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Mixtape Mondays: Te Amo Amor

June 1, 2026 by Belghast

Good Morning, Folks! Happy First of June. This is a big month for me because it contains both my birthday and the birthday of my mom. We were a family of Geminis. This morning, I have another mixtape ready to go, and for those who are not already engaged in this practice… I love making mixtapes. They were a big part of my childhood since I had a dual tape deck stereo and made them for my friends, and occasionally for those I was attempting to flirt with. There is a science to the placement of songs, and my goal is to make it so that the entre composure flows from one song to another without having any abrupt shifts. Most of the time, I accomplish this and then post the result for my readers to listen to. At this point, I have thirty-one mixes, and my extra challenge is that I cannot use the exact same version of a song on more than one mixtape.

31 – Te Amo Amor

My girlfriend loves to sing Karaoke, and low-key specializes in singing love songs. I’ve got a few videos of her singing various things, and I think she is pretty damned good at it. So the other day, she was asking me what some of my favorite love songs were. Being the wannabe edgelord that I am, I cannot, of course, choose the standard fare. So this morning, you have a mix of the songs that mean the most to me that exist within the love song category. I am cheating by throwing in the Nada Surf cover of If You Leave, because I have already used that song in my love letter to 80s soundtracks called Tape Deck Held Aloft. The only truly standard love song is Brian Adams banger from Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, and it was included because it represents the song that I had my first slow dance to. I think the entire thing listens extremely well for being crafted out of such contorted objectives. The two most important for me are Lovesong by The Cure and Because the Night covered by 10,000 Maniacs.

Track List

01 – If You Leave – Nada Surf
02 – Always – Erasure
03 – Lovesong – The Cure
04 – Come Undone – Duran Duran
05 – Still Into You – Paramore
06 – I Miss You – Blink 182
07 – Just Like Heaven – Dinosaur Jr.
08 – Life Eternal – Ghost
09 – Eternal Flame – The Bangles
10 – Brick – Ben Folds Five
11 – Sexual Healing – Soul Asylum
12 – Because the Night – 10,000 Maniacs
13 – Let’s Stay Together – Seal
14 – Nothing Compares 2 U – Chris Cornell
15 – Everything I Do I Do It For You – Bryan Adams

Listen to it yourself

Another mixtape added to the archives. For those not in the know, a lot of times I will add the mixtape to the archives ahead of actually making the blog post. I have various beta testers who give things a listen through to let me know if I am crazy or not. I think this one is pretty good, but I am not one to really dwell upon the love song as a genre. What are some of your favorite love songs? What do you think would have fit well with this mix? Drop me a line below.

The post Mixtape Mondays: Te Amo Amor appeared first on Tales of the Aggronaut.

Mixtape Mondays: Willowy Weary Wise

February 16, 2026 by Belghast

Good Morning Folks! This is an exceptionally busy morning for me. I have a pretty early doctor’s appointment and will have to fight road construction to get there. So as a result, I got up quite a bit earlier than I had normally been getting up, largely so that I could roll this post out without issue. This week represents the third week in this new series of Mixtapes, and the twenty-sixth in total since beginning this series during the pandemic lockdown. If you are tuning in for the first time, Mixtapes are really important to me on a personal level. I’ve always loved the art of constructing just the right mix of music for the right mood. There are a lot of things that have inspired me to make mixtapes in the past, but I think part of this is that I mourn the art of crafting albums. There were so many musicians that I grew up listening to that fully understood the way an album flows… is more important than the individual songs on it. While I am entering my “Cancer Boy” era, I am finding it more important to do little things that allow me to stake a creative claim on the world, and this mixtape nonsense is just a small part of this.

26 – Willowy Weary Wise

These mixtapes start for all sorts of reasons. Sometimes they are inspired by lived experience, other times are built around a specific song, and in the case of today’s mix, are a bit of a remix of someone else’s playlist. On February 6th, my friend Mallow shared a playlist on bsky, and given that I like Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, I clicked through and gave it a bit of a listen. One of my favorite things about social media is when you find out one of your existing friends has relatively “drift compatible” musical tastes. Collectively, there is a lot of really great stuff on that list, but I was floored by how well a very specific block worked together. Namely, how Red Right Hand, Down by the Water, and Tear You Apart flowed together perfectly and set a very specific tone for the entire outing. Individually, they are all great songs, and I have been a massive fan of PJ Harvey since she was thrust into my life initially with 50Ft Queenie. So that gave me the tapestry with which to weave another mix, and I anchored that block in the middle of a fifteen-song mix designed to exploit that same sort of feeling. The mixtape itself was named in honor of Mallow herself, since I am effectively copying her homework for my own creation. I am hoping you will enjoy my own spin, and also check out her own playlist, so you can see two different takes on the same idea.

Track List

01 – Dead Souls – Nine Inch Nails
02 – Cirice – Ghost
03 – This Corrosion – The Sisters of Mercy
04 – People Are People – Depeche Mode
05 – Bela Lugosi’s Dead (The Hunger Mix) – Bauhaus
06 – The Killing Moon – Echo & The Bunnymen
07 – A Girl Like You – Edwyn Collins
08 – What’s A Girl To Do? – Bat For Lashes
09 – Death Don’t Have No Mercy – Delaney Davidson
10 – Red Right Hand – Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds
11 – Down By The Water – PJ Harvey
12 – Tear You Apart – She Wants Revenge
13 – Black Wings – Tom Waits
14 – Glory Box – Portishead
15 – Stay – Shakespears Sister

Listen To It Yourself

This represents three weeks in a row that I have released a new mixtape on Monday. I know that I will probably not be able to keep this up indefinitely, especially as my whole “Cancer Boy” journey ramps up. However, I do like that this gives me at least a small amount of creative control over my world. Similarly, I am trying to arrange a time to sit down and record with “The Librarian” and do what will honestly probably be the most revealing and personal episode of “Bel Folks Stuff” that I have ever done. I kind of love that I have given them this ominous-sounding moniker at the same time they are themselves struggling to decide their own identity going forward. I have a few nuggets of playlists floating around in my head, or at least anchor songs that I want to build around. One of the big self-imposed challenges for me is that I do not want to use the same songs that I have ever used before in a playlist, and similarly, I do not want to repeat the same musicians more than once in the same playlist. For example, this week I might have gone with the Ghost version of Stay, but went with the original to keep from violating my own self-imposed rule. These mixtapes are yet another way I am trying to declare that I still live and am still trying to be a creative human. As always, you can see the full list of mixes over on my archives, and in many cases, I release the new mix a bit early there so it is staged and ready for Monday morning. Mixtape Mondays Archive The post Mixtape Mondays: Willowy Weary Wise appeared first on Tales of the Aggronaut.

Mixtape Mondays: Some Jokes Kill

February 9, 2026 by Belghast

Good Morning Folks! Welcome to the second week in a row of this new series of Mixtapes. For those who have not followed this series, essentially the idea is that each Monday morning, I share a new mix of songs with you. Growing up, mixtapes were very important to my existence. I was blessed with a stereo that had a double cassette deck, and I quickly realized that I could remix my favorite albums into combinations that made sense for me personally. Later on, I would share these mixes with friends, and occasionally love interests… that rarely seemed to appreciate the gravity of what I was giving them. For me, each mix is like a little chunk of my soul that I am carving off to share with you, and everything about them was labored over, from the choice of songs to the order in which they appear. During the pandemic lockdown era I started sharing these takes with you, my readers, and more recently, while dealing with my “cancer boy” era, I have started this back up, and while I am sure I will miss the occasional Monda,y I am hoping to keep this feature of my blog rolling for a while. As of this morning, there are twenty-five different mixtapes available, and you can find all of them on the archives page.

25 – Some Jokes Kill

Oftentimes, one of my mixes starts with a specific song that serves as the anchor. I then built the mix around that song, with it buried somewhere in the middle. This week’s spark of inspiration is Heathens by Twenty One Pilots, and was heard on Edge 104.5 while running some errands. I’ve always liked this song because it was so interesting and largely denied trying to place it in any clean category musically. This made it all the more challenging to build a mix of songs that evokes the same sort of feelings, because it doesn’t neatly fit into a box. This song was used in the soundtrack for Suicide Squad, and while piecing this together, a subtheme of the Joker started creeping in around the edges. While I don’t exactly love the Jared Leto Joker, when I think of the Suicide Squad movie, I think of Joker as a character in general. When I think of The Joker, however, I think of The Killing Joke, which is what ultimately inspired the album cover for this one. At face value, this is a weird mix of tracks, but it flows together far better than it might seem. I’m pretty happy with the end result and proud of this one.

Track List

01 – All the Things She Said – t.A.t.U.
02 – Elastic Heart – Sia
03 – Supermassive Black Hole – Muse
04 – Can You Feel My Heart – Bring Me The Horizon
05 – Red Stars – The Birthday Massacre
06 – Call Me Little Sunshine – Ghost
07 – Jenny Was A Friend Of Mine – The Killers
08 – High Enough – K.Flay
09 – Heathens – twenty one pilots
10 – Ex’s & Oh’s – Elle King
11 – Strangers – Halsey
12 – Centuries – Fall Out Boy
13 – Pity Party – Melanie Martinez
14 – bad guy – Billie Eilish
15 – Crazy – Gnarls Barkley

Listen to it yourself

Two weeks in a row, friends… let’s see if I can keep it going for a third week. I’m never terribly great at keeping a feature going for the long haul. At some point, I tend to run out of inspiration, and I know that I will either be dealing with Chemo/Radiation or a Surgery soon… which will probably knock the wind out of my sails a bit. I have the first several songs for the next mix ready to go, because it was inspired by one of my friends. This one took a bit of doing to make it work, so I am hoping since I already have three songs that fit together neatly that the next mix will come together easier. If you are enjoying the return of Mixtape Mondays drop me a line below. If you have listened through all of my Mixtapes, pat yourself on the back for being a true pal… but still drop me a line because I am curious if anyone has done this thing. As always, you can find all of the mixtapes… often times ahead of my Monday morning post over on the archive. I tend to stage things ahead of time so I can share them with friends to help beta test them a bit. Mixtape Mondays Archive The post Mixtape Mondays: Some Jokes Kill appeared first on Tales of the Aggronaut.

AggroChat #308 – Dance Battle Time

July 19, 2020 by Belghast

Featuring: Ammosart, Ashgar, Belghast, Grace, Kodra, Tamrielo and Thalen

This evening we record an entire show where we basically talk about three games. The first of these is Ooblets which came out this week in early access and how it is a blending of Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley, Pokemon and a Card Battler. From there we talk about Ghosts of Tsushima and how it presents Samurai gameplay in a new high fidelity light. Additionally we talk a bit about Kurosawa mode which offers you a unique black and white/film grain way of playing the game. Finally Bel talks about his adventures being a post apocalyptic fedex driver in a world seemingly run on twitter likes… aka Death Stranding. He talks a bit about the odd social aspect of the game where other players can only have a possible positive impact without ever causing any negatives.