If It's Too Loud...

Artist : Metric Album : Romanticize the Dive Quick Thoughts : A band like Metric, who rose during the 2000s indie era and are as loved for their own sound as they are for their adjacency to Broken Social Scene, is in some ways an institution as much as a band. They've been continually good-to-great for decades now, and Romanticize the Dive definitely reads as an album of a band doing their best versions of themselves. Production / instrumentation is very reminiscent of Fantasies for me, which is probably my favorite Metric record and why I like this album so much. "Victim of Luck" is a new classic, "Loyal" a soaring anthemic earworm, and the album is basically no skips. It would be worth your time in a busy week, but it's a great listen for a slow early spring release calendar too. Songs of Note : "Victim of Luck," "Time is a Bomb," "Tremolo," "Loyal," "Antigravity," "Clouds to Break" A...

Artist : Kim Gordon Album : The Collective Quick Thoughts : Someone on Twitter said that Kim won the divorce re: the breakup of Sonic Youth, and it's really really hard not to listen to The Collective and disagree. Someone who turns 71 this year should not be making music this interesting and this far off the beaten trap and making it work. "BYE BYE" is having its moment on social media for sure, but the industrial-esque pseudo-trap feel of this whole package is just stunning both in its scope and its musicality. This isn't going to work for everybody, not that Sonic Youth ever did, but wow, this album. Songs of Note : "BYE BYE," "The Believers," "The Candy House," "Dream Dollar" Artist : Weezy Ford Album : In the Movement Quick Thoughts : Outside of The Barbaras, we haven't heard from either of the Ford sisters in a few years, and Weezy Ford's second full-length album is a really gorgeous slice of retro roots...

Photo by Adam Parshall Kacey Musgraves is just one of those artists I'm not that familiar with, but if Weakened Friends are covering one of her songs I might have to check her out again! As part of this year's Something Merry covers compilation, the Maine trio have covered Musgraves' "Oh, What a World." The cover is this great alt-rock power ballad, the kind you don't really hear all that often. This song sounds like it was listed straight from the mid 90's when bands like Pearl Jam or Weezer would release these killer ballads that still rocked despite being on the slower side. Weakened Friends have given us this fuzzed out and jangly version of a country pop hit, and we're fully on board for this one. You can listen to Weakened Friends take on "Oh, What a World" below. The song is on After Hour from Something Merry with all proceeds going to The Brigid Alliance, a referral-based service that provides travel, food, lodging, child care, and ot...

I realize that I have nothing special to say about Kacey Musgraves that hasn’t already been said, nor do I have anything especially unique to write about Golden Hour than anyone else has. Sometimes, an album simply hits the overall zeitgeist and we see the years of toil and the occasional identity crisis come to fruition in an effort that spans multiple genres and refuses to be pigeonholed. One could have forgiven Musgraves for scaling back and doing a back-to-basics country record given the criticism she has taken over the years; she instead decided to mix it up and acknowledge her roots while doing something a little more risky. It works. It more than works. Everyone was rightfully thrown off by country disco song “High Horse” (even if it’s still a jam and a half) but the joys of this album come from songs like “Space Cowboy” and “Velvet Elvis,” two examples of which feel like what a modern country song should feel like, as opposed to the stereotypes we’ve all internalized in...

We're already a quarter of the way through the year! What?! Album of the Week : Artist : Kasey Musgraves Album : Golden Hour Quick Description : Latest from country music's... uh, bad girl? I don't know. Why You Should Listen : Kasey Musgraves is the most interesting mainstream country singer going. Overall Thoughts : Kasey Musgraves is pretty much known as the mainstream country artist that people who hate mainstream country listen to. And while she’s making some serious waves with “Space Cowboy,” songs like “High Horse” suggest a Swiftian pivot in the near future. It’s a great album, all things considered - a lot of the attitude that I always read about finally shows its face for me here in ways her previous records did not but if you listen to Musgraves for her outlaw-adjacent attitude, it’s possibly missing here for you. Still, this is a sneaky great record, and if you've resisted jumping on the bandwagon... Recommendation : ...plenty of room for now. ...