Neil Jung

Unbelievable, perfect sounding album. Feels crazy every time I throw it on.

open.spotify.com/track/6amFDa...

🫡

My beautiful autodrafted baseball boys

Despite not having ever followed baseball closely, I have joined a fantasy baseball league and am now deeply invested in America’s Pasttime

I love in the interview parts of What Did You Expect? where they say something like "we wish we could play some of these songs on the reunion tour but we can't remember the tuning we made up for them."

A band, much like Silkworm, who played guitar as if they were trying to put a python in a headlock, all muscle, treating it more like free weights than an instrument.

When I first heard Archers of Loaf I thought, “That’s insane, it sounds like he took all the strings off his guitar and put them back on at random” and it turns out that’s basically what he did

Bracewar is a band I thought was fine in 2008 and now I think that’s historically great hardcore

In college I had a “running playlist” and it was just 8 Ted Leo songs I would loop

you are a special individual whose music makes a unique contribution to the world that no one else on earth could make.

except Ted Leo. he could eat your songs for lunch and have room for dessert. he could do your shit with oven mitts on both hands.

We All Float On: A Weekend Aboard The Modest Mouse Cruise “What’s up, floaters?!” The Norwegian Pearl is pulling away from Miami Cruise Terminal B, and hundreds of people are gathered on the pool deck, waiting for the show to begin. The friendly thirtysometh...

I went on the Modest Mouse cruise FOR JOURNALISM

We did it !! Im moved beyond words,‘I cannot express enough how much this just changed the next few months for me. Blessed beyond measure, thank you

❤️❤️ incredibly, incredibly kind of you, I feel very emotional right now, thank you !

This was with insurance: if it had happened this month now that my insurance has expired, I would have been fucked up a creek. I can’t afford my meds because they’re like $350 out of pocket w/o insurance, it feels like medical costs are still a tipping point in my life

Venmo account: user @KeeganBradford

Had a shitty but necessary ER visit that resulted in $500 of medical bills that are hitting in a month when I’m between paychecks for longer than normal, trying to scrape together a little extra to get it paid before it goes to collections etc

Charles Joseph Smith brings his music aboveground  - Chicago Reader Charles Joseph Smith is a beloved fixture on Chicago’s DIY scene, but the ambitious music he's been making for decades has gone mostly unheard—until now.

My latest Reader music feature is all about Dr. Charles Joseph Smith, a classically trained pianist and pillar of Chicago DIY who is about to release a multi-disc archival compilation on @sooperrecords.bsky.social

The Ratboys really is fantastic

I’d flip Jenny and Bleed Out but I think you’re probably right

Pierre Chuvin is the best followed closely by Bleed Out followed closely by Jenny From Thebes and from then on it’s all pretty much tied except for Peter Balkan which is at the bottom

I think Bleed Out, that's gotten the most play from me at least. Goths might be...I feel like it's a strong holistic effort but I don't love all the sonic concepts. Getting Into Knives and Dark in Here have some totemic individual songs but have nothing holding them together. Been a weird run!

These are simply fighting words. That first statement must be an April Fool's joke, perhaps even a goof.

That said, Pierre Chuvin, Getting Into Knives, and Dark In Here all made it much easier to get through the main COVID years.

Pierre Chauvin is the obvious choice, but that seems like cheating given how it was recorded.

Otherwise it's Goths or Bleed Out

• Goths (2017) • In League with Dragons (2019) • Songs for Pierre Chuvin (2020) • Getting Into Knives (2020) • Dark in Here (2021) • Bleed Out (2022) • Jenny from Thebes (2023) • Through This Fire Across from Peter Balkan (2025)

I think it’s clear that Beat The Champ is the last truly great Mountain Goats album—the capstone of their very good decade following the stunning 2000-‘05 run.

Taking that as a given: what’s the best album in the decade since then?

💯

twothirtyeight was the first band I thought of with the first post. MFers had dashboard singing backup. Staples still releasing interesting stuff on barsuk.

I think that’s sort of the norm for nostalgia acts now, no?

I just can’t even *hear* the supposed greatness. Like I can typically listen to something and hear what people like about it, even if it doesn’t resonate with me. This one actively confounds me

a man in a suit and tie is holding a lighter and says vayagif.com on the bottom right ALT: a man in a suit and tie is holding a lighter and says vayagif.com on the bottom right

Better this way

I disagree with this so much (Cursive is great) but this is the energy Bsky desperately needs right now

There was a period of time where I would have said enthusiastically that I enjoyed the Ugly Organ, but those days are behind me for whatever reason