McGwire Bracket: Kincaid vs Radbird

[CardsofSTL]

Kincaid's Outtakes Playlist

Playlist description: Songs that were cut from their intended albums

vs

Radbird's Stratosphere Playlist

Playlist description: Random songs encountered while searching for space song.

[heyzeus]

I'm never voting against a playlist that has Elliott Smith on it. For anyone who's interested, the man left albums and albums worth of recorded but unreleased gems. These aren't just bsides or unfinished demos or material to weak to make a proper album. It's confounding how much immaculate music he made and never released, and infuriating that he took his life so young, with so much talent.

Anyway, here's my favorite Elliott Smith unreleased track. It did finally get a release on his posthumous rarities collection "New Moon," and was featured in the Clooney drama Up In The Air. This song is perfect.

[BottenFieldofDreams]

I never got around to listening to that Beck album. College me would be so disappointed. Great song. Similarly, Isakov is a guy I always meant to dig deeper on.

The Bob Dylan outtake reminds me of this pure joy pill:
https://youtu.be/dJe3R-HLIxQ?si=iKdnm7ePxtoprt7S

I voted Radbird.

[Jocephus]

both had 2 or 3 songs i'm alright with but ultimately chose kincaid's list though it's heavily weighted by the bob dylan song. elliott smith's is not melodic, just noise.

[TGantz]

Isakov is really good.

[Radbird]

Isakov is really good.

Yeah, I’m really into him lately.

[Kincaid]

I'm never voting against a playlist that has Elliott Smith on it. For anyone who's interested, the man left albums and albums worth of recorded but unreleased gems. These aren't just bsides or unfinished demos or material to weak to make a proper album. It's confounding how much immaculate music he made and never released, and infuriating that he took his life so young, with so much talent.

Anyway, here's my favorite Elliott Smith unreleased track. It did finally get a release on his posthumous rarities collection "New Moon," and was featured in the Clooney drama Up In The Air. This song is perfect.
...

New Moon is full of fantastic songs. I thought about picking something from that, but I like how "Melodic Noise" shows Smith branching out toward the end of his career in a completely different direction. You see a bit of it on From a Basement on a Hill, but I would have loved to hear more of his musical sensibilities translated to noise/electronic/ambient type stuff.

***
Some brief background for the other songs:

• "Blind Willie McTell" was infamously cut from Bob Dylan's Infidels record at the last minute for unknown reasons despite being the consensus best song on the album. There is a better-known version that features only piano and acoustic guitar which is also great.

• "Hard Times" was not cut from the album so much as the album never got released. The Jetzons were a big local band in the Tempe, AZ scene that seemed primed to break out nationally, but they broke up before finishing their first LP and the songs recorded for it were not released until their old label found the tapes decades later.

• "The Violent Sequence" was a rare Rick Wright composition Pink Floyd recorded for the film Zabriskie Point, but the director felt the song didn't fit the scene and ended up not using it. The melody was later used as the basis for "Us and Them" from Dark Side of the Moon

• "Cars Can't Escape" missed the cut out of a stacked set of tracks for Wilco's Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. The song did get some exposure in the Sam Jones documentary on the album before later being released on an album of rarities, demos, live/alternate versions, etc.

[CardsofSTL]

All tied up going into the last day of voting! Tie breaker needed!

[CardsofSTL]

Stratosphere with the win!

Congratulations @Radbird