#everyone go listen to cheekface

[screamingay]

thank u sm for tagging me my dear beloved mutual @homophobiana i havent done one of these in so long <333

list the first ten songs that play when u put ur music library on shuffle:

a burning hill - mitski

waylon jennings live! - mountain goats

dead girl walking from heathers

here come the tubular bells - japanese breakfast

addictions - lucy dacus

sexy national anthem - cheekface

indonesia - mountain goats

a soft place to land from waitress

merci - stromae

proof - paramore

i'll tag um @bisexualwolverines-main @fr0gkiid @rasberrybush @mirroredsea @lochnessbian @itsslayingabsolutepenis etc etc if we're mutuals it's free game u can say i tagged u <3

[letitfillyoursoul]

dps boys as music they would each listen to

neil: really likes the mountain goats, especially “this year” because it’s about escaping an abusive home. when he’s running lines sometimes he’ll put on herbie hancock in the background, and he listens to “alone and i” the most. todd buys him the vinyl for his birthday. he has a soft spot for musical theatre. he wishes he could sing, if he could hold even a bit of a tune he’d be in musicals but he really, really can’t. after his first paid acting gig, he buys a guitar at a pawn shop because he’s always wanted to learn how to play. 

todd: he won’t stop listening to elliott smith and sufjan stevens. his favorite song is “the predatory wasp of the palisades is out to get us!” and he listens to it loudly through headphones, so often that neil knows all of the words when todd finally works up the nerve to show it to him. his guilty pleasure band is wham! and during a holiday party he gets too drunk and sings last christmas with charlie for karaoke. 

charlie: loves riot grrrl and queercore. will not shut up about x-ray spex and bikini kill. has a soft spot for any girl indie singer, specifically mitski. his favorite pop artist is rina sawayama. he’s seen lady gaga live three times and dragged knox with him. when he’s sad he only listens to phoebe bridgers, and loudly sings every single song in the shower so everyone will know he’s in a mood. 

knox: oh god. it’s a weird mix of artists like her’s, mac demarco, diners, rex orange county and really silly stuff like yung gravy and tiny meat gang. he has a travis scott phase and is insufferable about it. neil is really annoyed because he inexplicably has a great voice, which he uses to his advantage by serenading every single person he’s ever flirted with. 

steven: indie king. he finds all of the music before it’s cool. he has a soft spot for oldies and will defend the beatles, so don’t go there. he likes bands you’ve never heard of like cheekface and pinc louds, but he’s not a dick about it. him and gerard take all of the poets to their first concerts. weirdly enough he listens to top 40s pop when he’s driving, which is a lot because he’s somehow become everyone’s designated driver for everything. 

gerard: 100 gecs, kero kero bonito, g.l.o.s.s., sophie, megan thee stallion. a different side of the coin than meeks but like his best friend he has the coolest taste. he dabbles in production and secretly wants to make hyperpop. he’s really good at modding pedals and runs an underground business doing it for a bunch of kids at all the neighboring schools. he listens to a lot of punk as well, and bonds with charlie over it. 

cameron: he’s obsessed with tchaikovsky. obsessed with him. he and charlie are always bickering over whether or not the other can play music out loud in their room. for the holidays the group all pitch in to get both char and cameron noise cancelling headphones. secretly, cameron kind of likes some of the music charlie plays, even though it scares the shit out of him. he doesn’t realize that people can see what you’re listening to on spotify and one day the groupchat explodes because richard cameron himself was listening to girlpool. 

keating: he’s iconic so he’s really into joni mitchell, and teaches a poetry lesson using her songs. when he realizes gerard is writing music he’s ecstatic and helps him with lyrics as much as he can. he doesn’t really get the newer genres that the poets are into, but he tries valiantly and even kind of likes hatsune miku when charlie jokingly shows her to him. 

[euclydya]

i'm doing alright, we just got lost a nail at work and dr. crane is a madman who just wanted us to?? continue work as usual? so i dipped. i do not have his level of pain tolerance. y'all's last song recommendations were really good; i ended up downloading every single one.

today i am recommending a bunch of shauna dean cokeland's music bc she is releasing a new song on spotify at midnight!

my recommendations are: this song saved my life by sdc for billy, moving in place (the song she is releasing this song tonight!) by sdc for eddie, electric blue by sdc for steve, reflections on the screen by superorganism for your jonathan, and "listen to your heart" "no." by cheekface for will. i hope he is doing alright over there.

dr. crane also wants poe to listen to truth is in the dirt by karen elson

Jesus christ that sounds painful what the fuck ausixiaks

We're glad y'all are okay though!! Those are all super great songs too, we don't fuck with TikTok but DAMN are there a lotta good musicians on there apparently omg

Our recs!:

Howard - Cake Bake Betty

Very,,, Haunting, I guess is the right word? We don't listen to her much at all but I Love the sounds and vibes of her music so far!! -Steve

The Mind Electric - Miracle Musical

ok now we're diving into the Important Songs™ JDJDIDKDKF

I suggest listening to this on YouTube cuz the first like 2 minutes is in reverse and it is. Cool but annoying to listen to. But anyways!! This song is. Super important to me! For some fucking reason! Cannot explain How Or Why but I. Love It. Especially this mashup that has like Every existing version of the song in it HFJFKF -Eddie

Tumbleweed - Puscifer

When we need to ground ourselves, this is one of our go-to songs,, It's also one of Those Songs™ in our library that has a lot of meaning/symbolism to a lot of people in our system, but for Billy and I specifically it's just... a good reminder to keep fuckin going tbh. -Groves (Billy's asleep rn lmao. She's fine just tired)

Good Morning, Captain - Slint

I don't,, know how this ended up on my playlist? I don't remember Listening to it before today actually lmao but looking through collective memories I can see Why it's on there, the ending lyrics are a punch to the gut honestly they're just so. Raw And Emotional. As are the rest of the lyrics, but those last few at the end of the song,,,, damn. -Jonathan

Daydreaming - Radiohead

I am doing just good I tthink! I'm getting used to. Being a person again and! talking! and! being! a person! :D /genuine

and ummm our Jonathan isn't letting me suggest the song I had in mind because it's "disturbing sounding" and "fucking unsettling" and he's like "what the fuck?? are you ok????" and i Am I just like songs that sound horrifying apparently! HDHDDHD

This is a good alternative though !! very very soft and quiet and feels like a soft blanket, when I make my playlist I'm putting this one on it ASAP (along with the song you recommended for me too!! I love it thank you!!) -Will

(His original choice was fucking. It's In My Blood by Coil, if you're curious. It's just,, 4 minutes of ambient noise and weird screeching with barely any lyrics it is So Goddamn Unsettling to like Everyone in the system, god fhfjdjd

Poe really likes the song Dr. Crane suggested for her too btw!! Her suggestion is Grace For Sale by Terrance Zdunich! -Jonathan)

[hellativity]

2,3,5,7,11,13,

2: Beach Life-in-Death by Car Seat Headrest. This song is 13 minutes long and i will not hold it against you if you dont want to listen to that.

3: bedroom community by glass beach. angsty af but they also do a lot of musically interesting things in this song (and on their whole album), would def recommend

5: No Children by the Mountain Goats. I think everyone on tumblr knows this one? and on tik tok now? lmao

7: Dry Heat/Nice Town by cheekface. i think everyone should listen to cheekface once. i dont think everyone has to like them but everyone should at least consider liking them

11: Drunk Drivers/ Killer Whales by Car Seat Headrest: one of their most popular songs, with good reason

13: Going to Georgia by The Mountain Goats. What can I say, I from georgia, I'm not living there, I'd like to Go there

Hope u enjoy!! feel free to send another ask and lmk what you think!! Thx :)

[theaudioglow]

"Dirty Grind" by The Scummies: Art Punk Fun Wrapped in a Melody That Rollerblades Through The Brain

The last album review I put out was for Taylor Swift’s “Folklore”, a perfectly produced piece of pseudo-indie faux-rustic pop. Yeah, I wrote it for the internet views – get off my back! Today’s commentary is on a true indie band, a band with a punk rock name and aesthetic that makes me want to melt down candy corn and aggressively gel it onto the plumbing under my sink. We’re talking “Dirty Grind”, the new single by The Scummies.  

Some background, The Scummies is a bass and drum art-punk duo out of the Chicago area fronted by Alex and Rowland Smelly and are currently working on their first EP. Rowland singlehandedly produces the Weird Smells Zine, a DIY production that writes on the indie/punk music scene. Its last issue interviewed artists like Cheekface and Ariel Pink.  “Dirty Grind” is The Scummies first single.

I haven’t yet listened to the song – this is a real-time reaction commentary, similar to The Audio Glow’s album reviews. So, let’s get into it and see what areas of the emotional spectrum are provoked in the next two and a half minutes.

“Dirty Grind” by The Scummies.

The upbeat bassline kind of makes me want to stroll around town in the sarcastic montage of a nihilistic comedy show with the offbeat oddball protagonist. Does that show exist?  

The first impression I get from the vocals is an echo of David Byrne of Talking Heads. I appreciate the sing-song fluctuations of his voice over the spastic drums and bouncing bassline – gives the song kind of an “I don’t care because life is whimsical” vibe. Infectious is a solid word to describe the bass. It’s like a carefree beat on rollerblades with an ice cream cone. An orange sherbet ice cream cone.  

Lyrically, the song seems to be a critique of the standard of content produced in television and music right now:

“Now I hate to talk about what I’ve seen on tv it’s too easy to call it lazy”

And:

“Laugh because the friends I know have better taste than who I follow”

My immediate reaction is to compare Rowland Smelly’s musings about the quality of mainstream creative output to the struggles of a writer sending stories to esteemed journals. I’ve seen stories win first prize in major contests, and read it thinking “is this better than mine?” Then the winning story is about a guy birdwatching on the beach having a pretentiously cryptic conversation with his intern, and somehow that constitutes high art. The question The Scummies provokes from me, then, is what constitutes art quality and if art is subjective for everyone, who holds the power to decide what constitutes “good” art?

Go check out “Dirty Grind” by The Scummies, or do it up big and go rollerblading with an orange sherbet cone while listening to “Dirty Grind” by The Scummies.

Your neighbors might call you weird – I call it art in motion.

Artist Links:

The Scummies Instagram      The Scummies Bandcamp Weird Smells Zine Depop

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