Green Day, “Basket Case”

I know they became clownish and bad, and that continuing to like them is evidence of creeping Boomerism, but I don’t care, this album rules and this song rules.

Yves Tumor, “Romanticist”

I had my annual tour through the year end album lists a month or so ago, and this Yves Tumor album was one of the big winners. It’s very good! I’m not sure what I was expecting from a band named Yves Tumor, but I don’t think it was this. Among other things, Yves Tumor isn’t a band, it’s a person. Anyway, excellent album.

Samiam, “Head Trap”

Samiam were part of the punk scene that would eventualy spawn Green Day. As the labels moved in, hunting for the next big thing, Samiam found themselves on Atlantic Records for a single album, which is as close as they got to breaking through. I always felt like they deserved a bigger audience, and it was a little sad that they didn’t connect. At any rate, this actually comes from the album right before their major label record, Billy, which is my favorite album from them.

Frisk Frugt, “Solsorte Synger Solen Op”

Frisk Frugt is the alias of Anders Lauge Meldgaard, who makes experimental pop music using modified toy instruments and various homemade instruments. He’s an artist I found through The Quietus, which can be a good source of music out of left field. It’s an interesting album, unlike anything else I really have, and there’s always room for stuff like that in my collection.

Hepcat, “Prison of Love”

You know what else we always have room for around here? Ska. Always! Can’t wait for a fourth wave.

Wolves in the Throne Room, “Ahrimanic Trance”

Wolves in the Throne Room are one of the biggest bands in black metal, by showing a path that could take the aesthetics of the music but apply a different frame. They merge an ecological consciousness and an atmospheric approach at times that is not just pure fury. It’s hacky to say that their music evokes the distant, misty forests of the Pacific Northwest, so I definitely will not do that.

Invisibl Skratch Piklz, “Cocaine”

I need to go find some turntable artists operating today. I love this shit.

Gob, “I Hear You Calling”

The bit where the collapse the tune to just the main riff at :40 in, that’s such a pop punk cliche, and it works on me every time. Especially when the drummer leads out of it by opening up the high hat just a little? Some of these things are cliches for good reason.

That’s month four of hitting every day! Woooo!

Mr. T Experience, “I Just Wanna Do It With You”

Too late, Mr. T Experience! Valentine’s Day was two weeks ago! What are you even doing!

Don Caballero, “Our Caballero”

Singles Breaking Up is, indeed, a singles comp. Pittburgh’s instrumental maestros put everything into their singles, so the comp is a solid album, if maybe not quite as coherent as their records due to not being recorded at once. You can do a lot worse than this record!

Kings Destroy, “W2”

You know, there just aren’t that many metal songs about tax forms, so let’s enjoy this one.

The Beatles, “Here Comes The Sun”

I’ve mentioned it before, but it’s been a while: it’s really disorienting listening to the Beatles with only one headphone in. I recommend it!

Big Black, “Dead Billy”

This song comes from the first Big Black release, Lungs (later collected with a couple other EPs on The Hammer Party). While it shows off Steve Albini’s dark sense of humor, the rest of his sound is still extremely embryonic here. This was a solo effort by him, and the lack of other contributors also helped produce the spare tunes.

The Beatles, “It Won’t Be Long”

With The Beatles is easily my least listened to album from them. It’s kind of hard to construct the thought process that would lead me to throw it on, honestly.

House of Rhythm, “Rudi”

There’s more than a little first wave in House of Rhythm, making them something of an outlier from the rest of the third wave of ska. That’s a common comment you’ll find on a lot of the third wave bands we get here, and that’s because I tried to seek out the ska bands, rather than the ska-punk and ska-adjacent stuff.

Swans, “Better Than You”

The late 80s/early 90s vesion of the band is probably the one that is most different from the other iterations. The period began with Burning World, the first (and last) Swans major-label release, which was a commercial disaster and an artistic mess. The other albums of that period (White Light From The Mouth of Infinity, Love of Life, and Ten Songs For Another World which was technically from World of Skin but who cares) were better artistically, but this is kind of the “pretty” Swans period. The albums all went out of print, and stayed that way for a while.

Rage Against the Machine, “Calm Like A Bomb”

The last proper Rage album, The Battle of Los Angeles is also my favorite of their records. It shows the most focus, and they refined their attack to the point of total relentlessness on this one.

The Dillinger Escape Plan, “Jim Fear”

Meanwhile, about a month before Rage released that record, the Dillinger Escape Plan put out Calculating Infinity which…uh, kind of puts “total relentlessness” into perspective.