I am Gen X and as such very much grew up making mixtapes for friends/family. As technology progressed this evolved to making mix CDs, and then, eventually, nothing.
As digital libraries moved online it no longer made sense to record onto magnetic tape or burn converted mp3s onto CDs.
I did, and do, search out new music constantly, and often would want to share those tracks with people. Also, I would listen to songs for days/weeks and then eventually move onto something else. Unless it was a band that I regularly followed I would often forget about those one-offs that at one point in time loved to the point of obsession.
When I first started connecting with my partner I made her an mp3 mix of songs I thought she should listen to; we both love music and it’s just one of the ways that we connected. At the time I predominantly listened to Spotify as it was very good at suggesting music that I didn’t already know, so Shalee suggested that I start cataloging these songs that I discovered and loved and put them into Spotify playlists (and later when I left Spotify, Amazon Music). She often teased my obsessive proclivities and suggested I call the mixes “Obsessive Compulsive Diaz.” And so, OCD was born!
I liked the name, or moreso, the initialism, and soon after decided to cap all playlists at 20 tracks. As I go through my day and notice that bands that I like release new music I will add tracks to the most current OCD collection, ditto for single tracks that I stumble upon. This way I have a rolling catalog and archive of the music that I am enjoying.
Other than capping playlists at 20 tracks I do try to limit artists to a single track in a collection. There are deviations from this rule, but sometimes I have a rationalization (which you’ll see below).
All that said, I just capped/closed OCD.106; here’s its track listing with some short comments.
- Tchami “Adieu” - discovered at Breakaway Grand Rapids 2024.
- Moby & Tchami “In My Heart {Confession 2023}” - this is a collab with Tchami, so technically it’s not a track by just the same artist as above, technically.
- Flogging Molly “These Exiled Years” - older track that I recently wanted to hear again
- Knock2 “dashstar*” - discovered at Breakaway Grand Rapids 2024.
- Diplo “Use Me {Brutal Hearts}” - Diplo, Dove Cameron, and Sturgill Simpson? It really works.
- Dirty Heads “Vacation” - yes, I saw the little kid on TikTok singing this song and had to listen to the original.
- Mitski “My Love Mine All Mine” - years back Mitski played a small venue near where I live and I tried to get my girls to go see her. They didn’t and now she’s a huge star. What can you do?
- Aimee Mann “Save Me” - Shalee was not familiar with this song so I played it for her one night and started listening to it again, so it made the mix.
- Iamamiwhoami “Thunder Lightning {Nuage Remix}”
- The Soft Moon “Become The Lies” - Recently discovered some synth-pop/post-punk bands and this got folded into the mix.
- Urban Heat ft. Party Nails “Have You Ever?” - pretty obsessed with this band the last few weeks; Shalee does not like them.
- Matte Blvck “Vows” - part of this new batch of synth/post-punk bands I discovered in the last month.
- Mass Minor “Worthy” - ditto.
- Depeche Mode “Speak To Me {HI-LO Remix} - I love the original, but they took a ballad and turned it into a banger.
- Ryan Gosling & Emma Stone “City Of Stars” - We watched this movie in December and I still listen to this far too much.
- TR/ST “Robrash” - from his new EP and it’s just perfect TR/ST.
- Junge Junge “Beautiful Girl” - this actually may be on a previous OCD collection, I came across it again after years and wanted to hear it again.
- Sleek Teeth “Gone” - part of this new batch of synth/post-punk bands I discovered in the last month.
- Nation of Language “Surely I Can’t Wait” - Probably off of the best record of 2023 that wasn’t released by Depeche Mode; absolutely love this band and this track.
- Beyonce “Texas Hold ’Em” - Beyonce wanted to go roots so of course she grabbed Rhiannon Giddens to come play viola and banjo on this track; sublime.
If you’d like to listen, it’s all linked here: OCD.016