It’s Sam’s Month, and it’s now or never. That’s his joke, you’ll hear it off the top of the ep this week. Top of the episode to ya! That should be something we say. We probably have said it all already. But we’ve never done an episode about the band Bomb the Music Industry! until now. So maybe you can scream along with us as we lock arms and get together in the pit, one last time.
Listen to the new ‘sode of 155 here.
Here’s some other stuff we’re thinking about right now:
Cherym “Listening to My Head”
Sam: This isn’t new, so apologies, but it doesn’t seem to have popped off like it should so I’m bringing it into the mix this week. I say this too much, but this is for real the only kind of music I really want to listen to (final FINAL). The guitar that opens it? Sick I love it. The melody that creeps in? So good. But what kind of song is it? Don’t worry the drums drop in and it rocks. Could there be a sick chorus? Here it is PSYCH that’s JUST the pre-chorus! The chorus is even BETTER. Could this song possibly have the type of bridge that elevates the whole thing and make me want to engage in so much eye contact with strangers?? It COULD. This song about DIVORCE? That’s surprising.
Jos: I haven’t pressed play yet but I just realized something adorable while reading Sam’s prose (Sam’s Prose): He writes these little question-and-answer checklists to increasingly rile himself up about how much he loves something. It’s like he’s doing the “Did we just become best friends?” scene from Step Brothers but alone, with himself, about a song. That’s cute AF! Okay, pressing play. Yeah I could see Sammy getting the zoomies from this.
Lamp of Murmuur “Conqueror Beyond the Frenzied Fog”
Sam: My ability to write or talk about metal (outside of the “nü” variety) is pretty limited so I’ll just say that I like when bands with names like this play death metal riffs in a black metal ways. I get to feel dark and spooky but really I’m nodding my head to these catchy grooves. Sorry but you can’t scare me. We’ve been talking about fantasy books in the Discord lately and I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to realize that I can read a whole book full of phrases like “Master of the fog / Harbinger of victory / Call upon your hordes / Cast the spell of Champions / Getting closer to the bridge / Where horizon merges with death / Still our blood, boils in your throne.” Great solo, too.
Jos: Now I’m starting to understand why metal bands write their logos like that. When I read the name “Lamp of Murmuur” in here I thought it was gonna be some corny wannabe Rhapsody of Fire shit. But clicking through I see a beautiful garage sale painting with a spiderweb word mark, and this song is sick as hell. Good band Sammy. *pats head*
Home Front “Nation”
Jos: Last summer, when I was walking to a slightly further away store to buy a certain hot sauce I like, I ran into Brandi and Ian, my friends from Edmonton who I know best from their incredible and pre-post-punk-hype post-punk duo Rhythm of Cruelty. We had a nice little stop and chat, and they mentioned that their new band Home Front was opening for S.H.I.T. that night in Montreal. Sara was out of town, and I had been thinking of going to the show (and, to be honest, now at my age I have an internal debate about going to a show that lasts far longer than the doable timeframe to decide, much like this. In fact, I’m still in a way thinking of going to the show) but ultimately opted to go home and lay on the couch alone. Whether or not I should have gone is a moot point (or could be the core dilemma of a choice-based Jos indie game), but it doesn’t really matter because Home Front is a perfect band to listen to at home. I actually can’t believe how good their new LP is. The band is rounded out by frontman Graeme MacKinnon (who you might know from No Problem or, if you’re old, the Wednesday Night Heroes), synth guy Clint Frazier (of Shout Out Out Out Out) and Calgarian drummer (and my personal crush) Warren Oostlander (who I’ve loved since the Throwaways). The LP kind of sounds like little bits of all those people, touching on so many kinds of punk hyphenates (synth-, post-, street-, etc.) and featuring all kinds of different British accents. It sounds, in a word, Classic. “Nation” is a perfect introduction to the album, utilizing guest vocals from the Chisel’s Cal Graham in a way where he almost sounds like the Transplants (compliment) before landing on a sing-along chorus that sounds like Christmas morning on This Is England. The accompanying video is so perfectly fun and gritty. (There’s something magical happening in Edmonton — a lot of the people involved in this were also involved in this. Click that link, Sam.) Home Front is so sick. I can’t believe it but I actually miss Alberta.
Sam: Holy shit this is so good. Would you believe the first Junior Battles show was opening for Wednesday Night Heroes? Tremendously sick band! We were called “Younger Strike” at that time, which was a name I loved but a fight I ultimately lost. The internet loves to talk about nü metal and ska revivals but it looks like Transplants (their own genre) is back and I couldn’t be happier. Everything I love is cool now! It’s a joke in Canada how people in Toronto think the rest of the country doesn’t matter, but it’s not a joke because it’s a very real and internalized part of our being. Like people in New York don’t think about Montana, I’m sorry. But this is proof that Montana can rock, too, and people from New York are dicks.
Meghan Trainor “Mother”
Jos: If you’re reading this right when it dropped, I’m about to lose my blue check on Twitter. I’m not gonna pay for it. I might even change my display name in an effort to crawl back some of the damage I’ve done to my reputation over the years. But most notably, I’m likely not going to get the same reactions out of people that I have over the last few years. A recent bait that got everyone pissed off at me was when I defended the snippet of Meghan Trainor’s “Mother” that everyone was dunking on:
Since I’ve already received death threats over it, we may as well listen to the actual song in full, which only dropped two weeks ago. I think it’s cool that Meghan Trainor kinda seems like a hologram pop star that would appear in a shitty fake dystopian movie, like if Olivia Wilde tried to make Blade Runner. This sounds like getting a headache from the scents in Bath & Body Works. She just name-dropped CSPAN. I just realized my dream job is to be in the writer’s room for one of those songs, just throwing out every buzz word you can think of. This song rules. The movie credits for this music video just started and there are three PR people credited for Kris Jenner. Sick.
Sam: Unlike Josiah, I will not be listening to this song in its entirety, but I am glad that accelerationism means that we may be seeing the end of the mothering / daddying of all things. The newsletter is mother. Josiah is mother. “Edging” is mother. That one’s true.
Wes Anderson Asteroid City
Jos: Here’s the section where I force us to talk about the stuff everyone else is talking about. Wes Anderson’s new movie. IDK when it comes to litely alt monoculture, maybe we do have to get behind this. After all, the Safdie bros are huge pieces of shit (TW on that link), so maybe noughties tweedy soy twee is the best option? This movie looks so boring. It reminds me of something you’d be forced to see in line for the Cars ride at California Adventure while 7-year-olds play run around and keep kicking you in the shin by accident. I’m not going to watch it, I can’t even make it through the trailer. But it’s probably the best mall-indie we can get.
Sam: Friend of the pod Daniel Halyburton said this movie was cast by googling “actors 2023.” And he loves Wes Anderson. I don’t think I’ve liked one of his movies (Wes, not Daniel) since Life Aquatic which I know is a bad opinion now. Remember seeing Royal Tenenbaums for the first time, though? That was cool.
blink-155s02e24
We’ve been joking a lot about how we have had to talk about blink-182’s “Edging” for six months straight, and Sam’s been mocking me for having too much faith that there would be a new song. Well what I really had faith in was the idea that we’d find something special if we kept talking about “Edging.” And we really did this week, and for the next few weeks or even months probably if we keep doing this very stupid idea that we started this week.