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sagehaleyofficial · 5 years ago

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HERE’S WHAT YOU MISSED THIS WEEK (10.23-10.29.19):

NEW MUSIC:

· While currently slated to continue touring the record well into 2020, Billie Eilish and her brother FINNEAS are already working on new ideas for her next album. During an interview on Apple Music’s Beats 1, FINNEAS confirmed that the duo is currently working on new music.

· New Found Glory debuted the final video from their recently released From the Screen to Your Stereo 3, the third in a series of film-inspired covers. They rounded out the seven videos with “Accidentally in Love” off the film Shrek 2.

· According to Slash Film, writer and director Kevin Smith revealed that Gerard Way has been recruited to score the upcoming Clerks 3 film. The news was revealed while Smith is currently on the road promoting the Jay and Silent Bob Reboot.

· The 1975 debuted a brand new track from their forthcoming fourth album, Notes on a Conditional Form. Marking the second song from the album, “Frail State of Mind” hits on the topic of anxiety.

· Simple Creatures released a new music video for their song “One Little Lie.” Directed by Morgan Freed, the video features the dynamic duo of Mark Hoppus and Alex Gaskarth in an epic “true or false?” pop-up trivia game.

· We the Kings surprised fans with a brand-new single, “Turn It Up.” The new song comes just two weeks after their epic collab with current tourmates Simple Plan and State Champs, “Where I Belong.”

· The Regrettes dropped an early holiday gift off in the form of a new track called “Holiday-ish.” The new song, also featuring 13 Reasons Why actor and Willows vocalist Dylan Minnette, will also be released as a 7” vinyl available on November 29th.

· Highly Suspect dropped their latest single, “Canals,” off of their upcoming third full-length record, MCID. At the beginning of this month, the band released a new collaboration with rapper Young Thug called “Tokyo Ghoul.”

TOUR ANNOUNCEMENTS:

· We Are the In Crowd announced that they will be returning for Slam Dunk Festival 2020, which hits the UK next summer. The festival took to socials to reveal the next round of announcements, which includes the band.

· Anti-Flag will be heading across North America and Europe starting this month and capping off in 2020. They’ll be receiving support from Grade 2 and Doll Skin on one leg of the tour, with Bad Cop/Bad Cop and Grumpster handling other dates.

· Green Day announced a one-off, small-venue show (only 2,500 capacity) in Madrid. Since the announcement, there have been some serious clues pointing to Green Day playing Dookie front-to-back at the Spanish venue, La Riviera.

· Halsey hosted her annual Halloween Party in Los Angeles and she brought along a very special guest in Avril Lavigne for an incredible performance. The two singers linked up for a duet of Lavigne’s hit track “Girlfriend” during Halsey’s performance.

· Coheed and Cambria have canceled their remaining 2019 tour dates after drummer Josh Eppard fainted during the band’s set on Friday. The band released a statement revealing that Eppard would be undergoing a heart procedure to close an “extra pathway” to his heart.

· Some Waterparks fans expressed concern over Yung Pinch due to the language used in some of his tracks, which frontman Awsten Knight addressed on Twitter. Yung Pinch later released a statement on his social media, apologizing for his lyrics.

· At the final show of Grayscale’s UK run in Southampton, Benjamin Langford-Biss of As It Is jumped up and shared vocal duties for “Palette.” The guitarist took to social media earlier last month to announce his departure from the band.

OTHER NEWS:

· YUNGBLUD celebrated the release of his latest EP with a high-energy performance of his Dan Reynolds collab, “Original Me.” The Imagine Dragons vocalist joined the musician on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert last Monday night.

· Waterparks secured the No. 1 spot on Billboard’s Emerging Artists chart. Released via Hopeless Records on October 11th, their latest album Fandom also debuted at No. 2 on the Alternative Albums chart, No. 5 on Top Rock Albums and No. 32 on the Billboard 200.

· This year’s American Music Awards nominations include Post Malone, Panic! at the Disco, Halsey and more. Known as the largest fan-voted award show, the ceremony is set to take place on November 24th in Los Angeles.

· A Kickstarter has been launched to fund the docu-series The Story of Warped Tour. Originally believed to be a four-part series, the Kickstarter launched last Thursday and is seeking $150,000 to fund the three-part series.

· Ice Nine Kills teamed up with Swan City Bagels in Orlando, Florida, for a special horror-themed bagel. The circle of baked bread is called “The Silver S-cream Cheese” and is available for a limited time.

· Twenty One Pilots’ Josh Dun posted a clip of him and boxer Glenn Holmesla training on the steps where Sylvester Stalone famously trained in Rocky. Dun also revealed he’s been doing boxing training every day for the past two weeks.

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Check in next Tuesday for more “Posi Talk with Sage Haley,” only at @sagehaleyofficial!

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brokeandunknownlifestyle · 5 years ago

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FANDOM By Waterparks: A Review (by Taylor Dakota)

Back in October, Waterparks released their third album, FANDOM, and I’d be lying to you if I told you it didn’t instantly become one of my favorites after the first listen. Because it did. And with all the songs being exceedingly catchy (including the rip-your-heart-out ones such as “High Definition” and “Never Bloom Again”) and the lyrics raw, honest, and hard-hitting, it’s no wonder why.

FANDOM starts off with "Cherry Red", a track that sounds almost like it belongs on a movie soundtrack rather than a studio album. At only a minute and twenty five seconds long, it's theatrical build up really prepares you for the emotional rollercoaster that is this album. It also has a dramatic outro that brilliantly transitions into track 2, "Watch What Happens Next".

"Watch What Happens Next" is an interesting track, to say the very least. While it has more of a stereotypical pop-punk sound, the lyrics tear into the culture surrounding the genre, or more importantly, the toxicity of it (the irony of this is not lost on me, Awsten Knight, nothing is ever a coincidence here). With lines such as "Hip hop can do what-ever it wants, Like make country songs, And hit number one, And that's fucking awesome, We could never do that, All the fans that like us need an easy fucking format" lead singer Awsten Knight expresses how little creative freedom musicians of the rock world have, particularly in a sub-genre that is so tightly gatekept. And this is by far not the only song on the album that touches on just how toxic fandom culture has become. On track 3, "Dream Boy", Knight sings about the pressure of living up to fan expectations and being built up in people's minds as someone you're not. And it's all covered up under an upbeat, pop sound that makes you wanna dance! And the verses of "I Miss Having Sex But At Least I Don't Wanna Die Anymore" (track 10) are dedicated to calling out fans for asking the same 3 questions over and over, sending death threats, and just generally not caring as much about the artists they listen to as much as they think they do.

Track 10 also directly ties in the other part of this album: the break up part. Because if FANDOM is one half calling out the pernicious tendencies of fans, the other half is grieving a failed relationship. This is honestly first shown in the lyrics of "Cherry Red", but we're brought back to it on track 4, "Easy To Hate" (which is my personal favorite). On this track, Awsten croons about how being with his ex was more trouble than it was worth, and how maybe he should have up-and-left a long time ago.

But the thing about grief is, there are many stages to it (five to be exact) and of those stages anger is a pretty prominent one on FANDOM. "Turbulent" (track 8) is a loud, angry rock song that exposes a lot of the negativity that came from Awsten Knight's previous relationship, both during and after it. Rap-centric "[Reboot]" is your typical slightly-bitter-sorta-petty break up song that takes the time to highlight some of the toxic behaviors of Knight's ex and flat out tell them "I'm too good for you and I deserve to be treated better".

There are four songs where the sad side of grief is so heavy it's almost tangible: self introspective "High Definition" (5), sad and slow acoustic "Never Bloom Again" (9), melancholy yet livid "Worst" (13), and the album closer "I Felt Younger When We Met" (15). "High Definition" laments on the trust issues Knight has experienced since going through all this while "Never Bloom Again" and "I Felt Younger When We Met" tell of the trouble he is having getting over this person. On "Worst" he touches on his feelings of anger and betrayal for the things that happened to him during his previous relationship.

Another absolutely wonderful thing about this album is how the end of "I Felt Younger When We Met" beautifully loops back into opener "Cherry Red". It really brings the whole thing together and puts a nice finishing touch on it, like a bow on a gift.

In short, if you haven't checked out Waterparks' FANDOM do yourself a favor and go do so now! It is a well-written, genre bending work of art that the rock world needs but perhaps does not (yet) deserve.

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