To kick off 2024, I've invited a very special guest to design January's playlist. Music obsessive, Robbie Phillips, counts among his heroes Dolly Parton and Courtney Love—he has a soft spot for a blonde dye job. Robbie developed his musical taste buds as a teenager in East Tennessee in the '80s before moving to Beantown to escape the South. He studied writing at Boston University and was soon in the throes of Boston's burgeoning punk and indie scenes of the late '80s and early '90s. What time he didn't spend as an activist in Queer Nation and ACT-UP/Boston, he spent in nightclubs and bars across town, attending multiple shows in a single night. Somehow he still managed to graduate and afterwards he found himself managing the flagship Newbury Comics location on Newbury Street.
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| Robbie Phillips, far left, and his Newbury Comics coworkers. |
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| Robbie, as a music journalist, here with Morrissey. |
Newbury Comics was the perfect place for twenty-five years to meet like-minded peers and sneak his musical anti-snob/snob aesthetic onto unsuspecting customers and employees. You can sample his musings about all manner of pop music on his Facebook page which, as an old person, he uses as a living blog.
Robbie, here with Hole front-woman, Courtney Love, and Melissa Auf der Maur, the bassist for Hole between 1994 and 1999.
Robbie, here with Denise Johnson, lead vocalist for the band
Primal Scream from 1990-1995.
Robbie agonized for weeks about getting the playlist "correct"—whittling it down from a possible ninety-eight possible tracks to the neat twenty-five songs you'll hear before you.
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5ShCPdzZ6nj7yrp2451u6f?si=d96956487d5345b4
Judy Garland. By Myself.
Adam Ant. Prince Charming.
Escape From New York. Fire In My Heart.
ABC. Valentine's Day.
Baby Tate. Jersey.
Debby Friday. So Hard to Tell.
Magnetic Fields. Take Ecstasy with Me.
My Robot Friend. We're the Pet Shop Boys.
Kenickie. How I was Made.
Jennie. Solo.
Sonic Boom. Angel.
Helium. Lucy.
The Roches. Runs in the Family.
79.5. Club Level.
Shygirl. Slime.
Mick Ronson. Growing Up & I'm Fine.
The Pastels. Firebell Ringing.
The Long Blondes. Once & Never Again.
Superchunk. 100,000 Fireflies.
One Dove. White Love (Guitar Paradise Mix).
Prince. Noon Rendezvous.
The Flirts. Calling All Boys.
Cumgirl8. I Wanna Be.
Chappell Roan. My Kink is Karma.
Dexys Midnight Runners. Thankfully, Not Living in Yorkshire, It Doesn't Apply.
Justice vs Simian. We Are Your Friends.
We would love to hear your feedback.
Quick programming note: Robbie has used "Song Shift" which is an app that transfers and shares playlists between two or more platforms. Thus Robbie's guest playlist can be found on my Apple Music profile as well as my go-to Spotify one.
