Now Balearic, and in many ways Yacht Rock, is a collection of tracks that usually wouldn’t be compiled together as a playlist - in some ways they follow the Northern Soul maxim of ‘it is, because it is’, and whilst less fixated on whether it is ‘Yacht or Nyacht’, I do like putting together playlists that are more rooted in a feeling, or a location, and include tracks that jolt the flow a bit, and survive repeated extended listenings.

As mentioned before, there’s a particular bar/cafe/restaurant in Puerto Pollença, northern Majorca, that has become the wife’s favourite for ‘bar bathing’ (getting a tan with a drink in your hand!). It does help that you can step from their seating area, onto the beach, and into the sea, within five strides, and their music selection is a mix of tracks that soundtrack their look. Carto Ao Tom 74 by Vinicius de Moraes etc is a really good example, that latin nostalgia vibe that so suits the sunshine and a jug of sangria/plate of dips. State of Mind by Jimpster would be another good example too.

They sell their own CD’s and they are too high priced, are not on Apple Music (but their App is), and I can nip onto Spotify (as a viewer) and drop the song titles into Apple Music, and compile them over a couple of hours. I do this, listen to it and then cull about 70% of it.

There’s lot of stuff by Gotan Project, Hotel Costes etc, but I find the majority of that too challenging. So, I’ve got this summer vibe on and have started a playlist called Grand Cafe (for personal OCD reasons). It’s a mix of Balearic and Pollença sounds.

I find some of the Balearic stuff too unsuitable and have thrown in early Beatles tracks such as Things We Said Today, so it’s a real mash-up but makes sense to me, putting me in another place whilst in my garden.

The reason for this sprawling, incoherent post is that I found a track by Tatsuro Yashamita (Theme of Mirai), and my skim reading of him was to do with Japanese City Pop and I’m keen to know if you know of him, and that ‘genre’?

Do you have any recommendations pal?