Is it just me, or did indie rock get a lot dreamier over the course of this decade? Perhaps blame it on some of the more influential bands of the decade who literally put “dream” in their album titles (ahem, War on Drugs, Beach House), or just blame it on drugs in general. But it seems that more and more bands have embraced a flurry of hazy guitars and half-comprehensible lyrics that harken back to shoegaze, but with less of the inherent noise. Jay Som proved on her last album that she could embrace the noise with stand-out track “1 Billion Dogs”, but here she plunges deeper into some dreamier jams. Continue reading →

That’s right. It’s 2019 and I’m still writing about The Hold Steady.

Which does bring up the question: at what point do you give up on a band you loved in college who might have passed their expiration date? Well, I find this happening less and less these days, considering streaming makes casual listening incredibly easy, which is exactly the kind of listening perfect for an old favorite of yesteryear. Meanwhile, the bands that never really mattered to you that much will fade regardless, while the ones you truly loved will have gained enough of your trust that you’ll continue listening to them into your dreaded thirties. Continue reading →

Sometimes, you just wish the art could speak for itself. But alas, we live in a time where that rarely happens. This especially comes to mind when talking about Sleater-Kinney’s latest, The Center Won’t Hold, which ended up being the last album recorded with drummer Janet Weiss before she exited the band prior to the album’s release. So while listening to it, one can’t help but take into consideration whether the new sounds explored on the album caused a rift in the band’s, well, center. Then when you also take into account that Weiss was injured in a potentially career-ending car accident last month, it feels as though a bit of a gray cloud hangs over The Center Won’t Hold. Continue reading →

There was something very assuring about discovering Bedouine, the project of singer/songwriter Azniz Korkejian. First, because there’s something inherently calming about the familiar, but nonetheless striking way she sings and plays guitar. Secondly, because after seeing videos online of her performing, despite being a relative up-and-comer, she looked to be about my age. Granted, I can’t actually find her age anywhere, but I did find an interview where she refers to her 20s as a thing of the past. Which isn’t that important, I’m just getting a little burned out on 20-year-old indie phenoms playing bedroom pop. Apparently, Korkejian spent much her early adulthood working as a sound engineer while music was nothing but a hobby, which explains why these songs are so casual but also so effortlessly pretty. Continue reading →

I’ll be moving to Philadelphia in the next few months, and though there are plenty of things I’ll miss about Seattle, I will not miss how it’s become an increasingly hard place for musicians (or non-rich) people to live. Philly, on the other hand, seems to have been a bit more hospitable to its music scene in the past few years. Or at least, this would explain the countless Philly indie bands to break out recently, which has to some extent made it feel like the underdog version of Brooklyn, musically speaking. I can’t say whether I’ll be going to a ton of smaller shows in Philly, since that’s never been something I’ve been great at keeping up with. But a band like Mannequin Pussy has me intrigued to see what other new artists the city has in store.

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Now that we’ve made it through Criterion Month, it seems as good a time as any to talk about some music that I was grooving to during July, despite being distracted from listening to music by arthouse cinema.

Anyways, isn’t this a surprise? After spending “a decade playing chicken with oblivion”, as David Berman states in the album’s lead-off track, free from the commitments of his longtime band Silver Jews, the man is back. In the years since Silver Jews broke up in 2009, Berman didn’t seem beholden to the music world, and in fact seemed to have turned his back on it, more inclined to spend his time writing poetry and, reading books, I guess. But in the ten years since the last Silver Jews record, he seems to have gone through a lot personally. Unsurprisingly, his personal troubles (which include a divorce) make for the basis of much of the album, and makes for some of the best material of his career. Continue reading →