The rest of the year still has Julien Baker, Converge, and Quicksand plus more so there's still some great stuff to come
Got me excited for new Sufjan, oh hell! ;d ..but still, I'll find some time and the first thing I'll listen to is The Con: X, there will be some great covers, I'm sure of that, and I'll spin the original for the first time in a long time!
Really impressed with We Came As Romans. Heavy music this year hasn't really stuck with me, but I'm really liking this one.
A band no one has mentioned, Everett, just put out a really fantastic EP today! FFO: From Indian Lakes, Into It Over It, Hearts Like Lions Also checking out I The Mighty and Nothing Nowhere
Oh, I forgot about one thing, with which I can't wait - started listening here in the office right now - new album by The Careful Ones, called 'Pegasus'. It's JMR's band (his debut album was produced by Aaron Marsh and sounded perfect, an amazing vocalist!).
So far, absolutely loving Flicker, the Niall Horan album. Definitely purchasing I the Mighty, but I might buy Niall, too.
Three friends put out records today so I'll hype them (also I like the releases quite a bit): Movements debut album Feel Something (Silverstein meets La Dispute with BalCo influence), Quiet's debut album Infinite Regress (a post-rock Brand New) and Iris Jupiter's new split with Fk. Mtn (grungier version of Weezer) I the Mighty and Bully really underwhelmed me. Pretty disappointed. Excited to listen to And So I Watch You From Afar, the Silver Snakes cover EP, Muskets, and maybe Nothing. Nowhere. if I can stomach it (I've always liked the idea of mixing emo guitars and rapping but his lyrics... yikes).
Movements is great. WCAR is their best in years, still probably won't go back to it. Teagan & Sara was cool.
Glad you've checked this out - I made it through the whole album too, and I think it's pretty good, will come back to it a few times for sure!
I The Mighty and Veil of Maya on repeat for the next 48 hours. Really hope there's nothing to that "LP - 03/ Is This the End of Us?" notation at the bottom of the ITM cover.
What did you think of the rest? I shared your thoughts but ended up feeling meh at the end. A few songs I just dislike and I don't like the lyrics for the majority of the songs.
I've only gotten through the first 4 tracks, and only really liked the opener...a lot of the vocals gave me an Anthony Raneri vibe in terms of the poppy sound but I think all their song writing powers went toward 'Degenerates.' Hopefully there's a couple more standouts later in the album...
I typically despise country but I think of stuff like Florida Georgia line and Luke Bryan, which I hate because it seems so fake and manufactured. Like the country twang accent is really poured on, and it's basically just frat boy music wrapped up in faux patriotism. It's probably also because I'm from New England, and the whole sitting in the back of a pick up truck in a corn field in the middle of nowhere after a hard day working on the farm is so foreign to me that I forgot people actually live that way and relate. Also, I hate to say it and understand it's stereotyping, but my narrow minded view of country music fans is that they love all things Republican including the Donald. However, this Turnpike Troubadours album, this is awesome. Only 3 songs in, and having never heard any of their previous stuff, I'm digging it big time. Sounds genuine unlike the stuff I mentioned, and the guitar work is phenomenal. Long story short, what other bands will get me to start liking this type of country music?
Glad you're enjoying it! If you like this, I'd definitely recommend their self-titled album from 2015. That's my favorite of theirs. I know a lot of people have similar feelings about country that you just listed here. There's a lot of that in the mainstream, definitely, but there's also some super high-quality stuff flying under the radar (or just recently cresting above the radar). If you haven't heard them, I'd say you'll probably like Jason Isbell and Sturgill Simpson. Lots of praise for those guys and their stuff right now. Tyler Childers is another guy who has gotten a lot of buzz this year. His LP has a similar feel to the Turnpike Troubadours album.