Review: Teen Suicide – Honeybee Table at the Butterfly Feast

Sam Ray is the most likable person in indie rock. If you didn’t pick up on my sarcasm there, it’s not your fault; it doesn’t translate well to text. In actuality, many people have many reasons to dislike Sam Ray, from his scathing send-up of Car Seat Headrest to his honest albeit prickly online persona and, perhaps most notably, the needlessly edgy moniker of teen suicide itself. Whether these reasons are valid enough to dismiss his music as a whole is totally your call, but I’m here to deliver the message that Ray’s newest album (and first since American Pleasure Club’s fucking bliss, a dark night of the soul via noise-rock), honeybee table at the butterfly feast, is one of the year’s most moving surprises.

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Review: Hello Stranger – True Belief

The latest EP from indie rockers, Hello Stranger, is a blast of fun-sounding rock songs that have plenty of meaning behind them. The band set out to create a collection of hard-hitting tracks that have plenty of substance behind them, and I’d say that is “Mission Accomplished.” The band shared, “We had these incredibly topical, salient songs we had been working on for months, but it was difficult to get into studios or collaborate with producers. As many other artists did during that time, we decided to do it ourselves.” By choosing the route of independence, this raw EP called True Belief stays true to who the band members are as people and they make a bold leap forward as a unit. With a sound that strays somewhere between Bayside, paired with the pop rock sensibilities of Switchfoot, Hello Stranger seem destined to be familiar in your music rotation.

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Review: Snarls – “After You (Samantha’s Song)”

The latest single from Snarls feels like those last great gasps of summer air before the uncertainty of autumn wraps over us and makes us wonder where the time went. The band is coming off of releasing a great EP (What About Flowers?) with Death Cab For Cutie’s Chris Walla, and they continue to go down the rabbit hole of self-discovery with vibrant, full guitars, enveloped with vocal harmonies much like Fleetwood Mac, or contemporary artists like Phoebe Bridgers or Hayley Williams, to make the listener feel welcome. On this single, Chlo White shared:

”After You” is my love song to my long distance bestie, Samantha. She lives in Denver now, but we met in high school when I invited her to come to one of my shows! We quickly became really close friends and I found myself out in Yellow Springs, OH at least once a month for a while. That was about an hour away from where I lived in Columbus at the time, and my dad would drive me halfway and meet up with her at a TA station so we could hangout for a weekend. Too cute. I think friendships like ours are rare. We can go months without talking and pick up right where we left off. She moved a while ago now, but I still feel so close to her. I don’t think I’ll ever know another love like Samantha’s!

By creating a song that is both personal and sonically rich and full in its sound, Snarls continue to impress.

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Review: Have Mercy – Have Mercy

The latest EP from Baltimore rock band, Have Mercy, is their first taste of new music since 2019, which in the middle of a pandemic might as well feel like it’s been eons. In addition, Have Mercy called it quits when the world went to shit in the spring of 2020, only to suddenly return with this reinvigorating self-titled EP that finds them sounding as refreshed as they’ve ever been. The record blasts off on the right foot with the anthemic “I’m Gonna Be Ok,” that sounds larger than life. Frontman Brian Swindle shared, “When we wrote this song, I realized that it summarized my entire life as of late. I met the love of my life and wanted to move forward with her but couldn’t until I took care of my issues. I had to get sober, get my mental health in check and just do better. This song was a reflection of all of that.” By handling the personal issues and coming out on the better side of things, Swindle and his bandmates in Have Mercy may have just made their late career masterpiece.

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Review: Kulick – “Goner”

The latest single from talented singer-songwriter, Kulick, called “Goner” reminds me a bit of the great, anthemic rock from the early 00’s, and packs plenty of punch in its delivery. The song features some guest vocals from Sleeping With Sirens vocalist Kellin Quinn, and he takes the reins of the second verse to paint the story being brought forth in the single. Kulick is coming off the success of his Everyone I Know Will Die sophomore record and he continues to explore the depths of his improved songwriting on tracks like this. The brilliant and vibrant chorus features vocal harmonies between the two vocalists and makes for a full-sounding vocal attack.

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Review: Butch Walker – As…Glenn

A bar band balladeer playing songs in a smoky dive, hammering away at the piano and spilling his soul onto the keys as the hour gets progressively later and the inattentive crowd gets progressively more intoxicated. Or maybe there isn’t much of a “crowd” at all and he’s mostly playing for the bartender and a few drunk regulars. For so many musicians, these sentences describe a day-by-day and night-by-night reality. Getting gigs is easy; getting the audience to pay even an ounce of attention is hard. And yet, if you live that life, you still show up every night, seeking solace in the songs you’re playing and hoping that, one of these nights, even one other person will find meaning in them too.

We tend to think of careers in music as glamorous, but if you’ve actually tried your hand at one, you know the reality is something else entirely. It’s late nights and long tours and loneliness. It’s drunk people talking over your songs. It’s the sting of polite but passionless applause. It’s bar fights breaking up your set and derailing any momentum you felt you had going onstage. It’s the hope that maybe this song, maybe this show, maybe this night will be different; maybe this one will be the big break. And it’s the crushing disappointment of your reality consistently falling well short of your expectations.

On his 10th full-length album, Butch Walker turns all of this not-so-glamorous musical reality into fertile ground for the best music he’s made in years. The album in question, Butch Walker As…Glenn, is a not-quite-concept-album about a bar singer named Glenn (Butch’s middle name) and the songs he plays in his set on any given night, in any given pub, in any given town in America. Unlike Butch’s last album, 2020’s full-blown rock opera American Love Story, there isn’t really a firm narrative here. The concept is little more than a framing device, with the album starting on an introduction of the titular singer, ending with an encore, and featuring a skit about one of those aforementioned bar fights somewhere in the middle.

But listen to the songs themselves and you can hear how the spirit of the concept bled into Butch’s writing for this album. All the big-dream romanticism and all the weathered weariness of being a working-class career musician is there in the music, and the album knits those conflicting emotions and moods together into a surprisingly poignant treatise on resilience and the beauty of a no-frills, knockout song. Will Hoge once wrote: “Keep on dreaming if it breaks your heart.” Glenn is all about the musicians who keep dreaming that dream year after year, looking for moments of transcendence amidst colorful stage lights and bar floors sticky from decades worth of spilled beer. Some nights, you find that transcendence. Other nights, it might as well be a billion lightyears away.

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Review: R.E.M. – Chronic Town

Coming up in the early part of next week is the 40th anniversary of the debut EP from R.E.M. called Chronic Town. The band is celebrating this momentous occasion/birthday with a re-issued CD, cassette, and vinyl picture disc that is releasing today. Featuring pop gems like The Smiths-esque “Gardening At Night,” to The Cure-sounding “Stumble,” and “1,000,000,” the five-track EP solidified R.E.M. as a name to watch in the early part of the 80’s. As lead vocalist Michael Stipe puts it on the detailed liner notes in the package, “We started like a lowly caterpillar, a pupa stage, then a chrysalis, into something resembling a pop band.” It’s a fairly accurate depiction of the sound that comes shining through the speakers on this endearing debut EP. You can definitely hear traces of where the band would take their sound on their debut LP Murmur that began to make R.E.M. a recognizable name.

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Review: Blindside – Silence

Usually you can point to certain moments in time when your taste in music changes to broader categories. For me, it came in the form of Blindside and their aggressive, yet melodic, third studio album Silence produced by veteran hit-maker Howard Benson (Hoobastank, Papa Roach). For quite a long time in high school, and even parts of the beginning of college, I was stuck in an Alt Rock and pop-punk phase that was tough to break free from for other genres of music. Enter Blindside and their hard-nosed guitar approach, semi-screamed vocals paired with melodic breakdowns, and my music world was turned upside down. Going down the rabbit hole of post-hardcore music led to my discovery of bands like Underoath and Thursday, and prepared me to be more open to different stylistic choices in our scene’s wide umbrella of artists that would appear on a Warped Tour lineup.

Silence is anything but a silent-sounding record. It’s aggressive, pulsating, and the tones of the guitars, bass, drums, and searing vocals made for a dynamic and sonically interesting band in Blindside. Whereas their previous effort A Thought Crushed My Mind left little room for melodic breakdowns, Silence had just the right combination of punishing guitars and screamed vocals mixed with a more radio-ready sound. The record would end up peaking at #83 on the Billboard 200.

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Review: Don’t Panic – “Conquer Divide”

The latest taste of music from Phoenix Alt Rock band, Don’t Panic, sets off the alarm bells of urgency on ”Conquer Divide.” The song comes from their soon to be announced LP, 24, and follows their lead single “Time Machine,” and further showcases the band’s captivating songwriting. A little fun fact is that lead singer, Dylan Rowe, was in the mix to replace Flyleaf’s vocalist a few years back. Rowe shines all over this great-sounding single that cements Don’t Panic as a band to watch as the year unfolds.

The track opens with some well-placed synths, roaring guitars, and perfectly in-time drums before bleeding away for Rowe’s great vocals to lift the song to new heights. What Don’t Panic do best on this song is slow-building to a crowd-pleasing, anthemic chorus to keep the interest high in their brand of alternative, radio-ready rock. The bridge features a slow-downed section that allows the band to take a quick breather before exploding back into a wall of sound for the final chorus to leave a great taste in the audience’s mouth, and leave them clamoring for more. The guitar tones, in particular, on this song are very powerful and full-sounding and much like the Leonardo DiCaprio movie quote of, “You had my curiosity, but now you have my attention,” Don’t Panic have certainly made me a fan.

Review: PONY – “Peach”

The latest single from indie pop rocker PONY is a blast of fuzzy guitars and vibrant vocals, called “Peach.” Singer/guitarist, Sam, mentioned this about “Peach,” “I think Peach is probably the most vulnerable song I have ever written. After all, what’s more vulnerable than a Peach? Some years ago I found myself in a relationship with someone who initially treated me like I was so special. But little by little the love seemed more and more conditional. With every bit they tried to control what I wore, who I talked to, and what I did – I lost a part of myself. It took me years to realize I was completely gone and I mistook abuse and manipulation for love. ‘Peach’ is about realizing that someone who wants to have control over you is not someone who loves you.” Out of this vulnerability comes a great self-empowering anthem of overcoming the lowest of lows. With a sound that drifts somewhere between Bully, paired with the pop sensibilities of Olivia Rodrigo and Phoebe Bridgers, PONY is well on their way to becoming your next great musical discovery.

The song starts off with some soft vocals from Sam before breaking away into some grunge-pop power chords that speak to the conflict brought forth in the lyrics. At the surface, it feels like a nice, summery pop anthem that would be perfect for those long summer drives. The reality is PONY have created such rich conflict in the lyrics about losing a part of oneself along the way to discovering what makes us tick, that it’s really hard to distance yourself from these personal issues the artist is experiencing. Overall, PONY have created a worthy single that continues to keep the interest high in this incredibly talented artist.

Review: Yellowcard – Southern Air

Yellowcard - Southern Air

By default, the most important Yellowcard album is Ocean Avenue. It’s the one that made the band stars, the one that gave them a classic hit that still lingers in the cultural bloodstream, and the one that provided them with the platform to launch a long, rewarding career. But Southern Air, the band’s eighth studio album, is uniquely vital to the band’s story too, because without it, the Yellowcard arc would feel incomplete. It was the album that took everything they’d been building toward and everything they’d been promising as a band and captured it all perfectly in 10 songs and 40 minutes. It’s not the most famous Yellowcard album, and there are days when it’s not even my favorite, but it is the best single-album distillation of what this band was capable of when they were at their best. And somehow, it’s 10 years old this week.

When Southern Air came out, it felt like Yellowcard had a lot of gas left in the tank. The band had just roared back to life the year before, with 2011’s When You’re Through Thinking, Say Yes, and Southern Air felt like the blockbuster sequel to that album. The two records share a lot, from their fleet 10-song tracklists to the faux vinyl wear rings that are drawn into the album art. Like two movies in a duology, they play beautifully as companion pieces – When You’re Through Thinking coming across as the origin story and Southern Air playing as the bigger, bolder, louder sequel that deepens the themes of its predecessor. In 2012, it felt like Yellowcard could keep making these types of albums forever, but looking back, Southern Air feels oddly like a swansong. The band would make another two LPs after this one, but this version of Yellowcard – this lineup, this sound, this aesthetic – would never exist again.

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Review: Unwritten Law – The Hum

Just like the famous quote from the character Michael Corleone in The Godfather: Part III of, “Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in,” can be directly re-applied to the case of Unwritten Law. The band seemed to have a tough time getting that “magic” back on the past few releases like Swan, and at-times Here’s to the Mourning, something appeared to be slightly out of sync in the band’s delivery. Enter the era of The Hum, and all appears to be heading back on the right course. The Hum is a cohesive and electric collection of songs that fit well from beginning to end, and feature several key songs that keep the listener coming back for repeat listens. While Unwritten Law doesn’t cover a ton of new ground here, getting the train back on the tracks is the most important thing that the band could’ve done here to re-establish their brand of music in the crowded pop-punk realm.

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Review: Momma – Household Name

The third studio album from Momma is an endearing collection of songs that they have affectionately titled Household Name. Mastered by Grammy-winning engineer Emily Lazar, Household Name captures a great indie rock spirit while still remaining true to the band’s core authenticity that came shining through the speakers on their first two records. The new songs drift in the realm of indie rock bands similar to Momma like Soccer Mommy, Snail Mail, and Beabadoobee, yet some of the guitar tones breathe new life into this group of musicians with a sound similar to Smashing Pumpkins and early-Nirvana. On songs like “Speeding 72,” the lead single from the set, Momma are able to achieve a sound that transcends genre lines and conventional boundaries.

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Review: Gin Blossoms – New Miserable Experience

One of the many fun things about revisiting albums, like this one, is learning out new things about the record that most may have missed when it first came out. For example, while researching the context surrounding Gin Blossoms and their second studio album called New Miserable Experience, I never knew there was an alternate cover that was released for this record. In fact, the first cover for the album depicts an Arizona desert, which would later be replaced with the current image after A&M Records decided to push the record hard at radio outlets. With singles like “Lost Horizons,” “Allison Road,” “Until I Fall Away,” and arguably their biggest breakthrough single called “Hey Jealousy,” Gin Blossoms had everything you’d like to see in a band trying to make a name for themselves. The set was co-produced by Gin Blossoms and John Hampton (The Raconteurs, The White Stripes), and this LP holds up surprisingly well after 30 long years. By the time the promotional cycle would wrap up on New Miserable Experience, Gin Blossoms would earn a 4x Platinum record on their sophomore effort.

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Review: Maggie Rogers – Surrender

Her talent is undeniable. Maggie Rogers seemed to be destined for this type of breakthrough success after catching an early break when her song “Alaska” caught the ears of Pharrell Williams in a class he taught at her school in 2016. This would allow the floodgates to open with opportunities of major labels wanting to sign Rogers on the spot. Heard It In A Past Life, Maggie Rogers’ debut, would continue this breakthrough success with marquee support tours with Mumford & Sons, Haim, and Kacey Musgraves before doing an extensive word-wide headlining tour to solidify her status as a name to watch, and she would even get nominated for a Grammy award for Best New Artist along this same timeline. Since the release of her debut album, Rogers decided to go to graduate school at Harvard Divinity School, where she would graduate with a Master of Religion and Public Life degree. This worthy path back to education still allowed Maggie Rogers some time to focus on her music and record what would become the Surrender sessions with producer Kid Harpoon. This set is co-produced by Rogers, and it’s a remarkable achievement in her musical journey. With an album filled with great vibes, soul-wrenching lyrics, unique beats, and the songwriting chops similar to a young Joni Mitchell, Maggie Rogers has created the record she may have only dreamed of making in her youth.

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