Warmer Climes

WARMER MIXTAPES #869 | by Whitney Weiss [Hotel Vanity]

1. The Miracles Club | U&Me
This is probably the newest thing on this list and I've listened to it entirely too many times in the past year. I can't get sick of it, and I've definitely tried. It's a fabulous House Music song with the DNA of a tender Pop song mixed in. It's great to dance to and it's also perfect if you're sitting and having a happy sulk because you have a crush on someone. I like the original and the Nile Delta Remix a whole lot.

2. The Damned | Jet Boy Jet Girl (Elton Morello Cover)
When I was in my very early twenties, I had a spring where I wore this single out, playing it over and over again because I had a crush on an emotionally unavailable rent boy of indeterminate Sexual Orientation who, incidentally, introduced me to The Damned. He is long gone, but this song remains, and I think it's my favorite boys with Electric Guitars song, even better than Richard Hell and Television and Dead Boys and Ramones and all that.

3. Sylvester | Rock The Box
Choosing a single Sylvester song is HARD, but this is the one for me. It sounds like a Club in a way that other Sylvester songs, actually other songs in general, don't. I think it's his Dark Horse, his Sleeper hit.

4. Sparks | The Number One Song In Heaven (Long Version)
The title track off the 1978 Sparks record produced by Giorgio Moroder. The first time I ever heard this was like going to Church and being saved. Not exaggerating. The full-length version, not the wimpy three minute edit. I've opened nights with this song, I've closed nights with this song, I've accidentally taken drugs and insisted that everyone stop everything they're doing to listen to all seven minutes of this song. I fucking love this song. Play this song at my funeral.

5. Moi Renee | Miss Honey
I have an unnatural love for this record and find it totally hypnotizing. I could listen to Moi Renee find new ways to enunciate Miss Honey for HOURS and probably have. And really, who among us cannot identify with lyrics like Where's the bitch?... She's got some nerve... Here I am and feeling fierce? This is potentially my favorite song of All Time. It also influenced many other songs I love and play out often.

6. Den Haan | Release The Beast
I never understood why this band wasn't immediately famous. They're a duo, their entire record Gods From Outer Space is stunning, and they make this macho Italo Disco that simply slays dance floors. I've put this on at 4am in Buenos Aires and seen the skinniest most demure man on the dance floor suddenly leap up and smash a bottle over his own head and get a second wind. It's that serious of a song.

7. The Crystals | Then He Kissed Me
This song makes me want to leap up and smash a bottle over my own head. Never underestimate the power of desperate Optimism in teenage women.

8. Stevie Nicks | Gypsy (Piano Demo)
The album version of Gypsy sounds almost chipper, which strikes me as odd because the lyrics are a bit more complicated and less peppy. This version seems to impart the intended feeling more effectively. It is just so beautiful and vulnerable and if you've never heard it, I implore you to listen to it right now.

9. Fleetwood Mac | Little Lies
Clearly I am all about Stevie Nicks, but Christine McVie was underrated, so here is a great Fleetwood Mac song (so great, in fact, that I did an edit of it), where Stevie is only doing the backing vocals. I think that Fleetwood Mac sings about Infidelity better than any other band!

10. Prince | Nothing Compares 2 U (feat. Rosie Gaines with The New Power Generation) (The Family Cover)
I love Prince, like really truly love Prince, like have thrown two parties in the past year where I played nothing but his music for 6+ hours at a time, and choosing one of his songs is impossible, so I've narrowed it down to two. The live version of Nothing Compares 2 U with Rosie Gaines, when Prince wails all the flowers that you planted sugar, in the back yard/all died when you went away, I fucking DARE you to not choke up. Also Uptown is one of many Prince songs about having fun and being a sexy weirdo. It is a dancey manifesto for people who aren't trying to be outsiders, but who get side-eyed by normal people all the damn time (see also: Controversy.). Depending on my mood, the best line is either White, black, Puerto Rican, everybody just a-freakin' or Baby didn't say too much/She said, 'Are you gay?'/Kinda took me by surprise/I didn't know what to do/I just looked her in her eyes/And I said, 'No, are you?'... There is also a live version of this from South Carolina in 1980 where he plays it SO FAST and it is just ferocious, so if you can find that, listen to it.

Honorable Mentions: