Interview: Butch Walker

Butch Walker
Craig Manning

Last week, I got a chance to chat extensively with a personal hero of mine, Butch Walker. We talked about Butch’s new album, Afraid of Ghosts, including how the recent loss of his father inspired a new direction for his music, why he decided to have Ryan Adams produce the disc, and why his trademark sarcasm and upbeat songwriting is nowhere to be found. We also touched upon Walker’s back catalog, the woeful reasons why no one should be expecting to find Letters on vinyl anytime soon, whether or not The Black Widows will be making music again in the future, and why Butch’s protege Jake Sinclair took over most of the production duties on the new Fall Out Boy LP.

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Tom DeLonge Leaves (or Doesn’t Leave) Blink-182; We Don’t Know

Blink-182
Jason Tate

Tom DeLonge has left Blink-182 “indefinitely.”

Matt Skiba of the Alkaline Trio will join Blink-182 in replacement of Tom DeLonge at the 8th annual Musink Music and Tattoo Festival. “We were all set to play this festival and record a new album and Tom kept putting it off without reason. A week before we were scheduled to go in to the studio we got an email from his manager explaining that he didn’t want to participate in any Blink-182 projects indefinitely, but would rather work on his other non-musical endeavors.” Travis Barker and Mark Hoppus plan to honor all Blink-182 commitments including the Musink Festival and are excited to have singer/guitarist Matt Skiba join them for this project. “No hard feelings, but the show must go on for our fans.” Additionally, Skiba will continue to make new music and tour with the Alkaline Trio.

UPDATE

Tom Delonge has made the following post on Facebook:

To all the fans, I never quit the band. I actually was on a phone call about a blink 182 event for New York City at the time all these weird press releases started coming in… Apparently those releases were ‘sanctioned’ from the band. Are we dysfunctional- yes. But, Christ….. ‪#‎Awkward‬ ‪#‎BabyBackRibs‬

UPDATE

We have received the following statement from Tom DeLonge’s publicist.

Contrary to reports, Tom DeLonge has not left Blink 182. “I never quit the band,” he says. “Actually, I was on the phone discussing a possible Blink-182 event in New York City when I heard the ‘news.’ The ONLY truth here is that I have commitments that limit my availability this year. I love Blink-182 and I’m not leaving.”

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Recommendation: Logitech UE Mini-Boom

Logitech UE Mini-Boom
Jason Tate

For Christmas I got a few Amazon gift cards, and because these things apparently just burn a hole in my mind — I decided to buy myself a couple presents with them.

One of those was the Logitech UE Mini-Boom.

The problem I was trying to solve was how to give myself a very easy way to listen to podcasts while in the shower / getting ready in the bathroom. The rest of my place has speakers where I can be anywhere and hear them with clarity; however, the bathroom (especially with the shower running) drowns out almost all of the sound. So, I wanted something I could easily listen to while in the shower or shaving. And how’s this device solve that problem? With flying colors.

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Recommended Blog Reading

Jason Tate

motifsinthecity asked:

You’ve mentioned several websites that have become staples in my morning Feedly reading. I was wondering if you had plans for a “Recommendation Post” like your technology one—a post that culls together a list of your essential morning reading for news on tech, art, pop-culture, etc. Personally, I’d find something like that invaluable.

Thanks for the compliment! Here’s a rundown of websites and authors I read every day. I use ReadKit as my RSS reader on the Mac and iOS.

I’ll try and keep this updated when new things get added into my daily routine.

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AbsolutePunk.net’s Top Albums of 2014

AbsolutePunk.net
Jason Tate

This best of list was put together by the AbsolutePunk.net staff in 2014. It used an old system for ranking albums, but has been brought over to Chorus.fm for posterity.

One thing Jason has always said he enjoys about our staff here at AbsolutePunk is that we are willing to let our opinions and biases shine through. No one here is trying to be a robot, solely evaluating music in an objective manner – if there even exists such a way to listen to these albums, the ones that have made us feel more emotion than all the other music released in 2014. Subjective opinion and bias is present as much as ever on any given publication’s albums of the year list, and ours is no exception. The following 30 albums were hand-chosen by our 21 active AP.net staffers, voted upon in only the most scientific of voting fashions. The best thing about these types of lists, though, is not seeing what we rank, but why we rank it; so each album is accompanied by a blurb from a staff member who loved it. We believe that there is no greater impetus behind listening to music than hearing someone tell you why they love it, so we hope you find something new here, or revisit something you enjoyed all year. – Thomas Nassiff

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Recommendation: Elevation Labs’ Anchor

Jason Tate

I wrote about Elevation Labs’ “Headphone Anchor” when they were doing their Kickstarter campaign. Last week my order showed up. Since my new computer came last week as well, I decided it was a good time to clean out my office and work on decluttering. I installed the new headphone anchor under my desk and so far it’s been brilliant. I love having my headphones at arms reach without them sitting out on the desk. The anchor’s adhesive feels strong and secure but I used two tiny screws to double down on security. If you’ve got a home office and are looking for a good, simple, solution to storing your headphones — I’d definitely recommend picking one up.

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Review: Against Me! – Transgender Dysphoria Blues

Against Me! - Transgender Dysphoria Blues
Jason Tate

About one minute into the lead track, front-woman Laura Jane Grace snarls, “you want them to notice the ragged ends of your summer dress, you want them to see you like they see every other girl, they just see a faggot, they’ll hold their breath not to catch the sick” … and the gauntlet is thrown down. What Against Me!’s new album, Transgender Dysphoria Blues, offers is a mixture of attitude and bravado that pulls together an emotion, weight, and gravitas that I’ve felt missing from music for a while. The lyrics contain something actually worth saying and while the sing-a-long choruses may get stuck in your head, there’s an underlying message that expels itself in a way unique to music — one that travels from head to heart and leads to rumination long after the guitars and drums dissipate.

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Review: The Lawrence Arms – Metropole

The Lawrence Arms - Metropole
Jason Tate

In a recently aired episode of the AP.net podcast I go on a (way-to-long) rant about genres and the labels we put on bands. The heart of the argument is ‘fuck labels and fuck genres’ because it’s all a mess. We waste time sitting around saying, “Is this pop-punk, or pop-punk, or pop-punk?” The whole thing is a classification system that no one agrees on, no one abides by, and it becomes a cluster-fuck when trying to talk about bands or describe a sound to someone. In fact, sometimes I think we spend more time arguing about genres than the music itself. Some genres have turned into four-letter words and used as a means to demean and dismiss bands almost as a personal affront. I hate it and I’m unsure if there’s a bigger offender than “pop-punk.”

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Review: Copeland – Ixora

Copeland - Ixora
Jason Tate

I think my biggest draw to music is the emotion it pulls from me when listening to a great song. That feeling where you experience the song with the entirety of your being. Everything fades away and all that matters in that moment is the space between notes, ears, and heart. Copeland’s upcoming album, Ixora, embodies everything I search for in music.

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Interview: Chad Gilbert of New Found Glory

AbsolutePunk

I love most genres of music, but I have a special place in my heart for hardcore music – Terror, Hatebreed, etc. You know who else loves hardcore music? Chad Gilbert from New Found Glory. I thought it would be cool to sit down and talk about one of his favorite hardcore bands, Madball. So we went to Starbucks in Portland, OR and talked about exactly that – Madball, and memories he’s had with them. If you’ve never listened/heard of Madball before, definitely give this a read and check them out.

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Review: Walk the Moon – Talking is Hard

Walk the Moon - Talking is Hard
AbsolutePunk

I came up with an idea a few months ago that I put to the test recently. A couple of weeks ago I shut off the lights, eliminated all distractions, closed my eyes, and played Walk the Moon’s Talking is Hard for the first time, front to back. My hope was that I could connect completely with the music pouring from the speakers and produce completely candid thoughts about the songs. Much like a movie in a theater, music deserves to be played directly to the viewer. It’s tough to do that these days. You’re listening… but are you really?

Walk the Moon is a four piece band out of Cincinnati and they’ve been churning out delicious alt-pop songs since ’08. They had me hooked with “Anna Sun” two years ago from their self-titled, which delivered an incredibly solid line-up of tracks. I don’t know what happened in the past two years, because Talking is Hard is an improvement on Walk the Moon in every way.

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Review: Copeland – Ixora

Copeland - Ixora
AbsolutePunk

“Your music helped save my life.”

These words are so simple, so jarring and so potent. Almost every musician has heard them at one point in time. While some may be exaggerated and overstated, the fact remains that music is one of the strongest voices in this world and its impact can never be underestimated. 

How is this relevant, you ask? Copeland helped save my life.

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