This week’s newsletter highlights a bunch of my favorite holiday music and the various pop-punk and alternative adjacent music that’s made it into my yearly listening playlists. ‘Tis the season. This week’s supporter Q&A post can be found here.
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Read More “Liner Notes (December 8th, 2024)”
Ryan Holiday with some great advice on reading:
These 31 rules by no means make a complete list, but if you implement even a couple of them, I’m comfortable guaranteeing you’ll not only be a better reader for it, but a better person too.
–It is not enough that you read. You have to read well. You have to read the right books. You have to figure out how to process and retain and of course apply what you read. As Epictetus said, “I cannot call somebody ‘hard-working’ knowing only that they read.” He said he needed to know what and how they read. He needed to know that their “efforts aim at improving the mind.” Because then and only then would he call you “hard-working.” Then and only then would he give you the title “reader.”
I didn’t read as many books as I wanted to this year. Other priorities ended up taking up my time. I read more from my RSS feeds than I think ever before but I need to make sure I bring book reading back into my daily routine.
Matt Birchler, with my favorite line of the week so far:
If a tool makes my job meaningfully better, AI or not, I’m gonna use it, you don’t have to convince me. Maybe some people are resistant to learn anything new, but my impression is that the gains bosses have promised have been too grand and the use cases too broad, so employees get a bad taste in their mouth.
Again, I’ll shout it from the rooftops, if a piece of software is revolutionary and will make workers’ jobs easier, they will use it. If you find you have to keep making the hard sell to your employees, maybe it’s not bringing as much value to them as you think.
Amen.
The first new music from Hit The Lights in nearly a decade, called Tomorrow’s Gonna Hurt, is a solid collection of four songs that highlight the band’s slick approach to pop-punk. Released in part as a tribute to their bandmate Kyle Maite, who tragically died in September 2022, Hit The Lights do their best to honor their past legacy while leaving the door open for where they could go next if they continue to march on. The set features two guest spots, the opener has guest vocals from Jay Pepito and the third track features Hit The Lights’ original vocalist Colin Ross. While the band doesn’t cover too much new ground on this EP, there’s still plenty to enjoy in these songs that will hopefully rejuvenate Hit The Lights in making even more new music soon.
Read More “Hit The Lights – Tomorrow’s Gonna Hurt”
Wham!’s “Last Christmas” has reached its highest peak on the Billboard charts. Full press release below.
Read More “Wham!’s “Last Christmas” Reaches #2 on Charts”
A few weeks ago I started working on a new weekend project. I wanted to build a mini-computer that could sit on my desk and display what I was currently listening to. A simple idea. After completing it, I figured I should write up the entire process, because if I don’t blog about it … did it really happen?
I’ve compiled everything I used in making the little device, and walked through the process below. Most of it is pretty straight forward if you’ve ever worked with a Raspberry Pi or Unix before, and I documented the tutorials I used as well as the actual code I used for the website.
Read More “Now Playing: My Raspberry Pi Weekend Project”
Piebald’s If It Weren’t For Venetian Blinds… is getting a new vinyl pressing.
Read More “Piebald’s ‘Venetian Blinds…’ Gets New Pressing”
I have to admit that I rolled my eyes a bit at the thought of remixing/remastering what I consider to be one of the most sonically dynamic records this scene has ever had the privilege of calling our own: My Chemical Romance’s Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge. How exactly do you make any improvements to a classic recording? The answer was found out quickly when I first put my ears around the 2025 remix/remaster of Three Cheers. Instead of just making it louder, the original mixer of the record (Rich Costey) used the original source files that were carefully stored away by veteran producer Howard Benson to fully revamp the overall sound that comes out of the speakers when you hit “play.” This article will not be so much of a review per se of the Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge record, as I originally did the retrospective review a few years back, as much as it is a deep dive into the overall package that is presented here in 2025.
Read More “Thank You For The (New) Venom: An Analysis of My Chemical Romance’s 2025 ‘Three Cheers’ Remix”
I love the way it breaks the silence.
If you’ve never heard “Feeling a Moment” before, do yourself a favor and click play on that YouTube video down below, or go cue it up on your preferred streaming service. You’ll hear what I mean: a few seconds of something played backwards, and then a torrent of sound – an electric guitar strum and a wordless wail. For me, it is the sound of everything I was feeling at the start of my ninth-grade year: nerves, excitement, anticipation, self-belief and self-doubt in equal measure, and more than a little bit of fear.
Because what’s scarier than a totally new frontier? I’ve got the answer: being dropped into said new frontier in your early teens.
Read More “My Life In 35 Songs, Track 8: “Feeling a Moment” by Feeder”
The latest taste of music from Spanish Love Songs, called A Brief Intermission in the Flattening of Time, is a guest-heavy, moody and reflective romp of well-written songs. The set was collaborated with producer Arun Bali, and each of these vibrant tracks feature a guest artist/friend of the band. On the key song of “Cocaine & Lexapro” that features Kevin Devine, frontman and guitarist Dylan Slocum shared, “I’ve been trying to work with Kevin for a while now. We have a good number of mutual friends but had never met up until this. The reasoning was simple — our band doesn’t exist without Kevin Devine, so when he agreed to sing on a song, he got to sing on a song. He took what I had demoed as an angry, contrarian second verse and turned it into something delicate and full of pathos. It absolutely floored me the first time I heard his vocal tracks dropped in.” By working with four great artists on this EP, Spanish Love Songs reinvigorate their passion for writing songs filled with uncertainty in the days that lie ahead of us, but with a beating heart of hope that things can and will get better.
Read More “Spanish Love Songs – A Brief Intermission In The Flattening Of Time”
Panic! at the Disco have officially released the demo of “Lying Is The Most Fun A Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off” from their upcoming deluxe edition of A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out.
Read More “Panic! at the Disco Release “Lying is the Most Fun…” Demo”
Rise Against have announced some new tour dates.
Read More “Rise Against Announce New Tour”
Let’s start with the new record – what’s the vibe like in the Fall Out Boy camp based on the reactions to the new song, the buzz around the viral campaign and so forth? Does it feel as big as everyone’s hoping for?
I guess there’s a question these days of “Why put out records anymore?” you know, like, “Why even bother?” I wasn’t really interested–I don’t think any of us were really interested in getting rich and famous–and, by virtue of putting out a new record, we will probably get more rich and famous, you know? [laughs] Which is not something I want really. So like, why really [put out an album], right? It’s because you want to say something. You want to express yourself. You have art that you need to get out. So that was really my only purpose in making a record and I’m totally stoked on it the way it is now, for sure.
Read More “Patrick Stump of Fall Out Boy”
I am starting to feel like these “time to rank things” lists pop back up on me quicker and quicker each year. We are once again halfway through the year, and that means it’s time to reflect on the best albums of the year (so far). Below, you will find both our combined staff top 30, as well as individual lists from our contributors and moderators. We hope you’ll find something new to love.
Note: You can share your own list in our music forum.
Read More “The Best Albums of 2025 (So Far)”
Slothrust have shared their cover of “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch.”
Read More “Slothrust – “You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch””