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Month: May 2017
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Harry Styles Debuts at #1, Paramore at #6

Jason Tate

Harry Styles has the number one album in the country this week.

With Styles’ start of 193,000 he earns the biggest debut sales week for a U.K. male artist’s first full-length album since Nielsen Music began tracking sales in 1991.

Paramore came in at number six, selling around 67,000 album equivalent units. I’ve seen a few people saying this is a disappointment, and I wanna push back on that just a bit. The band selected a fast album roll-out with very minimal press. They did only a few interviews, with massive publications, and turned down requests from everyone else. They didn’t send out advances to virtually anyone, and I think they knew going in this wasn’t going to be an album they pushed for the first week sales. I think it’s instead setting up their upcoming tour, they’ll have a bigger push on the second single, and the positive word of mouth will keep this album moving throughout the summer.

Basically, I don’t think it’s a disappointment, and I wouldn’t worry.

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Review: All Time Low – Last Young Renegade

All Time Low - Last Young Renegade
Jason Tate

This first impression was originally posted as a live blog for supporters in our forums on May 19th, 2017. First impressions are meant to be quick, fun, initial impressions on an album or release as I listen to it for the first time. It’s a running commentary written while listening to an album — not a review. More like a diary of thoughts. This post has been lightly edited for structure and flow.

Oh yes, it is that time again … first listen time.

Tonight I’m excited to share a live-blog-first-listen thread all about the new All Time Low album.

My history with All Time Low is interesting. I remember seeing a lot of hype for the band around The Party Scene era and giving the songs a listen, I thought it was pretty run of the mill stuff, nothing really stood out to me. Then they released PUOSP and I was like, eh, ok, this is better, there’s some stuff here that I like, but as a whole, nothing really grabbing me. That was a three or so year long period of seeing the band, thinking they had potential, but nothing stood out to me as a “hit.”

And then the band sent me some demos for SWIR.

I heard “Dear Maria.”

I remember thinking, “yep, that’s the one.”

As a whole that was the first album I thought really nailed a pop-punk vibe and they had multiple tracks on that album I really, really liked. “Six Feet,” “Remembering Sunday,” “Stay Awake” … I felt like I finally got the band, even if I wasn’t really feeling the albums. That continued with Nothing Personal, an album where I really enjoyed a variety of songs, even more than the previous album, and this was the first time where I felt the band had put together a full album of songs. Something I felt like I would come back to time and time again and be able to listen to front and back.

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Rare Fall Out Boy Demo Tape Being Auctioned Off

Jason Tate

A copy of Fall Out Boy’s first demo tape is being raffled off tomorrow by Christopher Gutierrez (HeyChris) to benefit The Catcade, a Chicago nonprofit cat rescue/arcade combo.

This is the first and original Fall Out Boy demo tape. Maybe like 50 ever made. One of the few pieces of early-2000s pop punk history I have collected that I said I would never sell, is now being raffled off to raise money for my non-profit charity @thecatcade – for every $10 donated between now and Saturday at TheCatcade.org , your name will be entered into a drawing and the winner will be chosen live and fairly this Saturday. Good luck.

Donations can be made here.

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