Welcome back to the LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY TRACKS, our weekly (in theory) music discovery game. Eleven players submit tracks each round on a theme – the idea is to find stuff we the voters haven’t heard yet. This is the playlist post – once you’ve heard the songs, go and vote in the poll post.
This week’s theme is – well, it’s complicated. Originally the submitted idea was “Introducing…” – debuts by musicians on songs by others, like guest verses or debuts of later jazz bandleaders. A cool theme, but very tricky to research (since, by the nature of things, debuts of famous people tend to be well known in their own right). I asked to expand it to include more broad shifts like band line up changes, collaborations, aliases and side projects. And in the end line up changes and side projects were what almost all the players went for. So I renamed the week to “ALL CHANGE!”
The Spotify playlist is missing a final track – the Orb and Alan Parker collaboration – it’s the final song on the YouTube list:
I’ll leave it to the players to explain how each track qualifies. For now, just enjoy the sounds they’ve selected. Thanks to them for wrestling with a tricky brief!
Ringing The Changes:
- HERBIE HANCOCK – “Wiggle Waggle”: From 1969’s Fat Albert Rotunda
- BY STORM – “Double Trio”: From 2023’s Double Trio EP.
- V/Z – “Habadash”: From 2023’s Sueno Assente
- PROPAGANDA – “La Carne, La Morte e Il Diavolo”: From 1990’s 1234.
- EKKAH – “Last Chance To Dance”: From 2014’s Last Chance To Dance EP.
- THE OTHER TWO – “Selfish”: From 1993’s The Other Two And You
- MAM – “Ongelofelijk”: A 1989 single!
- LEAVES’ EYES – “Across The Sea”: From 2018’s Sign Of The Dragonhead
- TSOL – “Flowers By The Door”: From 1984’s Change Today?
- NANCY VANDAL – “Egg Sandwich”: From 1996’s The Interrogation Room
- THE ORB ft ALAN PARKER – “Grey Clouds”: From the 2007 compilation Annie Nightingale Presents Y4K
Special note: One contestant was unable to submit this week, so I found a track instead. But I’m not going to tell you which it is!