Today's Music That Jason Found In His Car is So Tonight That I Might See by Mazzy Star. Somehow, inexplicably, I have a cassette copy of this album, and I've been listening to it lately after rediscovering it underneath my copy of Crime and Punishment and some checks that I don't think I'll ever cash.
I don't exactly know how I came into possession of this album. I'm partially surprised that the contents of the tape didn't become Queen's Greatest Hits at some point as well, ha ha. I suppose it's possible that I may have purchased it at a thrift store, or that someone left it in this car or my previous vehicle, a red 1991 Grand Prix that was acquired through a Satanic ritual. In any event, it's nice to have, given that I've listened to most of my R.E.M. cassettes to the point where they are beginning to deteriorate. (I suppose a similar fate will befall this cassette in the relatively near future, inevitably.)
Prior to finding this album and actually listened to it, my exposure to Mazzy Star was simply to the song "Fade Into You", the first track on this album and a mainstay of every high school dance I ever went to. It's a nice enough song, probably featured in a number of movies with overly emotional endings that I didn't ever see. I certainly don't mind it, but I wouldn't trade you a Cat Power song for it, to be certain. The rest of the album has a similar sound, not overly complicated, slow and dreamy. The guitar playing is very mellow, the vocals are subdued and entrancing. Maybe if Cat Stevens or whatever he calls himself now had been a depressed twenty-something in the early 1990s he would have made music like this. I especially like the title track of this album; it has a real slow burn to it, a rhythm so good I could listen to it all day.
Also, Hope Sandoval (the singer of Mazzy Star). I don't know where she is now, exactly, but I really really hope she could use a skinny Midwestern poolboy. Let's just leave it at that, though I think you get the idea.
Also I went to the Atomic Garage this weekend. I love that place.