Five Obsessions (Feb 2025)
Five Obsessions covers five of my favorite songs each month. Some new, some old. Some new to me, some revisited. Published in the middle of every month (typically on the second Saturday).
You can listen to the running list of Applied Science favorites in the Spotify playlist below and read about this week’s specific picks below that.
julie - “piano instrumental”
Sure, comparison is the thief of joy, but sometimes nostalgic echoes make a song that much more potent. It’s not that trio julie’s “piano instrumental” sounds like a particular Nirvana or My Bloody Valentine or Sonic Youth song, rather bursting out of silence an unearthed relic from a lost band, at once a beautiful recall to a bygone age and something wholly fresh. “piano instrumental” distills the compelling creative collisions at the core of julie’s debut album my anti-aircraft friend, by turns heavy and pretty, plodding then ascendant.
Eddie Chacon - “let the devil in”
A career like Eddie Chacon’s is highly unusual. A truism perhaps not said often enough: It is hard to make a hit. As a member of duo Charles & Eddie, Chacon scored a massive one with “Would I Lie To You,” a mid tempo R&B song from the early ‘90s that sold millions of records, a staple of light radio and playlists across Europe to this day (its instantly memorable hook also lent itself to a surprisingly effective David Guetta and Cedric Gervais remake in 2016 alongside longtime Guetta secret weapon, former gospel singer Chris Willis). It is rarer still to have a hit and recede from the public eye, a totem of the true era of one hit wonders, only to return later in life as a soloist on a beloved independent label.
Such is Chacon’s arc. It lends his new album Lay Low (his second release for stalwart underground hip-hop imprint Stones Throw; produced with real grace by Nick Hakim) the air of haunted meditation, every song colored by a peace hard won through experience. “Let The Devil In” stands out against the album’s quiet storm, with Hakim’s shuffling, droning sound bed roiling beneath Chacon’s delicate performance.
Lido, Jordan Ward - “time to go”
A gorgeous surprise on a 2023 Lido album I did not know existed until I was digging around Jordan Ward’s Spotify page last week.
Benjamin Booker - LOWER
The easy early frontrunner for my favorite album of 2025. Booker’s was a name I had seen for years, but seldom investigated. Much of his other music trod a path through more classicist rock and soul territory, though his voice and songwriting always cemented him in the modern. LOWER, his collaborative project with lauded underground hip-hop producer Kenny Segal, defies any prediction from past creation.
In conversation, I occasionally talk to artists that I work with about the power of reinterpretation through covers and the related notion that a great song transcends genre. An example that I use is Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer,” which feels like a Prince song in its writing, but something entirely other in its production and performancr (it is, of course, not a Prince song, but imagine it for a second in his voice with his “Kiss”-era production flourishes and you may see what I mean).
LOWER is like deliverance on my imagined intersection of Trent Reznor and Prince, a jagged, political, sensual, and often surprisingly gorgeous exploration of American life, internal and external. That it lands amid one of America’s most turbulent times is bittersweet serendipity, as much a reflection of a cruel age collapsing in on itself as a safe haven for anxiety displacement. It is as unique a listening experience as I’ve had in recent memory, never so avant garde as to spin away from well-written, sharply crafted songs. LOWER reveals something new to me on every listen. I look forward to discovering more of its cracks and corners as I live with it.
Welles - “Seventeen”
When I was 25 years old, some time in the too-hot summer of 2014, I flew to Arkansas for a weekend to meet Jesse Welles. At the time he went by Jeh Sea Welles. He had just left a band, yet to start the one that would adopt his last name as its mononym. In 2025, he is a solo act again, but in 2014, he sat alone on a collection of stunning demos he had self recorded in a decaying home in Siloam Springs, Arkansas.
Over 48 hallucinatory hours, we walked humid woods to abandoned bunkers, past Indian burial grounds where he pointed out all the places he’d found arrow heads. We drank terrible whiskey and crossed the border into Oklahoma to try our luck at a deeply depressing casino. Jesse performed at a coffee shop that became a bar and local hub for performers at night. In his set, he played an early version of what would become “Seventeen,” originally called “Red Trees and White Trashes.” The former would be its title on his band’s 2018 album (bearing the latter as its name). As some songs do, it felt immediately timeless in the literal sense, divorced of a specific moment, old and new at once.
While it never reached the acclaim I felt it deserved, “Seventeen” is one of those songs I come back to year after year, pulled in by the gravity of every little lived detail captured by the jagged contours of Welles’ voice and songwriting.
Bonus: After watching the Grammy’s, my 2 and a half year old is going through a big “Pink Pony Club” phase. Still at the age where he is certain his parents control his surroundings and the magic of time, he kept yelling “Again! Again!” at the screen as Chappell Roan and her dancers performed the her hit, moving on from parts of the performance he liked. We explained this was not like a Bluey episode that we could stop and rewind. We had to keep going forward. He was asleep by the time Cynthia Erivo performed his favorite song, “Fly Me To Moon,” which he knows almost word for word. Get this kid a ballot next year.
A quick update on my personal relief efforts:
I donated all of the subscription money raised thus far to the Anti Recidivism Coalition’s Firefighter Fund last week.
I will continue to donate all subscription revenue generated throughout the year. If you live in the Los Angeles area and are able, I also highly recommend volunteering in whatever capacity possible. I spent a shift preparing meals for homebound patients with critical ailments and specific dietary needs via Project Angel Food last week. That work shines a light on one chilling aspect of this city’s crisis, as the most vulnerable (and often poorest) citizens met the greatest devastation visited from these fires. The work of recovery is merely beginning.
As before, please find some resources below with direction on those in need of donations, volunteering opportunities, and reliable information sources.
LA Country has launched an exhaustive websitewith resources for preparedness and recovery (including links for debris removal and right of entry forms).
Mutual Aid Network of Los Angeles’s spreadsheet lists an expansive number of funds, organizations, and aid types across the expanse of the city. A great place to start.
A comprehensive volunteer and support guide from local organization LA2050.
A good post from The Angel on different ways to get involved with relief efforts.
A book/PDF written for parents to help explain the enormity of wildfire to their children.
PBS SoCal’s resources for how to talk to children about wildfires.
A U.S. government fact sheet on protecting children from wildfire smoke and ash.
A spreadsheet of GoFundme’s for Black families from Altadena who have been displaced or lost their homes. Altadena is one of Los Angeles’ historically Black centers, a place where generations of hard-earned wealth and equity in the land were decimated in a matter of days. (first seen via Saul Williams)
A collection of GoFundme’s that are under 20% funded, shared by 5PM LUCKY (via Ventura-based brand RatBoi):
