”

#63 February, 2020 | Cat Power, “Moon Pix”

#62 January, 2020 | Yusef Lateef, “Eastern Sounds”

#59 November, 2019 | Frank Sinatra, “In The Wee Small Hours”

#58 October, 2019 | Steely Dan, “Gaucho”

#57 September, 2019 | Bonnie Raitt, “Streetlights”

#56 August, 2019 | Daft Punk, “Alive 2007”

#55 July, 2019 | John Coltrane, “Interstellar Space”

#54 June, 2019 | Big Pun, “Capital Punishment”

#53 May, 2019 | Paul Simon, “Rhythm of the Saints”

#52 April, 2019 | Dirty Projectors, “Rise Above”

#51 March, 2019 | Kate Bush, “The Sensual World”

#50 February, 2019 | Sonny Rollins, “Next Album”

#49 January, 2019 | Sade, “Diamond Life”

#47 November, 2018 | Curtis Mayfield, “There’s No Place Like America Today”

#46 October, 2018 | The Blue Nile, “Hats”

#45 September, 2018 | Lucinda Williams, “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road”

#44 August, 2018 | Aretha Franklin, “Amazing Grace”

#43 July, 2018 | Teddy Pendergrass, “TP”

#42 June, 2018 | Dennis Wilson, “Pacific Ocean Blue”

#41 May, 2018 | Bobby Brown, “Don’t Be Cruel”

#40 April, 2018 | Amy Winehouse, “Back to Black”

#39 March, 2018 | Q-Tip, “Kamaal the Abstract”

#38 February, 2018 | Miles Davis, “In a Silent Way”

#37 January, 2018 | Beck, “Sea Change”

#35 November, 2017 | Slum Village, “Fan-tas-tic Vol. 1”

#34 October, 2017 | Steely Dan, “Two Against Nature”

#33 September, 2017 | Baaba Maal and Mansour Seck, “Djam Leeli”

#32 August, 2017 | Billy Joel, “The Stranger”

#31 July, 2017 | Big Daddy Kane, “Long Live the Kane”

#30 June, 2017 | Janet Jackson, “Control”

#29 May, 2017 | Steely Dan, “Aja”

#28 April, 2017 | The O’Jays, “Back Stabbers”

#27 March, 2017 | Wire, “154”

#26 February, 2017 | Professor Longhair, “New Orleans Piano”

#25 January, 2017 | Elvis Costello, “Live at the El Mocambo”

#23 November, 2016 | Erykah Badu, “Mama’s Gun”

#22 October, 2016 | Donald Fagan, “The Nightfly”

#21 September, 2016 | Aretha Franklin, “Young, Gifted, and Black”

#20 August, 2016 | The Dave Matthews Band, “Under the Table and Dreaming”

#19 July, 2016 | Clams Casino, “Instrumental Mixtape II”

#18 June, 2016 | James Brown, “Love, Power, Peace”

#17 May, 2016 | Ali Farka Toure & Ry Cooder, “Talking Timbuktu”

#16 April, 2016 | RIP PRINCE

#15 March, 2016 | Prince, “Prince”

#14 February, 2016 | Big L, “Lifestyles Ov Da Poor & Dangerous”

#13 January, 2016 | Bill Evans, “Live at the Village Vanguard”

#11 November, 2015 | Donny Hathaway, “Live”

#10 October, 2015 | Paul McCartney, “McCartney”

#9 September, 2015 | Talk Talk, “Laughing Stock”

#8 August, 2015 | B.B. King, “Live at Cook County Jail”

#7 July, 2015 | Miles Davis, “Filles de Kilimanjaro”

#6 June, 2015 | Joni Mitchell, “Hejira”

#5 May, 2015 | Kanye West, “The College Dropout”

#4 April, 2015 | MF DOOM, “Operation: Doomsday”

#3 March, 2015 | Bruce Springsteen, “The Wild, the Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle”

#2 February, 2015 | Eric B. and Rakim, “Paid in Full”

#1 January, 2015 | Johnny Thunders & the Heartbreakers, “L.A.M.F.”

 

ANNUAL

#121 | 1 0 0 2 0 2 4

 

DECENNIAL

 

THEMED