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Articles - PAGE 13

Respire – ‘Black Line’ Track-by-Track Break Down

Respire
Drew Beringer

I’ll always contend that the most exciting part of consuming music is discovering something new – an artist or band or record that just completely enraptures you – like you found the world’s greatest secret and can’t wait to share it with anyone and everyone. That’s Respire – the Toronto sextet that’s turning heavy music on its head. The band’s new record, Black Line, is 41 minutes of pummeling drums, jazzy time signatures, and swelling horns. It’s exhilarating blackened screamo with the ethos of Broken Social Scene – Respire burns down the boundaries of what extreme music can be. Below, the band walks us through their impactful new record track-by-track.

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Liner Notes (December 4th, 2020)

Jason Tate

Is it too early to start singing holiday tunes? It’s December. I can see trees up in people’s windows with lights on already (we’re putting one up tomorrow); I can start annoying my wife by singing “Jingle Bells” every day, right? This week’s newsletter has some thoughts on music and entertainment I liked this week, a playlist of ten songs I enjoyed, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

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2020 Holiday Gift Guide

Gift
Jason Tate

For the past few years, I’ve put together a little gift guide in December full of things that I think make great gifts and are a lot of fun to give or receive for the holidays. Everything on the list is something I’ve used and enjoyed and recommend. I have recommendations posts for software, headphones, and miscellaneous stuff around the house, so the things on this list will be more focused on stuff not included in those posts and geared toward things I’ve come across in the past year or so and think would make good gifts.

I used my Amazon affiliate link when the product showed up there, which gives our website a slight percentage back if you make a purchase and therefore helps fund our continued existence.

If you’d like to get me a gift, becoming a supporting member or gifting another user a supporting membership for a year would mean the world to me. And, if you’re looking for something in just about any price range with a Chorus.fm or AbsolutePunk.net logo on it, check our merch shop.

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Liner Notes (November 27th, 2020)

Thanksgiving
Jason Tate

Happy day after Thanksgiving. This week’s post-food-indulgence has thoughts on the upcoming strange holiday season, thoughts on the new celebrity and TikTok culture that I know absolutely nothing about because I’m old, and some thoughts on music and entertainment I enjoyed this week. The holiday movie watching has begun. You’ve been warned. As always, there’s also a playlist of ten songs I loved this week, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

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An Update on the Rest of 2020

Chorus.fm
Jason Tate

As I wrote about in October, this was a very weird year to be running an independent, online, business. I just wanted to take a few moments to be upfront about a couple of changes that I’m going to be making for the rest of this year. In the online ad world, the last part of the year is usually one of the best for online advertising. It tracks along with the holidays and consumer spending and advertisers wanting to convince shoppers to buy their gadgets and gizmos. Now, digital advertising has been a mess for virtually everyone this year, but there’s a small hope we can make up some of that lost revenue with a terrific final quarter. So, I’m going to let the company that handles all of our display ads run a few different advertisements on the website for the next month.

Honestly? They’re probably going to be annoying as hell. They’ve promised to keep everything frequency capped so that users only see one of the annoying ads one time per session, but there’s no nice way to spin the fact that these kinds of advertisements suck for the user experience. I know it, you know it, but it’s me throwing everything at the wall as we end the year in an attempt to salvage what, in many ways, has been a lost year. I want to be forthright about it, so everyone knows what is coming. And, to let you know you can remove all ads on the website by becoming a member. (These ads will only run for a few months, and we have a monthly option for just $3 a month. Remove all ads, get dark mode, live the good life.)

I don’t know what 2021 will hold, but I plan to continue to keep everyone updated as we journey into this uncharted territory together. I hope everyone is staying safe and doing well. The contributors and I have begun preparing for our end of the year feature, which we hope to run, like always, in early January.

Liner Notes (November 20th, 2020)

Jason Tate

I hope everyone had a good week this week. We’re back with another newsletter looking at music and entertainment I enjoyed this week. There’s also a playlist of ten songs I enjoyed, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

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Liner Notes (November 13th, 2020)

Jason Tate

This week’s newsletter has early thoughts on the new Less Than Jake album, high praise for The Queen’s Gambit, and other reflections on music and entertainment I enjoyed this week. There’s also a playlist of ten songs I loved, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

Read More “Liner Notes (November 13th, 2020)”

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Liner Notes (November 6th, 2020)

Voted
Jason Tate

This week’s newsletter is brought to you by coffee, coffee, more coffee, and the letter B. I share my first thoughts on the new EP from The Dangerous Summer, some thoughts on entertainment consumed last weekend, and a few thoughts on the election. There’s also a playlist of ten songs I enjoyed last week, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

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This article is available exclusively to supporting members of our website. Join now for as little as $3 per month and get access to exclusive content and a variety of other great perks (like removing all ads and unlocking a dark mode theme). Plus, you'll be helping an independent publisher. Learn more here.
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Liner Notes (October 30th, 2020)

Pumpkin
Jason Tate

Usually I end up listening to a lot of Alkaline Trio, AFI, and My Chemical Romance leading up to Halloween. This year I forgot to do any of that and all of a sudden the month’s gone. Weird. Anyway, this week’s newsletter has thoughts on music and entertainment I enjoyed this week, my favorite candy, and a playlist of ten damn good songs. This week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

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Liner Notes (October 23rd, 2020)

Pumpkin
Jason Tate

This week’s newsletter has early thoughts on Bruce Springsteen, Seaway, and various other things I listened to, watched, read, and consumed this week. There’s also a playlist of ten songs I enjoyed, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

Read More “Liner Notes (October 23rd, 2020)”

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Liner Notes (October 16th, 2020)

Halloween
Jason Tate

The combination of falling temperatures and pumpkin themed desktop wallpaper is really giving me a Fall/Autumn vibe today. I’m sure there will be no ramifications of the past few months just kind of disappearing due to a pandemic and gross mismanagement by the government, right? Anyway, I’m in a weird mood and this week’s newsletter has thoughts on music, entertainment, and other things on my brain this week. There’s also a playlist of ten songs I enjoyed this week, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

Read More “Liner Notes (October 16th, 2020)”

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The Biggest Memories Are Always Chaos

Time
Jason Tate

First of all, thank you to everyone for the massive feedback from last week’s article about dealing with the collapsing ad market due to the pandemic. All of the kind words made a time of uncertainty a little more bearable, and it was the best week of membership signups we’ve had since the first week I launched the website. Everything is still very much up in the air, but the last week gave me a feeling of comfort I haven’t had in a few months, so thank you for that.

While I was putting together the “Back to” and “My Nostalgia” series, I tried to capture as many of the significant memories as I could about the years and, specifically, the music. However, as I finished, I realized something was missing. While I felt good about documenting the music and what was going on behind the scenes of running the website, I couldn’t pull in as many of the other random anecdotes or bigger things that were happening around the website and our community through those years. Various moments stand out to me, usually related to a dramatic event, that felt almost as memorable as the music itself. This week I’d like to reminisce about five of them. I don’t always remember the specifics of the years and timing, but I’ll try and pull in what I can track down.

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Liner Notes (October 9th, 2020)

Jason Tate

Somehow we’re already in the second week of October.

This week’s newsletter looks at music, entertainment, and other things I found interesting this week. There’s also a playlist of ten songs I enjoyed, and this week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here. I hope everyone has a great weekend.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

Read More “Liner Notes (October 9th, 2020)”

This article is available exclusively to supporting members of our website. Join now for as little as $3 per month and get access to exclusive content and a variety of other great perks (like removing all ads and unlocking a dark mode theme). Plus, you'll be helping an independent publisher. Learn more here.
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A Message From Jason; Because He Has No Other Title Ideas

Jason Tate

Years from now, I’m not sure I’ll be able to adequately explain to someone that didn’t live through 2020 precisely what it was like. It’s been a year unlike anything I’ve ever experienced in my lifetime. Things I never thought I’d see are happening on such a regular basis that I feel myself fluctuating between numb anxiety and flashing white-hot anger. When the pandemic began in March, I reacted by tackling some projects I had on my list for a long time. I redesigned and rebuilt the entire main website and launched that in May; I then brought back hundreds of pieces of old AbsolutePunk content and got that part of the scene history back in our database. Over the past eighteen or so weeks, I’ve also been writing weekly articles that first re-ranked all of the “best of” lists from 2005 through 2015, and then deconstructed my entire musical journey starting in 1998 and tried to tell the story of how I fell in love with music and the history of beginning AbsolutePunk. These have been welcome distractions in these weird-ass times.

Usually, in August, I do some kind of “supporter pitch” on the website. I’ve done it the past three or four years to remind people about our membership program and talk about how it’s because of the supporting members that this website can exist. I try not to be too annoying about this because I’m not great at self-promotion, but if I don’t do it, I always feel like I’m not trying as hard as I could be. This year, with all of the racial injustice, pandemic, and so much more going on, I never could find the time that felt right to do it. After finishing my article project last week, I spent some time brainstorming what other kinds of articles I could write that I think would be fun to tackle, and I also did my annual deep dive on the state of the website and how I’m feeling about everything. The bottom line is the pandemic really fucked with my plans.

From the end of March through this month, on average, the website’s ad revenue was basically cut in half. We saw more traffic than usual, and virtually half the income from the ads. That’s not great. I don’t know if, or when, the ad revenue will return to something resembling what it looked like at the beginning of the year. So I realized before I can start thinking about my next article series, I have to write up some pitch about our membership program. So here I am.

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Liner Notes (October 2nd, 2020)

Leaves
Jason Tate

This week’s newsletter has my first extensive thoughts on Machine Gun Kelly’s pop-punk album, thoughts on more music and entertainment I enjoyed this week, and a playlist of ten songs worth your time. This week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.

If you’d like this newsletter delivered to your inbox each week (it’s free and available to everyone), you can sign up here.

Read More “Liner Notes (October 2nd, 2020)”

This article is available exclusively to supporting members of our website. Join now for as little as $3 per month and get access to exclusive content and a variety of other great perks (like removing all ads and unlocking a dark mode theme). Plus, you'll be helping an independent publisher. Learn more here.
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