12 Songs: I Like Their Early Stuff
You’ll remember Alex Lavayen from last week’s last-minute 12 Songs fill in. I was attempting and failing and when I found myself on a Third Eye Blind record, I pulled the pin and asked for his help. I mentioned this to Alex and it ended up inspiring his new “12 Songs: i LiKe ThEiR eArLy StUfF”
“I’ve had idea like this for a while,” Alex said. When you mentioned Third Eye Blind I wanted to see how far I could push it, and it basically came out with a bunch of bands generally deemed “uncool” by the cool kids.
We all grew up talking about “the early stuff” and this is just that — but a bunch of bands we would probably never touch as a teenager in Southern California today. Most of them have gone cringe, some of them still rip but are overlooked cause they’re just too big to be “cool.”
I understand there’s a good reason why you wouldn’t want to post a playlist with Goo Goo Dolls, Kings of Leon and Ryan Gosling’s band before he was a Ken doll (Dead Man’s Bones) — so I get why this might be a hard no, but maybe give it a listen without looking at the band names and let me know.”
I did just that and I think it’s one of our best playlists yet. “Pa Pa Power” featuring Ryan Gosling is literally the best song I’ve heard in a long time. Just make sure you turn off the Apple Car Play so no one knows their new favorite band is fronted by Barbie’s boyfriend. —Travis Ferré
