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My Life In 35 Songs, Track 32: “evermore” by Taylor Swift

My Life in 35 Songs
Craig Manning

Hey December, guess I’m feeling unmoored; can’t remember what I used to fight for

In competitive running, they call it hitting the wall: the moment near the end of a race, usually a long, arduous one, where all the fight goes out of you. Your legs feel like lead, your heart is hammering on overdrive, your lungs are screaming at you to stop, and your mind is sounding every alarm bell it knows how to hit, all in a desperate attempt to override any motivation, goals, or positive self-talk you have left. Suddenly, everything inside of you is screaming the same word at maximum volume: quit, quit, QUIT.

When Taylor Swift released evermore, her second surprise album of 2020, on Friday the 13th of that December, I felt like a man who had hit the wall – not in my ability to run a race, but in my ability to weather a particularly fraught chapter in human history. When the sun rose that morning, it marked nine months to the day since the year’s other Friday the 13th – the March day when the world had turned upside down in the face of the incoming COVID-19 pandemic. And, for my part, I wasn’t sure if I could take any more months.

Writing about evermore on my favorite albums of 2020 list (it came in at number 3), I wrote that it “dropped on a chilly December Friday that just so happened to be the end of one of the worst weeks of my life.” At the time, I did not elaborate. I felt like everyone’s lives were in disarray, and I thought the sentiment would be more relatable if I didn’t tell my full story of why Taylor Swift’s saddest album came to mean so much to me as 2020 drew to its (merciful) conclusion. After all, who couldn’t relate to feeling down about a Christmas season where the very things that make the holidays special – namely, the warmth of togetherness with family and friends – were going to be all but impossible?

Five years later, I’m ready to share what happened that week, and that year, and how it tore my family apart, changed my entire life, and reframed my whole damn worldview. And I’m ready to tell that story because every time I listen to evermore, particularly the beautifully, exhaustedly sad title track, I can’t help but flash back to where I was the first time I heard it.

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Interview: Ronnie Winter and K. of The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus

The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus
Adam Grundy

Recently I was able to schedule a Zoom call with Ronnie Winter and K. of emo rock band, The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, to discuss their latest record called X’s For Eyes. The band’s sixth album to date features key cameos on songs like “Always the King” (ft. Kellen Quinn) and “Worth It” (ft. Craig Mabbitt) and an urgency towards the political climate today. If you’re enjoying the interview, please consider streaming X’s For Eyes here.

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Interview: Taylor Acorn

Taylor Acorn
Adam Grundy

A couple of weeks ago, I scheduled a Zoom call with Taylor Acorn to discuss everything that went into her excellent sophomore LP, Poster Child, that is out everywhere you stream your music today. In this interview, I asked Taylor about key songs from Poster Child, the inspiration behind some of these songs, and what keeps her motivated in her musical career. Taylor Acorn will be supporting Poster Child with a headlining tour, and tickets are on sale here.

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Omenbringer – “MONSTERBATION” (Song Premiere)

Omenbringer
Adam Grundy

Today is a great day to share the spooky new single and lyric video from Omenbringer, called “MONSTERBATION.” On this Halloween-themed single, the band channel their love for big metal riffs and slick production into a fun-themed track. The band’s Molly Marie Kent shared: “MONSTERBATION is my homage to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and tells the story of me creating the perfect bride, hand choosing her parts to satisfy my every whim, and then fucking her back to death. So you could call it a love song I suppose.” Keep an eye out for new music from Omenbringer in 2026.

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My Life In 35 Songs, Track 31: “Passing Afternoon” by Iron & Wine

My Life in 35 Songs
Craig Manning

There are things that drift away, like our endless numbered days

“What song would you want to have played at your own funeral?”

Back in 2011, a friend and I decided to work through a 30-day song challenge on Facebook together, each of us posting one song per day in response to the same prompts. I have to chuckle in retrospect, realizing that the challenge bore more than a little resemblance to this series that I have spent the past seven months making my raison d’etre. That exercise was colder and more simplistic in its approach, though. Most days were less about deep emotional exorcism and more about the most rudimentary questions you could ask about someone’s music taste. “A song that reminds you of someone” was one prompt. “A song that you listen to when you’re sad” was another. But the overall idea of the project – essentially, selecting songs that for one reason or another were part of your life soundtrack – was the same as the driving force behind “My Life In 35 Songs.” And it stands to reason, when you’re making a soundtrack for your life, that you might flash-forward and try to imagine the song that would roll over your end credits, whenever they happen to arrive.

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N.E. Vains – “6 For 36” (Song Premiere)

N.E. Vains
Adam Grundy

Today is a great day to share the new single from garage punk rock band, N.E. Vains, called “6 For 36.” In this electric-charged song, N.E. Vains quickly showcase why they’re turning heads in the crowded rock scene. Vocalist Tyler Boutilier shared about the origins of the single: “In Canada, First Nation Reserves are allowed to sell weed through their own non-government stores. Purchased during a particular trip to Cape Breton Nova Scotia (six packs for $36), the evening didn’t particularly end well for me.” If you’re enjoying the early listen, please consider pre-ordering N.E. Vains new LP, Running Down Pylons, that will be released on November 7th, here.

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My Life In 35 Songs, Track 30: “The Days” by Hailey Whitters

My Life in 35 Songs
Craig Manning

Instead of counting up the days, I just want to make ‘em count

In books and movies, it’s easy to spot the foreshadowing – the little details in the narrative that hint at something bad coming around the corner. In real life, you often only spot those warning signs in retrospect, when you’re looking back after some catastrophe transpires and wondering whether you could have known what was coming. Such is the case when I look back on the music that was dominating my life in 2019, right before the world went into a tailspin. And it is especially true about “The Days,” an achingly wistful summer song by country singer-songwriter Hailey Whitters, about making every good moment count lest they run dry a whole lot sooner than you expect.

In the moment, the good times seemed to be in endless supply in 2019, at least in my life. By the time that summer rolled around, I felt like I’d reached a state of total contentment. I was 28 years old and things were finally falling into place with my career. As a runner, I was getting back into racing after having not run competitively since high school, and my training had me feeling like I was in the best shape of my life. Most importantly, by moving back to our hometown, my wife and I had reignited our social life, which had mostly fallen by the wayside since our college years. We reconnected with old friends, made new ones, and spent a lot of time with family that we’d seen too little of in our years away. Everything felt just about perfect.

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Interview: Alex DeLeon and Alex Marshall of The Cab

The Cab
Adam Grundy

This past week I was able to schedule a Zoom call with Alex DeLeon and Alex Marshall of The Cab to discuss what went into their thrilling new EP called Road To Reign: A Prelude, which is their first taste of new music in over ten years. I asked the two band members about what brought them back to playing music together again, their memories surrounding their previous albums of Whisper War and Symphony Soldier, and their upcoming tour dates with All Time Low. You can stream Road To Reign: A Prelude here.

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My Life In 35 Songs, Track 29: “Carry Me Home” by The Alternate Routes

My Life in 35 Songs
Craig Manning

We got the street lights, we got it all right, we got this whole night, carry me home

There’s this stretch of roadway just south of my hometown that I’ve always loved, where you go around a bend and suddenly find yourself surrounded on both sides by towering pine trees. The road gradually climbs from there, taking you out of this beautiful, tranquil valley. But the feel of that short passage – the indescribable power of those trees and the many, many years they’ve been there – lingers for the rest of the drive.

Throughout my life, that spot on the road has always been the checkpoint – the spot where, when I pass through it, I know I’m home again. I came to feel that way during college, when I drove that road literally hundreds of times to get back to my parents’ house – for weekends, or Christmases, or summer vacations. I kept feeling that way after I graduated, when the visits home became less frequent, and therefore, that much more precious. I still feel that way today, when I come back into town after a vacation, or even after a quick jaunt downstate for a concert. No matter how many times I pass into that forest of pines, I always feel the same way about it, like I’ve just entered the gravitational pull of the place I love most, and can lay whatever burdens I’ve been carrying down. “Rest easy child,” those trees seem to whisper; “everything will be alright. You’re safe here.”

“You’re home.”

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My Life In 35 Songs, Track 28: “Dibs” by Kelsea Ballerini

My Life in 35 Songs
Craig Manning

If you got a Friday night free and a shotgun seat/I’m just saying I ain’t got nowhere to be

Sometimes, in life, it’s nice just to stop for a minute and take a breath.

That’s how I felt in the spring of 2015. For the preceding two years, everything in my life had been moving at the speed of sound. Graduating from college in April 2013 and moving in with my girlfriend; trying and failing to find a full-time job; striking up a career in freelance writing; proposing to my girlfriend; planning a wedding and juggling all the festivities that come with it – from showers to bachelor/bachelorette parties; actually getting married.

I thought things might ease into a slower pace after the wedding and the honeymoon, but they didn’t. A month after that, my wife was interviewing for a new job, and we ended the summer of 2014 by turning in the keys of our Illinois apartment and moving to Grand Rapids, Michigan to start another new chapter. And shortly after that, my grandpa passed away, throwing my whole extended family into a tailspin that lasted through the holidays.

The whirlwind of changes kept going into the New Year. On the first day of 2015, my wife and I adopted a tiny kitten, the first pet we’d ever shared together. She was (and is) a beautiful little troublemaker and she stole my heart immediately. And then, that winter, we got so sick of living in a cramped apartment that we found a realtor and started shopping the housing market. We closed on our first house in March of that year, and moved in the next month, right as Michigan was bursting into springtime bloom.

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Caicos – “Behemoth” (Video Premiere)

Caicos
Adam Grundy

Today I’m thrilled to bring everyone the latest single and video from New York-based indie pop artist, Caicos, the moniker of Alex Frenkel, called “Behemoth.” On this vibrant track that is filled with lush and complex guitar parts, Caicos establishes himself as a key artist to watch. “To me, the behemoth is a tryingly-formative experience from our past that we silently carry until it becomes very burdensome to divulge when embarking on cultivating new relationships,” Frenkel explains. “How can we possibly effectively communicate the emotions that have calcified over such a long period of time? The song explores a few examples of behemoths as well as the problems that might arise when deciding to finally attempt to share them.” If you’re enjoying the new single and video from Caicos, please consider supporting this artist here.

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The Barracudas – “Phantom Creep” (Song Premiere)

The Barracudas
Adam Grundy

Today I’m thrilled to bring everyone the latest single from The Barracudas called “Phantom Creep.” The Bacarrudas upcoming double EP, Bleed Out, Get Pushed off a Cliff, Sink to the Bottom of a Lake, and Play a Halloween Monster House Party! (or…The Halloween Extended Player) tells stories of classic Halloween monsters from the all too relatable point of view of both the monster and the torch carrying townsfolk. The Bacarrudas rely on their cobwebby organ sounds and reverbed guitars to capture the essence of 1960’s novelty songs and the creepy vibes of Vincent Price movies. The result lands near an Animal House frat rock band fronted by Bobby “Boris” Pickett. The Barracudas’ Adam Rabuck shared: “’The Phantom Creep’ is a cautionary tale of the real monsters in the world. These are not vampires or werewolves, but the people lurking in the darkness. ‘The Phantom Creep’, of course, includes a warbly theremin and echoey backup vocals that were recorded deep in Victorian era London sewers. Very authentic!” Look for Bleed Out, Get Pushed off a Cliff, Sink to the Bottom of a Lake, and Play a Halloween Monster House Party! to be released on October 3rd by Schuylkill Beat Records and Mom’s Basement Records.

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Elway – “Down The Lane And Far Away” (Song Premiere)

Elway
Adam Grundy

Today is a great day to share the electric new single from Elway called “Down The Lane And Far Away,” that comes from their hotly anticipated new LP, Nobody’s Going To Heaven, out on October 10th via Red Scare. Tim Browne (vocals/guitar) shared on the new single:

It feels like every day we lose more of our connection with the natural world and with each other. The simulacra of real human interactions that define our days are approaching an event horizon after which we will be lost entirely to each other and to the immovable truth at the center of our existence, which is that all the universe is meant to be shared and enjoyed, not stashed away behind layers of digital obfuscation. Touch grass before we’re too far gone, kids.

If you’re enjoying this new single, please consider pre-ordering the new record here.

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