taped together

We (@melex & @brainpicker) love music. And we believe crowdsourcing and content curation are two of today's most powerful cultural propellers – seeming opposites with an even more powerful intersection. To prove the point, last winter we asked 31 interesting people we knew to each curate one season-inspired song for every day of December, then released the crowdsourced seasonal playlist as a holiday mixtape on December 31.

Thanks to a terrific response, we've decided to come back with Volume 2, crowdsourcing a summer playlist for 2010. For each day between June 1 and June 22, the Summer Solstice, we're once again asking a different interesting person we know to curate a summer-inspired song. On June 22, we'll release the playlist as a free download.

It's been another great season of collaborative playlist-making – thank you for joining us in it. As promised, here's the mixtape for you to download – enjoy by the beach or on a hot summer party night. Mojito optional but highly recommended.

Posted on Friday, 11 December 2009

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december 11

Jónsi - Boy Lilikoi

Today’s track is curated by Kirstin Butler / @kirstinbutler

Whenever anything Sigur Rós-related happens, I pay attention. Earlier this week I learned that the band’s lead singer, Jónsi Birgisson, has a solo album called “Go” coming out early next year; even better, string arrangements on the album are courtesy of contemporary classical wunderkind Nico Muhly (whose must-read blog contains brilliant and hilarious observations about music and pop culture, by the way). “Boy Lilikoi” is the first track available from the album, and in a gesture befitting the holidays it’s available for free download.

Liliko’i are yellow passion fruit, and while I don’t know if that’s what Birgisson had in mind when he wrote the song, he totally evokes their vivid, extraordinary beauty.