This month’s list is large because time kind of dragged on and on. Probably because I’m counting down the days until I move to Nashville. But hey, a lot of good music came out this month, so that is cause for celebration! If anything on here isn’t due to a new release, it’s due to me just now getting back to a release or two that I’ve been meaning to enjoy more (like Local Natives, Freelance Whales and Surfer Blood).

1. Four Tet – “Love Cry” (There Is Love In You)
2. Mumford & Sons – “Little Lion Man” (Sigh No More)
3. Frightened Rabbit – “The Loneliness and the Scream” (The Winter of Mixed Drinks)
4. The Jimi Hendrix Experience – “Red House” (Are You Experienced?)
5. Anais Mitchell – “Wedding Song (feat. Justin Vernon)” (Hadestown)
6. Broken Bells – “The High Road” (Broken Bells)
7. The Chieftains – “La Iguana (feat. Lila Downs)” (San Patricio)
8. Titus Andronicus – “A More Perfect Union” (The Monitor)
9. First Aid Kid – “Tiger Mountain Peasant Song” (Drunken Trees EP)
10. Local Natives – “Airplanes” (Gorilla Manor)
11. Liars – “Scissor” (Sisterworld)
12. The White Stripes – “Icky Thump” (Under Great White Northern Lights)
13. Freelance Whales – “Generator ^ Second Floor” (Weathervanes)
14. Surfer Blood – “Swim” (Astro Coast)
15. Surfer Blood – “Take It Easy” (Astro Coast)
16. Ryan Bingham & the Dead Horses – “Bluebird” (Roadhouse Sun)
17. Manchester Orchestra – “100 Dollars” (Mean Everything to Nothing)
18. Manchester Orchestra – “I Can Feel a Hot One” (Mean Everything to Nothing)
19. Deftones – “Diamond Eyes” (Diamond Eyes single)
20. The Dillinger Escape Plan – “Farewell, Mona Lisa” (Option Paralysis)
21. Silversun Pickups – “Growing Old is Getting Old” (Swoon)
22. The Boxer Rebellion – “Soviets” (Union)

And, as always, here is your mix:

I saw this movie last night and pretty much sat in the theater in wonder for two hours. Not only were the sounds these three guitar legends able to coax out of their instruments amazing, but it held up as a journey through many philosophies about creativity and artistic creation. Immediately upon leaving the theater I felt an intense urge to pick up a guitar, find my voice and play whatever comes out.

Talk about resetting the synapses. They make it look so easy, but I wonder sometimes if they are created special beings. Beings that can tap into a sense of focus and creative meandering and a freedom and confidence to put notes and words on paper and hope other people feel the same way they do about them.

Someone once said that when they saw The Raconteurs live, everyone did their job well on stage, but Jack White was clearly on a higher level with his stage energy and magnetic personality. Maybe his years of experience in The White Stripes has something to do with that, or maybe he just has it (whatever that means).

In White’s new band, the Dead Weather, this is no exception. Their new album, Horehound, is out this week and it’s all I want to listen to. Jack has drummer duties with the band, and only sings on one song, but his fingerprints are all over this album. It reeks of pure charisma, confidence and, to repeat the ambiguous phrase, just has it. Check it out.

I’ve been neglecting you. I swear I have stuff to say. I’m just trying to organize my thoughts right now. Maybe I’ll make an attempt at expressing it soon. For now, here’s my monthly playlist for May.

1. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club – “All You Do Is Talk” (Baby 81)
2. Of Montreal – “Labyrinthian Pomp” (Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?)
3. Interpol – “NYC” (Turn On The Bright Lights)
4. mewithoutYou – “Paper Hanger” (Catch For Us The Foxes)
5. Anathallo – “Hanasakajijii (Four: A Great Wind, More Ash)” (Floating World)
6. The White Stripes – “Icky Thump” (Icky Thump)
7. Kings Of Leon – “On Call” (Because Of The Times)
8. !!! – “All My Heroes Are Weirdos” (Myth Takes)
9. Grizzly Bear – “Knife” (Yellow House)
10. He Is Legend – “(((louds” (Suck Out The Poison)
11. Devendra Banhart – “Now That I Know” (Cripple Crow)
12. Zozobra – “The Blessing” (Harmonic Tremors)
13. Ray LaMontagne – “Be Here Now” (Till The Sun Turns Black)
14. Grizzly Bear – “Lullabye” (Yellow House)
15. Mono – “a thousand paper cranes” (Walking cloud and deep red sky, Flag fluttered and the sun shined)
16. Neko Case – “Star Witness” (Fox Confessor Brings The Flood)
17. Eightball – “Drama In My Life (feat. Psycho Drama)” (Lost – Chopped and Screwed)
18. Ryan Adams – “The Shadowlands” (Love Is Hell)
19. Neko Case – “That Teenage Feeling” (Fox Confessor Brings The Flood)
20. Ryan Adams – “Hotel Chelsea Nights” (Love Is Hell)