Summer's on Us
Have you met the new items you'll be wearing all season? If not, press play, open this link in a new tab and allow our summer mixtape to inspire whatever you decide to add to cart.
For Vol. 180 we've turned our back on the usual format, and instead of outsourcing the mixtape duties to a DJ or musician, we've put together something inhouse – an exercise drenched in nostalgia that reminded us of a TDK90 we once made for a ripe young boy we met on a beach during summer vacation 1998.
He was a small-town boy working as a lifeguard on the South Coast of Durban, all sinew and salty brown skin. My family was staying at the same timeshare we'd holidayed at since forever. That year was different though. After I'd seen him I'd lay down my towel closer to his high-chair in the hopes that he'd talk to me. Eventually he broke the ice, asking for help applying sunscreen to his back. Later I would mock him mercilessly for that, but at the time it was electric and sparked a summer loving that happened so fast. With the summer days drifting away to summer nights, I wish I could tell you more, but eventually the holiday was over, and I had to head back to Joburg for my final year of high-school. He went to do a gap-year in London. There wasn't enough After Sun in the world to soothe my burning chest and I couldn't bear to face him on my last night in town. Instead I spent the evening in my room crying and making him a mixtape. I forget exactly what was on the compilation, probably the type of thing typical of a 16-year-old city girl coming of age in the late 90s. I will tell you this, it was obviously infinitely cooler than the pop punk he always listened to. Still, I never saw or heard from him again, that following summer he'd been replaced by another lifeguard and years later when everyone joined Facebook, well, if you'd met him you'd know that he was never going to make a profile.
So yes, anyway, there you have it, sorry for getting emotional, the point is that while technology has changed the sentiment remains the same – here's something for you to listen to while making memories of your own.
Starting with hip hop it builds into some dancier stuff, mixes in a few acoustic numbers and ends off with chill vibes. Bring out your Bluetooth speaker and stream this at your next pool party, beach bonfire, road trip, festival campsite or wherever else this summer takes you. And if your party happens to last longer than the 23 tracks that we've put together for you here (about as long as my summer romance lasted) then lucky you, you can keep the party going by streaming some of the other mixtapes we've kicked off with in weeks past.