Ben Quad – Wisher | Album Review

Pure Noise Records

Ben Quad are back. Not only are they back, but they’re fucking huge. Or at least that's what it feels like for those of us in the emo world, anyway.

I first discovered Ben Quad because I was endeared by the idea of a new band using so many interesting tricks and flips from the same dust I grew up in. They’re one of several Oklahoma acts from the past several years to break out of their local scene to more renowned heights, alongside acts like CLIFFDIVER, Chat Pile, and Red Sun. What makes Oklahoma such an outpost for this style of music? I am not quite sure, but earlier this year, I was in Ben Quad’s home state for a couple of concerts. Both nights, I stood outside my hotel room, looking at the way the sky never ends there. If I grew up under that sky, I would try to absorb the world with my guitars, too. 

Wisher is technically Ben Quad’s sophomore album. But between 2022’s I'm Scared That’s All There Is and present day, the band has unleashed a steady flow of releases that tightened their sound and expanded their ambitions. First, they released “You’re Part of It,” a standalone screamo single that felt like an instant addition to the Emo Canon. Then there was Hand Signals, a tour split, and finally Ephemera, their 2024 post-hardcore EP where they cited groups like Underoath and Norma Jean as inspiration. Wisher elaborates on the Ben Quad that Ephemera left behind, offering something not quite as genre-hopping but upholding that harsher sonic twist with even more experimentation. 

Ben Quad have described their new album as “post-emo,” a kind of theoretical subgenre that I’ve heard described as “emo but better” or “not real” depending on who you ask. Whatever it is, it marks a departure from the rules of the original emo sound and a step further into the depths of rock.

Wisher is an album that spans the parking lots of Warped Tour metalcore, the terrain of midwest emo, and the highs of country lilts, all with dizzying guitar tapping, frenzied screaming, and a desperate demand for something better than this. The record is full of “what-ifs,” both sonically and lyrically. What if we dialed this amp to eleven? What if we added tooth-grinding bass here? What if I told them I’m sorry? What if they told me they’re sorry? Say you’re sorry, you’ve been so hard on me. You. You. You.

The album begins with a banjo’s twang on “What Fer,” floating over the atmosphere that Ben Quad are desperately trying to find the limits of. The instrument bends with the breeze before ripping into the sky with electric guitars playing so ferociously you worry they might summon a lightning strike. The energy they build here shocks everything directly into “Painless” where Sam Wegrzynski begs some faceless other to “please just tell me how you’re doing” while Edgar Viveros’ guitar arcs around the song.

It’s at this point that I realized this album is so big that I had to talk to them about it.

Swim Into The Sound: This album sounds massive. As a long-time Ben Quad listener, I have always appreciated how flexible y’all are in your sound, but this is the biggest the band has sounded yet. I know you spoke a bit about the expansive studio access inspiring some of the sound, but what about the scale? 

Edgar Viveros: A lot of that has to do with Jon Markson’s magic. We really wanted to go with someone who could have a major impact on the production of the record. We walked into that studio with the intention of writing bigger choruses, and he knew exactly how to make them sound massive. We had so many new direct influences on the record, too — country, electronic, pop-rock. We knew early on that we wanted to have songs that got as big as a Third Eye Blind, Goo Goo Dolls, or Killers track.

No matter whether the band was tapping out Midwest Emo, post-hardcore, or playing along to an Always Sunny clip, Viveros’ guitar playing has always been a beloved aspect of Ben Quad. His style is very distinct in this era of post-emo: irrevocably fast, intricate, and loud. During live shows, Viveros stands center stage, radiant, as the crowd screams at him to play forever. On Wisher, he does seem to play forever, each song demanding something new and exciting, like the ethereal reverberations of “Classic Case of Guy on the Ground” or the world-absorbing work on the closer, “I Hate Cursive and I Hate All of You.” 

SWIM: I personally hear a lot of the stuff I grew up with — third and fourth wave emo, 2010s metalcore. What music were you inspired by while recording this album? What was it like working with Jon Markson?

VIVEROS: This record was influenced by so many things that I know I’ll probably forget something. The 3rd and 4th wave influence is definitely there. We’re all big fans of stuff like Taking Back Sunday, The All-American Rejects, and Motion City Soundtrack, and I don’t think there’ll ever be a Ben Quad record where my guitar playing won’t be inspired by Algernon Cadwallader and CSTVT. Stuff like Brakence and Porter Robinson heavily inspired the glitched-up guitar samples that are all over the record. There’s a good amount of banjo and slide guitar that draws inspiration from country and folk music. Personally, the recent wave of alt-country, like MJ Lenderman, really inspired me to dive into that style of playing. Beyond that, there’s huge Third Eye Blind and late 90s/early 2000s pop-rock influence. 

When it comes down to it, a lot of this record was us channeling the sounds we loved growing up to make something new. Jon Markson helped out so much with making that vision come together. His perspective was such a valuable resource when we were finalizing songs, and I don’t think I’ve ever worked with anyone who has pushed me to be a better musician as much as he did. It was such a cool experience to wake up and record music all day with him for three weeks. That guy rules. I look forward to being isolated on a farm with him many, many more times.

Photo by Kamdyn Coker

There’s a chance that this album might launch a dozen tweets about Ben Quad not being emo anymore from whatever the remnants of DIY Twitter are posting these days, but know that there’s nothing people can say that Ben Quad doesn’t already know. They make this abundantly clear on “Did You Decide to Skip Arts and Crafts?” with Sam Canty from Treaty Oak Revival.

SWIM: I’ve always heard that Oklahoma sound in your music, but never as much as I hear it in “Did You Decide to Skip Arts and Crafts.” What inspired y’all to bring a country twang to such a loud emo song? Do you see a connection between country and emo?

VIVEROS: I demoed out the instrumentals for that song in the summer of 2024 and really didn’t know where to take it. I kind of just wrote the song structure to be a mixture of big, anthemic Wonder Years choruses and some of the twangier moments in the Beths’ catalogue. It really came together when we invited our friend Sam Canty to hop on the track. That’s when I think we decided to really lean on the arena country-rock sound. I specifically love how Rocklahoma-coded the bridge sounds. Sam Canty’s feature fits so perfectly. I think the link between the two is a lot closer than people think. Sonically, both genres incorporate sparkly single coil guitars, and they both get pretty sad. Country is just farm emo.

I agree with all of the above: the connection between country and emo is storied, they’re both wrought, misunderstood genres that come from the middle of our nation. The aforementioned track starts with a phone call from Canty, playing a detractor of Ben Quad’s ever-evolving sound, telling them that they “ain’t the same anymore.” The song kicks in, and eventually Ben Quad gets him to change his mind and his sound too. Isaac Young clears a space in his drumming for Canty to return to the song to yell too, his Texas accent curving around an exasperated, “I guess it never made a fuckin’ difference to you.”

It’s impossible to discuss this album without acknowledging just how many people are on it; in addition to the Treaty Oak Revival frontman’s appearance, Zayna Youssef from Sweet Pill joins Wegrzynski and Henry Shields to kick your teeth in on “You Wanted Us, You Got Us.” Later on, “West of West” features Nate Hardy of Microwave, who contributes what might be the heaviest moment on the entire LP. It all starts to feel like a totally deserved victory lap, a testament to how big emo (or post-emo) has grown over the past few years, and a reminder of how much Ben Quad has grown since they met each other on a Craigslist post over their love of Microwave and Modern Baseball. 

SWIM: Y’all have called this album a kind of evolution for Ben Quad. How would you describe Ben Quad’s evolution since I’m Scared That’s All There Is, sonically? Since that album, y’all have also toured pretty nonstop (I think I’ve seen you guys three or four times on different tours over the past few years) – How would you describe Ben Quad’s evolution since your debut beyond the sound? Any ideas on what’s next after Wisher?

VIVEROS: I’m Scared That’s All There Is was cool because it was basically us doing emo revival worship with a little bit of a modern twist. Since then, we’ve just been throwing more and more influences into the kettle. I love that you can trace through our discography and see us gradually adding influences of screamo and post-hardcore. This new stuff has country, electronic, pop, and so much more thrown into the mix, and I’m just excited to keep growing that sound moving forward. 

Beyond sound though, I think we’ve grown in a lot of ways since the ISTATI days. We’re way more road-worn. When we released ISTATI, we hadn’t actually done a proper tour. Now, we’re releasing this new record on like our sixth full US tour. That alone has given us so much perspective on the world and many chances to meet a lot of talented and insightful people. I’d say our biggest area of progression has been in the confidence of our songwriting abilities. We’ve put out a handful of releases at this point, so sitting down and writing songs just feels so natural now. We’ve learned to just go with our gut when it comes to making music. I think any writing roadblock we encountered during the recording process was sheerly because we were afraid of sounding too honest or vulnerable. 

At the end of the day, if we think it sounds good, then that’s all that matters. As far as what’s next after Wisher, I have no idea. Maybe we’ll make a real butt-rock record. Some real Breaking Benjamin type shit.

Anything is possible when it comes to Ben Quad. At its heart, that’s what Wisher is about: testing how far post-emo can stretch, showing off the possibilities of the sounds they can craft, and clearing a path for what’s next. On Wisher, Ben Quad ain’t the fucking same anymore, but who would want them to be?

Around this time, three years ago, Ben Quad released “You’re Part of It,” where they chanted endlessly and heart-wrenchingly about how they were just waiting for all of this to fall apart. Unfortunately, with Wisher, they’re just going to have to keep waiting, because this album is universe-engulfing and none of this is falling apart.

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Caro Alt (she/her) is from New Orleans, Louisiana, and if she could be anyone in The Simpsons, she would be Milhouse.

Tiberius – Troubadour | Album Review

Audio Antihero

During my sophomore year of college I recorded a breakup album. It was not very good. When I was writing it, I thought it was a raw—dare I say important—portrait of a self-loathing lover scorned. When I go back and listen to it now though, I find that it’s actually just mean and annoying, a dishonest collection of songs that feature little to no introspection. The main problem is that I ultimately just wanted the person I was writing about to hear the album and feel bad for me, a last-ditch effort to get them back. I was pretending to look at my heart while actually targeting theirs; it was a doomed pursuit from the start. 

When you try and fail at something, it gives you a greater appreciation for those who approach the same task and succeed. People who are able to paint their pain without bitterness coming through as the dominant force make me take note, because I know how hard that can be. This is the main thing that struck me when I first listened to Tiberius’ third album, Troubadour. Throughout the record, we hear about people in Brendan Wright’s life and how they made Wright feel, but the lens through which we see this is consistently pointed inwards. That’s not to say there’s no anger towards others or spiteful words on Troubadour—there’s definitely some of that—but when we do get those ugly feelings, they’re almost always tempered with self-reflection. 

Take, for example, the album’s fourth track “Tag,” where Wright sings: “Went to her apartment when she’s on a date / I’d rather hang with her than not at all / Lying on the lap of some dumb fuck that she doesn’t even like.” No argument from me, definitely anger there, both in the words and in Wright’s vocal affectation, but, this anger is almost immediately cut with the realization that “I just can’t let you know that I despise to be apart / I need to take this time to learn to be alone / And to really be alone I have to be alone.” The song gains a lot from this quick shift in viewpoint, which seeks the internal root of the emotion; it transforms what could be a simple “fuck you” into something more substantial. 

This all works especially well because the record’s path of reflection is not linear; we’ll get a track like “It Has to Be True,” where it feels like things are getting figured out, followed by “Moab,” where we once again find ourselves in despair. Too often, the road to self-actualization is portrayed as a one-way journey, but on this album, it’s presented much more accurately as a rollercoaster; ascendant acceptance that can be followed by a sudden, vindictive drop, only for us to rise again moments later. This is something that’s well encapsulated on “Sitting,” where Wright sings, “Am I starting to have fun? Am I starting to have hope? / Am I starting to be let down? Am I down again?”

There are so many different sounds and genres traversed throughout the record that it feels impossible to touch on them all in a short review. This range makes each song feel huge, with even the shorter tracks having distinct movements that stick with you. After I first played through the album, I thought that I had a few songs stuck in my head, but when I listened back, I found that what I’d been mentally replaying was actually just different parts of “Sag.” I love how this is done because you never get bored as you jump from moments that sound like Uncle Tupelo to moments that sound like DIIV to moments that sound like Modest Mouse, sometimes all within one song. There’s gazey post-hardcore, gut-wrenching emo outpourings, and wide-open indie country soundscapes. To seamlessly switch from one sound to another like this without ever feeling frenetic or scattered is truly impressive, and it all results in a great experience for the listener. 

Existential country rocker “Moab” is probably my favorite song on the record. I thought I might be tapped out on country-influenced alternative music, but I was wrong. Perhaps it’s the vocal inflection in the opening verse when Wright sings “plans her day while laying down for bed,” but something about the song conjures images of the country music I used to listen to as a kid in a way that modern alt-country rarely does. I also love the track’s more anthemic back half, which slows down and brings some indie influences to the table, sounding almost Band of Horses-esque. 

A sonic thread throughout Troubadour that I found to be particularly effective is the subtle use of non-core-to-the-band instruments to make certain moments really stand out. For example, at around 2:45 of “Tag,” bouncing piano chords come in out of nowhere to give things a groovy little boost; similarly, I loved this really reedy and dissonant sax that’s deployed about a third of the way through “Redwood,” giving the song some extra edge as it ramps up. These aren’t the biggest moments that will necessarily knock you over, but cumulatively, they add up and keep you engaged through multiple listens.   

I’d be remiss to talk about Troubadour without mentioning trees, which loom large over the journey the record takes us on. Where this most struck me was on “Sitting,” particularly the lines: “I need to leave again / Meander ‘round the trees / As if I’m looking for the sign / As my brother sings to me / What I'm feeling is alright.” As I listened to this, I thought back to Wim Wenders’ 2023 film, Perfect Days. When I saw the movie in theaters, they had a pre-show clip that featured Wenders and the film’s star, Koji Yakusho, discussing the concept of “komorebi,” a Japanese word that refers to the sunlight as it’s filtered through leaves and trees. This is core to the film, as Yakusho’s character is always able to escape and find joy by photographing the trees in the park where works. The main thing I took away from Perfect Days is that appreciation for the beauty of komorebi—or nature more broadly—is something that’s incredibly centering.

This sort of naturalism is woven throughout the record. In Wright’s own words, Troubadour was written during a period of time where the relationships in their life were changing significantly, likening that experience to ego death. For months, they “found solace in nature and the constant of the trees,” explaining that, for a period, “I felt utterly connected to the universe in a way that was completely outside my sense of self. I was everything all at once, and it was one of the most profound experiences I’ve ever had.”

As we see Wright’s journey through Troubadour and the way that nature and trees factor into it, I’m left feeling the same sense of power. That centering is key to everything. That’s why, by the time we get to the end of the roller coaster with “Barn,” we’re ultimately somewhere placid and peaceful, even if there is still some sadness along with it. It’s why we get reflection rather than just anger and why the album has such depth. It’s what separates those who can make a work like this—something truly reflective—from those stuck lashing out in attack mode. With that as the foundation, everything else clicks into place and we’re left with a really special record. These types of experiences are never linear, nor are their conclusions definite. In the case of Troubadour, the ending is satisfying, not because we’re at the end of a journey but because we feel like we’re finally on the right path. We’re left with reasons to keep pushing, and sometimes that’s all you need. 

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Josh Ejnes is a writer and musician living in Chicago. He has a blog about cassette tapes called Tape Study that you can find here, and he also makes music under the name Cutaway Car.

Stop Streaming, Start Listening

You know that James Baldwin quote that’s something along the lines of “Every writer has only one story to tell, and he has to find a way of telling it until the meaning becomes clearer and clearer”? Well, sometimes that’s how I feel with this blog, and this post might be my most concerted effort to articulate that yet. 

I’ve written critically about Spotify before: about how the streaming service has made music feel disposable, how they can yank your songs away at a moment’s notice, how they encourage streaming bloat and gluttonous album rollouts, how they’ve alienated the listening public from their own libraries and laid the groundwork for an algorithmically generated hellscape long before anyone realized it was happening. Combined, these articles add up to over 10k words against Spotify, and that’s just the stuff that I’ve written. 

Spotify made fake genres and fake musicians. They underpay artists and overpay bigots. They brought back payola and chased TikTok endless scrolling in a bid for our increasingly worsening attention spans. If quotes like Spotify saying that the company’s “only competitor is silence” didn’t tip you off, this is not an artful app designed by people who care about music. Rather, Spotify is an experience designed around collecting your data, funneling money upwards, and contributing to the “contentization” of music. Everything is designed to keep you in the app to track you for longer, facilitating surveillance creep in the process. There have been entire books written and podcasts recorded dedicated to covering how Spotify is actively ruining music, so all the hyperlinks shouldn’t be too surprising. 

As if there already wasn’t enough to criticize Spotify for, most recently, the company’s CEO, Daniel Ek, chipped in nearly 700 Million Euros toward an “AI defense company” called Helsing. Even though this isn’t the first time he’s reinforced that allegiance, this recent warmongering double-down has spurred a wave of discussion about the place Spotify holds in our lives and what we might be actively contributing toward, either with our $10 monthly subscription or with our time and attention. Bands like Deerhoof, Xiu Xiu, King Gizzard, and Hotline TNT have all removed their music from Spotify in direct protest to this news, sparking a long-overdue reckoning with the application that acts as the de facto hub for all things music. 

While these are relatively modest household names in the indie community (they’re no Neil Young or Joni Mitchell), these artists have acted swiftly and decisively, and one after the other, each making explicit statements about why they’re making this decision in their own words. “We don't want our music killing people. We don't want our success being tied to AI battle tech,” Deerhoof wrote. In an interview with Anthony Fantano, Jamie Steward of Xiu Xiu stated it plainly, saying that “bands lost the battle with streaming.”

In response, many people have been cancelling their Spotify subscriptions (met with a creepy "goodbye" playlist in a feeble plea to reel you in one last time), but hopping from one streaming company to another isn’t the entire solution. Swapping Spotify for Apple or Amazon on moral grounds is laughable—no ethical consumption and all that. Sure, cancelling your Spotify subscription sends a message, but I believe the bigger solution is to disentangle as much as you can. 

All the time, people ask me how I find new music, and the answer is never any one thing; it’s more to do with an underlying curiosity. It’s not just opening Spotify and clicking on whatever playlist the algorithm sputters out; it’s following bands and keeping tabs on their label. It involves digging through related artists and seeing which groups a band is touring with. It’s going to see the opening act or creeping through someone’s Bandcamp collection to discover other albums they've purchased. It’s following writers and small blogs (cough cough) to see what they recommend. In an era where AI threatens to water down and homogenize literally every aspect of life, flawed but earnest human creations and recommendations are going to win out every time.

When you approach music this way, with the idea that your new favorite band could be one click away, something beautiful happens. You’re no longer waiting for your favorite artist to drop another album; you’re making your own luck and digging until you find something that scratches an itch you didn’t even know you had. It’s music culture vs platform culture.

As with all technofascism, I believe that breaking out of the currently designed scroll cycle, logging off, and spending your attention elsewhere is an act of defiance. In that regard, having control over your own files is about as radical an act as a music fan can make in 2025. I currently have over 80k songs in my iTunes library. I say that not to boast, but to show that it’s possible to have a bunch of music you care for in one place. It’s rewarding and worthwhile and intimate and can even be a fun hobby. 

Go download some albums. Spend an afternoon burning all your old CDs. Redeem those codes that came on the little slips of paper in your vinyl. Go into Bandcamp and press “download” on everything in your library, even if it’s just to keep them in a folder somewhere on your desktop. What you might find is that that collection of music feels more representative of you and your taste than whatever Spotify is shoving into your face on the home screen. As you build this library out and listen to it, you might find you need Spotify less and less. 

There’s no escaping the fact that your money is going somewhere evil, so I think most of this boils down to intentional listening. It’s about asking yourself what you want and putting a record on, not letting Spotify tell you what it thinks you want. It’s about engaging with what you’re taking in, thinking about what you consume, and supporting what you enjoy. It’s about being informed, empowered, and making intentional decisions. 

Ultimately, the solution to so much of this is just a modicum more autonomy. The cool thing is, we can grant ourselves that.

Anamanaguchi – Anyway | Album Review

Polyvinyl Record Co.

The ground is firmly under your feet. Your gaze rises to greet an open street lined with trees and grass and apartment complexes that are knotted like corridors of a maze. The wind is warm and breezing past you as you trek one leg in front of the other. The sound of footfalls to the left and right let you know that your best friends in the whole world are right by your side. These are relationships forged across God-knows-how-many dreary hours of school, eyes aching in anticipation of the clock chiming the hour of freedom, releasing you into countless untold adventures through backyards, pools, and playgrounds throughout the summer months. A sense of wonder and excitement begins to bloom in your chest, and you can’t help but think, “I wonder what’s next?”

Whatever Anamanaguchi may have intended when they arrived at the American Football House to write their fourth full-length studio album, what they ultimately landed on was this: a collection of songs that feel as filled with emotion and childlike abandon as they do with air-guitar-inducing riffs, windows-down full-belt choruses, and an irresistible desire to drink in the setting sun. The music video for “Darcie” reads as a prime example of this. Shot in the world-famous Champagne, Urbana emo landmark, the playful fun of the track is paired with heartfelt lyrical recollections of a local legend. The video’s conceit sees the band reckoning with constant upgrades as their mics are replaced with popstar headsets and their instruments abruptly change size or are swapped for double-neck guitars. Throughout it all, a genuinely good hang is on full display.

Known as one of the preeminent bands in the chiptune genre, Anamanaguchi has been creating ultra-melodic 8-bit rock as far back as 2006. With a focus on instrumentals and a penchant for NES-style bleeps and bloops, it only made sense that the group would create the soundtrack for the Scott Pilgrim video game, contribute to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade-style beat ‘em up, and score their own high-concept experimental game. They’ve soundtracked podcasts, covered Nirvana, and collaborated with everyone from Hatsune Miku to Porter Robinson. It was only natural for the band to reach this point nearly two decades into their career and wonder “what’s next?” 

Turns out what’s next is Anway, a twelve-song collection billed as Anamanaguchi’s first “lyrically driven rock record.” Though it’s landing at the tail end of summer, the album bursts with the energy, wonder, and unadulterated sprawling joys of carefree summers’ past. Recorded by Dave Fridmann (The Flaming Lips, MGMT, Sleater-Kinney), the album’s embrace of vintage gear and straight-to-tape approach captures the scratchy incandescence of fireworks and sweating through your lightest clothes after playing for hours under an unset sun. 

This sensation is telegraphed clearly with the opening track “Sparkler,” a fuzzed-out rager which makes it clear that tapping shoegaze wunderkinds Ovlov open for them on tour was not some random decision. As pixels sparkle and guitars explode, it’s easy to imagine how well the song will translate to a packed, sweaty rock crowd. 

Later on, “Magnet” is a proper grungy alt-rock love song about a “dark romance that feels like it's gliding out of control in a blissful way,” with the band explaining, “We realized that this balance is a key part of the formula for Batman music.” Following that logic to its extreme, Anamanaguchi decided to turn this into a pitch to be in the next Batman movie, teaming up with Jared Raab of Nirvanna the Band the Show for a hilarious yet endearingly sweet homage to the lost art of the movie tie-in music video. Everything from Tim Burton’s 1989 classic to Nolan’s Batman and 2022’s Battinson are on the table as Anamanaguchi’s band members are spliced into pivotal scenes from the franchise’s various films, making for a marvelously edited music video. If this all sounds a bit confusing, the band has created this helpful chart to explain the various waves of Batrock.

While on first pass this graph reads as a funny instance of overcommitting to the bit, it’s actually a perfect example of the type of geeky dedication with which Anamanaguchi approaches their art. A studied band adept at richly texturing their music, the group display an omnivorous admiration for a multitude of rock genres throughout Anyway, accurately capturing the freeing, free-wheeling nature of jamming with your buds. 

“Rage (Kitchen Sink)” feels like it’s trying to capture the spiraling misery of everything while also offering a glimpse of hope towards the end. The gentle, plodding melody climbing up against the band’s classic chiptune scales is an absolute blast to witness. “Valley of Silence” has the type of gorgeous, melancholy groove you’d find on a deep cut by The Cure, complete with a long, winding instrumental introduction to set the mood. One track before that, the cascading pianos of “Sapphire” evoke flashes of Culture Club and soaring '90s arena rock as the lyrics recount a loose history of the band, showcasing appreciation for their roots and the tools that brought them to this point in their storied career.

There are rug pulls and genre pivots abound. The immediate urgency of “Fall Away” performed a bait and switch on me as the track’s middle section steps the pace back before ramping back into a huge surge of instruments, bits and bytes all swirling into a technicolor cascade before sliding into a fuzzy, prickly layer of feedback. One of my favorite tracks on the album, “Buckwild,” lies smack dab in the middle and is a Wild Hogs-referencing track that opts for the nerdy pleasure of scoring a sought-after DVD at a yard sale over a night out on the town. Even with each half-turn to different shades of rock music, everything fits together beautifully and still sounds unmistakably Anamanaguchi. The variety is both staggering and engaging, and not just because of where the band has come from. 

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You finally reach your destination. Friends and neighbors surround you in a semi-circle of chairs. You're handed a bowl of popcorn as your friends cradle candy and hot dogs, things that act as the perfect complement to the end of the day. Sodas, waters, and sparkling seltzers are handed out liberally. Somewhere off to the side, someone's father is grilling over a quick setup hibachi, and a hush falls over everyone as they tell you it’s about to start. Your eyes meet the first to fire into the sky. A lone trail of flame and stardust connects with a particular black spot where it was meant to go and explodes into a menagerie of color and sound. 

All the apprehension and twists and turns of the summer heat are beating upon your body till it feels like it’s cooking your bones. All the long walks and bike rides and time spent rollerblading have led to these moments where you get to stare into the night sky, surrounded by the people you care about. You're facing everything together, and you’re watching all the lights in the sky come up one after another. The immense and massive sound feels like it’s rattling your teeth. You feel every moment of the last few months – all the sticky days, the pool parties, the birthdays, the overeating, the trips to the mall, the walks off the beaten path into a hidden creek that you're sure no one else knows about. 

Anyway finds each of these moments and spreads them across its dozen tracks, giving you a long journey to walk, but not an unfamiliar one. When the four members of Anamanaguchi assembled in that infamous emo house, they rediscovered the one simple truth that, if you’re having fun, making music with your friends is the most natural thing in the world. Even as the band takes a conscious step away from the “pure” chiptune sound of their previous work, what remains is something just as true and just as representative of what it feels like to be a fan of music, movies, video games, and art. 

The one final truth that Anamanaguchi can offer to us with this album is that sometimes life is actually just really fun. Even in despair. Even in horror. Even as atrocities steal our breath and we experience a full-body chill for every autoplaying document of cruelty, we still have each other, we still have music, and we still have the hope of something better. 

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Southern California-born and raised, Elias can often be found at the local gig, be it screamo, emo, hardcore, or online @listentohyakkei, begging people to listen to theMANS Summer 2007 demo. Their time in the scene is patchwork, but their dedication to it and the music that makes it has made up the last few years of their life. They love this shit with the whole of their heart and will talk your ear off about it if you let them.
Screamo for fucking ever.
Love Your Friends, Die Laughing.

Hater’s Delight – 2025 Edition

It’s hard to look around lately and think ‘You know what the world could use more of? hate.’ Of course there’s an abundance of hatred, animosity, division, and destruction right now. I’d argue it’s our number one export. 

Every morning I wake up with a pit in my stomach, scrambling for meaning and stability as I take in a torrent of crushing news alerts, outright rejections, and full-scale desperation. It all feels uniquely bad, and the idea of adding more negativity on top of that doesn’t feel like a way out. 

What does feel like a way out is leaning on each other. Finding strength in those around us who feel the same way and raising our voices together in displeasure. As much as I am a lover and an enjoyer and an optimist, it’s hard to deny the deep-down primal satisfaction of being in the presence of people who feel the same way about the same things and venting together. It’s not a solution to every problem, but damn it feels good to let it out. 

We’re going to zoom into the same corner of the world that we always operate in, which is to say we’re going to take a break from recommending music we like and think you should listen to in order to focus our attention on parts of this ecosystem that have rotted beyond repair. Just as Mood Machine exposed the evils of Spotify (now fully out in the open), this all feels symptomatic of larger issues. We may only be talking about one thing that might seem insignificant on the surface, but dig deep enough and you’ll find it’s tied to something deeper. Join us as we uproot the evil together and voice our unhappiness with The Current Arrangement. Hopefully whatever’s on the other side looks better than this.

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The Genericization of Metalcore or: When Genre Labels Break Down 

I hate genres. I hate the way that, as culture shifts and evolves, genres fail to recognize change until it's too late. I hate the endless gatekeeping that comes with a genre reaching new audiences and thus redefining itself. So, I plead: just be normal.

Metalcore, originating as a style that blends extreme metal and hardcore punk, has evolved from being a niche genre to a commercial behemoth that’s reached the general public, netting radio hits, Grammys, and sold-out arenas. For a brief crash course, I recommend listening to Converge’s “Effigy,” a grindy, guitar-forward track full of distorted screaming and flying instrumental parts. It’s heavy on the hardcore drumming and metal riffs, blending the two effortlessly for a perfect example of “classic metalcore.”

For something completely different, queue up Sleep Token’s “Caramel,” a song that many would class as “post-metalcore” or “Octanecore.” If you're listening to this one and thinking, ‘this doesn't sound like the other example at all,’ you’d be right. This is the shape much of metalcore has taken in the 2020s – trading riffs and brutality for commercially viable melodies, synth beds, and pop song structures with the occasional breakdown thrown in to remind audiences that they still want the metalcore label.

These songs clearly don't belong in the same genre, musically or culturally. This leads to old-school metalcore fans feeling upset that their spaces are being invaded by bands that don't resemble the genre they love, while new fans are upset because they aren’t being allowed inside the tent.

The gatekeeping is what really grates on me. Open up and allow new things inside. Perhaps you'll appreciate having variety, new friends, and a greater community that can raise all ships. We simply want to share in the fun while being introduced to music that expands our palates. Instead of closing the gate behind you, show someone new Better Lovers and invite them in. That’s what I'm going to do.

– Noëlle Midnight

Stop teasing me like I’m a child

I can not tell you how excited I was when Gouge Away returned in May 2023 with “Idealized,” five years after their last album, Burnt Sugar. I can not tell you how annoying it was to wait until JANUARY 2024 for their third record, Deep Sage, to be announced and see “Idealized” on the tracklist. So many bands are utilizing a strategy like this: dropping one single and pretending it is a loosie, then a month or two later announcing their next record, including said prior single. Jeff Rosenstock did it with “Liked U Better” and Hellmode, Mannequin Pussy did it with the title track of I Got Heaven, and I’m sure Courtney Barnett is doing it now with whatever album “Stay In Your Lane” will be on. It’s like we’re pretending Santa exists: ‘Oh we got a single, I wonder what this is related to, teehee. 

All of this does immediately go away once the album is out. No one but nerds like me will remember when a random single dropped; the context of the album will outweigh this complaint in the FOREVER after release… But why do we have to wait that long for the context? 

Be a grown-up. Announce your fucking album. Or give me a B-side as a little treat.

– Lillian Weber

Not Everyone Needs A Country Album 

The resounding opinion of your favorite local bar band goes something like this: “I love country music, but only the real stuff. Waylon, Willie, and Johnny. Not any of that bro country or stadium country.” Okay, I understand the sentiment that Ticketmaster country or coworker country doesn’t feel as genuine as the genre’s flagship men and women of the ‘60s and ‘70s, but I have no reason to deny myself a few actually great songs by Brad Paisley or Blake Shelton, Kelsea Ballerini, or Maren Morris. What I do feel isn’t genuine is every mega pop star getting their piece of the country radio pie. Beyoncé, Post Malone, Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, reportedly Lana Del Rey, and a slew of other already-hitmakers have been crossing over to cowboy hat territory since the once-primarily Middle American sound started bleeding out of every grocery store speaker across the nation. I actually commend Taylor Swift for staying in a traditional pop lane in her stratospheric rise, as opposed to reverting back to her original style, although it’s possible that streak may end soon.

Five years ago, Halsey scored one of her biggest career hits with “You Should Be Sad,” an indirectly country-influenced emo-pop track that had a heavy western saloon theme in its music video and Saturday Night Live performance, both of which may be in the top five all-time clips of a singer looking head-spinningly stunning on camera. I think, secretly, this was the genesis of the POP pop country boom of the 2020s, just like Lana Del Rey’s “Video Games” music video and infamous SNL clip was the secret genesis of the moody, sad girl pop star streak of Billie Eilish, Clairo, and, well, Halsey. I love country music in most of its forms, but there’s definitely enough of it out there, and I have no use for a saturated sound from new millionaire adopters.

– Logan Archer Mounts

Take a Breath

This is going to sound fucking insane to say as a guy who runs a music blog where we often post reviews on the day of an album’s release, but I think people need to chill out on the sweeping declarations. This applies to everything from the hyperbolic Geese claims to the outright dismissal of anything that doesn’t immediately “hit” or cement itself as part of the zeitgeist. 

Some of my favorite albums this year have been comforting and slow-simmering records that have grown on me gradually over time and with repeated listens. On first brush, these albums can appear reserved or down-the-middle, but that kind of dismissal is not one of a music fan, merely someone trying to have a take for attention, engagement, and affirmation. 

By rushing to these types of claims, you’re closing any sort of ongoing relationship with the art. One of my favorite things about music (and one of its most mystical aspects) is the imperceptible way a band, album, or song can infiltrate your existence and morph over time, growing in importance or association as it reflects off different things in your life. Having a knee-jerk reaction to the popular thing forces you into this game of extremes, potentially shutting yourself off from a more rich and complex experience. I suppose I’m telling this to myself, too. 

Part of me understands in a world that’s ever-accelerating, where tens of thousands of artists (both real and fake) upload songs every day. The desire to overreact is appealing, to break through if nothing else. Even when this very site publishes a review of an album on the day that it releases, there’s an implicit understanding that the writer has spent time with this record digesting the music, is recommending it for some reason or another, but is ultimately presenting it as an option for you to take off into your own life so you can formulate your own unique connection to it. To me, that makes way more sense as a way to approach art, not immediately exalting something as the best thing ever or brushing a release off as mid after a cursory listen. Give yourself time. Go back and revisit an album you forgot about. Spend time with a record and develop an understanding of it through an ongoing relationship between yourself and the music. I promise it’s much more rewarding than rushing to be the first one to make a bold claim. 

– Taylor Grimes

Don’t Even Think About Changing That Album Cover

Back in my day, you only got one album cover, and that was it. It was unthinkable to even suggest a different one, maybe with the exception of a cool deluxe version for the superfans. But something bad shifted this year.

I have identified three categories of album cover changes: the Overly Online, the Re-Do, and the Variants. The Overly Online album cover change is mostly an Internet phenomenon, a product of a music culture dominated by streaming; a prime example is Charli xcx BRAT-ifying her other albums for like a year. The Re-Do is when an artist totally changes their cover. This is pretty rare, but Lucy Dacus did it earlier this year for Forever is a Feeling. I agree with her that the new one looks better than the original, but no takesies backsies. “because… I want to and I can!” has to be the dorkiest thing any artist has posted all year, and I am a Lucy fan! The Variants is obviously whatever Taylor Swift is doing — multiple official covers for one album. She’s been doing this for a while, but her latest album cycle was the most overwhelming. Sabrina Carpenter also opted for Variants while courting controversy over the original Man’s Best Friend cover. If you’re going to be controversial, at least stick with it. Don’t release like three other regular versions, I thought this meant something to you. 

I just think it's such a pathetic thing to do. Switching a cover makes me think that you’re not confident in your album at a minimum or insecure about your art at a maximum. We are trapped in a world that demands content, but you do not have to cave to the mob with more covers! We are stuck with streaming for the foreseeable future, but you don’t have to change a cover just because the website has a setting that lets you! Everything is fleeting, stand by that damn cover and for the love of God, do not edit your songs!!!!!!

– Caro Alt

The Dichotomy is Crazy

Every time I visit my corner of the internet sphere, I experience the fleeting hope that I won’t come across another mediocre Punk-Goes-Pop-style cover on my Explore or fyp page. And without exception, that hope is immediately crushed as a video of yet another alternative man in Carhartts and a condom beanie asks the camera, “What if [insert any pop song here] was pop-punk?” I groan and throw my phone across the room as I’m blinded by rage. These all sound the same. Can’t any of you people come up with an original idea that isn’t ‘Pop Song Becomes Pop-Punk Song’? The obvious perpetrators of this trend need to get back in the studio and write their own music. I am begging them to look inward and come up with a chord progression of their own. Girls aren’t going to think you’re complex because you listen to Sabrina Carpenter. “Manchild” was never intended to be pop-punk. Stop trying to make fetch happen. It’s not going to happen.

– Britta Joseph

Colored Contacts 

I haven’t seen the Bruce Springsteen movie, and I won’t, because Bruce Springsteen has brown eyes, and they couldn’t trouble themselves to cast someone with brown eyes. I refuse to engage with colored contacts on any level.

To anyone involved in the choosing of colored contacts in any capacity, ever: You think we can’t tell they’re contacts? We’re not stupid!!!!!!!  

– Katie Hayes

Blowing up and acting like you don’t know your old albums 

I was very excited to see that one of the best bands in Minnesota was finally gearing up to release a second record. Gully Boys, the Twin Cities quartet-via-trio, has held a steady and special place in the heart of the local scene since they proudly declared their existence with 2018’s LP, Not So Brave. Singles, tours, and two stellar EPs came and went, until the early 2025 announcement of Gully Boys, the group’s… debut??

At some point, every digital version of Not So Brave was affixed with a new, undermining addendum: (Demos). This isn't the first example of a band seemingly trying to hide their early music by abandoning it to a fate of digital flotsamhood. To name a couple more examples, both 2025 Indie Rock Discourse Champs™ Geese and Wednesday have disowned their debuts. Rechristening one’s first major release, recorded at arguably MN’s most famous studio, as just a bunch of demos is an interesting attempt to have your cake and juggle it too—maximizing the promotional synergy of a faux-first LP without completely deleting the past.

I would chalk most of it up to the need for narrative. It’s not the Boys’ fault that parasocial attachment and relentless engagement are the only non-freak-accident ways to grasp at success. The new album, technically GB’s second self-titled release, is excellent. The quartet finally feels like a quartet. Every hook gleams with grungy radiance. Despite or maybe because of it, Gully Boys doesn’t sound like a debut. The years of work—getting in the van, community organizing at home, writing and recording — are blisteringly apparent. Especially after covering the band for years, the most satisfying aspect of Gully Boys is the improvement, the sharpening, the palpable joy of ever-deepening collaboration. Rewriting your discographical history via misdirection only masks how hard you worked to get here.

– aly eleanor

Streaming’s Steroid Era 

Welp, it appears we’ve officially entered the “steroid era” of album sales. In Young Thug’s leaked jailhouse tapes, the Atlanta rapper embraced the role of neighborhood gossip, spilling piping hot tea on everyone from Outkast to Drake and even Kendrick Lamar. Between the prison chatter, something stood out to me like a sore thumb on a hand model. Young Thug admitted to spending $50K on fake streams for Gunna, an artist on his label at the time, to debut at #1 over The Weeknd’s Dawn FM. What happened to the game I love? Next to Adam Silver’s insistent greed that is ruining basketball, this is the next biggest scandal in my world.

If an artist like Young Thug can brazenly go about botting streams for one of his artists, what’s stopping literally any other record label, especially the large ones, from doing that very same thing? I don’t know what or who to believe anymore when news comes across my desk about an artist selling an extraordinary number of records. At least during the “steroid era” in baseball, we got to see dingers being pimped out over 500-plus feet. This “steroid era” is just fake numbers going up higher than other fake numbers, and that feels cheap, slimy, and uncompelling to say the least.

– David Williams

Production Should Suck More

More music needs to have shittier production. Crisp, pristine production used to make sense for radio-oriented music: artists wanted their work to be as clear and perfect-sounding as possible in order to appeal to as many listeners as possible. In the clutches of the streaming era, there needs to be more interesting choices than making everything sound like a polished plastic water cup at Denny’s. Even music in the DIY space has taken on a timbre that sounds too nice for a freak like me—someone who wants to listen to music with some heckin’ character. Steve Albini was onto something in his attempts to capture sounds exactly how they are instead of just trying to polish an artifact. The former is a photograph, while the latter sits unappreciated on a shelf. If a production too polished flies too close to a generic sun, it burns up in its atmosphere. I would rather freeze in the dark shadow of an imperfect moon.  

– Joe Wasserman

Down with the Bits

I’m so tired of the gimmicks and the skits. The Sallys, the Junos, the Apple Girls, the Johannas, and whatever improv from hell Sombr is doing making teenage girls call their fellow teenage exes mid-concert in what logically can only be an effort to eat up time. Addison Rae pulls audience members onstage to scream with her during the “Von dutch” remix. PinkPantheress plucks a boy from the crowd each night to be her “Romeo.” They’re fan service at best and Hail Marys to appease the algorithm at worst, all born out of the hope that one more viral Pop Crave clip will keep the tour relevant.

It’s different from Justin Bieber’s fanfic-worthy “One Less Lonely Girl” schtick, or Janet Jackson “making miscellaneous uncs shoot poison on stage” in the early aughts. It’s also different from Lady Gaga getting the kid in the orange shirt on stage for the “Schieße” dance break at the Born This Way Ball. The former two, Jackson especially, were way before clips on Twitter had an actual impact on public discourse, let alone ticket sales. Bieber was leaning into his teen heartthrob, while Gaga’s was a serendipitous moment of recognition for one special longtime Little Monster, a shooting star in the greater Monster canon. 

All I ask is that everyone start to exercise a little more restraint. Lean into the element of surprise, uncertainty, and possibility. How many mid-40s actresses need to pretend they know the words to that Role Model song before we can all admit we’ve never heard it before? Wasn’t it painful enough when it was The Dare??? How many more sex positions are we going to make Sabrina Carpenter think of???? I’m tired.

– Cassidy Sollazzo

Notes App =/= Promotion

Apparently Instagram has started pushing anything Notes app-related higher in the algorithm, which has cascaded into artists, bands, celebrities, and anyone with something to say (or, more than likely, a lack thereof) utilizing the app to try to get in front of people. Your notes app is for your grocery lists, not for your apologies, announcements, or aggrandizements. Unless you’ve actually got something to say, you don’t have to push that stupid Calibri-whatever font onto your followers. It feels almost like a form of mockery. It’s a strange and truly terminally online type of thing to feel any sort of way about. We know you didn’t rob the Louvre, you don’t have to post about your whereabouts through that stupid app to get your dopamine fix. Go type in a Word document!

– Samuel Leon

Geese are Making Me Feel Old 

It’s not about Geese, it’s about me. I really enjoy the new Geese album, Getting Killed. It's so good! We all know this, but throughout the hyped rollout and far-flung claims upon the album’s release, I felt myself feeling weird about it. I couldn’t figure out why, and that really bothered me. Then, I saw footage from their free show in Brooklyn, and it all became clear. It wasn’t that I couldn’t be there in Brooklyn for the show; it was because seeing all of those kids together celebrating what seems to be “the band” of their generation helped me to understand that I’ve aged. I’m not ancient, I’m in my early thirties, but this is the first time I’ve had to grapple with the fact that I’m no longer a part of “the youth,” and that makes me feel weird and uncertain. I feel like I’ve transitioned from being an active participant to more of a witness. I can go to a Geese show, but it would be in poor taste for me to weasel my way into a space up front because that’s for the kids. This is their moment.

– Connor Fitzpatrick

ISO: Better Band Names, Better Bands 

Every day I get emails (I could just end the entry there tbh) about bands with the most uninspired, nothingburger-no-cheese names ever. All love to Shower Curtain and Computer and Guitar, but your names do not live up to the music they’re representing. All love to Wednesday, whose frontwoman Karly Hartzman has publicly rejoiced the ungoogleability of her band’s name, especially after the success of Netflix’s Addams Family spinoff of the same name, and one throwaway bit in another Netflix show in which Wednesday was literally the name of a band that doesn’t exist. 

The rule of thumb is that if your band is good enough and/or the bit is funny enough, you can have a generic-ass SEO-unfriendly name (the search results for “Geese Getting Killed” used to be much more violent, even though now what comes up is sometimes related to having a bomb in your car). But as for the rest of you, don’t come into MY humble inbox telling me I just HAVE to listen to the sprawling and ethereal new shoegaze record from a Philly band called “Couch.” Yes. I just made that shit up because it’s easy to come up with a bullshit one-word band name when you spend exactly two seconds thinking of a band name. Couch, the band does not exist, or maybe they do, either way, I have no fucking way of knowing because googling “Couch band” is probably not gonna yield any worthwhile results. Besides, how sprawling and ethereal can a band called Couch even be? 

My other gripe is that no one knows how to do an album rollout anymore. If you release eight singles ahead of an eleven-song album, I hope your next tour is an endless hurricane of tomatoes. 

– Grace Robins-Somerville