I've worked in coffee shops a whole lot over the last 6 years. I've even volunteered for a few years just to have access to a nice espresso machine and a big empty room, and dibs on the day old pastries. When I worked, I always brought with me music I thought people needed to hear. I probably hurt the business in the process. These are the records I played most persistently and was consistently reprimanded by the customers for assulting them with... and a few that restored the cool to the shop:
Check out DM Stith's album
Heavy Ghost HERE.
1
It's easy for me to understand this one, but still it's sad to me that there are people incapable of experiencing what I experience when I hear this album. 10 seconds into track 2 I'm being approached by several people at once. "This has got to end" and "are you serious."
2
Maybe he soars too unabashedly? People more often then not ask who this is and why we're listening to it.
3
Maybe it's the production quality. Older men with coveralls tend to like this one, like to admit that it's mysterious and beautiful, whispering it so that their coverall'd buddies don't hear. Older women in coveralls hate this one.
4
I guess I understand that this one is weird, but after a double cap it's the most beautiful fluid thing. I've never been told to turn this off but I've received some pretty murky glares from customers, gazes over opened newspapers, suddenly silent conversations, shufflings toward the door.
5
"I guess if I were stoned this would be amazing."
6
I've never played this one in a coffee shop. I wish I had. I think it'd either clear the room, or unify the whole block in some deep convergence, like a scene out of The Happening.
7
"Well this is depressing" and "How did this guy kill himself?"
8
The "Swimming Pool" yodel in Banshee Beat gets people giggling for the first 2 minutes, then mocking by the 4th, and complaining by minute 6.
9
Ny far the most polarizing music. Somehow, and I still don't understand it fully, this record gets the most inquiries -- who is this, where can I buy this record, what's wrong with her voice, would you please change to something else, I can't stand this, please play something good.
10
Maybe it's that this is genrefiable, but people tend to approve of this as a replacement for just about anything on the list above.
11
I love this album -- I don't see it fitting into the middle-of-the-road category, but something about it calms people, restores their sense of privacy and peace...
12
There's almost no ego in this music. The coffee in their mugs could be splashing from the low end but still people will forget anything is playing.
2xLP $14.99
