We are back again! In this fourth, mid-February installment of Pressing Concerns, I highlight the third album from Virginia’s The Crowd Scene, the first solo record from Anika Pyle (Katie Ellen/Chumped), the second album from janglers The Boys with the Perpetual Nervousness, the reissue of 90’s queercore band Longstocking’s discography, and a new release from the lo-fi pop stylings of The Fragiles. You aren’t gonna want to miss any of these albums, folks. You’ll want to be sitting down for this. You’re going to be on the edge of –oh, just read these.
If you can’t get enough of album roundup posts, be sure to check out previous Pressing Concerns entries. I’m hoping that the next edition goes out roughly a week from when this one goes live, so watch this space!
The Crowd Scene – South Circular
Release date: December 11th Record label: Self-released Genre: Power pop, orchestral pop Formats: CD, digital Pull track: Soho Square
Virginia-by-way-of-England band The Crowd Scene certainly work at their own pace. Their debut album, Turn Left at Greenland, was released in 1998, and their sophomore effort followed merely a decade later. With this in mind, I think Rosy Overdrive can be forgiven for being a couple months late to December 2020’s South Circular, their third LP. Led by the duo of Grahame Davies and Anne Rogers, South Circular clearly takes influence from the lush orchestral pop of the early Rock era, but the time period it takes me back to above all else is the early 2000s, when troubadours like Brendan Benson and Elliott Smith could find success by marrying their smartly-penned tunes with cherry-picked pop production and instrumentation from decades past and present.
The album starts with the airy, minimalist “Mistake I Had to Make” that’s reminiscent of the lounge-pop of Ivy or even a trimmed Stereolab, but this is either a red herring or an example of The Crowd Scene’s dexterity depending on your point of view. By the halfway mark, they’ve already run through the twang of “Too Late to Send Letters”, the bright hues of “Soho Square”, and the closest thing South Circular has to a straight-up rocker in the extended guitar soloing of “Records You Love the Most”. Davies’ clear and ageless lead vocals throughout the record remind me of Jon Brion’s solo work, while the languid “You Can Always Come Home” would fit right at home on an album by one of Brion’s frequent collaborators, Aimee Mann. The around-the-fire, reflective acoustic closer “Brotherhood of the Leaky Boot” sounds like something off of Paul McCartney’s latest album, which South Circular actually predates by a week. Time is a funny thing. The Crowd Scene has shown throughout their career that they don’t allow themselves to be controlled by it, and with South Circular they’ve put together a collection of ten strong songs that will help them weather it. (Bandcamp link)
Anika Pyle – Wild River
Release date: February 12th Record label: June/Quote Unquote Genre: Indie folk, synthpop, spoken word Formats: Vinyl, digital Pull track: Emerald City
Anika Pyle spent the majority of the 2010s fronting emo-tinged DIY punk bands Chumped and Katie Ellen, far from household names but revered in certain circles and widely influential in several scenes, particularly in her current stomping grounds of Philadelphia. That someone as musically active as Pyle has finally made her first solo album isn’t surprising, especially as it’s inching up on four years since the last full-length she was involved with (Katie Ellen’s sole LP). Wild River, however, is not the “Anika Pyle solo album” that a casual Chumped or Katie Ellen listener might conjure up in their head. It’s a sparse album, built from minimal synths, quiet acoustic guitar, and Pyle’s words—often spoken, but even when sung landing as evocative and arresting as her poetry does.
This didn’t exactly come out of nowhere—Katie Ellen was just as likely to break out the acoustics and slow the tempo down as they were to rip like Chumped, but that seemed like such a natural progression for Pyle that I didn’t notice it too much. With Wild River, however, we’re confronted with this dimension of Pyle’s songwriting head-on. The album’s musical palette is, to me, reminiscent of Allison Crutchfield, another pop punker who made the transition to solo album by embracing a similar toolbox. Lyrically and thematically, however, comparisons to Wild River fall flat—it is a deeply personal record that could only have been made by Pyle herself.
Turning down the amps on one’s music and “pivoting to synthpop” conjure images of trying to make a finished product that’s more widely palatable for mass consumption, potent if successfully threaded but at its worst merely wallpaper to blend into the background of a mood playlist or melodrama. Wild River is no such compromise—Anika Pyle uses her new music vocabulary to command your full attention. Spoken word pieces, recurring themes, and an unflinching account of a very real loss make Wild River nothing short of active listening. This is not to say that individual songs from it can’t stand on their own—“Emerald City” and “Haiku for Everything You Loved and Miss” are, in their own way, confident, modern pop songs. It is to say that as powerful as “Orange Flowers” is by itself, hearing it immediately after “Mexican Restaurant Where I Last Saw My Father” stirs up emotion that musicians rarely attempt to stir, let alone succeed in doing. “The significance of letting a grown man cry” carries that much more heft. It is to say that “Look up, you dummy” and “Life is a funny haha” become more than just single lines as you carry them with you throughout Wild River. It’s music that will make you appreciate a piece of pie—like, really appreciate—and there’s nothing stronger than that. (Bandcamp link)
The Boys with the Perpetual Nervousness – Songs from Another Life
Release date: February 5th Record label: Bobo Integral Genre: Jangle pop Formats: Vinyl, digital Pull track: Can’t You See?
When Teenage Fanclub put out their breakthrough Bandwagonesque in 1991, it was so widely anointed a spiritual sequel to Big Star’s three-album run in the 1970s that Big Star itself acknowledged this fact in a reissue’s liner notes. While the Fannies have thankfully stayed together long after their initial rise, this has nevertheless not prevented The Boys with the Perpetual Nervousness from submitting their bid to become third-generation torchbearers. And what a bid it is—Songs from Another Life’s all-too-short runtime is stuffed to the brim with jangling guitars, beautiful vocal melodies, and bright, shiny numbers with titles like “Waking Up in the Sunshine” and “Summer” that still somehow have a melancholy cloud hanging over them.
The Teenage Fanclub comparisons are unavoidable, right down to the Scottish accent of Andrew Taylor, one half of the duo behind TBWTPN. But Taylor and his counterpart, Gonzalo Marcos, know better than to stake their reputation on one act (of course, so did TFC look elsewhere than Big Star to draw from their sound). They cite both other mile markers in their jangle pop lineage (The Beach Boys, The Byrds, R.E.M.) as well as offshoots from it (Dinosaur Jr., Weezer, Fountains of Wayne)—and the synth accents of the album’s final two songs suggest that they’re no Luddites on principle. TBWTPN work very hard to wring genuinely affecting emotional material from these well-worn tools, and their best moments are completely transcendent. The under-two-minute plea of “Can’t You See?” is instantly memorable, and the way they subtly shift from “urgent” to “contemplative” for the following track (“Rose Tinted Glass”) without fundamentally changing up their sound is deft indeed. There’s very little not to like about Songs from Another Life. (Bandcamp link)
Longstocking – Once Upon a Time Called Now and Singles & Demos: 1994-1998
Release date: February 5th Record label: Jealous Butcher Genre: Queercore, riot grrl Formats: Vinyl/digital (Once Upon a Time Called Now), digital (Singles & Demos) Pull track: Jehu on a Rollercoaster
The first reissue I’m covering in Pressing Concerns is a monster. Los Angeles’s Longstocking released one album (1997’s Once Upon a Time Called Now) and a handful of singles before disintegrating as the century turned. Some members of the band, mainly lead vocalist and primary songwriter Tamala Poljak, later showed up in other bands afterwards, but during their brief, obscure run, Longstocking put together a reappraisal-worthy body of work. Jealous Butcher Records has risen to the task, putting out a remastered reissue of their sole LP, and appending a digital compilation of the rest of their recordings (Singles & Demos: 1994-1998) for good measure—all of which presents a picture of a band that achieved plenty in a short period of time.
The most immediately striking thing about Once Upon a Time Called Now is just how good it sounds. Musically and vocally, this could’ve been a major label release, sounding just as close to The Breeders as Bratmobile, if not closer. This is a function of recording and producing choices, of course, but also the songs themselves. Barely half a minute into “Jehu on a Rollercoaster”, they pull out all the stops on the chorus: plenty of “ooh”s, vocal harmonies, guitar-stab underscores. This is the first indication of what exactly Longstocking are capable of, but not the last—“Goddess, Pt. 4” is coming up, its “you look like a goddess, Shakespeare wrote about you in his sonnets” refrain being, if anything, the polar opposite of holier-than-thou punk posturing. If that alone wasn’t enough to put them in the pantheon of queercore royalty, Poljack kicks it over the finish line with the ripping alt-rock of “Not a Jerk”. Once Upon a Time Called Now is a half-hour all-killer, no-filler statement, and I’d recommend it to anyone who cares about punk or indie rock music. Singles & Demos: 1994-1998 is more optional listening—the early versions of the songs that would end up on the LP are interesting, but don’t merit many repeat spins for me. The compilation’s originals, however, contain quite a few gems. While not as cohesive or polished as the studio album, songs like the swinging “Rocking Chair” and the busy “Chance to Laugh” are as well-written as anything on Once Upon a Time, and you could fashion a nearly-as-worthy collection of songs from the recording dump presented.
Riot grrl is on track to become reissued and repackaged just about as much as the original wave of punk rock has suffered through, as it arrives at its mid-life crisis of large-scale reunion tours and being namedropped by celebrities for cool points. Longstocking’s discography, however, in all its original glory, is a breath of fresh air from all that burgeoning cultural baggage. Once Upon a Time Called Now serves as a reminder of everything good and powerful that triggered the gold rush around the scene in the first place, as well as proving just how important a second glance with the benefit of time can be to understanding and appreciating an album. Once Upon a Time Called Now planted itself a ways off from MOR mainstream palatability, but was still a little too glossy for a movement that, even among the wider landscape of punk rock, stood out for its disinterest in concessions. The great trash compactor of time has crushed all these once-binding genres and scene dividers together. Longstocking, regardless of when and where they were, made a strong collection of songs that stand up against any rock music coming out over two decades later. (Album Bandcamp link) (Singles compilation Bandcamp link)
The Fragiles – On and On
Release date: February 12th Record label: Living Lost Genre: Fuzz rock, lo-fi rock Formats: Cassette, digital Pull track: Kaleidoscope
David Settle continues to keep busy. Last year he released two albums as Psychic Flowers (which ended up on my best of 2020 list) as well as another solid record from the longer-running Big Heet. This time it’s The Fragiles’ (mostly Settle, with a couple drum credits and a lead guitar credit) turn to drop an album with On and On, which continues the pop songwriting Psychic Flowers explored but also allows itself to stretch out a bit more than that project’s ramshackle nature. It’s all still very lo-fi, 8-tracked and all that, but that doesn’t constrain Settle’s dynamic ambitions—see opening with the five-minute, slow burn (for this kind of music, at least) of a title track before letting loose with fuzzy power pop of “Kaleidoscope”, a lead single if I’ve ever heard one.
One of the clearest influences on The Fragiles is Martin Newell, with On and On coming off as a scuzzier Cleaners from Venus on several occasions. The pastoral “Garden of Cleaners” is the lyrically explicit tribute, but to my ears “Armistice Day” (which shares a title with a Cleaners song) is the real dead ringer, the way it builds around a simple, catchy riff and then spends the rest of the song alternatively riding it out and trying to knock it off balance. This will only get you so far, however—if there’s a comparison point for the lumbering “Success Is…” on one of Newell’s albums, I haven’t heard it. Since time seems to be the unofficial theme of this post, I’m pleased that the album brings it all together again at the end with “Hourglass”, which calls back to the previously-mentioned “Kaleidoscope” and trades in the kind of beautiful existentialism of The Chills and Flying Nun Records—two more shadows cast over this album. Whatever the moniker, it’s another worthy effort from Settle and his collaborators. (Bandcamp link)
We’ve broached February, and I am once again here to tell you about the good music from the recent past, present, and future. The third installment of Pressing Concerns is a little smaller than the first two, but let’s just say we’re dealing with a “quality over quantity” scenario (which is somewhat amusing considering the final entry on this list). In this post, I review the exciting debut album from Editrix, try to explain why Yasmin Williams has been the artist I’ve listened to the most over these past two weeks, learn about sporting trivia from Captain Frederickson, and ruminate on a curiosity of a release from the prolific Hello Whirled.
It remains to be seen whether four albums over six is merely the product of how things shook out this time or the future of this format, but I will say that the back half of February is stuffed with potential entries to this column, so you will be hearing from Pressing Concerns fairly soon in one form or another.
Be sure to check out the previoustwo Pressing Concerns posts, both from January, if you haven’t already and just, like, need more.
Editrix – Tell Me I’m Bad
Release date: February 5th Record label: Exploding in Sound Genre: Avant-jazz-math-pop-junk, post-punk, chillwave(?) Formats: Vinyl, digital Pull track: The Sound
Editrix are a power trio of sorts, voiced by Wendy Eisenberg (whose excellent solo album Auto made my end-of-year list in 2020). You could say that Tell Me I’m Bad sounds like a beefed-up Auto and be right on some level, but that doesn’t really do justice to all that’s going on here, particularly what the other two pieces—drummer Josh Daniel and bassist Steve Cameron bring to the table. Tell Me I’m Bad somehow pushes forward on both the chaotic and catchy ends of the spectrum, dealing in guitar squalls and a kinetic rhythm section that nevertheless do not get in the way of Eisenberg’s strong vocal hooks. Nearly as effective as the hooks are Eisenberg’s memorable lyrics, which frequently serve as one-liner mile markers between instrumental breaks (Samples include: “What kind of monster makes the summer last forever”, “What’s your moon, what’s your sun, what’s your rising—stop hiding”, and all of “Bad Breath”).
The one-two punch of “She Wants to Go and Party” and the near-masterpiece “The History of Dance” suggest Editrix is dead serious about not being serious, but check the blistering, anti-capitalist “Chelsea” lest you get lulled into any sort of anything. Bands who claim prog influence but still trade in reasonable song lengths intrigue me, and Tell Me I’m Bad backs this up through technical expertise by everybody involved as well as frequent left turns, like when “Sinner” morphs into a bizzaro marching number in its second half. There are moments—such as the one-liner drop and subsequent instrumental rave-up of “Instant”—that remind me of a zippier Grifters, while the sing-song vocals fitted into the margins of “Anna K” are reminiscent of Eisenberg’s old band, Birthing Hips. It’s hard not to think of fellow Bostonians Squitch at that band’s most raucous, but Tell Me I’m Bad also has the warped pop ambitions of Palberta5000. It’s like a 1000-piece jigsaw puzzle—jagged edges, rewarding, greater than the sum of its parts. (Bandcamp link)
Yasmin Williams – Urban Driftwood
Release date: January 29th Record label: SPINSTER Genre: Fingerstyle acoustic guitar Formats: Vinyl, CD, digital Pull track: Swift Breeze
Urban Driftwood is the kind of album that can stop you in your tracks. It’s the kind of album that could inspire a writer who has never attempted to tackle any instrumental music to give it a shot in an effort to capture just a little bit of what I find special about it. It hooked me from the beginning—the way the quiet picking on opening track “Sunshowers” gives way, about a minute in, to a giddily melodic riff and adds on from there. The way the other bookend to the album, closer “After the Storm”, similarly builds around a memorable melody but delivers it in a more subdued, relieved manner. These are songs, and they communicate their ideas, themes, and throughlines just as well as does any other album on this list, perhaps better.
Despite my praise for how it starts and ends, for me, the album towers the most in its midsection. “Swift Breeze”, which begins with a busy, squeaky intro, soars when Yasmine Williams launches into the arresting tap-heavy main instrumental part of the song, all the while not losing any steam from the introduction. “Adrift”, featuring cello accompaniment from Taryn Wood, builds into a swirling number that intertwines both instruments, but its slower tempo also allows Wood’s and Williams’s playing to shine individually. Williams chooses her accompaniments wisely, not being overly wedded to a one-person show but also confidently knowing her playing could carry the entire album and not allowing too much to get in the way of it. The only other featured credit is the title track, featuring djembe and cadjembe from Amadou Kouyate in what amounts to a powerful homage to West African musical tradition. I am not sure what the ceiling is in 2021 for the kind of music that Yasmin Williams makes, but Urban Driftwood makes it feel like the stratosphere. (Bandcamp link)
Captain Frederickson – Absolute Disaster
Release date: February 12th Record label: Self-released Genre: Post-punk, noise rock Formats: Digital Pull track: Ant & Dec Break America
I don’t really know what goes on up there in Buffalo—I’ve never been close enough to reach the signal of anything remotely CBC-related. If I’d had to guess, though, I would’ve said more “sleepy, snowy village”, and very little like anything depicted in the arched-eyebrowed, noise-mumble-rockers Captain Frederickson’s manifesto Absolute Disaster. In a move that will shake out to be either incredibly canny or deeply misguided, Captain make a bid for both-sides-of-the-pond dominance, penning tributes to cricket player Ben Stokes and (British) footballer Stuart Pearce (“Ben Stokes” and “He’s Got to Go to Middlesbrough and Get Something”) while planting one foot stateside in their paean to the (American football team) Buffalo Bills and their fanbase in “Get the Tables”. I’ve learned so much already!
The real draw here, however, is the frequently overpowering music the band cook up, which ping pongs between straightforward garage rock and distorted synths and drum machines, and even ends with a straight-up piano ballad in “I Used to Be Over”. I’m more predisposed to like something meaty like “Didn’t Get All of It”, but there’s something oddly…hypnotic about some of the more experimental fare. One might find themselves smirking at C.F. bragging about their song being a certified banger in “Certified Banger” over what’s mostly percussion, but, well, maybe they’re onto something. Why wouldn’t it be one? Yes, to the top of the charts it goes. (Bandcamp link)
Hello Whirled – Down on Sex and Romance
Release date: January 30th Record label: Self-released Genre: Lo-fi, power pop Formats: Digital (free) Pull track: White World
I have to include this project (“album” doesn’t quite cover it) just for the sheer scope and ambition of it. It’s a 64-song, career-spanning Robert Pollard cover album recorded by, as far as I can tell, just one person from New Jersey. And these are all pretty deep Pollard cuts here—the casual Guided by Voices fan might recognize two, three songs here tops. What’s the most well-known song on Down on Sex and Romance—Chicken Blows? The Brides Have Hit Glass?
I am not near to tell you that H. World, Ben Spizuco, has beaten his biggest influence at performing his own songs, or that each of these 64 covers unlocks an exciting new dimension to the original (although quite a few of them do). Spizuco doesn’t have the vocal range of Pollard, but this is only overtly noticeable on a couple of the ballads. The album’s at its best when it’s triumphantly plowing through rockers like “Expecting Brainchild”, “Useless Inventions”, and “White World”. That it dresses up over 30 years of varying lineups, songwriting partners, and recording techniques in the same lo-fi clothing is a feature to my ears rather than a bug. Whether these songs were originally recorded in a slick studio, in a basement with friends, or alone on a 4-track, Spizuco provides the throughline—it’s all Pollard. Something from Alien Lanes isn’t more sacred than something from Force Fields at Home on Down on Sex and Romance—why shouldn’t they sit side by side? All of it adds up to an almost-69 Love Songs tribute to one of the few songwriters who inspires the devotion necessary to see through such an endeavor and has the back catalog to make it possible. (Bandcamp link)
Good morning/afternoon, readers. I am back with again with my monthly exorcism of all the music I absorbed over the past 31 days. January was very much a month of transition—with regards to what music I was listening to, I mean. In terms of new releases, you’ll find some 2020 stragglers as well as brand new, hot off the presses January 2021 drops, and in terms of older music, I finished up my 1995 deep dive and began my investigation into 1991 (which was thirty years ago, folks!).
Several of these songs appeared on albums I wrote up in Pressing Concerns—I will spend a little less time going over those. Cicala, Swamp Dogg, Palberta, Home Blitz, Tucker Riggleman & the Cheap Dates, and Kiwi Jr. both get two selections this time around. The next Rosy Overdrive post will probably be an album roundup post sometime Mid-February.
“Truck Stop”, Cicala From Cicala (2021, Acrobat Unstable)
We’re starting 2021 in medias res—more specifically, at a truck stop in Oklahoma. We’re also hitting up a Taco Bell in California, a rest stop in Minnesota, and we might be falling in love with Carolina (the states). This song isn’t really a love song to the open road (“Find someone I like enough / And live off the land as much as I can” muses Quinn Cicala at one point, but it’s clear from the rest of the number that they’re spitballing here). However, it does cause some unintentional nostalgia for this writer who used to split their time between three states and would routinely follow the strings that bound me to them via interstates, but…you know…
“The Heart of Human Trafficking”, Chris Brokaw From Puritan (2021, 12XU)
If I were to be so generous as to allow myself to label one song from each of these 30-plus-song playlists an “epic”, “The Heart of Human Trafficking” is January 2021’s epic. Although it doesn’t directly recall any of the bands in which Chris Brokaw made a name for himself during the 90s and 00s (Come, Codeine, The New Year), it still feels drawn from the same era, where Neil Young-influenced indie rock bands were creating exciting guitar workouts—see Silkworm, Dino Jr., Built to Spill, not to mention Thurston Moore’s solo work and Sonic Youth contributions. The titular heart of human trafficking, according to Brokaw, is “deep in the jungle”, which I guess I’ll have to take his word on that, but it does remind me of Pere Ubu’s “Heart of Darkness”—certainly not a bad thing.
“Trouble”, Hen Ogledd From Free Humans (2020, Domino)
Free Humans is a bonkers double album—I can’t get too much into it because these playlist posts take long enough even just restricting myself to the songs at hand. Suffice it to say: there are a lot of successes over that album’s 79 minutes, but “Trouble” is something else entirely. This is a perfect pop song! The first of three on this playlist. This song’s nearly six minutes long and it still feels like they could’ve coasted on that beautiful chorus for even longer. For some reason, I cannot get it out of my head that this would make an excellent country song—maybe Sturgill Simpson could cover it on a future bluegrass album and turn those synth breakdowns into dueling banjo/fiddle parts…which is not to say that the song needs improved at all.
“Who Do They Think They Are”, Swamp Dogg From Surfin’ in Harlem (1991, Volt)
I’m not sure why Surfin’ in Harlem isn’t traditionally listed among Jerry Williams Jr.’s best albums. I could hazard a few guesses—timeline-wise, it came out at a time when there didn’t seem much interest in Swamp Dogg (something that has thankfully shifted in recent years), and the 10-minute “Appelle Moi-Noir” (“Call Me Black”) probably would make certainly folks uncomfortable. Nevertheless this might be my favorite Dogg album I’ve heard other than Total Destruction to Your Mind, and “Who Do They Think They Are” is the perfect vintage Dogg tune to kick it off. There are no traces whatsoever of late 80s production on here, which probably got the record shrugged off at the time but has of course aged quite well.
“Summer Sun”, Palberta From Palberta5000 (2021, Wharf Cat)
In my Palberta5000 writeup, I said “the 90-second stomper ‘Summer Sun’ just might be the most fully-developed pop song of them all”. The more I hear it the more I find to enjoy from it. The main vocal melody and inflection sounds like it could’ve been copied and pasted from a vintage Sheryl Crow song, the backing vocals have a girl-group vibe going on, and while the ramshackle instrumentation initially seems like the foil, it never falls apart or goes anarchic. It’s all complimentary, and easy to soak up.
“Final Decay”, Home Blitz From All Through the Year (2020, Sophomore Lounge)
As we have established multiple times here, garnering comparisons to Game Theory—as Daniel DiMaggio’s Home Blitz has—is a surefire way to get the attention of the author of this blog. Although this comparison is warranted (more on that later), “Final Decay” is probably not the best example of that side of DiMaggio. What we have here is a lo-fi, drum machine-and-bass-led number with a genuinely dancefloor-ready chorus and a spoken-word-breakdown bridge, all coming together to make a perfect pop song (that’s #2 so far). Sounds kind of like if 1990s-era Of Montreal tried to make a song that sounded like 2010s-era Of Montreal.
“Storming in Memphis”, Tucker Riggleman & the Cheap Dates From Alive and Dying Fast (2021, WarHen)
In my review of Alive and Dying Fast, I wrote that “Storming in Memphis” was “lilting shuffle travelogue” that “recall[s] the songwriting of fellow traveler William Matheny, but while Matheny’s best recent moments find him looking back with a new-found clarity, Riggleman paints himself as a man very much still in the middle of it all, and still feeling everything as if it’s just happened to him”. Like “Truck Stop” earlier on the playlist, this is another classic “asking big and existential questions while the shitty-food-and-caffeine-addled mind wanders in a way that only the open road can allow” song. Memphis—where Big Star languished in obscurity and The Replacements made their strongest bid not to do so—is anything but a random mid-sized U.S. city to invoke, especially considering another song on the same album is effectively a tribute to Paul Westerberg.
“Letter to Memphis”, Pixies From Trompe le Monde (1991, 4AD)
I do distinctly remember saying the Pixies were overrated a few months ago, when I was in an agitated mood. Politifact has rated this statement as “mostly false”—perhaps I should have been more accurate and gone with “Bossanova and Surfer Rosa are varying degrees of overrated, I never need to hear ‘Where Is My Mind?’ ever again, Doolittle is more or less as good as people say it is, and Trompe le Monde has actually become underrated somehow”. It’s a weird one, but “Letter to Memphis” is a crowd-pleaser—it’s the Pixies at their glam-pop-punk best. The Breeders are still better, though.
“Maria”, Steve Earle & The Dukes From J.T. (2021, New West)
In a Rolling Stone piece about the late Justin Townes Earle that came out a couple weeks ago, it details a moment early in Justin’s career where Steve hears his son’s band play a then-unreleased “Maria” and mistakes it for an Elvis Costello song, which of course flatters Justin. In J.T., the elder Earle’s moving tribute to his son recorded in the months after his tragic death, Steve really leans into the Costellian power pop aspects of “Maria” compared to the more subdued version Justin eventually released on Nothing’s Gonna Change the Way You Feel About Me Now. I imagine this country-rock version (which sounds like The Dukes as much as it does The Attractions, despite the obvious influence) is closer to how it came off live, which seems appropriate. J.T. is above all else a celebration, and “Maria” is its most jubilant moment.
“Double Ono”, Subtitles From Commoner (2021, self-released)
I don’t really know much about Subtitles other than they’re apparently from New Jersey, but I stumbled onto Commoner this month and it gets a thumbs up from me. It’s a perfectly solid 20-minute mini-album that shades its underdog IndieRock with punk, emo, and alt-country in various spots. “Double Ono” is a rocker, a nervous-sounding stomp that really erupts in the final minute (which is nearly half of the song’s 2:30 runtime).
“Fruitcake”, Subsonic Eye From Nature of Things (2021, Middle Class Cigars)
I called “Fruitcake” “pure guitar pop” in my writeup of Nature of Things, which is not a descriptor I would dispute with a few weeks of hindsight. Most of the song features treadmill-speed bass plucking and frantic guitar strumming that occasionally contorts itself into a jangling sound, but neither ever get in the way of lead singer Wahida’s vocals. The feel that the Singaporean band gives the instrumentation compliments the song’s urgent, repetitive lyrics. It’s an intriguing character study (“She’s a trainwreck / Nailed to ideas” and “She’s walking like that / With the devil in her eyes”) that Wahida sells with the right mix of melancholy and energy.
“Six Flags America”, Mister Goblin From Four People in an Elevator and One of Them Is theDevil (2021, Exploding in Sound)
There is a Six Flags not too far from where I’m living these days. It’s not the titular Six Flags America, located in Largo, Maryland, but I was never a Rollercoaster Kid (traumatic log flume incident and all that) so I couldn’t really tell you the difference. Still, the loops and slides rising off in the distance from the interstate is always a sight to behold. Mister Goblin, the solo project of Sam Woodring, formerly of the underrated Two Inch Astronaut, seems to share none of my amusement park-based reservations, however. My personal feelings don’t get in the way of me enjoying “Six Flags America”—whatever muse Mr. Goblin needs to follow to bring songs like this out of him is fine by me. It’s a beautiful acoustic ballad, enhanced by Sadie Dupuis’ vocals and Matt Gatwood’s cello playing. While most of my favorite Mister Goblin moments thus far had been easier to trace back to the pop-punk-post-hardcore-etc of Two Inch Astronaut (like the excellent “Calendar Dogs” from 2019’s Is Path Warm?), “Six Flags America” is a strong argument for another dimension of Woodring’s songwriting.
“Waiting in Line”, Kiwi Jr. FromCooler Returns(2021, Sub Pop)
There is something oddly pleasing to me about a band taking the most immediately pleasing, catchiest song on their album and sticking it dead last in the tracklist. I realize that streaming and the internet and whatnot have made this a much less bold move, but it appeals to a certain part of me—contrarian, self-sabotaging, difficult, whatever you’d like to call it. Regardless of its position on Cooler Returns, however, there’s nothing difficult about “Waiting in Line”. It’s pure pop, and it’s no accident. Every short guitar fill, keyboard blast, the clap-along-fuck-you drumbeat, the “You-hoo-hoOOoo” in the chorus, the just-the-right-length outro—all of this is scientifically designed to make this song as hooky and catchy as possible. Cooler Returns showed that Kiwi Jr. is more than just a party band, but for 3 minutes and thirty seconds you have to wonder what would be so wrong about that anyway.
“Blunt Force Concussion”, The Dirty Nil From Fuck Art (2021, Dine Alone)
I’ve talked about “perfect pop songs” already on this playlist. Here we have Canadian punk/hard rockers The Dirty Nil, who have given me no choice but to give this label to their “Blunt Force Concussion”, which is against all odds probably my favorite song of 2021 so far. When you’ve got a hook as strong as this song does, you have given yourself a certain amount of leeway in how you put the rest of it together. You can grab some easy rhymes. You can go full snotty pop-punk dude and sing about how you’re absolutely fucking terrified of commitment but you’ve still got feelings too, you promise. You can assume rock and roll band posture while putting a sheen over everything that’d make the most radio-ready top 40 single blush. Hell, you probably should do all this, because I can’t imagine “Blunt Force Concussion” working any other way. Also, they called their album Fuck Art and released it on New Year’s Day—it’s hard not to admire these guys on some level.
“Retainer”, Fuvk From Imaginary Deadlines (2021, Z Tapes)
In my Imaginary Deadlines writeup, I said “Retainer” “begins humbly and lo-fi only to evolve into a roaring alt-rocker in its second half”. Other than a brief instrumental interlude towards the end, Shirley Zhu is tearing through confessional lyrics, singing nonstop for nearly the full three minutes. Her unwavering vocals anchor the song as it evolves from an acoustic number and more and more instrumentation joins in the mix, leading to the aforementioned cathartic, roaring ending and a near-acapella epilogue. The music rises to the occasion provided by Zhu’s tormented lyrics—or, perhaps, the other way around.
“The Pearl”, Lorenzo Wolff and Bartees Strange From Down Where the Valleys Are Low: Another Otherworldfor Judee Sill (2021, StorySound)
Judee Sill is a big blind spot for me, I will admit. Frankly, I still haven’t stopped confusing her with Julee Cruise. Producer Lorenzo Wolff, with help from a red-hot Bartees Strange, seems intent on changing this, however, as he’s got a whole-ass Sill cover album coming out in March. Wolff and Strange give the song a soul-rock stomp, a pretty big change from the orchestral folk of the original version (which I went and listened to just for this post). Perhaps this radical reimagining would be blasphemous if I were a folkie with a strong previous attachment to Judee Sill and Heart Food, but with no pre-conceived notions going into either, I can safely say I prefer the new version. Not to say that I dislike Judee’s version, however—the strings don’t do much for me but once the banjo kicks in I see the appeal.
“The Curse”, Mekons From The Curse of the Mekons (1991, A&M)
I usually cite the Mekons’ first decade after reforming (1985 to 1994) as their “golden age”, but ’91’s The Curse of the Mekons, lacking a cohering theme or big single, has always been the one I spent the least time with from that era. This is not going to be a full album review, but after giving it some time on the occasion of its 30th anniversary coming up later this year, I can safely say: it’s good, folks. Maybe not quite as good as I Heart Mekons or Fear and Whiskey, but, you know, what is? Plus, it has this very excellent opening and title track, a woozy, accordion-heavy mug-raiser of a tune that’s the Mekons at their folk-punk best (actually meaning folk sensibilities mixed with punk instrumentation, not whatever the hell it means now).
“All Around You”, Joensuu 1685 From ÖB (2020, GEMS)
Joensuu 1685 is a Finnish band featuring members who have collaborated with Wolf Parade’s Spencer Krug, and there is a clear Wolf Parade/Krug/Moonface/Sunset Rubdown influence on their music, particularly in singer Mikko Joensuu’s vocals. “All Around You”, however, doesn’t directly harken to any of Krug’s esoteric compositions, preferring to trade in the kind of wide-open, heartland synthpop that’s more frequently explored by the other prominent member of Wolf Parade, Dan Boeckner. The song is based off what is basically a carnival ride keyboard riff, the kind of beat that actually does make you want to get up and move, and an unabashed, joyful “I’m gonna wrap myself around you” chorus (subbing in “arms” and “heart” for “self” in later lines).
“Part of Me Crying”, This Is Lorelei From Jimmy Buffett Tape (2021, self-released)
Water from Your Eyes’ Nate Amos is back barely a month after his last EP with another short, sweet collection of pop songs under his This Is Lorelei moniker. The minute-and-change “Part of Me Crying” is my favorite from Jimmy Buffett Tape, although the whole thing is worth a listen. Built around a nice, fuzzy riff, the song manages to pack a surprising amount in its brief runtime. We’re off to the races immediately with “You know you know how to take my face off” as the opening line, and Amos doesn’t let up from there.
“Coming Soon”, Matthew Sweet FromCatspaw(2021, Omnivore)
Catspaw stands out most prominently among Matthew Sweet’s increasingly impressive discography due to its full embrace of the classic-AOR-era-guitar heroics that had always been an undercurrent of Sweet’s work, and in this particular arena “Coming Soon” does not disappoint. Why this song in particular gets the playlist nod over the others, however, is the pop songwriting which allows “Coming Soon” to stand arm-in-arm with career highlights such as “Sick of Myself” and “Evangeline”. Sweet isn’t messing around from the opening “You’ve arrived to bring about the end of the world / I’m about to make you mine”, and spends the rest of the 2:30 effectively fighting the lead guitar for the listener’s attention with a stately vocal melody and lyrics that suggest something higher-concept that your run-of-the-mill love song. Even if Sweet ultimately intended it as such, the best ones (like this one) find new grooves to try out and questions to ask.
“The Diner”, Dan Wriggins From Dent / The Diner (2021, Orindal)
Dan Wriggins has spent the last half-decade fronting the Philadelphia alt-country band Friendship, who have released a handful of excellent records (including 2017’s Shock Out of Season, which would be on the shortlist for my album of the last decade). I could’ve chosen either side of Wriggins’s debut solo single for this playlist, but there’s something about the way he sings “The Diner” that resonated with me in particular. The way Wriggins strains and reaches for the final “Like when youuuu were hanging with meeeee” towards the end of the song is reminiscent of his role in Friendship’s greatest moments, like the chorus of “Skip to the Good Part”. There are excellent little instances like this throughout the song—you can practically hear him ruefully shaking his head while singing “You got excited telling me a story / And I was feeling it”. Wriggins has just announced his debut solo EP coming out next month, and even though this song isn’t technically on it, it’s definitely got me anticipating it.
“Sleepyhead”, Camp Trash From Downtiming (2021, Count Your Lucky Stars)
In my writeup of Downtiming, I said “The ‘Hey Jealousy’ intro of ‘Sleepyhead’ gives way to a troubling and surreal scene that nevertheless doesn’t get in the way of that driving, anthemic chorus”. In the weeks since that, “Sleepyhead” has remained my favorite from that EP, although (perhaps because?) I still have many unanswered questions about what’s exactly going on here. In whose lawn are the three dead boys? Is this part of the vision mentioned earlier, or is this really happening? “Life’s much harder when you’re feeling out constant control or lack thereof”, despite (perhaps because?) being hard to parse, seems to be the thesis of the song. Truthfully, I’m not really trying to figure this out on my average listen, mostly just letting them hooks wash over me.
“Corner Store”, Palberta From Palberta5000 (2021, Wharf Cat)
This is not the Girlpool song of the same name, although there is a certain similar charm between the two. While that particular song feels the need to temper its bitter-sweetness with an abrasive middle instrumental, however, the Palbertan Corner Store goes for broke much like Palberta5000 did as a whole. Those excellent harmonies I mentioned in “Summer Sun” are back again, not only accenting the lead vocals but adding a whole alternate dimension to the song for most of its runtime. I’m not sure if there’s more going on in the background here than in “Summer Sun”, but the slower tempo and longer length (two and a half whole minutes!) give one a chance to appreciate them just a little bit more.
“I’ve Never Been to Africa (And It’s Your Fault)”, SwampDogg From Surfin’ in Harlem (1991, Volt)
Even if all that I said about Surfin’ in Harlem earlier—it being underrated within Mr. Dogg’s discography and aging particularly well and whatnot—wasn’t true, it would still have justified its existence easily just by virtue of having “I’ve Never Been to Africa (And It’s Your Fault)” on it. Built on the foundation of a killer piano riff and bolstered by some insistent saxophone playing in its latter half, the song pulls no punches musically. But this is somehow, as you may have gathered from the song title, not even the focal point of the track, but rather merely background pieces to the lyrics, which find Swamp Dogg at his angriest and most Afrocentric (which is saying something!). In a 2021 in which the richest person in the world is a white man from South Africa, some of the most “of the time” lyrics from the song actually might be as relevant as ever.
“The Driver (Pt. 1)”, Terry Reid From The Driver (1991, Warner UK)
This short, entirely acoustic interlude is the best 45 seconds on The Driver, an album that is deeply fascinating but also just as deeply marred by unfortunate late 1980s production choices. Terry Reid, aka “Superlungs”, does his best to single-handedly carry this album with his voice over gated reverb and weepy synths, but I keep coming back to this beautiful English ballad and thinking about what could have been instead. If such production techniques don’t scare you off (and they really better not, because it’s one of the most egregious offenders I’ve heard and I have a decent tolerance) there’s a cheesy, full-length “Pt. 2” at the end of the album as well.
“Heaven Beats Iowa”, Cub Scout Bowling Pins From Heaven Beats Iowa (2021, Guided by Voices, Inc.)
Title track from Robert Pollard’s latest side-project, recorded with the other members of the current Guided by Voices lineup. In my Heaven Beats Iowa writeup, I said “[These] six tracks have a kind of muddier and less formal feel to them than the last few proper GBV albums, with Pollard’s vocals being buried a bit in the mix. It feels, in spirit, kin to Guided by Voices’ mid-90s kitchen sink EPs, but sonically it reminds me most of 2019’s slapdash, recorded-on-tour-buses-and-hotels Warp and Woof.” “Heaven Beats Iowa” the song is the most pure pop of the bunch, guided by a sugary organ part and some tastefully chugging power chords. It’s one of the simpler song structures for a prominent Pollard number in awhile, and his vocals take a backseat, content to let the shiny instrumentation do the heavy lifting in the verses, but turning up just in time do deliver a classic refrain.
“Darkness on the Face of the Earth”, Willie Nelson From Teatro (1998, Island Def Jam)
Oh, uh, I’m a Willie Nelson person now. This happened at some point in January, not sure when exactly. I spent a good deal of time with his half-dozen or so most well-regarded albums in the first half of the month, and they’re all varying degrees of greatness. It’s the stuff that should get shoved under the nose of those saying they like “every kind of music but country”. It’s hard to choose just one song to represent all this because Willie’s songs—and I mean this in the best way possible—start to blur together if you listen to enough of them in a row. “Darkness on the Face of the Earth” (and a lot of 1998’s Teatro, for that matter) stuck with me, however. There’s a real simple, effortless excellence to Willie’s best songs, and this one (a confident re-recording of a song from his early years) is a good an exemplar as any. She left him and now the entire world is dark. Maybe he’s just in Alaska?
“In Your Head”, Kendra Smith From Five Ways of Disappearing (1995, 4AD)
On its surface, “In Your Head” is pretty straightforward. It’s a 90s pop-alt-rock released on 4AD that’s equal parts slacker and dreamy, and it is in the same conversation as something that would be written by a Deal or Tanya Donnelly. Kendra Smith, however, didn’t take the conventional path that led to “In Your Head”. She spent the 80s jumping from cult band to cult band—she was the bassist for The Dream Syndicate when they made their canonical Paisley Underground/psychedelic debut album, did a stint in supergroup Rainy Day (featuring a couple Bangles, as well as members of Game Theory, The Three O’Clock, and The Rain Parade), and teamed up with the late David Roback in Opal (who replaced her with Hope Sandoval after her departure, changed the band’s name to Mazzy Star, and the rest is history). Somehow, Five Ways of Disappearing was the only album she ever made under her own name—she’s out of music now mostly, which is a shame considering how worthwhile this album is. Not all of this album is as accessible as “In Your Head” (peep “Bohemian Zebulon” if you’d rather go the other way) but for four minutes we’re left to ponder: Mazzy Star, The Breeders, Veruca Salt—why not Kendra Smith?
“The Freed Pig”, Sebadoh From III (1991, Homestead)
You can’t ever accuse Lou Barlow of holding anything back. There’s a part in the Dinosaur Jr. chapter of Our Band Can Be Your Life which talks about how Barlow would intentionally be obnoxious and uncomfortable toward J. Mascis due to some sort of cocktail of anxious, insecure young man emotions and lack of coping mechanisms. It’s illuminating, but also unnecessary, because Barlow had already penned this song in 1991 that basically admitted it all. “You were right / I was battling you, trying to prove myself” starts it off, and Lou elaborates with “I’m self-righteous and rude…tapping ‘til I drive you insane”. Like many Sebadoh songs it’s absolutely brutal towards its author, but there’s an undercurrent of “you’re no better than I am” towards the song’s subject that indicates self-awareness shouldn’t necessarily be conflated with healing and self-improvement. Of course, the song is fantastically-written—before entering the weed-, distortion-, and Eric Gaffney-laced terrordome of III, we get one classic boilerplate-setting alt-rock anthem from Lou that reminds us that we shouldn’t take for granted his influence, for better or worse, over so much music I cover here.
“Night Star”, Squitch FromLearn to Be Alone (2020, Disposable America)
I think it would accurate to describe “Night Star” as a “ditty”. While the majority of Learn to Be Alone is interested in mathy guitar parts and off-kilter structures, with this one Squitch repurpose the main riff as a foundation to build a more conventional (relatively) pop rocker. This is another example of a band sticking their catchiest song at the close of their record, but it has an air of finality to it that gives it weight as the capper. Makes sense for a group making an album called Learn to Be Alone would like to leave the listener with a rumination on just that. And I do say “rumination” rather than “condemnation” or “endorsement”—anyone can make an anthem out of bold proclamations, but it’s more impressive to do the same with more hesitant and nuanced emotions.
“We’ll Ride in Your Car”, Dave Scanlon From Pink in Each, Bright Blue, Bright Green (2021, Whatever’s Clever)
In my Pink in Each, Bright Blue, Bright Green writeup, I wrote that “We’ll Ride in Your Car” is “a beautifully straightforward slowcore ballad that would be an attention-grabber anywhere”. Like a lot of that album, it’s a very sparse composition, almost entirely made up of Scanlon’s gentle vocals and his minimal, barely-more-than-root-note guitar picking. Combine that with its romantically evocative lyrics (“And let God decide / If buttons stay buttoned / If shoulders stay clothed”) and you have a pop song stripped to its barest essentials.
“9 Times a Week”, We Are Joiners From Clients + Carriers (2020, Totally Real)
Dutch lo-fi pop rockers We Are Joiners split the difference between cacophonic and melodic here, outfitting “9 Times a Week” with crowd-pleasers such as a sweet vocal melody, tasteful acoustic guitar, and whistling, but then throwing it through a funhouse mirror of 8-track production and loud percussion. They back up their musical dichotomy lyrically as well—“9 Times a Week” name-drops both the Minutemen and “Frankie Says Relax”. It’s reminiscent of the most recent J. Marinelli album, which is high praise in my book. Clients + Carriers is the band’s debut of sorts—it’s a compilation of the two EPs to their name thus far (Clients, and Carriers) in a single place, as a stopgap before their true first album. Not streaming, but it is name your price on Bandcamp, so no excuses.
“Highlights of 100”, Kiwi Jr. From Cooler Returns (2021, Sub Pop)
I think “There’s been a specter haunting Texas ever since they drank whiskey on the moon” was the moment I realized I was fully on board with Cooler Returns. “Waiting in Line” might be the more well-constructed number of the two Kiwi Jr.’s on the playlist, but “Highlights of 100” best “highlights” what really works about the album as a whole. It finds the Canadians in full-on carnival barker mode, being handed one line of the song on a notecard, reading it out through the megaphone, ripping the paper up and grabbing the next one before we get the chance to process the images we just got thrown at us. Was that an intentional Taylor Swift lyric reference? Were they calling back to their first album with the line about the swimming pool? Did he just say “Sixteen terabytes of land, with asterisk and ampersand”?
“What We Wore”, Home Blitz From All Through the Year (2020, Sophomore Lounge)
“Final Decay” was Home Blitz’s deconstructed pop-dancefloor number, and the 62-second “What We Wore” is more-or-less straightforward jangly dB’s/Game Theory homage piece from All Through the Year. The brevity is probably the most subversive thing about this song—Daniel DiMaggio could have stretched this one out a bit more, and perhaps it would’ve been had it been conceived and recorded at a time when it would’ve had some college radio currency, I.R.S. Records breathing down the auteur’s neck for a “single”. Not in this universe, where it’s merely one of the four horsemen of a 12”. I went with this one over the 9-minute “Real Green” from the same record but that one’s pretty damn impressive too.
“Monolith”, The Chills From Scatterbrain (2021, Fire)
My partner upon hearing this song commented that it “sounds old” and was shocked to hear it’s from an upcoming album this year. They were onto something with that comment, though—there is an ageless/timeless quality to Martin Phillipps’s voice and in the rollout for the other advance single from Scatterbrain (the aptly-titled “You’re Immortal”), he cited Love’s Forever Changes, a similarly unmoored creation, as a major influence. While I would just be happy with the idea of a new Chills album every three years (which has been our blissful reality since 2015’s Silver Bullets), the vaguely dark and mysterious girding conjured by the driving instrumentation and Phillipps’s high-priest lyrics suggests they’re shooting for something as affecting as “Pink Frost” thirty-five years later.
“Alive and Dying Fast”, Tucker Riggleman & the Cheap Dates From Alive and Dying Fast (2021, WarHen)
The title track to Alive and Dying Fast finds Tucker Riggleman and his Cheap Dates at a low point, perhaps the lowest on the record. The song starts with Riggleman reflecting on being in what seems like a rut, but the song then becomes a chronicle of that moment when, finding yourself in that rut, you start probing to see how deep in it you can go: “This week has kicked me in the ass” quickly morphs into “I don’t know how I can survive” and “I’m too fucked up” before “Alive and Dying Fast” runs its course. In the context of the entire album, it’s key time spent in the doldrums before one final push towards the “Alive” end of the record title, but taken on its own it’s some cathartic wallowing.
“Will”, Cicala From Cicala (2021, Acrobat Unstable)
I am a sucker for good use of “catty-corner” in a song, and Cicala delivers effortlessly on this song. Thematically, “Will” is practically the sequel to the aforementioned “Truck Stop”, although it’s a bit more down to Earth and closer to home. Nevertheless, we still meet a narrator using driving and automobiles as escapism (“I never felt more alive in a parking lot” and “I don’t need to feel everything I did” are twin candidates for the thesis of Cicala). In this case, it’s a van that needs to be fixed and the state line that just might be the antidotes. Also, the titular “Will” seems to be the verb rather than the name or the noun, which is a fun twist.
“Car Wash Hair – Full Pull”, Mercury Rev From Car Wash Hair (1992, Mint Films/Jungle)
Originally encountered by me as the hidden track to 1991’s Yerself Is Steam, but submitted here as the single version for ease of listening. I do not have any Mercury Rev hot takes—I like them, they’re not my favorite band or anything and I’ve only heard their two most notable albums (Steam and Deserter’s Songs) in full, but they’re both pretty solid to my ears. Like anyone else who’s heard both their wild psych early material and shiny indie pop late 90s work, I find it hard to believe that the same band made both—which is partially because, of course, they more or less had become a different band by 1998. “Car Wash Hair”, however, is a harbinger of the friendlier material to come despite appearing on Rev’s free-for-all of a debut album. There are some guitar squalls, to be sure, but the draw here is the simplistic refrain, and the mostly tasteful instrumentation (Horns! Acoustic strumming!) that adorns it.
The first month of 2021 is about to be wrapped up, and I’m back to tell you about the albums I enjoyed the most over the past few weeks. In this installment of Pressing Concerns, I review the debut LP of Tucker Riggleman & The Cheap Dates, Kiwi Jr.‘s avoidance of the sophomore slump, left-turn albums from indie rockers Palberta and Subsonic Eye, a solo release from Dave Scanlon of JOBS, and the latest Robert Pollard side-project: Cub Scout Bowling Pins.
This is Rosy Overdrive’s second installment of 2021 album highlights–be sure to check out the first edition from earlier this month, featuring Cheekface, Matthew Sweet, and more.
Tucker Riggleman & The Cheap Dates – Alive and Dying Fast
Release date: January 29th Record label: WarHen Records Genre: Alt-country, roots rock Formats: Vinyl, digital Pull track: Storming in Memphis
Tucker Riggleman has been working the Appalachian DIY circuit for the past decade or so, playing in bands such as the fuzz-rockers Bishops and The Demon Beat (which also featured Jordan Hudkins of Rozwell Kid, who created the artwork for this album), as well as making music under his own name. Alive and Dying Fast is the debut full-length of his new band The Cheap Dates, and while it hews closer to the country-punk of the group’s previous singles and EPs than the grunge and garage rock of his previous concerns, that genre doesn’t quite encapsulate what’s going on here musically, either. With Alive and Dying Fast, the band isn’t afraid to slow things down a bit in order to accentuate and compliment the real star of the show here—Riggleman’s evolved songwriting.
Moments like the lilting shuffle travelogue of “Storming in Memphis” recall the songwriting of fellow traveler William Matheny, but while Matheny’s best recent moments find him looking back with a new-found clarity, Riggleman paints himself as a man very much still in the middle of it all, and still feeling everything as if it’s just happened to him. Over the course of Alive and Dying Fast, Riggleman, chases his vitamins with beer, clings to his music idols (Paul Westerberg in “Void”, the obvious in “Robert Smith Tattoo”), tries to convince someone that he’s “an artist, man”, shouts into the void, loves everything too much, wonders when and if that “big break” is going to come, and ends the whole thing by imparting “You might light up like a candle, just to wind up in the dark” on us—all we can do is experience it with him in the moment. This is not the work of a wide-eyed neophyte singer-songwriter, no—but the guy who wrote “Curtain” can’t be too jaded, either. Alive and Dying Fast is something better than either extreme: it’s an emotional journey of an album, helmed by someone with the skill and depth to shade and color every single peak and valley. (Bandcamp link)
Subsonic Eye – Nature of Things
Release date: January 15th Record label: Middle Class Cigars Genre: Indie/dream/jangle pop Formats: Vinyl, cassette, digital Pull track: Fruitcake
Singaporean indie rock band Subsonic Eye pull away from the noisier elements of their sound to hone into something more sublime with Nature of Things, somewhere between Sonic Youth’s last couple of albums and The Sundays (a band that probably do not get enough credit for their influence on where we’re at now). A more modern touchstone would be New Zealand’s The Beths—which, due to my ignorance of the East Asian jangle pop scene, also function as the nearest geographical reference point I can offer. They can do pure guitar pop (such as in “Fruitcake” and half of “Further”), but they’ve also got a melancholy streak to them (the heartstring-tugging “Kaka the Cat” and the other half of “Further”). The album cover is perfect—the map with the record’s song titles as fake landmarks is unabashedly corny, but by making it look real enough to use for navigation and combining it with the “field guide” motif and the strange image to its left, it strikes the balance between “sweet and comforting” and “venturing into the unknown”. (Bandcamp link)
Palberta – Palberta5000
Release date: January 22nd Record label: Wharf Cat Records Genre: Post-punk, experimental punk Formats: Vinyl, CD, digital Pull track: Corner Store
I walked out of a Palberta show fairly early on into their career because, well, I didn’t get it (Remember walking out of shows? Can’t even imagine doing that now) . It wasn’t until I heard how 2018’s “Sound of the Beat” effortlessly molded their sound into a digestible pop “hit” that the possibilities of a Palberta started being unlocked to me. Now, here we are in early 2021, where me being at my most open to Palberta has collided with the band themselves making their most inviting collection of songs to date. There’s no shortage of winning vocal hooks and melodies throughout these 16 tracks. Hearing the band turn their base ingredients into pop gold all across Palberta5000 is like watching Sully land on the Hudson a dozen times in a row. But this is still Palberta we’re talking about, mind you. It’s all still topsy-turvy. The near-four minute “Big Bad Want” is one of the simplest tunes, content to ride out one line over and over again in some sort of bizarre endurance test, while the 90-second stomper “Summer Sun” just might be the most fully-developed pop song of them all. They even flirt with some multi-suite prog-pop a la Guided by Voices in the last couple of songs on the record. That big step, they’ve taken it. (Bandcamp link)
Dave Scanlon – Pink in Each, Bright Blue, Bright Green
Release date: January 15th Record label: Whatever’s Clever Genre: Indie folk, ambient folk Formats: Vinyl, digital Pull track: We’ll Ride in Your Car
I am not overly familiar with Dave Scanlon’s “main” band, JOBS, but I’m aware of enough of them to know that Pink in Each, Bright Blue, Bright Green is a departure from their experimental rock. Scanlon has made a minimal folk album here, the vast majority of which features solely his fingerpicking and voice speak-singing frequently pastoral lyrics. Its sparse instrumentation and gentle vocals remind me more of Phil Elverum’s recent work over anything else, but there isn’t any one Dave Scanlon “style” over the course of the record. “Water’s No Crop” and “She Is the Girl Behind Your Money” are the album’s fullest moments, grabbing your attention through vivid lyrics and busier picking, while the rest of the album plumbs various depths—“Everybody Knows” floats along through ambience and harmonics, while “Indoors” is a near-spoken word rumination on the place we’ve all been for God knows how long. “We’ll Ride in Your Car” is the biggest surprise of all—a beautifully straightforward slowcore ballad that would be an attention-grabber anywhere. Pink in Each, Bright Blue, Bright Green—a good an argument as any for “less is more” in 2021. (Bandcamp link)
Cub Scout Bowling Pins – Heaven Beats Iowa EP
Release date: January 22nd Record label: GBV, Inc. Genre: Lo-fi indie rock, power pop Formats: Vinyl, CD, digital Pull track: Heaven Beats Iowa
Robert Pollard has seemingly finally found stability in the last half decade. Unless you count Cash Rivers (which I don’t), Cub Scout Bowling Pins is the Guided by Voices ringleader’s first side-project in about four years—shocking for someone who was more likely to average four per year for most of his career. And this “new” band only goes further to prove Pollard’s happiness with his current group of collaborators. Heaven Beats Iowa is credited to nearly the exact same people as the current Guided by Voices lineup—the lone change being producer Travis Harrison is promoted (or demoted?) to being a sixth member. Heaven Beats Iowa has been described by the band as having a more “collaborative” writing process than GBV, but exactly what that means is for us to speculate on. The six tracks have a kind of muddier and less formal feel to them than the last few proper GBV albums, with Pollard’s vocals being buried a bit in the mix. It feels, in spirit, kin to Guided by Voices’ mid-90s kitchen sink EPs, but sonically it reminds me most of 2019’s slapdash, recorded-on-tour-buses-and-hotels Warp and Woof. All the songs are classic Pollard, but the last two are the ones that deserve to live on in future setlists and compilations—the most exhilarating moment on the record is when the band spends almost a third of “Funnel Cake Museum” floating in on a murky intro only to tear into the main riff about 50 seconds into it. (Bandcamp link)
Kiwi Jr. – Cooler Returns
Release date: January 22nd Record label: Sub Pop Genre: Jangle pop, 90s indie rock Formats: Vinyl, cassette, CD, digital Pull track: Highlights of 100
Football Money was one of my favorite debut albums of either 2019 or 2020 (depending on what country you were listening in), so it’s a pleasant surprise that Kiwi Jr. is back already with their sophomore LP. They feel ever-so-slightly less eager to please on Cooler Returns—they don’t slow down the tempo too much or abandon hooky choruses, but dialing back the number of those instant-gratification electric guitar jangling arpeggios and upping their acoustic instrumentation is a subtle but nonetheless bold move. This and a subsequent (perhaps necessary) emphasis on the bass lead to a surprising point of comparison for me—early Spoon, when they were still navigating their transformation from Pixies/Pavement fetishists to the unflappable groovers they would end up becoming. Thankfully, however, Kiwi Jr. have too much to say to worry about trying to look and sound “cool” just yet. It’d be far too dramatic to say that Kiwi Jr. have strangled the jangle pop band of Football Money with Cooler Returns (cut and paste the “In the Mouth a Desert” guitar solo about one minute into “Norman Jean’s Jacket” and I bet it’d fit perfectly), but what they have made is a distinct and rewarding follow-up to a debut that merited one. (Bandcamp link)
It’s January again, which doesn’t actually mean anything in and of itself, but it does coincide with this post about some albums I’ve liked from the baby new year. I hadn’t really planned on giving much attention to this year’s new albums until February at earliest, but here I am barely halfway through the first month of the year (as of writing this) having collected enough writeup-worthy albums that I’m happy to fire this off already. Part of this is probably due to me being more Tuned In than normal since making this blog an active concern, but most of these I’d have heard regardless of my half-hearted attempt to re-enter society in 2021. This is the least-important part of this post, so let’s move on to the contestants already.
Cheekface – Emphatically No.
Release date: January 11th Record label: New Professor Music Genre: Participation Trophy Rock Formats: Vinyl, digital Pull track: Emotional Rent Control
“All-the-time influences: Modern Lovers, Malkmus, Lou Reed” begins a tweet from @CheekfaceREAL. This proverbial Big Three’s shadow over Emphatically No. goes beyond what I’m going to get into here, but the lyrical and vocal stylings of Greg Katz is what you’ll pick up on first. Like them, Katz aims to make catchy and re-listenable pop rock music despite talking over the music as frequently as he sings over it. Cheekface (also consisting of bassist Amanda Tannen and drummer Mark Echo Edwards) accomplishes this with two ingredients—their love of a good hook (the choruses of “(I Don’t Want to Go to) Calabasas” and “Original Composition” back to back in the middle of the album won’t leave my head) and Katz nailing the majority of his put-it-all-out-there, swing-for-the-fences lyrics. There’s too many to quote—I’m certainly fond of “Boyfriend with a soul patch, I know, I know, it’s serious”, but “I am eating like it’s Thanksgiving, but without the gratitude” is a really good under-the-radar one too. It also features a guitar solo from the great Devin McKnight, so what more could you want? Resistance is easy—listen to Emphatically No. (Bandcamp link)
Fuvk – Imaginary Deadlines
Release date: January 11th Record label: Z Tapes Genre: Bedroom pop, indiefolk pop Formats: Vinyl, cassette, digital Pull track: Tiny Figure
Fuvk is the Austin-based bedroom pop project of Shirley Zhu. Though what I’d heard from her in the past sounded more like straightforward indie folk, Imaginary Deadlines is more of a stretching-out. There are still acoustic flourishes, such as in the late-album highlight “Bluebell”, but there’s also an honest-to-God rap feature on opener “Take Me Back”, and “Retainer” begins humbly and lo-fi only to evolve into a roaring alt-rocker in its second half. Where Imaginary Deadlines earns its “bedroom pop” distinguisher is either in its modern-era attitude towards influence, which sees no reason why synthpop, emo, hip-hop, ambient, folk and rock can’t sit side-by-side on the same shelf, or in its pacing-the-room, up-late-at-night lyrics like in “Wishful Thinking”, which is exactly what it says it is, and the “I love you, will you hate me” duet of “Subside”. (Bandcamp link)
Camp Trash – Downtiming EP
Release date: January 22nd Record label: Count Your Lucky Stars Genre: Emo power pop Formats: Vinyl, digital Pull track: Sleepyhead
Forget “twinkle emo”—the Florida-based Camp Trash have debuted a tour-de-force EP of pure sunshine emo. A quarter-century of alt-rock history is reflected in these four songs—the effortless cool of the Gallagher brothers, Drive-Thru Records, Bleed American, the Clone High soundtrack, The Get-Up Kids covering Superchunk, PureVolume, MySpace, inconsistently-numbered “waves” of genres that never actually went away, Jade Lilitri. Of course, this wouldn’t be as notable if the songs themselves weren’t very well-written to boot. The “Hey Jealousy” intro of “Sleepyhead” gives way to a troubling and surreal scene that nevertheless doesn’t get in the way of that driving, anthemic chorus, and “Weird Carolina” traps a fleeting feeling in amber the way that the best records about the impermanence of one’s station in life as a young person do. Even though the mountains do, in fact, know my name, I am still able to easily recommend Downtiming to those in favor of good-timing. (Bandcamp link)
Cicala – Cicala
Release date: January 8th Record label: Acrobat Unstable Genre: Alt-country, “post-country”, Emoricana Formats: Digital Pull track: Truck Stop
Quinn Cicala’s alt-country-tinged emo-rock (or is it emo-tinged alt-country?) band found its way to me somehow, and we’re all the better for it. Any reader of this blog will recognize them as “an extremely Rosy Overdrive band” by about 8 seconds into the opening and pull track. The characters in several of these songs can be found alternating between driving somewhere and stopping at some kind of liminal space, making grand proclamations and life decisions somewhere in the turns, only to eventually come back to Earth, resolving that their denouement will come in the next few miles, or at the next rest stop. With the full knowledge that I have already compared another band to Lucero this month already, man, I can totally hear early-2000s Ben Nichols sing “I’ve smiled at you like six times today / but it’s all good” from “Will” with the inflection Cicala gives it. Plus, I always respect bands flying flags for their respective micro-genres, and “post-country” is as worthy a cause as any. (Bandcamp link)
Squitch – Learn to Be Alone
Release date: December 31st Record label: Disposable America Genre: Math rock, post-punk Formats: Cassette, digital Pull track: Night Star
Oh no, you don’t. Squitch tried to disqualify this album by burying it on New Year’s Eve, but this is something we’re taking with us into 2021. Mathy riffs abound for the Boston band, particularly in the throwing-you-into-the-thick-of-it opener “Egg” and the post-hardcore “Kaleidoscope”. On the other end of the ‘scope, “Night Star” is positively catchy and could’ve been a beefier Frankie Cosmos song, while “Sink into the Sand” is the Squitch version of an earnest, affecting ballad. Local influences/contemporary touchstones abound such as Exploding in Sound Records and Wendy Eisenburg, as well as Dischord Records and some squirrellier 90s alt-rock bands like Helium and Slant 6. Plus, the album artwork kind of reminds me of Pardoner’s Uncontrollable Salvation, and that’s certainly not a bad thing. (Bandcamp link)
Matthew Sweet – Catspaw
Release date: January 15th Record label: Omnivore Genre: Power pop, alt-rock Formats: Vinyl, CD, digital Pull track: Coming Soon
I’d like to start out by highlighting Ric Menck’s drumming contributions to this album. I skipped around Catspaw the other day trying to find a specific song and was struck by how many of the songs started out with a percussive intro. His playing remains prominent in the mix throughout the songs’ bodies—if I didn’t know better I would’ve thought it was recorded by Steve Albini at Electrical Audio. Menck’s playing really elevates the whole album—it’s the sound of one longtime collaborator trusting another, to the benefit of us all. The rest of Catspaw, however, is pure Sweet. It is not the side of him, however, that one might expect from a home-studio-recorded album wherein Sweet plays nearly every instrument. Stripped down and solo-heavy, it’s more Crazy Horse than Beach Boys. A studio-rat creation a la In Reverse this is not. That doesn’t mean that Catspaw isn’t shaded as vividly, however, despite the smaller toolbox. Sweet saunters through tracks like “Challenge the Gods” and the galactic “Stars Explode”, turns reflective on “Drifting”, and gives us one of his greatest pining numbers in “Come Home”. (Omnivore link)
It’s time to wrap up 2020, and I can think of no (literally not a single) better way to do so than to share the music I enjoyed in its final month. I spent this past December catching up on releases from earlier this year that I’d missed the first time around, listening to a few albums from 1995 that turned 25 last year, and just some general odds and ends (I seem to find myself listening to Pile a lot every winter).
The new Slaughter Beach, Dog was certainly a nice Christmas present. Jake Ewald has quietly amassed quite the back catalog over the past half-decade, and while I don’t think At the Moonbase is destined to be my favorite of his releases, I appreciate the twisting alleyways it wanders down and it’ll probably go down as a nice bridge between Safe and Also No Fear and wherever he ends up after this. Plus, it’s only a year and a couple months after the last one, so it’s kind of like a bonus. Plus, it has this song on it—an excellent opening statement and my favorite of SB,D’s that doesn’t involve wishing to be someone else’s cat.
“Nu Complication”, Disheveled Cuss
Nick Reinhart, the guy from Tera Melos, the proggy mathy weirdos in Tera Melos, made a really punchy, straightforward, catchy, “normal” alt-rock album and it really rips. The Disheveled Cuss album would’ve been more or less a lock for my end-of-year list if I’d heard it in time. But we’ll have to settle for me telling you how good this song is. The chiming guitar and the background “woo-oos” are pure pop even without taking into account the subject matter (“How can I sleep / When you won’t answer?” is the kind of territory we’re in here).
“Forgive Me, Philip”, Brontez Purnell
I talked about my appreciation for this song and the EP it accompanies on my favorite EPs of 2020 post, the successes of this song in particular are worth reiterating. Singers singing over each other, is one of my favorite tricks and Mr. Purnell (who you may know from Gravy Train! and The Younger Lovers) does some really nice layering on the chorus. It’s really good pogo-pop-garage-mod…eh, it’s rock and roll music.
“House Is Falling”, The Geraldine Fibbers
For some reason I thought the Fibs were a rockabilly revival band, and no disrespect to those bands, but—they’re very much not, and in fact they’re quite up my alley. They are broadly speaking part of the 90s “alt-country” scene, but with both punk and experimental cred (Nels Cline spent some time in this band). There’s a southern gothic streak to this whole album despite this band being a West Coast concern, and Carla Bozulich is the kind of frontwoman that it really shouldn’t have taken this long for me to stumble into. I’ve given you the most immediately fun and hummable song from Lost Somewhere Between the Earth and My Home—don’t mess this up.
“Pervert”, Pile
Spoiler alert: there are three different songs from Jerk Routine on this playlist. It’s taken me awhile to fully appreciate this album but I can report from 2021 that I very much do now—it’s pretty wild to me that Rick Maguire’s gutter post-hardcore blues was so fully-formed even back in 2009, that he’d already set the groundwork for the tinkering and (pardon the pun) perverting of that sound for an excellent string of 2010s LPs. Like many of the best Pile songs, this is an uncomfortable, gross, sweaty fever dream (literally) of a number that uses its full 5-minute allotment for maximum effect.
“Wait Til I Turn Bad Again”, This Is Lorelei
Ah, pop music. Pop 40 Town music, to be precise. This is a nice little EP that almost flew under my radar, but I’m glad it didn’t, because this might end up being one of the true keepers here for me. My goodness, I love Nate Amos’s lyrics on this one, and I’m being serious here and not just talking about That One Line. I appreciate anyone who throws a bunch of vivid images towards you in a way that makes it clear that they’re meaningful, but declines to sort it out for you in any way (I’m thinking of “Every year the sun gets worse for the skin / Thinks of all the light it shed on Mars” as we speak).
“Electronic Windows to Nowhere”, Guided by Voices
Styles We Paid For is, as much as anything else, the “Old Man Yells at Cloud” of Guided by Voices albums—the titular dead-end vistas being the screens of the phones that are keeping us all, like, prisoners, man. At this point I am pretty sure that Robert Pollard, who knows damn well he couldn’t have made this album remotely during a pandemic without the help of the Internet and other modern conveniences, is fully leaning into a caricature at this point, much as he does with his hard-drinking “Uncle Bob” live persona. Regardless of what this song’s about, it’s less than two minutes of mid-tempo down-stroked power chords, a simple handclap-bait of a drumbeat, and one of the most memorable vocal performances from Pollard of the current iteration of Guided by Voices.
“Where Will I Be”, Emmylou Harris
Wrecking Ball is the first Emmylou album that I’d ever listened to in full, and from what I gather it’s not exactly typical of her oeuvre. This is the one she made with Daniel Lanois, who’s the one that made The Joshua Tree sound like The Joshua Tree. I quite like this song (which was apparently penned solely by Lanois), and it does sound kind of U2-y—does Emmylou have a U2 covers album? I feel like I might enjoy listening to that more than I would a U2 album (and I’m by no means a U2 hater).
“Soul Sister”, Blue Mountain
Not a Train cover, but rather an original by the mid-90s Mississippi roots/southern rock band. There’s actually a pretty fair deal of “”””rootsy”””” songs on this playlist, for whatever reason—perhaps ’95 was just a good year for that kind of thing. Blue Mountain has a Wilco connection (their bass player is the twin sister of Wilco’s bass player) but they sound more like Jay Farrar’s Uncle Tupelo songs and Son Volt to my ears. They have more of a southern bluesy drawl than any of those bands’ Midwestern twitchiness, however—Lucero might be another point of comparison here.
“Clutter”, Sonny Falls
I already mentioned an album that would’ve made my end-of-year list if I’d heard it in time—here we have a song from an album that could’ve damn near topped it, if it hadn’t come out on December 18th. This is a double album by Chicago DIY fixture man Hoagie Wesley Ensley, who I knew nothing about before hearing this album, and who I now know is a hell of a songwriter. The music is a bit deceptively welcoming, but this is anything but an easy listen for me. It’s a 4 minute tour through claustrophobia, paranoia, dysfunction, fury, and hopelessness. “There is no destination, fate’s a hallucination”—surely you want to hear this song now, no?
“A Dog’s Life”, Nina Nastasia
One of my musical Rosetta Stones is Silkworm’s You Are Dignified covers EP. While four of the acts represented on that release—Pavement, Robbie Fulks, Bedhead, and Shellac—I’ve spent plenty of time with and received much from them in return, the fifth has until recently eluded me. Nina Nastasia is/was a traditional (instrument-wise) folk singer who released music on Touch and Go and recorded with Steve Albini—a curiosity then, and still hard to neatly pigeonhole now. The song title here is quite literal—a dream of turning into the aforementioned creature then turns into a rumination on wanting to live as a canine herself (“it’s interesting to me” being her justification).
“Rear House”, Little Gold
More rootsy stuff—can’t say I didn’t warn you. Little Gold, led by ex-Woods member Christian DeRoeck, claims a big Silver Jews influence, and the vocals on several songs on Wake Up & Die Right are such a dead ringer for Berman I had to check the Bandcamp credits to be sure it wasn’t him. Not this song, though. I initially came through this band due to their being labelmates of the appearing-later-on-this-list State Champion, and there’s definitely some similarity there, as well as to the mentioned-earlier-on-this-list Uncle Tupelo. Country punk, is what I’m getting at here.
“The Living Films”, Mythical Motors
Mythical Motors, led by Chattanooga, Tennessee’s Matt Addison, emulate their on-sleeve influences (Robert Pollard, Martin Newell, Elephant Six) across several planes—the prolific output pace, the lo-fi production, the short song lengths and hook-centric writing. “The Living Films” is to my ear the “hit” from their latest, Sleepwalking on Main Street, as it wastes no time showing off its earworm of a verse melody to all and plows straight through for 2 minutes.
“Pages Turn – Alternate Version”, 28th Day
The year is over but I’m still listening to and finding more to like from the Strum & Thrum compilation. 28th Day is probably one of the more notable bands on the comp due to the later minor-indie-rock-level fame of Barbara Manning. I’ve heard some of Manning’s later bands before but this is the first thing to grab me, which might be because she apparently wasn’t the bandleader and this song was actually written by Cole Marquis, I’m not sure. It certainly sounds like her singing, though, and this song could’ve come out today and not be out of place amongst the Landscape. Sounds like something The Courtneys would do.
“White Knuckles”, Pile
Here we have what might be described as a Pile country song. “White Knuckles” does not sound like Killdozer, per se (too strummy, not enough sludge), but the combination of the backwoods horror, the bizarre folksiness, and Rick Maguire fucking losing it on the last verse puts me in the same mental space that I go when I listen to Killdozer. It smells like rancid meat in here.
“Stick Figures”, Gold Connections
We’ll get the Car Seat Headrest comparison out of the way now: yes, production-wise and vocally, Gold Connections do sound a bit like a band that’s part of the Will Toledo extended family, but the songwriting and structure is where the similarities end. Rather than turning insular, cleverly meta and self-referential, Will Marsh uses his chugging power chord foundation to shoot for a wide-eyed, wide-open, big empty country feel a la Cymbals Eat Guitars or another of those heartland indie punks (or, in this case, Acela corridor punk?).
“Pressure Drop”, Toots & The Maytals
Not to turn this post into a 2020 in memoriam reel, or to steal valor as a Toots Hibbert superfan whose life will never be the same after my icon passed on last year—I just happen to like this song and it seems fitting to have it here. I am not by any stretch of the imagination a fan of reggae music, but I would advise any of my fellow skeptics to give a listen to Funky Kingston (of which this song was not originally a part, but only improves as a later-added bonus track)—there is no barrier to entry here whatsoever. I can’t wait for the pressure to drop too, Toots (this entry written on January 6th).
“Sorrow Reigns”, Papa M
I probably have to acknowledge that “There was something like a wall between us / That stopped your going down on my penis” is a line in this song, because it feels like I’m punking you if I pretend that it doesn’t exist, but really, I’d rather talk about the follow-up couplet (“The ghost of lovers past still await your response / Was I just a medium in your séance?”). Under 80 seconds, too, which is a nice bonus.
“Directions”, Thanks for Coming
Apparently some people are scared off of bands and artists who release a lot of albums. I’m not really sure why this would be the case—music industry complacency? Not being able to count very high? Anyway, the point is this is not a malady from which I suffer, and in fact, it’s actually a pretty good way to get me to pay attention. Another way is to write a song as good as “Directions”. Hats off to Rachel Brown for apparently being aware of how much I enjoy a good road song (let alone road-as-metaphor song) and for striking just the right balance between sympathetic and cloying with that “IIIIIIIIiiiii’m calling to tell you” smirk of a refrain.
“San Andreas”, Portastatic
Speaking of releasing a lot of albums, always respect to Mac McCaughan for having a completely different run of great records not made by Superchunk and, like, not making a big deal about it. Like many faster-paced Portastatic songs it’s in the same ballpark as ‘Chunk, just a bit more rudimentarily-performed (certainly not –written though). Either this song is truly about an earthquake occurring along the titular fault, or Mac is just being melodramatic about someone not calling him back, or I suppose it could be a bit of both. I was also unaware of the music video for this song when I put it on this list, but having seen it for my research, I’m begging you to watch it too.
“The Black Mirror Episode”, Open Mike Eagle
So we move on from Mac McCaughan to an artist that I’m aware that Mac is a big fan of. I myself don’t quite understand my own taste in hip-hop—so many of the heavy hitters don’t do much for me, but I’ve heard enough that has really resonated with me to know I’m not averse to the genre entirely. It’s not surprising to me at all that I’m into this, though. I mean, come on: “The Black Mirror episode ruined my marriage”? That’s fucking perfect. That line is actually, literally what the song is about, and is also an absolutely true story according to OME. It’s absurd, funny, devastating, and completely believable to me—I bet that goddamn episode raised the divorce rate, whatever it was.
“Can’t Be Shown”, Pardoner
Pardoner’s underrated Uncontrollable Salvation was a dense and swirly bit of Polvo-y post-hardcore/post-punk skronk, so I was a bit surprised when I (belatedly) got around to listening to their independently-released follow-up and got a face full of straightforward Dinosaur Jr. fuzz pop. Not that that’s a bad thing, of course, and in revisiting them I did realize that they’d always had a bit of the Freak Scene energy in them. Oh, and there’s some jamming too.
“The Mountain Low”, Palace Music
“If I could fuck a mountain, Lord, I would fuck a mountain” is somehow only the second-most out-of-nowhere surprising sexual lyric on a turn-of-the-century-Drag City folk album appearing on this playlist (see: M, Papa, above). Anyway, maybe not this song precisely, but listening to Viva Last Blues as a whole helped me understand why Jason Molina got so many Will Oldham comparisons when he first came on the scene. Molina and Bonnie Prince Billy never sounded too much like each other at the same time, as they both changed styles significantly from their origins, but the Oldham of one point (this point) sounds very much like the Molina of another point (about four points—err, years from now).
“A Band Called Bud”, Blue Mountain
Gather ‘round, children, and listen to Blue Mountain’s tale of an apocryphal mid-90s post-grunge band, true “rock and roll soldier[s]” with the “big green on your mind”. Later, they try “rapping rhymes over funky bass” in order to get their big break. Channeling their inner Steve Albini, Blue Mountain warn them “don’t sell your soul to a deceiver”, and you do find yourself rooting a bit for the marijuana-themed titular band. It’s a moment of zen for the No Depression movement—but this is all a bit rich coming from a band who released this album on Roadrunner Records. So this is how they remind me.
“Snakeface”, Throwing Muses
I slept on Throwing Muses for way too long for a silly reason—namely, that “Not Too Soon” is so great and also doesn’t sound like anything Kristin Hersh would ever write. I had been depriving myself of some of the most entertainingly nuanced (not to mention influential) rock music of the 90s. I like to think that Hersh realized that this slinky, bass-driven song sounded like a snake slithering along and titled it accordingly, but for all I know she could’ve had that snake visualized in her mind already and structured everything else accordingly.
“Banker”, Them Airs
Them Airs’ other 2020 album, Union Suit XL made my end-of-year list, and the only reason the album this one is on didn’t get considered as well is it got lost somewhere in the shuffle and I only just got to it. The biggest surprise for me is just how poppy “Banker” (and a couple others on this album) is compared to what I was familiar with from them. Structurally this song almost feels like an alt-rock single circa ’95 (“You know the code word” would’ve been a hell of a chorus hook), but filtered through the lens of 2000s maximalist, post-psych-punk indie/blog rock.
“Slaughterhouse”, Guided by Voices
Continuing with the theme of “songs with excellent bass work”, here we have this lumbering behemoth of a song from the new GBV album. This sounds like nothing else that the band’s current lineup has put to (digital) tape, and given that my only real complaint about their recent output is it can be a bit samey, I must applaud this risk taken and successfully executed. It’s no surprise that Robert Pollard, a vegetarian, isn’t celebrating the titular facility here, but given that I’m not sure Uncle Bob could write a straightforward political lyric if he tried, this is not exactly a PETA ad either. A lot of dark humor here (“when pork comes to pull”, of course, and what might be a Charlotte’s Web reference as well).
“Last of the Big Game Hunters”, Barstool Prophets
A really strange nostalgia pick from me. More bass-driven stuff too, which makes sense, given that this is the instrument of choice for the band’s primary songwriter. Barstool Prophets had a few moderate rock radio hits in their native Canada in the mid-to-late-nineties, including this song, which somehow I stumbled upon years ago in my youth. It stuck with me, which upon reflection isn’t surprising—it’s got a killer guitar riff for a hook and vintage “quirky” college rock evocative lyrics. “Watusi Rodeo” comes to mind, but there’s Hoodoo Gurus in there too. Anyway, at the time I discovered the song it was out of print and not available for iTunes download (hah!) so I could only enjoy it through a rudimentary version of YouTube. I had a thought recently to see if it had ever turned up, and lo and behold, the Prophets have two whole albums on streaming services.
“Roses Rotting in Your Glass”, Sonny Falls feat. Sen Morimoto
Much of what I said about “Clutter” earlier applies here too, although with this one the vocals are mixed a little lower and it’s busier musically, with Sen Morimoto earning his “featuring” credit with some tasteful saxophone parts. The former aspect meant that I picked up the details of the song’s narrative in bits and pieces through multiple listens—first I learned she was passed out, later concerned that she wasn’t breathing, but finally relieved to learn she was only sleeping.
“Seeds”, Fig Dish
Fig Dish might be most notable today for being the precursor band to Caviar, a Y2K-era one-hit-wonder who made their small mark on the culture with the deeply bizarre and equally fascinating “Tangerine Speedo” (a song that I will talk about here eventually). However, before that, they were Fig Dish, just another Chicago alternative rock band that got a major label deal, did not actually become the next Nirvana/Pumpkins, and subsequently got sent to label purgatory until the band petered out. 1995’s That’s What Love Songs Often Do seems to have a minor following, and I can hear why—it’s definitely above average for bargain bin stuffing. There’s another universe where Fig Dish were the next Soul Asylum, or at least the next Buffalo Tom. “Seeds” kind of sounds like if Archers of Loaf decided to “sell out” and write the most radio-friendly thing they could’ve, and I mean that as a compliment—I enjoy it greatly. Also, according to their Wikipedia page, they quoted Game Theory’s “Friend of the Family” in another of their songs, and Rosy Overdrive wholly supports any and all Scott Miller homages.
“Powerful Mad”, The Sorts
I suppose we’re fully into the “curiosity” section of this playlist by this point. The Sorts were a Washington D.C. post-rock/emo/jazz/slow noodle band that was associated with Dischord, although I don’t think the album this song’s pulled from, Common Time, came out on that label. They shared at least one member with the slightly-more-remembered Hoover. What band info is out there refers to them as “mostly instrumental”, but this song does have some singing on it. “Powerful Mad” is a slow burn number, nearly 7 minutes of fills, mid-tempo jazzy/mathy riffs, and occasional outbursts of sad-sack vocals.
“Sunflower”, The Springfields
The Springfields were the proto-Velvet Crush (who will also appear here eventually), but in terms of pop, they were much more “jangle” to Velvet Crush’s “power”. As the title of this song indicates, there’s some 60s sun-drenched psychedelia going on here as well, and the 15-second intro riff is practically the ideal opening for this kind of music. Their discography, primarily consisting of five singles released from 1986 to 1991, got a reissue in 2019, aptly titled Singles 1986-1991. This song also was featured on the Strum and Thrum compilation, which I promise I’m done pulling from…for now.
“Evelyn”, Tica Douglas
2017’s Our Lady Star of the Sea, Help and Protect Us was my go-to rec for sad singer-songwriter indie folk for awhile, but even this didn’t prevent me from somehow overlooking its follow-up for a few months. The silver lining is I can put this song here now. Douglas does some of their best work when the whole song is mainly just a simple electric guitar riff played and sung over (see also: “The Same Thing” from Our Lady Star of the Sea). “Evelyn” is another such entry. The effectiveness of a line like “I was a little bit drunk, you were totally sober / That’s happening more and more” depends entirely on the singer’s delivery and, readers, Douglas delivers.
“No Magic”, State Champion
Would any of my playlists be complete without a State Champion song? They may not be my overall favorite, but, technically speaking, they may be a perfect band. There is hardly a wasted note or track among their four albums and thirty songs. “No Magic” takes an absurd amount of twists and turns for something begging to be slapped as “alt-country”, and I’d submit from 1:53 to 2:23 as the best 30 seconds of any song on this list, although even this would leave out the floating-on-air instrumental break that comes 20 seconds later, and the “nomagicnomagicnomagicnomagic” breakdown before the second chorus might put that part over the top. If Sophomore Lounge wanted to repress this album on vinyl, this would certainly not upset me.
“The Moon”, Pile
So, this is the song I’m putting 2020 to bed with, if that’s how any of this works. “The Moon” has a surface similarity to “White Knuckles” since they’re both acoustic, but whereas the latter flies off the handle as it approaches its end, “The Moon” just kind of floats away. Not that there isn’t an ominous undercurrent flowing through this song, regarding what the narrator is running from and/or towards, why he “has to move”, why the moon howls back, and why it needs to be qualified that no one is trying to kill him “on purpose”. “Climate change” is probably too lazy of a critical analysis.
“China Beach”, Laura Jane Grace and the Devouring Mothers
This is pretty far away from the other LJG song on this playlist. Musically it’s on the harder-edge side of the kind of glam-punk the last couple of Against Me! albums featured, and Laura pairs some nice pacing-around-the-room-muttering-to-yourself verse lyrics with those screams in the chorus.
“Kkkitchens, What Were You Thinking?”, Mclusky
Apparently there was actually a kitchen supplies store with the unfortunate titular name, which is what the song’s about. The lyrics seem to imply the singer believes the naming convention to be a boneheaded coincidence, and while I do not know anything about this particular situation…it reads a lot different in 2020 than it does in 2004.
“Satan in the Wait”, Daughters
There’s a good portion of the music internet that would be quite happy with my Mclusky-to-Daughters transition here. I do think that You Won’t Get You Want and Daughters, without being uniquely transcendent modern rock albums or anything of the sort, are both exciting releases and they’re more deserving of an out-of-nowhere hype chain than most that end up with one. Oh, and this one’s seven minutes, too—although there’s no watch-checking until “the good part” kicks in here.
“Vocal Shrapnel”, Archers of Loaf
So, Icky Mettle is the instant-classic debut album, Vee Vee is the slightly darker follow-up, White Trash Heroes is the left-turn final album that embraces non-traditional rock instrumentation…where does All the Nations Airports fit into the Archers’ discography? Is it…the pop album? Part of me feels like that’s a disservice to “Web in Front” and “Harnessed in Slums”, but this song seems much less self-conscious and confident about how ear-pleasing it is—it’s not wild to imagine “I can’t run fast enough to beat you in a simple way” worming its way onto the radio in 1997.
“New Radio”, Bikini Kill
I’m not really tapped in well enough to know how Bikini Kill is perceived these days, if they’re perceived at all. They seem like the kind of band that’s in a cultural position that would put them in danger of becoming more of a brand than anything else, but man, does the singles compilation hold up. You can’t kill what’s fucking real.
“Dinosaur Dying”, Sioux Falls
The Sioux Falls album is so fucking good. For people who don’t know, they were a band from Montana who kicked around for awhile, made one ridiculously overstuffed album in 2016 that rightfully turned some heads, and then (some of?) the members resurfaced in Strange Ranger not soon after. The Rangers are frequently brilliant, and they’ll show up on other playlists, but they’ve (probably intentionally) never made another album like that one. Northwest indie rock at its finest, this wearily singable song reminds me of early Modest Mouse, while there are shades of Built to Spill, Lync, and plenty of others throughout the rest of the album.
“Me & My Dog”, Boygenius
I’ve never been fully on the Phoebe Bridgers train, and it effectively left the station without me this year, but for me every project she’s involved with usually has at least one “oh, wow” song. This is the one from the Boygenius EP. The spaceship taking off (2:11) is one of my favorite music moments of 2018. Also, WRT misheard lyrics, I hear (and prefer) “an impossible you” over “an impossible view”. I suppose that changes the meaning, though—or does it?
“For Olive”, Kindling
I’m not a shoegaze-head, so I’m not able to possess the knowledge as to why the same quarter-dozen bands in that genre routinely get overpraised and overhyped while really good stuff like this flies under the radar. Put down Souvlaki, kids, and listen to a band from this century! Although, maybe I like this because it’s more Swervedriver than Slowdive.
“Eureka Signs”, Guided by Voices
Post-Do the Collapse Guided by Voices is usually thought of as more user-friendly than Bee Thousand and Alien Lanes due to it not being “lo-fi”, but musically the songs are a lot less straightforward. Having a band of ringers let Bob Pollard indulge some of his prog fantasies and getting as something as immediate as “Game of Pricks” (or, god forbid, anything like a Tobin Sprout song) became rarer. This is to say that it took me awhile to fully come around to the non-singles on Universal Truths and Cycles, but I have, and I’m glad I have. “Eureka Signs” is a soar-er, GBV at their Who-cues best, and an all-time vocal performance from Pollard.
“Spirit FM”, Bad Moves
I cannot do this song justice with a couple of sentences. I can only really say that this song could’ve been drawn (much less elegantly) from a certain point in my own adolescence, and I know goddamn well I’m not alone in that. Cheers to you, fellow survivors of American Fundamentalism.
“Done Nothin’”, Dusk
Another song that could’ve drawn from my own life, I suppose, all too often in These Times™. When I saw Dusk live before the shit went down, Julia Blair killed it on this song and it was the highlight of the show. There are many layers to Dusk, like an onion.
“Kimmy”, Antarctigo Vespucci
This is maybe the most sweet-tooth songs on this playlist, and I make no apologies for this. It’s not like I listen to Love in the Time of E-Mail more often than Jeff Rosenstock’s 2010-20s string of solo albums, or even the other Antarctigo Vespucci stuff, but there’s nothing wrong with the sheen of “Kimmy”, unless of course you’re a grouch.
“Human Landmine”, J. Marinelli
Short little ditty about fantasizing about nuclear-grade destruction (both self- and otherwise) rather than having to live another second as a human being. Absolutely!
“Shame”, Spirit Night
This is not the first song on this playlist to come out of Morgantown, WV, nor is it the first to originally be released on Broken World Media—but I AM pretty sure that it’s the first song by a former member of The World Is a Beautiful Place and I Am No Longer Afraid to Die. And boy, it’s a doozy. It wouldn’t be worthy of its title if it didn’t make us at least a little uncomfortable, no? It couples those a-bit-too-close-to-home lyrics with extreme hummability and I can see some sunshine if I squint.
“Dancing as the Boat Goes Down”, The Bats
Couple internet comments claim this song is about the 1985 sinking of the Rainbow Warrior—I wasn’t able to verify this, but it would make sense. Now there’s a “fun” rabbit hole to go down. Regardless of which boat when down amongst dancing, this is one of the highlights from Fear of God—it’s a bit more urgent and faster-paced than your average Bats song, and there’s even a prominent violin, but all your typical Bats hallmarks remain as well.
“When She Comes”, The Green Pajamas
I made a determination when I decided to go through these old playlists that I would always present them as-is, which will assuredly make for some uncomfortable moments if I keep doing this. Why I’m bringing this up here, in the middle of this seemingly innocuous and quite tuneful Beatlesy psych-pop tune? Well, there is one line (the one about how the singer “won’t say please” with regards to…well…) that I didn’t pick up on the time but I’ve since realized could be interpreted in an uncomfortable way (I believe the technical term is “rapey”). But it could be interpreted in other ways as well, perhaps in an ultimatum sense, so I’ll give the Green Pajamas the benefit of the doubt here for now.
“Funnelhead”, Archers of Loaf
It’s the Archers of Loaf covering Treepeople (Doug Martsch’s pre-Built to Spill band)—indie on indie violence! If the Archers are singing about something that seems vaguely metaphorical but whose meaning isn’t apparently clear, I usually just assume its about 90s indie rock politics and subtweeting. I can’t quite make out what the lyrics’ take on the Funnelhead character is (he’s got an open mind, but “narrow at the bottom / to make sure that it all fits”?), although I assume it’s different from both Cuphead and Jughead.
“The Suspension Bridge at Iguazú Falls”, Tortoise
This playlist is almost over, so let’s now enjoy the home stretch with some nice smooth jaz—I mean post-rock!! Post-rock, sorry, not jazz. Two completely different things. Please ignore Jeff Parker’s vast jazz discography, Tortoise’s connection to the Chicago Underground Orchestra, and also all the jazz that’s on the Tortoise albums.
“Noid”, Yves Tumor
It seems inappropriate to make a joke about the Domino’s mascot given the heavy subject matter of the song, so I won’t. I am sitting here two years after its release, listening to this song about how Sean Bowie’s life is valued less than other people’s because of their race, right after I finished writing up my favorite releases from 2020, a lot of which contained songs about the same thing, because the police keep murdering black people in America for being black. “911 Is a Joke” by Public Enemy is somewhere in another one of these playlists, but the joke has long gone stale.
“For the Dishwasher”, Grandaddy
Ironically for Grandaddy, the dishwasher in the song seems to be a person rather than a machine. However, “Computers in the sun, not one with power on” is perhaps the most Grandaddy lyric to ever Grandaddy. This near-lullaby also appeared on Machines Are Not She, as well as being the B-side to the “A.M. 180” single.
“We Can’t Win”, The Goon Sax
This is a sad-ass Aussie indie pop song. Not sure where I was getting off putting such a sad song as the penultimate track here. The final song better put me in a good mood after this. Not that this song isn’t very well-done, mind you. I can’t say I was going through the situation described in the song at the time, but the concept of distant as a source of pain is juuuuuuuust universal enough.
“Kiss Only the Important Ones”, Guided by Voices
Nonetheless, do not turn back. Refuse to hear another thing. And so we end this long journey with Bob Pollard alone, singing into probably some sort of boombox accompanied only by an acoustic guitar and some feedback. We end with “You’ve always been a marionette, so go alone, cut your own strings”. Where else could we have ended? I stand by everything I said about “Eureka Signs”, but if I had to distill what Guided by Voices means to me into one song, it would be closer to this, if not this itself.
One of the reasons I initially decided to put medium-effort into making this blog—other than gentle suggestions by acquaintances that this would be more productive than just talking their ears off whenever I had something to say—was to go through, share, and review all these old playlists I’ve been making the past half-decade. These playlists are generally made once a month (with exceptions) and generally around two hours in length (again, exceptions), and have no real theme other than “music I enjoyed listening to in this particular month (believe it or not, exceptions here too). So, this one will kick it off. It’s far enough away from Present Day to where there’s no overlap with my recent end-of-2020 posts, but not too far that I’m particularly embarrassed of anything on it, and not too much of “well, this hasn’t aged well”.
This playlist was initially made in November of 2018. It is, chronologically, the 42nd playlist on my master list of all the ones to potentially post about on here. It is 18 minutes over the ideal two hours, and contains 43 songs. The next one of these I’ll do should be the one I’m currently in the process of making (December 2020), and in a perfect world I would ping-pong between a new one and one from the archives for the next few years. We’ll see how this goes.
I’ve split this one up into two parts, because 43 is kind of a lot of a number.
The first track on the first Bad Moves album feels like the opening number to a punk rock opera. There’s no traditional song structure here, just two parts: build-up and release. On a more personal note, I always hear “we all share a common excuse” with “we all share a communist view”, and really, who’s to say which is the correct line.
“The Airplane Song”, Laura Jane Grace and the Devouring Mothers
The in medias res mid-flight manifesto of “The Airplane Song” is an impressive turn of songwriting for Grace. I already knew what she could do as the leader or Against Me! and while their fingerprints are on this song (particularly the insistent chorus), this kind of character ride-along is something I’d wish she’d explore more often, especially with a band of Devouring Mothers caliber.
“All the Nations Airports”, Archers of Loaf
This is going to be the case a lot in going through these old playlists—I do not know if the two air travel songs in a row were intentional. I do remember putting this playlist on while picking up or dropping off a friend from the airport. I also remember nearly rear-ending someone trying to get around the airport while listening to a Red House Painters song. Good thing I wasn’t listening to this—somebody’s ride would’ve gotten totaled.
“John the Dwarf Wants to Become an Angel”, Boston Spaceships
Musically, as gorgeous and understated as any of Robert Pollard’s greatest pop songs. Apart from being characteristically enigmatic, the lyrics have a pretty dark undercurrent (references to slaves, being bound and gagged, spies, and just a general uneasiness and melancholy), suggesting that John the Dwarf’s request may not have been fulfilled.
“She Will Only Bring You Happiness”, Mclusky
Not sure what possessed the noise rockers to make such an (albeit skewed in the usual British way) effortless pop tune, but as someone who’s playing both sides (so I always come out on top), I have no complaints whatsoever. The chiming guitar and the singer’s emphasis on repetition and vocal delivery puts this closer to later-appearing-in-this-list Life Without Buildings than Mclusky Do Dallas.
“Madison Girls”, J. Marinelli
Madison, West Virginia is the hometown of one Marinelli’s most frequent points of comparison, the psychobilly pioneer Hasil Adkins, something I don’t imagine is a coincidence. It’s as good a place as any to situate this 2.5 minute 4-track pop-rocker, whose scattered allusions to walls and swastikas belie the disgusting 2016 election soup in which it was concocted.
“New Kind of Hero”, The Verlaines
My notes tell me this is the only Verlaines song I’ve ever put on one of these playlists, which I should look into correcting. Most of the best albums to come out of the Dunedin/Flying Nun scene are compilations, and Juvenilia is, for my money, a better collection of songs than anything The Clean or The Chills ever put out. Which, as will be revealed if you and I both stick to these playlist reviews long enough to see how often both of those bands show up, I do not say lightly.
“Gold Star”, St. Lenox
My goodness, there are so many excellent lines to quote from this one from Andrew Choi, one of my favorite vocalists of the past decade. Following up Ten Hymns from My American Gothic, a deeply rewarding concept album about his experience being a son of Korean immigrants, with, you know, the being a musician that isn’t famous kinda sucks don’t it, is pretty risky but “You don’t wanna go Gangnam style with a shit-eating grin and bear it” and “Did you know beggars on the street make about fifty bucks a day more than you do?” is more than enough.
“Wine Flies”, Upper Wilds
Let’s get a few things straight. Parts & Labor was one of the best bands of the 2000s. Upper Wilds was one of the most underrated bands of the late 2010s. Mars was maybe the best album of 2018. Dan Friel is one of rock music’s greatest hook writers, and the amount of distortion and/or screaming guitars and synths he dresses them up in doesn’t change this. We need to be on the same page here before we continue.
“Let’s Get Out”, Life Without Buildings
Speaking of misheard lyrics, I always hear Sue Tompkins singing “I still believe in getting low” as “I still believe in gay love”. Other than that I don’t have much to say about this song from this cult favorite album—I am not one of the people whose trajectories were altered by finding Life Without Buildings at the right time but I can still appreciate how friendly and unique this song (and most of their other songs) is.
“Leave Him Now”, Cloud Nothings
Last Building Burning was the Cloud Nothings Damage Control album, coming less than two years after the mature Life Without Sound didn’t land the way it would have in a more tasteful world. And “Leave Him Now” is the Attack on Memory Part 3 Single, with Dylan Baldi grabbing the titular phrase and turning it from tuneful to screamed out over three minutes. All of this would be a little too on-the-nose if it wasn’t executed perfectly, which it was.
“The Names You Got”, Dusk
The Dusk self-titled LP is one of the best alt-country/no depression albums of the past few years. The singer (of this song, at least—seems they all take turns) has a voice that’s going to necessitate an Old 97s/Rhett Miller comparison, though they come off as a bit more traditionally-influenced musically and more band-centric rather than a songwriting vehicle.
“Maybe More”, Eyelids
Every Eyelids album is good for at least one nü-power pop classic and here’s the one from their 2018 release of the same name. Peter Buck production and excellent melodic guitar lines, if you know Eyelids you know what they do and how well they do it.
“Look a Ghost”, Unwound
Weirdly enough I believe this is the only Unwound song to ever appear on one of these playlists. Not exactly a “singles” band, I suppose. This is another band where—they changed a lot of peoples’ lives, and I can appreciate that without pretending I was one of them. Doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy them when they click for me, like this shiny one.
“Bow Down”, CHVRCHES
Oh, wow, a CHVRCHES deep cut! At least, to the degree a band of CHVRCHES’ stature can have a deep cut. I’m not sure why so much music like this makes me grit my teeth (respectfully) but I actively enjoy listening to this, but those first two albums still hold up to my ears. The less said about the third the better, though.
“One Thing”, Bad Moves
This is really the Bad Moves playlist, ain’t it? Man, you could make this tune the focus of a songwriting seminar or something, if that’s something I didn’t just make up. Just the tightest music with tantalizingly vague lyrics (it’s begging us to let it out…), and then it just lays everything out in the last twenty seconds, leaving you to pick up the pieces.
“Sea Ghost”, The Unicorns
Not sure if this is a hot take or anything, but I’ve always found the Unicorns album very memorable and spirited but also wildly uneven and viewed Nick’s post-Who Will Cut Our Hair output (particularly the first Islands album) as more rewarding. “Sea Ghost”, then, would fall towards the “hell yes” end of the “wildly uneven” spectrum.
“Levitz”, Grandaddy
Wikipedia says this song was originally released in 1998 on Machines Are Not She, which was a bonus 12” that came with their first proper album, Under the Western Freeway. I know it as part of a B-sides comp, and a great downer of a Grandaddy song that bridges the gap between Freeway’s alt-rock leanings and the atmosphere they achieved on The Sophtware Slump.
“Not Given Lightly”, Chris Knox
What more is there to say about “Not Given Lightly”? It’s probably New Zealand’s greatest love song (speaking of things not given lightly), and despite how readily apparent this song’s greatness ought to be for both those familiar with Chris Knox’s other work and those unfamiliar, it’s still able to retain the personality typical of his songwriting.
“My Body”, David Bazan
This is an instant Bazan classic that he admirably buried on a split release with the ambient musician (and current Pedro the Lion drummer) Sean Lane. It’s a midtempo chugger with some Only David Bazan Could Write This lines (“All growing up I was banking on the Second Coming / Now I’d be ecstatic if someone would just pick up the phone”).
“I Hate Everything”, Obnox
This song originally showed up on 2017’s Murder Radio but it didn’t grab me until Lamont Thomas and crew re-recorded it with Steve Albini for Bang Messiah (which is the version I’ve chosen here). It’s about as fun a fuzz rock song called “I Hate Everything” could be, with a nice call-and-response verse structure.
Lee Bains III & The Glory Fires – 2-4-6-8 Motorway
Release date: October 30th Record label: Don Giovanni Records Genre: Southern rock, punk rock Pull track: The Company Man (Acoustic) Synopsis: No new original songs here, unfortunately, but the titular Tom Robinson Band cover is a like-a-glove fit for the band (they know how to pick ‘em—see also their Swamp Dogg and Primitons covers), and the three acoustic versions of older songs showcase a different side of Bains’ songs than you get from their recent studio releases and the punk rock sermonizing of 2018’s Live at the Nick. Certainly more than enough to keep me satiated while waiting on the next full-length from the best southern band of the past decade. (Bandcamp link)
Beauty Pill – Please Advise
Release date: May 8th Record label: Northern Spy Genre: Electronic rock, art pop Pull track: Prison Song (2004 Chad Demo) Synopsis: Beauty Pill had a busy 2020 without releasing a full-length album. Their 2010 soundtrack album Sorry You’re Here finally got a digital release, they dropped the non-album single “Instant Night”, and they put this thing out as well. Two additional versions of “Prison Song”, which already appeared on the first Beauty Pill album, seems like overkill, but somehow they both improve upon the original. Of the new material, “The Damndest Thing” is the closest the band gets to recapturing the magic that made 2015’s Beauty Pill Describe Things As They Are such a singular album, but “Pardon Our Dust” is a nice flex as well. (Bandcamp link)
Nerve Estate – NE II
Release date: January 27th Record label: Self-released Genre: Power pop, lo-fi rock Pull track: Previous Lake Synopsis: I don’t know much about Nerve Estate. They’re from St. Louis, and I know they’re in some way connected to The Astounds, another St. Louis band. Like the first Nerve Estate EP, they plow through three scrappy power pop tunes in nine minutes. Parity’s the game here—really, I had to flip a three-sided coin for the pull track. There’s at least three identifiable hooks in “Previous Lake” which gives it a slight edge. (Bandcamp link)
NNAMDÏ – Black Plight
Release date: July 3rd Record label: Sooper Records Genre: Math rock, punk rock Pull track: Heartless Synopsis: The ambitious, genre-hopping BRAT will probably (and probably should be) Nnamdi Ogbonnaya’s most-enduring 2020 release, but dirty rockist that I am, I played this one more. Dropped in the middle of the nationwide George Floyd protests, Black Plight directly rages at foundational racial injustice and the poisoned discourse around it (Helpfully explaining that “you can fix a Target but you can’t bring a person back to life” because apparently this is new information to some people) as well as functioning as a fundraiser for two Chicago organizations fighting for justice. You can still give them money by buying the album, mind you. (Bandcamp link)
P22 – Human Snake
Release date: April 3rd Record label: Post Present Medium Genre: Post-punk, punk rock Pull track: The Manger Synopsis: I’ve seen this listed as both an EP and an album—at 17 minutes (shorter than several others on this list) I’ve decided to roll with the former category. I welcome P22 and/or Post Present Medium to send a cease-and-desist over this. Wordy, spiky, self-destructing and -reconstructing punk rock music. (Bandcamp link)
Brontez Purnell – White Boy Music
Release date: November 13th Record label: Post Present Medium Genre: Garage rock, punk rock, Mod revival? Pull track: Forgive Me, Phillip Synopsis: Brontez Purnell’s stated intention with this short three-tracker was to “make a fake mod 80s white boy record”. His realized vision ends up sounding not all that dissimilar from his current band, The Younger Lovers. This is, if you are familiar with the Young Lovers, certainly not a bad thing. The rollercoaster of a pull track might be my favorite song he’s done yet, not that “Leave Me Out of This” or even the Beat Happening cover slouch. Great place to start, although check out Sugar in My Pocket too. (Bandcamp link)
Sleeping Bag and Rozwell Kid – Dreamboats 2: A Real Chill Sequel
Release date: February 7th Record label: Self-released Genre: Pop punk, power pop, 90s-alt-rock Pull track: Back to the Future IV Synopsis: It’s nice to hear from Rozwell Kid again. This EP is a sequel to 2013’s original Dreamboats collaboration. I’m less than familiar with the Indiana fuzz rockers of Sleeping Bag but they seem to be kindred spirits, and the second Dreamboats has all the hallmarks of a great RK album in half the time. There’s the four minute mile of “Absolutely”, the bass-and-power chord (and kazoo?) glitch-finding of “Letterman”, and of course the liberal pop-culture borrowing and melodic guitar that turn the pull track into another “no, seriously, how did they make this work” anthem. (Bandcamp link)
John Vanderslice – Eeeeeeep!
Release date: August 21st Record label: Tiny Telephone Genre: Ambient pop, glitch, do people still use the term “Folktronica” Pull track: Lure Mice Condemn Erase Synopsis: Neither the electronic-informed but grounded pop of The Cedars nor the garbled computer viruses of Dollar Hits, this EP feels like the most democratic marriage yet of John Vanderslice’s indie rock hero background and his current digital fascination. “Team Stammer/Savior Machine” floats along in its new duds, while the tender “Song for Jaime Sena” could positively be on Romanian Names. Mr. Vanderslice has already announced his third LP in as many years as of the publication date of this list, but Eeeeeeep! deserves some appreciation before he and we plunge further into the Vanderslice revival. (Bandcamp link)
Yo La Tengo – Sleepless Night
Release date: October 9th Record label: Matador Records Genre: Folk rock, indie folk Pull track: Wasn’t Born to Follow Synopsis: This is Yo La Tengo at their Fakebook folkie peak. Apparently these mostly-covers aren’t from the same sessions and actually range several years apart, but they all fit together quiet nicely, all having an understated, minimal, driving late at night vibe that nobody else does better. The pull track, originally by the Byrds, is about as upbeat as it gets, the only song with any sort of noticeable percussion, but it (the drums and the song both) is just enough not to distract. (Bandcamp link)
Synopsis: Well, this is certainly a left turn from the former Guided by Voices contributor. Instead of the fuzzy psych-garage-pop of that band and his last solo release, Sprout has presented us with a acoustic guitar-heavy classic folk concept record about the Civil War. Tobin slips into these new shoes with ease, with many of the straight acoustic cuts (“The Return”, “Antietam”, the pull track) functioning as excellent showcases for his twin talents: an ageless, graceful voice and an incredible knack for melodies. (Bandcamp link)
STAR – Violence Against Star
Release date: October 23rd
Record label: Self-released
Genre: Noise pop, shoegaze
Pull track: Angel School Anthem
Synopsis: Unfortunately for my ears, my predilection for sweet vocal hooks married to headache-inducing blown-out production hasn’t waned by now. While vocalist Shannon Roberts isn’t too far removed from the Donnellys and Deals who briefly threatened to make dream pop a force in the 90s, a more accurate sonic comparison would be Psychocandy or, hell, Times New Viking and other assorted shitgaze fiends. Not sure if this is the last of STAR (Theodore Beck, 1/3 of the trio, tragically passed away around the time of release) but an appropriate supernova if so. (Bandcamp link)
Stay Inside – Viewing
Release date: April 10th
Record label: No Sleep Records
Genre: Post-hardcore, emo
Pull track: Revisionist
Synopsis: This theatrical, icily beautiful post-hardcore album sounds a lot like mewithoutYou. As someone who doesn’t like most post-hardcore bands that aren’t named mewithoutYou, this is a good thing. One upgrade here is the male-female vocal thing going on, which allows for some moments of reprieve in this tornado of a record. Fun fact: apparently, fellow list-appearer Bartees Strange was in this band at one point. Thanks Wikipedia! (Bandcamp link)
Superchunk – Clambakes Vol. 10: Only in My Dreams – Live in Tokyo 2009
Release date: May 8th
Record label: Merge Records
Genre: Punk rock, pop punk
Pull track: Precision Auto
Synopsis: Without releasing a proper studio album, Superchunk have still managed to be a bright spot in 2020. They released an excellent Halloween single, made the first nine volumes of their Clambakes live album bootleg series widely available digitally, and unveiled a brand new volume as well. This 2009 recording from a Japan tour sounds excellent and contains selections from across their illustrious career—including two songs from the then-unreleased Majesty Shredding. The spirited cover of Telekinesis’s “Tokyo” is just icing. (Bandcamp link)
Teenage Halloween – Teenage Halloween
Release date: September 18th
Record label: Don Giovanni Records
Genre: Pop punk, power pop
Pull track: Holes
Synopsis: Everyone knows I’m a sucker for big, bombastic, sincere, ambitious hooky punk rock collectives. Bad Moves, Martha, PUP—Teenage Halloween has arrived and already vaulted themselves into some esteemed company. The album is full of victories, but the nonstop pogoing of the pull track is the one that consistently wows me. Fun fact: Jordan Hudkins of Rozwell Kid made the album art for this one. Thanks Bandcamp! (Bandcamp link)
Them Airs – Union Suit XL
Release date: January 17th
Record label: Self-released
Genre: Experimental rock, post-punk, skronk
Pull track: Reception Desk
Synopsis: As the band’s album title (as well as their immaculately-curated Spotify playlists) suggests, this band worships at the alter of Thinking Fellers Union Local 282, something more people ought to do in 2020. It’s quality egg punk, with heavy emphasis on the “egg”. They’ve already amassed an impressive discography for their time alive (including a quarantine album not making an appearance here), and if this don’t end up amounting to much more than the detritus of classic New England weirdos, then it can be our enjoyable secret. (Bandcamp link)
Throwing Muses – Sun Racket
Release date: September 4th
Record label: Fire Records
Genre: Alternative rock, college rock, post punk
Pull track: Dark Blue
Synopsis: Where would we bewithout Kristin Hersh? It’s hard to imagine the kind of spunky, barebones “DIY” indie rock that’s in vogue today without herself and her band’s groundwork. Although (what I remember from) her more recent releases have shown a bit of wanderlust, Sun Racket is classic Muses—plenty of simmering, coiling stuff but bringing the fire and brimstone as well. (Bandcamp link)
Told Slant – Point the Flashlight and Walk
Release date: November 13th
Record label: Double Double Whammy
Genre: Indie folk, bedroom pop, chamber pop
Pull track: Run Around the School
Synopsis: Don’t let the occasional fingerpicking and campfire motifs fool you into thinking this is some kind of bedroom folk project—this is Felix Walworth’s big shiny pop album. I wish the other such widescreen-aiming albums lived up to such billing. I’d really like to see Told Slant again and watch Felix sing and drum to these songs like they did last time I saw them. Meditation. Catharsis. Meditation. Foot stomping. Etc. (Bandcamp link)
Trace Mountains – Lost in the Country
Release date: April 10th
Record label: Lame-O Records
Genre: Indie folk, “”heartland”” rock
Pull track: Me & May
Synopsis: I can’t tell you how many precious lo-fi-minded bands have made a move towards a big, populist, “heartland” production and totally erased any sort of uniqueness or personality they possessed. Okay, I can tell you how many: it’s one, and I’m still mad about it. But that’s not what happened here. Primarily because, despite all the Big Country grand ambitions of this record, it’s still a Dave Benton album through and through. All the friendly, catchy songs about dreams and dogs are still here, and Dave’s voice is still front and center, it’s just now we are (in a nice bit of synergy with the previous album on this list) going on a walk in the woods with him. The pull track is where the album succeeds best—some bells and whistles, but without getting lost in the….well, you know. (Bandcamp link)
Mo Troper – Natural Beauty
Release date: February 14th
Record label: Tender Loving Empire
Genre: Power pop, jangle pop
Pull track: Lucky Devils
Synopsis: Mo Troper is, as far as I’m concerned, a national treasure at this point. Following up 2017’s end-of-decade shortlister Exposure & Response was going to be difficult, but the only real complaint to be had is that I wish there was more of it. Stuff like “Come and Get Me” and “Your Boy” is just absolutely timeless, I-could-do-this-in-my-sleep pop rock, but I’ve always found Troper at his best when he reaches a bit difficult, like on 2016’s bass-and-vocals “Somebody Special”. Here, we get the blistering Portland beatdown of the pull track (gifting us “the Charlie Chaplin of empty gestures” like it’s nothing), and the six-minute, vocal-straining, acoustic-based closing track that is, unfortunately, not about the celebrity pay-per-video website (as far as I can tell at least). (Bandcamp link)
John Vanderslice – Dollar Hits
Release date: March 20th
Record label: Tiny Telephone
Genre: Ambient pop, glitch
Pull track: Weirdo: The Beginning
Synopsis: This is certainly a strange and wonderful second act from the veteran indie rocker and producer. A far cry from the (excellent) choirboy chamber pop polishings of his late 00s and early 10s work as well as the more rock-band oriented time with MK Ultra and early solo releases, Dollar Hits is a twisted and deconstructed DAW trainwreck, like someone trying to drown everything resembling 1995 from Kid A. While my favorite parts of it are where the sun peaks through (the pull track and “Show Me Love”), I’ve also found myself getting sucked into the likes of “Cracked Pass Words” as well. If all this sounds a bit intimidating, you might want to start with 2019’s more song-based The Cedars, one of the best albums of last year. (Bandcamp link)
Various Artists: Strum & Thrum: The American Jangle Underground 1983-1987
Release date: November 13th
Record label: Captured Tracks
Genre: Jangle pop, college rock
Pull track: Late As Usual
Synopsis: I debated whether or not I should count this, as several of these tracks originally appeared on other albums during the run specified in the comp’s title, but I decided for inclusion because 1) a lot of these songs never did actually appear on a long-player and 2) a lot of the albums that actually did feature these songs are long out-of-print. And also, it’s awesome. 90 minutes of underground, jangly 80s indie rock? From mostly bands I’d never heard of? Sign me up. I already knew that the Primitons and the Windbreakers were hidden gems, but “Promise” by One Plus Two? “I’m in Heaven” by the Cyclones? The pull track? Any of these would be good enough to start a movement. (Bandcamp link)
Vintage Crop – Serve to Serve Again
Release date: August 7th
Record label: Upset the Rhythm
Genre: Post-punk, garage rock, punk rock
Pull track: The North
Synopsis: Australia seems to churn out a lot of these droll garage rock bands as of late (from what I understand it’s a bit nasty down there), but Vintage Crop stand near the top of the trash heap. Serve to Serve Again threads the right amount of bile, surrealness, and on-the-nose into their lyrics, and what they lack in Nobel Prize-winning writing they make up for in the delivery. The backwards glam of the pull track is their best look. (Bandcamp link)
Vundabar – Either Light
Release date: March 13th
Record label: Gawk Records
Genre: Post-punk revival, indie pop
Pull track: Montage Music
Synopsis: Vundabar might be trending towards “taken for granted” territory. Consistently releasing good indie pop rock music without fuss will do that to you. And Either Light is quite good—and also, like, weirdly backloaded? Not to badmouth the first three songs, but “Petty Crime” is the one that really grabbed me (turning that title into that level of earworm ought to be against the law), and the thing didn’t let up after. (Bandcamp link)
Waxahatchee – Saint Cloud
Release date: March 27th
Record label: Merge Records
Genre: Alt-country, Roots rock, folk rock
Pull track: Hell
Synopsis: Katie Crutchfield was one of the best songwriters to emerge over the last decade. She’s dressed up her albums in various sheens and succeeded every time—snotty pop punk, bedroom home recordings, shiny radio rock—I’m not at all surprised that her pivot to Americana and country ranks among her best. I won’t even get into her lyrical skillset, because it gets remarked upon every album cycle as if we hadn’t already, ya know, noticed. What she may not get enough credit for is her incredible sense of melody and her arguably singular influence on the current state of DIY indie rock. Saint Cloud indicates that Katie will be making worthwhile music long after her imitators have faded. (Bandcamp link)
Western State Hurricanes – Through with Love
Release date: February 14th
Record label: Self-released
Genre: Seattle indie rock
Pull track: Through with Love
Synopsis: Through with Love was recorded in the late 1990s, sat in a vault for twenty years as WSH lead singer John Roderick re-recorded most of these songs with his next band, The Long Winters, and in 2020 was finally rescued from poor taping by advanced technology and got a crowdfunded release. Roderick’s been mostly inactive since the last Long Winters album came out in 2006, so I’d forgotten exactly the damage his songs can do. The lone previously-unreleased song here, the title and pull track, is an absolute monster. When John and Stephanie Wicker start singing separate parts in the second first it’s my favorite music moment of either 1998 or 2020, take your pick. The Hurricanes were, perhaps unsurprisingly, grungier than the Long Winters ended up being, while still being recognizably similar beasts—all the proto-LW songs here are weird and different and make for a fascinating alternate history. Still waiting on that next Long Winters album, though. (Bandcamp link)
Whelpwisher – New Brilliant Polygons/Okay Sick
Release date: February 18th and July 31st
Record label: Self-released
Genre: Power pop, lo-fi indie rock
Pull track: Deaf to False Metal
Synopsis: Psychic Flowers rules apply here, too. Ben Grigg had a productive 2020—the “proper album” Okay Sick is the better of the two releases listed here, but the write-and-record-a-song-a-day project of New Brilliant Polygons is also worth a mention in its ramshackle glory. On the slower, more crowd-pleasing numbers like “Line at the Cool Bar” and the pull track he comes off as a kindred spirit to fellow Power Pop list-appearers Mo Troper and Brian Mietz, but he’s also got a fuzzy garage rock side, and bass-driven headspinners like “Kneel Young” suggest another path entirely. (Bandcamp link)
Wire – 10:20
Release date: June 19th
Record label: Pinkflag
Genre: Post-punk, art punk
Pull track: The Art of Persistence
Synopsis: Wire’s second album of 2020 is a collection of outtakes and alternate versions (recorded in 2010 and this year, hence the title). They pull heavily from their underappreciated 1980s releases on this one, so if you’d like to hear songs from that era without the admittedly of-the-time production flourishes, then this one is for you. Even if you do like those albums (like myself) it’s a treat to hear “Boiling Boy” and “Small Black Reptile” seamlessly integrated with newer fare. This is what, the fourth version of “Over Theirs” to show up on a release? And I’m still not tired of it! (Pinkflag link)
Wire – Mind Hive
Release date: January 24th
Record label: Pinkflag
Genre: Art punk, post-punk
Pull track: Cactused
Synopsis: It’s a good sign when a band releases an album of new stuff and an album of old stuff in the same year and the new stuff record’s the better of the two. Really, it’s hard to believe that this band started making music in the 1970s. I think part of the reason some people struggle to get into Wire is that they’ve been ripped off so many times (punk stole the Pink Flag blueprint, indie rock took Chairs Missing, and new wave got 154) they lose a bit of their edge. Which is why I recommend just diving into their later catalog—it’s just as good without the baggage. You can trace the line from their beginning to Mind Hive if you want (start with Outdoor Miner to Off the Beach) but you can also pretend this is a hip new post-punk band associated with Speedy Wunderground and it works just as well. (Pinkflag link)
Wolf Parade – Thin Mind
Release date: January 24th
Record label: Sub Pop Records
Genre: Indie rock, post-punk
Pull track: Forest Green
Synopsis: Spencer Krug and Dan Boeckner continue to be two of the most substantial artists to emerge from the blog churn of the 00s. They’d qualify as such even if they hadn’t made a solid Wolf Parade album at the beginning of the year thanks to Operators and Moonface, but that Spencer can just step back into these old shoes and bust out “Julia Take Your Man Home” is just gravy. (Bandcamp link)
Worriers – You or Someone You Know
Release date: April 3rd
Record label: 6131 Records
Genre: Pop punk, punk rock
Pull track: Chicago Style Pizza Is Terrible
Synopsis: Worriers are back! Lauren Denitzio’s band’s last album was 2017’s Survival Pop, and I couldn’t describe SideOneDummy refugees’ sound any better than that. If you’re looking for big, hooky queer modern punk anthems, this record’s got them. But my favorite song (whose title doubles as advice to Midwestern tourists) is the kind of reflective mid-tempo stroke that stops one in one’s tracks. (Bandcamp link)
X – Alphabetland
Release date: May 1st
Record label: Fat Possum Records
Genre: Punk rock
Pull track: Cyrano deBerger’s Back
Synopsis: X’s first original-lineup album in 35 years does everything you could possibly want an original-lineup X album to do in 2020—namely, rock. I actually like the first post-Billy Zoom album, but the re-recorded version of the pull track is a pretty clear improvement. If you aren’t having fun, you’re doing it wrong. (Bandcamp link)
Xetas – The Cypher
Release date: January 24th
Record label: 12XU
Genre: Post-punk, punk rock
Pull track: The Hierophant
Synopsis: Nearly 40 minutes of noisy, shouty punk rock. Catnip for anyone who counts Our Band Could Be Your Life among their favorite books. 12XU is a virtual quality-assurance stamp when it comes to this kind of thing. Not much else to say here other than it’s good stuff. (Bandcamp link)
Neil Young – Homegrown
Release date: June 19th
Record label: Silver Bow Productions
Genre: Folk rock, Country rock
Pull track: Separate Ways
Synopsis: Another archival release from Neil Young, this shelved 1970s album doesn’t quite reach the heights of his best work from that decade but is still a key piece of one of the greatest ten-year periods for any songwriter, period. In terms of cohesion it’s more American Stars and Bars than On the Beach, with signature Neil left turns like “Florida” sharing space with the tossed off excellence of “Mexico” and “Kansas”, and the first two songs could hold their own on basically any Neil album.
Yves Tumor – Heaven to a Tortured Mind
Release date: April 3rd
Record label: Warp Records
Genre: Experimental rock, industrial soul
Pull track: Gospel for a New Century
Synopsis: While it’s certainly a populist move compared to Safe in the Hands of Love, no one’s going to mistake this for anything other than a Yves Tumor album. They haven’t given up the hoopla, just, you know, shaped it a little differently. What we end up with is stuff like “Kerosene!” (a substance with an above-average track record as a song subject) and the little-banger-as-a-treat pull track (Bandcamp link).
Thanks to everyone who made it all the way through this list, it means a lot that you took the time to read this. I have some vague plans as to what I’m going to do with this blog in 2021–hopefully it involves talking about both new and old music that I like.
If you’re reading this because you were involved in making or releasing any of these albums–thanks so much for salvaging something from this rough year. I look forward to hearing and writing about your future endeavors.
Rosy Overdrive 