THURSDAY MORNING MIX January 8, 2009
Scott Foley

These Thursday mornings come and go all too quickly.

Thursday mornings find me up at around 5, gathering the final few CDs into my box despite the fact that I know I already have more than enough to build an entire Episode of the Mix. Load the car around 6 and head north up 287. These days, the sun is just rising, making for a beautiful drive.

Up the road, I'm throwing on CDs to preview tracks for play. I always consider stopping for coffee in Loveland, but never do. There's a Dazbog Coffee shop just after a new place advertising pizza and oysters ... The stretch between Loveland and Fort Collins can be a bit congested, and I'll switch between my CDs and KRFC, checking out what Chris or EP has to say.

I arrive at the station by 7. Check out newly arrived CDs, send and print out the week's reviews I've written, and gather a few stragglers from the library. By 7:30 I'll establish my space in the studio, News On the Range playing in the background, sun warming the parking lot.

On at 8, the time goes too fast. Plans rarely come together as expected. I'll either hit a groove or I won't, knowing that either way it's probably fine with listeners. I inevitably wish I'd prepared more (or less) with more (or less) to say, or wish I'd said it all better. Never feel I'm ready to go once Charlie or Aaron or Steve pulls in for Morning Dew.

It's a delicious but troubling operation for us. As an insatiable lover of music, it's all about the "you've got to hear this!" moments, and there are times when I feel some extra satisfaction for having cobbled together a good show. More often than not, I leave the parking lot, back onto 287, looking forward to my next chance to achieve groove, to correct my missteps, to pull magic from my cardboard box.

* Billy Bragg & Wilco, "Hesitating Beauty" Mermaid Avenue (Elektra, 98)
* Neko Case, "John Saw That Number" Fox Confessor Brings the Flood (Anti, 06)
* Mando Saenz, "Engine Roll" Watertown (Carnival, 04)
* The Bridge, "Poison Wine" Blind Man's Hill (Hyena, 08)
* Mark Olson & Gary Louris, "Turn Your Pretty Name Around" Ready For the Flood (New West, 09)
* Horse Flies, "Baghdad Children" Until the Ocean (Pest Control, 08)
* Paper Bird, "Pennies" Anything Nameless and Joymaking (self, 07)
* Boris McCutcheon & Saltlick, "I Long (Then I'm Gone)" Bad Road Good People (Frogville, 08)
* Brave Combo, "Louie Louie" Exotic Rocking Life (denTone, 08)
* Gwil Owen, "Cadillac" Gravy (Rambler, 08)
* Eleni Mandell, "Bigger Burn" Artificial Fire (Zedtone, 09)
* Shane Nicholson, "It's Such a Shame" Familiar Ghosts (Liberation, 09)
* Old 97s, "Salome" Too Far To Care (Elektra, 97)
* Ben Sollee, "Only a Song" Something Worth Keeping EP (self, 08)
* Pine Hill Haints, "Say Something Say Anything" Ghost Dance (K, 07)
* Jamey Johnson, "High Cost Of Living" That Lonesome Song (Mercury, 08)
* Gourds, "Way You Can Get" Haymaker! (YepRoc, 09)
* Gurf Morlix, "Walkin' To New Orleans" Last Exit To Happyland (self, 09)
* Tift Merritt, "Wayward & Weary" Please Break the Silence Of the Middle Of the Night (08)
* Bob Dylan, "Mississippi" Tell Tale Signs (Columbia, 08)
* Rhythm Angels, "If I Had a Gun" Girls Like Us (High Horse, 09)
* Kathy Mattea, "Green Rolling Hills" Coal (30 Tigers, 08)
* Ben Kweller, "Things I Like To Do" Changing Horses (ATO, 09)
* Corb Lund, "Short Native Grasses" Five Dollar Bill (Stony Plain, 02)
* Otis Gibbs, "Preacher Steve" Grandpa Walked a Picketline (Wanamaker, 08)
* Peter Case, "Every 24 Hours" Let Us Now Praise Sleepy John (YepRoc, 07)

Scott