WARMER MIXTAPES #1658 | by William Macdonald Fox [Will Fox]/(Los Angeles Police Department)

1. Broadcast | Tears In The Typing Pool
We all have one of those friends who helps mold our musical taste, whether they’re sending you their favorite Contemporary song as soon as it comes out, or digging through the crates and discovering some long lost recording. Well, Greg Dillon is that guy for me. He showed me this song a few months ago. I’d heard of Broadcast, but had never explored much of their Music. This song is so beautifully haunting, the Lo-Fi production, the ghostly mellotron, the slap-back on the vocals, the quaint Acoustic guitars. This song is a must-listen for anyone looking for a new haunting Folk classic.

2. Vashti Bunyan | I’d Like To Walk Around In Your Mind
It’s a special thing when you can connect with a romantic partner through Music. I’m really lucky that my girlfriend has amazing taste. When we were first dating especially, we really built our friendship on sharing Music with each other. I’d Like To Walk Around In Your Mind was one of the first ones she sent me that I’d never heard and really fell in Love with. It’s so calming, sweet and delicate, with her whispered vocals and the gentle string section. I'd like to run and jump on your solitude, I'd like to rearrange your latitude to me, she sings. This song is destined to be in a Wes Anderson movie, if it isn’t already.

3. Otis Redding | I’ve Got Dreams To Remember 
A couple of years ago I ordered some Best Of CD’s to listen to in the car. This song is track 16 on that particular compilation. It’s such a good feeling to fall in Love with a fresh song from a voice as familiar as Otis Redding’s. This is one of my favorite vocal performances of all time, and you bet I roll the windows down for The World to hear when I’m driving around with this one.

4. Neil Young | Razor Love
I’m a huge Neil fan, especially his first 4 or 5 records. It struck me one day to check out some of his more recent Music, so I stumbled across Silver & Gold released in 2000, and was so pleased to discover this song, Razor Love, perhaps my favorite Love song that he’s written. The lyrics just kill me – “Now all I've got for you is the kind of love that cuts clean through, all I got for you is razor love, it cuts clean through”. It has everything you want in an Acoustic Down-Tempo Neil track... Simple production, that vulnerable croon, dreamy guitars and, of course, a harmonica solo. This is an overlooked Neil track.

5. Wilco | I Am Trying To Break Your Heart
My cousin Caleb may be the biggest fan of Jeff Tweedy (Wilco) in The World. At 15 I had to see what the fuss was all about, so I went to the local CD store outside of Boston called Strawberries and picked up Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Went back to my grandma’s house, sat down on a rocking chair on the screened-in porch and pressed play. This is the first song on that iconic Modern Rock record. The song begins, I am an American aquarium drinker, I assassin down the avenue. Well, I was hooked; I listened to the whole CD twice in a row, until dinner was ready. There is so much Experimentation, Improvisation, and a beautifully fine line drawn between Noise and Music on this song. It feels more like your jumping into a novel than into a record, if that makes any sense. Tweedy is one of my favorite lyricists after Dylan.

6. The Idle Race | Morning Sunshine
I discovered this track on Michael Rault’s collaborative playlist he made on Spotify. What can I say? It’s one of those tracks that teleports you into the late 60’s as if you’re hearing English Psych Rock for the first time. It’s so subdued and the production is so dark, it almost sound like a demo, in the best possible way.

7. Nick Drake | Place To Be
I think I can safely say that Nick Drake’s Pink Moon is my favorite record ever, and that Nick might be the most underrated songwriter of all time. Pink Moon is timeless, and paved the way for True Intimacy in Music, against the odds of an era that was focused on a “More Is More” attitude. To think that this Music went practically unseen at the time is tragic, but then to see the deluge of support Nick has seen since his death defines the true beauty and purpose of Music: to create something that can live on, and the hope that the Art you create when you’re feeling weak is stronger than you ever could have imagined. Place To Be is my favorite song on the record, seemingly simple but near impossible to re-create. It also has my favorite lyric of all time, Now I’m weaker than the palest blue, oh, so weak in this need for you. RIP Nick.

8. George Harrison | Run Of The Mill (from Early Takes Volume 1)
This is not only one of my favorite songs, but this Acoustic demo version is so intimate… To hear any of The Beatles’ Music in such a raw and personal way is stunning. This song gives a bit of an insight into the crumbling dynamics of the band through Harrison’s eyes. It’s so sad and eye opening to hear that in the lyrics of this song. He sings with such confidence and simultaneous vulnerability, a juxtaposition that he is a true master of.

9. The Miles Davis Quintet | It Never Entered My Mind (Shirley Ross Cover)
This one begins with Red Garland on the piano, playing an arpeggio that you feel like you’ve heard before, but the song strays away from your expectations, especially with Miles on the muted trumpet. This song has everything I look for in a Jazz ballad, so much character in each instrument, so much Restraint and feel that you sit there and just go, I’m not worthy. My buddy Brendan Lynch-Salamon showed me this one on a trip we took up to a little mountain town for a quick getaway.

10. Cornershop | Brimful Of Asha (Norman Cook Remix Radio Edit)
Here’s a curveball for you! Sometimes a song just makes you feel like a kid again. When I was growing up I lived in London, and I used to sit in the back of the school bus and listen to the radio, and just wait for this song to come on. Man, did they love playing Fatboy Slim on the radio back then. This is of course a remix of the Cornershop track. It’s just so hard not to bob your head and sing along to this one. When I listen to this song, I’m sitting in the window seat of the bus, with my backpack on my lap, driving down King’s Road, riding slowly into my teenage years.