1. Wolf Alice - Lisbon
I feel like it's been forever (it hasn't) since the last time I went through a Discover playlist. "Lisbon" is a great (re)introduction to Spotify's incessant demand that I listen to (what I assume is) popular indie music. I still haven't figured out Spotify's algorithm for these playlists, if it even has one.
2. Lungfish - Black Helicopters
I think it's just dawning on me that Keelhaul owed as much to Lungfish as they did to anybody. One of the most brilliant aspects of Lungfish has always been the ability to get as much out of one riff as possible - more out of it than should be possible.
3. Echo & The Bunnymen - Silver
If I was teenage-me in the 80s, would have I liked Echo & The Bunnymen? I dunno, because teenage-me didn't care about them in my own temporal sequence. I like them now, though. Would 28-year-old me like them in the 80s, too?
4. From Indian Lakes - Come in this Light
Moving Mountains-esque but with downplayed emotionality. I'd be willing to listen to this album front to back.
5. Timber Timbre - Beat the Drum Slowly
This is like if Johnny Cash and Michael Gira co-write Mr. Bungle's "Sweet Charity" while on a Halloween-themed music bender.
6. Unwound - Corpse Pose
Unwound and Lungfish? Am I sensing a pattern? I hope so. Unwound has nearly as many compilation albums as they do proper releases from when they were an active band. If Shellac and/or Slint don't show up on this week's Discover, I'm going to be very disappointed.
7. Father - Who's Gonna Get F****** First
"Who's gonna get fucked first?" asks Father, spoiling my fun game of guessing what "F*****" could possibly stand for. The answer, Father, is the disenfranchised. Duh.
8. Everyone Everywhere - Turn & Go & Turn
I loved this album when it came out in 2012. I still listen to it from time to time. This isn't one of the tracks that I go back to frequently, but it's got lots of frenetic energy to match its twinkliness. It's an infectious bit of punkier emo in the middle of the album that kinda disrupts the slower pace of the rest of the record. It also features this weirdo computer-blown-out guitar solo that seems out of place but is super rad.
9. Yuck - Rubber
I never listened to this album (or the second) album when it was released. I just have absolutely no gauge of what trendy shit I'll actually like, so I just avoid all of it. I don't mean "trendy" as an insult, either, though it certainly hasn't been used in any way other than pejoratively maybe ever. I mean shit that buzzes, has buzz. Great, now I'm MTV in the 90s. Yuck is/was buzzworthy. I would've dug this album back in 2011 had I listened to it. Slimy Dino Jr/MBV grunge/shoegaze.
10. Gang of Four - Damaged Goods
Gang of Four was just never a band I got into. I know that seems unconscionable, but it's true. I never sought them out and no one around me was invested in them while I was growing up. Obviously when I got to college, I met people who were (possibly just getting) into them, but it was maybe too late? I probably should familiarize myself with their big records, but I dunno.
11. Ghostface Killah, Badbadnotgood - Street Knowledge (ft. Tree)
Dope. Pretty Tony is pretty much always dope. Still don't know what/who Badbadnotgood is, though.
12. Fallujah - Levitation
I've spent this entire song trying to write an explanation as to why I don't like it than actually listening to it. Sometimes it's hard to explain, as someone who likes metal music, why certain subgenres hold no appeal, even when they're really close sonically to other subgenres that do appeal to me. Is there a melodiousness in Fallujah's form of death metal that irks me? Is it that deathcore is a genre that I just generally dislike without engaging with it much at all? Or is it that I just don't listen to much death metal anymore, and if/when I do, I want it/need it to be as gargantuan and ugly as Cattle Decapitation?
13. Dads - But
I've been meaning to listen to this band. Quavering emo in 6131 Records. I gotta get this album.
14. Nothing - B&E
Just the saddest bunch of sad bastards that have ever moped around on a record or a stage. They're just miserable. I love them so much. I didn't listen to Guilty of Everything enough when it came out, even though I listened to it a ton. This is one of the most expansive, heart-wrenching tacks on the album. It is loud.
15. Mac DeMarco - A Heart Like Hers
For a long time, I couldn't keep track of Mac DeMarco and Mac Miller and who was who because that's how little I give a fuck about either of those two people/artists. I'll officially take DeMarco over Miller, though. I'm not finishing this song.
16. Chon - Drift
This is just the album intro, so I'm actually listening to the album's second track so I have any idea of who this band is. Prog-emo? This band oughtta call themselves Twinkle Theatre. Nailed it.
17. Madvillain - The Illest Villains
One of the best hip-hop albums ever made. Simple as that.
18. Pure Bathing Culture - Seven to One
That's one funny band name. They're from Portland - I was just in Portland! Dreamy, wistful lo-fi Brit-pop-inspired indie music. It has a very unmistakably 80s vibe that I can get behind.
19. Majical Cloudz - What That Was
Majical Cloudz, who apparently have a new album out, was the type of band that we got into and could not figure out how we weren't finally crossing musical paths with trendy folks. I don't necessarily know what we found/find so appealing about Majical Cloudz versus a litany of other bands they presumably sound like, but I think it was always how downtrodden they were. Listless, sure, but not afraid to just be fuckin' bummed. I think too much listless indie music is afraid to embrace pure bummer. Don't be scared of your feelings, folks. Embrace them shits.
20. Periphery - Stranger Things
Holy shit this is un-fucking-believably bad. Prog-metal butt rock par excellence? I can't stop listening to it in the same way you can't turn away from Faces of Death when you're 15. It's like the wussiest version of Meshuggah ever concocted. Good god.
21. Loscil - Goat Mountain
Well whaddya know! That band that kept haunting all of my Discover playlists and YouTube choices finally appears. If this song is indicative of the rest of Loscil's oeuvre, I just found a new favourite artist. Beautiful, sprawling ambient dronescape to lose yourself in. Rising waves crash down on expanses of sound in subdued yet encompassing aural catharsis. This is music you can inhabit.
22. Tiny Moving Parts - Sundress
"I love you - at least I used to" I'm immediately so in love with this band I can hardly stand it.
23. Pelican - Perceptual Dawn
Spring Break junior year, I went to a hippie fest with my friends. Pelican was playing (for some reason). They were on some tiny stage at like 1am across from the Disco Biscuits. About 25 people watched them, and I'm almost certain no one knew who they were. I was on ecstasy and asked them to play "Mammoth" or "Into the Woods." (I get that asking a band to play a song live is about the most gauche thing you can do, but we were at a hippie fest, I was on ecstasy, and I figured they'd appreciate some recognition that anyone in the crowd knew who they were.) They did neither. What they did do, though, was be bad live, which is what they've been every time I've ever seen them. Also they've failed to release compelling music since Australasia, aside from a song or two here and there. This is not one of those songs.
24. A Place to Bury Strangers - Straight
I always mean(t) to listen to this band more than I do/did, but I kinda always forget to. That's more a commentary on me than APTBS.
25. Girlfriends - Brobocop
Frantic, short-lived math-rock/emo band from the late aughts/early '10s. They were probably more suited for the early aughts, though.
26. Carpenter Brut - Obituary
This act has some relationship to Perturbator, which is clear from their sound. (They were on one of Perturbator's albums). It's got a little more of an early-NIN vibe, though. It's dark and dancy and gothy and delicious.
27. Jordaan Mason & The Horse Museum - Racehorse: Get Married!
Is this a horse-themed Neutral Milk Hotel tribute band? Jordaan Mason looked at the Elephant Six Collective and thought, "Nah. Wrong animal. I got this."
28. Tides of Man - Desolate. Magnificent.
This is a post-rock song, but apparently this band was some sort of band that toured with the likes of Dance Gavin Dance before becoming a post-rock band. Huh.
29. David Sylvian - Maria
This is goth-folk ambient. To hell with your descriptions of it, Allmusic.com.
I feel like I gotta give this playlist a strong A. Multiple bands I love + multiple bands I will begin loving. Only two lowlights. Strong.
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