Braid - No Coast // A Review

           It’s a week since Braid’s triumphant return to form No Coast dropped. Prior to that, the band’s swan song Frame and Canvas was released just over sixteen years ago. A lot of people, myself included, consider Frame and Canvas to be an integral part of the emo canon. So much so that if anybody were to brazenly admit that they’ve never heard “A Dozen Roses” in the middle of a conversation about emo I would almost certainly discredit whatever came out of their mouth next. Whenever I talk about Braid and “Frame and Canvas” however, I feel as if I’m talking about the love of my life that I haven’t met yet. I was eight years old when it came out and I didn’t really start to love it until I was 18 and the band had long since called it quits.

            So all this time I’ve had this perfect, flawless image of Braid in my head as a relic of a golden era of music that I’d never relive, save for the few shows after their reunion that I was lucky enough to catch at The Fest in Gainesville, FL. Even then, the band played with such youthful exuberance and fervor that it wouldn’t be unrealistic for an ignorant attendee to assume the band had been around for only a couple years. So now, like some kind of spunky, jaded emo phoenix the band has officially released a follow up to their classic record.

            If I had to succinctly describe what listening to No Coast is like, I’d say something like “yeah man, it’s like knowing I had a kid but somehow I’ve been separated from the kid for 16 years, knowing perfectly well the whole time that it was growing up and changing and then suddenly being reunited 16 years later and having a conversation about what’s been happening.” No Coast is decidedly a Braid record through and through but right away you can tell that something just isn’t the same (and not necessarily in a bad way). You can still hear Nanna and Broach’s combatting guitar lines as well as their call and response vocal attack. Damon Atkinson’s tightwire drumming is still there, and overall, the group’s understanding of how to write clever, emotionally charged, guitar driven music is ever present.

            I want to keep the Frame and Canvas comparisons to a minimum, but inevitably someone’s gonna say “well it’s good but it’s not as good as their older stuff,” and that’s fine, but the truth is that it’s just different. Take the openers from each record for example. “The New Nathan Detroits” sounds frantic, uncalculated, and syncopated. No Coast opener “Bang” is something different altogether. The band offers a somewhat subdued, more predictable form of song writing, and therein lays the essential difference between the Braid from then and the Braid from now. Gone is the 20-something year old desire to play frantic punk rock, and instead we have dudes who are almost 40 trying to put a little more thought into this whole emo thing.

            Nanna and Broach’s lyrical content has also shifted since the band’s younger days. Instead of self-deprecating songs about lost love and rotten relationships, the two are singing about how their lives are going pretty well, with the occasional allusion to the punk shows of their youth thrown into the mix. Basically it’s gonna give people the chance who grew up with Braid a chance to be like “dude I totally get it” while giving younger fans an idyllic version of their unabashed dreams of an emo future.

            I’m sure being on Topshelf Records has something to do with the direction the band chose to take. I mean, looking at the label’s roster, you can safely assume that almost every single band is not only significantly younger than the dudes in Braid, but they all probably love Frames and Canvas and owe plenty of their musical development to that record and the others surrounding it. It surely put Braid in a position to write a record that would satisfy longtime fans as well as new fans whose first exposure to the genre was You Blew It! and Into It. Over It. Admittedly, the amount of IO.OI. influence in No Coast is almost off-putting at times, but I can forgive it. Nanna and Broach often sound more like a mixture of Evan Weiss and Ben Gibbard rather than grown up versions of themselves, which I suppose is fine since it’s most likely a result of trying to make sure they fit in with the current trends in the genre they helped define, instead of trying to recreate what they already essentially shaped.

            As long as you go into the new record knowing full and well that Frame and Canvas is a relic of the past, you’re going to enjoy it. Tracks like “East End Hollows” and “Many Enemies” are perfect examples of the pop infused modern rendition of the band that seeps throughout the majority No Coast, while “Put Some Wings On That Kid” and “Pre Evergreen” harken back to the golden era of Frame and Canvas. The former especially recreates the spastic nature of some of their older cuts, at times sounding like a logical succession to “Collect From Clark Kent.” Bottom line -  as a 24 year old who has been listening to Braid for several years, I’m not pissed in the slightest about their revitalization.

-Wilson De Gouveia

What's Honestly Going On With the Emo Revival

            OK so this emo revival is getting out of hand. To sum it up quickly before going into exhaustive detail about it, emo and screamo bands popped up in the late 90’s and no one really cared because the internet wasn’t what it is now, those bands made sick music and broke up. By then there was full-blown internet and people started discovering them postmortem. There were still bands making the same music, but people still didn’t really care because screamo and emo started getting tossed around to generalize bands that didn’t fit the mold. By 2010, bands were still making the same kind of music but people finally started caring only because they started paying attention, which is basically what this dude said, even though the majority of what he says is a bunch hot air. And now, the whole thing has come full circle since the bands that were around in the 90’s were like “fuck people actually care about this oh and also we don’t have any money” so they are getting back together and this whole thing is becoming more like a resurrection than a revival.

                                       Indian Summer - Live

            So what I’m trying to decide is whether or not this whole ordeal is actually something cool or just some kind of scam. I remember being 16 years old in 2006, during the “dark era” of this whole scene when dumb rock bands that yelled into microphones were getting called screamo, sitting by myself in my room after school like an actual loser scouring people’s folders on Soulseek to find bands even more obscure than Orchid, Neil Perry and Indian Summer. While I filled my iPod that played music and that’s it with shit like Subir En Busca Del Aire (rad Chilean screamo) and I Wrote Haikus About Cannibalism In Your Yearbook (the Kali sound before the Kali sound was a thing) I was losing my mind about the mysticism of these bands. These were dudes playing discordant music that sounded like actual visceral emotions and yelling about their hearts slitting it’s own wrists and I loved it. I also hated it because I knew I’d never get to see those bands because they appeared and disappeared like someone blowing a candle out, but that’s what made it cool.

                                                      Orchid - Live

           And I’m not trying to discredit the current bands that are actually carrying the torch that older bands pioneered. Bands like Pianos Become The Teeth, Frameworks, You Blew It!, and The World Is… are legitimately doing something cool. The problem I’m facing is trying to come to terms with bands like American Football and Mineral coming back to life. Like I said earlier, you know those dudes need money and I’m sure the whole reason these bands are getting back together is because this kind of sound has recently become “cool.” And honestly, I hate to say it, but when something becomes “cool” everywhere, it can basically stop being cool really quick. The mysticism and obscurity surrounding bands like Orchid and Indian Summer are part of what made them so interesting. They existed, said what they had to say, and then burned out like a super nova only leaving behind recordings to be discovered later on, like a relic from some overly emotional sunken ship.

            So at this point in time there’s a split between bands that have been making this kind of music for a while and working insanely hard to carry the sound pioneered by the bands in the 90’s but are just now getting noticed and the very same bands from the 90’s getting back together to reap the benefits of the commotion started by bands in their absence. Obviously as a huge fan of bands like Mineral, American Football and Cap’n Jazz I’m not going to be upset that I’m being granted the prodigious honor of watching them perform, but those bands’ truly magnificent performances happened when they were active. When they were actually feeling the emotions that led them to write their songs. As cool as hearing American Football play live in a couple months is gonna be, it’s ultimately going to resemble a letter written to an ex-lover from ten years ago. In other words, the feelings are going to be there, but they are going to be rusty and corroded.

                             Pianos Become The Teeth - Live

            I’m excited to get hammered drunk and cry during Mineral’s upcoming set here in New York, and I’m especially excited to solemnly reflect on how much of a stupid loser I am when they play “Slower,” but somewhere deep in my heart of hearts I’m gonna know that something is wrong. I’m gonna realize that I wished I could have been here or here to really get the full experience. The guys and gals at those shows are feeling the same things that I feel when I’m at a Pianos Become The Teeth or Frameworks show today, and those feelings are ultimately what bands like that are attempting to convey through their music.

                                        You Blew It! - Live

            I’m glad that emo and screamo bands are actually getting respect and recognition now, but eventually they are gonna burn out of existence just like their predecessors did. I think the only difference is that later on, there isn’t gonna be such an ordeal about a revival or resurgence because attention was given to the bands when they needed it as opposed to after they decided to call it quits. If anything, the bands now deserve more credit than their ancestors because they are cultivating and breathing life into a sect of music that up until now was pretty much shrouded in obscurity, and they’re creating meaningful, powerful music at the same time.

                                         Frameworks - Live

            Bottom line, go catch these reunion shows simply because they might never happen again (although I doubt it) but also do everything you can to support the bands that are hard at work to remain active. Of course, remaining active while a huge spotlight is shining directly in your face is pretty easy, and that’s something dudes like Orchid never had. But with a spotlight comes the easy opportunity to churn out whatever mediocrity bands what. Fortunately, the bands that matter now don’t seem interested in taking that route, and that’s something we should all be thankful for.

-Wilson De Gouveia

Perfect Pussy - Say Yes To Love // A Review

            The first time I heard about Perfect Pussy was at a gig I went to at NYU. They were opening for Ceremony and White Lung and I had very little expectations. I mean I think by then I had read something about them online but I’m pretty sure I wrote it off. All I knew then was that I thought their name was funny and I just wanted to see Ceremony play at an incredibly prestigious educational institution. Well, Perfect Pussy hit the stage and I was in a fucking trance for the fifteen something minutes they played for. Every fucking member of the band was flailing around like a rabid dog (even the motherfucker whose only job was to make noise on a circuit board), all the while singer Meredith Graves spat volatile incantations about who the fuck knows what at every member of the audience. After their set, I felt like my first girlfriend took my virginity, called me a loser and then broke up with me after throwing my shit out of a window.

            Since then, I’ve paid considerably more attention to Perfect Pussy and their music. The Syracuse band rose from the ashes of a couple other acts (Shoppers was Graves’ old band) and released their live demo I have lost all desire for feeling last year. The four song EP was a torrent of distortion, noise, maniacal drumming, feedback and brutally personal lyrics that seemed like they were ripped straight from Graves’ diary. In agreement with the name of the EP, a lot of the songs deal with Graves’ friends stabbing her in the back and sucking her boyfriend’s dick and just generally being real fuckwads. She spouts rancor left and right, fuming at the head but keeping her voice barely above a yell. All the while, her bandmates are responsible for conjuring up a literal vortex of instrumental fervor. The guitars hinged on the cusp of clean and distorted, but still had the intensity of a car crash. I don’t want to get stuck on this subject since this should be about their new full length, but Perfect Pussy could have called it quits after the EP and people would have been flipping cars in the street.

            Thankfully however, they didn’t, and their LP Say Yes To Love has been unleashed into the world. Calling it an LP seems wrong though since it’s eight tracks and clocks in at just over 23 minutes. It’s straight though because by the end of those 23 minutes, enough shit has happened that I feel like buying a Corvette, quitting my job and driving it off the first cliff I find. Say Yes To Love is a supernova of a record, blending the best parts of punk, noise and pop into a literal chimera. Throughout the songs, it’s easy to picture Graves as an actual chimera, each head responsible for vomiting rage, hope or vulnerability at you. Despite having three heads, Graves makes sure to always do one thing right: sound like the world is fucking ending. She sings with such a distinct howl, nearly every word on the record is indecipherable; and even when she tones it down for a second, there’s gonna be some wicked feedback obfuscating her words like a wristcutter hiding their scars. At the same time, I can’t help but think how proudly Graves would wear those very same scars.

            The record opens up with “Driver,” and there’s an awkward tranquility in the tape loop and solitary guitar strumming we’re initially treated to. I use the word awkward, because it’s tranquil in the same way the eye of a hurricane cuts out all the bullshit before it inevitably tears your house down. Sure enough, Graves starts off at just above a whisper but eventually starts shrieking her feelings off in typical fashion while the rest of the band comes in like a bull through a china shop. Ray McAndrew’s guitar has one of the most intoxicating clean tones I’ve heard from a band in a long time. There’s a certain urgency that oozes from every reverb soaked strum that exemplifies how it isn’t necessary to bury your guitar in layers of overdrive or fuzz to sound “heavy” (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Jangly power chords carry the majority of “Driver,” while drummer Garret Koloski beats at his skins like they owed him fucking money. It’s a perfect backdrop for whatever litany Graves is going through, and until I buy the record when I see them in a couple weeks, I won’t know exactly what she’s so angry about. I can make out a couple lines here and there (something about “you don’t know shit about me” and “home is wherever I’m never invited”) but every single aspect of the song is so very pissed off that I get the point.

            And really, I don’t think knowing every word Graves is spewing is necessary or even healthy. I’ve read the lyrics to I have lost all desire for feeling, and like I said above, it’s fucking rough. Graves has clearly been through some shit and it comes out in every aspect of her lyrics, and her bandmates do an excellent job of giving her the appropriate canvas to spread her vitriol over. This seething bitterness is a theme throughout the record, even when certain songs take a more uplifting approach. “Big Stars” sounds like the beginning of a punker Japandroids track, and the bright, colorful chords that frame the song do seem to borrow a lot from the good ol’ Canadian boys. On the other end of the spectrum, there’s tracks like “Work,” that sound like a demented version of Minor Threat that forgot it’s Ritalin and chose to explore the effects of PCP instead. There’s even a standard bass riff while the other instruments break away only to come fuck you right back up like some coiled up snake. Meanwhile Graves deplores “I’M SO FUCKING HAPPY NOW” with a level of acrimonious sarcasm that hasn’t been heard in a punk song for quite some time.

            Say Yes To Love is a punk record through and through even if it doesn’t have all of the qualities of your big brother’s favorite punk bands. There’s more going on than three power chords played really fast, there’s considerably more feedback and experimentation, and the person behind the microphone fits a lot of the rules regarding being a vocalist in a punk band while breaking a bunch of them at the same time. Basically, Say Yes To Love is probably gonna go down as one of those “weird punk records” like Zen Arcade, or more recently, You’re Nothing that did the genre right by grabbing it by the balls and twisting really hard. Even during songs like “Interference Fits,” where the punk meter hits a low, there’s still an almost overwhelming sense of urgency and anxiety that the band is able to create. Graves’ vocals are hushed and buried behind feedback for the first half of the song, while gently picked guitars reminiscent of Pavement or Modest Mouse or something totally unexpected lead up to the climactic proclamation of “SINCE WHEN DO WE SAY YES TO LOVE” and then shit hits the proverbial fan as the song rockets towards it’s ambient coda.

            If I had to compare listening to Say Yes To Love to other similar activities, a couple ideas pop into my head pretty clearly. At times, I imagine that it resembles reading Naked Lunch while on LSD and held at gunpoint. Or it could maybe be like sending a fake suicide note to your ex-lover than showing up at their house and breaking all of their windows. Bottom line, this shit is visceral and cathartic, and not just for the listener. I bet every time these mother fuckers play live they feel like they just came out of the womb. The band chose to end the record with the largely ambient “VII,” which consists largely of feedback, tapes warbling and Graves obscured vocals. It seems like a weird decision, but after listening to the record a couple of times it makes complete sense. The song accurately translates into audible noise how fucked my head feels after wrapping it around everything these guys and girl are getting across with their music.

- Wilson De Gouveia

True Detective // Season Retrospective

           So the first season of True Detective has come and gone, and I gotta say I was initially disappointed with the conclusion. However, my disappointment stems largely from my own selfishness, because I wanted the show to end differently. I wanted something darker. I was hoping for something that would keep me awake at night for weeks on end. I wanted a show that would strip away my faith in humanity. I guess I’m gonna go ahead and mention that there will be a couple of spoilers for the whole series in this write up since I’m gonna talk about what I liked, what I didn’t like and how Rust Cohle’s bitterly rancorous philosophical musings made my life a little more bearable.

            Throughout the entirety of the season, the audience was treated to eight episodes of impossibly dark dramatic mystery. From the nascent stages of the Dora Lange case to the final moments of uncovering the identity of the Yellow King, there were multiple instances that left me feeling guilty for having laid eyes on whatever I was shown. The writers did an excellent job of recreating this sensation when Marty had to watch the videotape of the cult gang raping an innocent child. I mean, I wanted to scream at a wall and rip my eyes out when we were forced to watch Errol slipping his disgusting fingers into his sister’s or his mother’s (whatever she was) insides. It was those kind of situations that really made the show shine – the impossibly dark and twisted moments that were just on the cusp of Camus’ absurd.

            Those situations and displays of pure human cruelty were the reason Rust was the bitter nihilist that he chose to be, given what little faith he saw in the possibility of finding good in the world. All of his musings about time being a flat circle and recalling Nietzsche’s eternal return where his way of coping with the malignancy he saw everywhere around him. And after eight episodes of this very same malignancy, I began to adopt a very similar worldview as Rust for the weekly hour I spent watching the show, and this sort of became the reason I found myself disappointed with the conclusion of the program.

            I expected something vile to occur as a result of Marty and Rust’s venture into the catacombs of Carcosa. I mean, we were treated to a massive pile of children’s clothing, chandeliers adorned with children’s shoes and increasingly large devil catchers. And, naturally, the final encounter between Errol and the two heroes was fucking hard to watch. I mean, Rust was impaled in the stomach with a dagger and Marty had an axe thrown into his chest, but as soon as the final gunshot rang from my TV speakers and I saw Errol’s head blown to pieces I exhaled a full hour’s worth of anxiety.

            But then I thought, “that’s it?” They found Errol, killed him and it looks like the two are going to survive. I was kind of pissed truthfully. Like I said, after 8 episodes of murder, rape, ritualistic sacrifices, infidelity, nihilism and crushing existential tirades – I wanted my own “The King In Yellow” to push me towards the brink of insanity. But then I calmed down and realized two things: I probably need psychiatric help and I was neglecting to see what the show was intending to do with it’s conclusion.

            The final moment of the episode gave us a Rust Cohle who has just nearly escaped the grips of death, and in doing so, reached a form of enlightenment that was thus far, unknown to him. What he perceived to be his final moments on this plane of existence were spent as far removed from his beloved nihilism as possible. He saw his deceased daughter in another plane and he was elated to be reunited. He saw a possibility for a world filled with something other than death and rape. And this isn’t speculation; we can find proof of all of this in the final conversation between Rust and Marty. You know, the whole dissertation about the vast darkness engulfing the minimal amount of starlight, and how for once there might possibly be more light than dark. It was essentially like going from getting yelled at by Nietzsche to having coffee with Kierkegaard.

            This revelation in Rust’s worldview is important for several reasons, the most prominent one was obviously the show’s final overall message: that good had prevailed over evil. But if we think about this for a little bit longer than that, we can find other reasons why it’s important. One of the show’s biggest themes was the evolution and natural progression of the characters changing as time passes. This is obvious given how there are three distinct timelines throughout the season and each one shows us the characters in varying lights. It only makes sense for the show to come full circle (again, another theme reiterated multiple times throughout the season) and have Rust make one final transformation. In this case, the transformation was essentially a complete 180 degree turn from how the character started. He went from a man convinced the world had no redeeming qualities to a man who had seen the most beautiful image he could have possibly conceived.

            Of course, Rust’s revelation came as a result of the eradication of the world’s evil manifested in a single individual. It almost seems natural: remove the evil from the world in order to uncover the good. Of course, the evil that Rust and Marty removed seemed to be limited to their own world (that is, an evil that they were exclusively committed to eliminating), since the sirens blaring over their last conversation almost served as a reminder that there is still plenty of fucked up shit happening out there.

            The last thing I want to mention is a comment about recent great TV in general. I think part of the reason that I was expecting a twisted, sadistic vile ending has something to do with the recent trend of anti-heroes in TV drama. I mean, take a look at Breaking Bad – we were blown away as an audience for the entire series due to the heinous actions Walter White committed in order to save himself and the only way for the show to end appropriately and have a somewhat satisfied viewers was to kill him off. Other examples of this kind of protagonist include Don Draper in Mad Men and Nucky Thompson in Boardwalk Empire – basically, evil men who do evil things and then get what they deserved. The protagonists in True Detective might have been the first ones in a while that had all of the makings of anti-heroes, but instead of getting what they deserved, they emerged from the darkness they shrouded themselves in.

            So basically, I want to call out other recent TV dramas for making me a bitter, nihilistic asshole that expects the absolute worse out of his media and I want to thank True Detective for successfully pulling off a happy ending.

-Wilson De Gouveia

Morrissey's Autobiography // Some Thoughts

  I’ve been a fan of The Smiths and Morrissey for a pretty long time. Truthfully it was the song “There Is A Light That Never Goes Out” that really turned me into Smiths music. I remember thinking “just exactly why is this dude so sad about everything,” and up until recently I only had the narratives given by the songs he penned as answers. With the release of Morrissey’s autobiography, I was able to get a firsthand account of why Morrissey is the way he is, and a lot of it was kind of predictable. A life of squalor and parsimony growing up in Manchester, repeated accounts of ostracism from his peers, a rabid addiction to music and TV that no one else seemed to care about and finally multiple deaths in the family and of friendsa that eventually hindered on the unfair. Essentially, the life of Morrissey was prototypical of a troubled, frustrated creative individual due to the amount of times the world took a literal shit on him.

The autobiography was a great read. I mean, Morrissey is a fantastic lyricist with a penchant for all things sad and mawkish, which translated well into his own reflections on life thus far.  There are certain things that I expected to be included in the book without fail, and those aren’t necessarily things that I feel the need to write about, especially since not many people are going to read this. I’m talking shit like Mozz utilizing Smiths lyrics unironically in the middle of a passage to describe an emotion or situation. Or perhaps the limitless acrimony Mozz felt towards Johnny Marr after the dissolution of The Smiths. Maybe Morrissey’s Patrick Bateman-esque diatribes about songs and old TV shows he loved growing up could have been toned down (after three pages about a single TV show I had never heard of I decided that I’d rather not do the research and just take his word for it). But I mean, what can you do, he’s Morrissey: verbose, bold, charismatic and unflinching, every page a reminder of why he is so beloved.

There are however, several fragments and anecdotes that truly shed a light on his persona. I mean, truthfully revealing something about his life that even countless years of listening to Smiths music never revealed to me. A lot of these were comical situations that nobody would ever know about unless they were told by Mozz himself (go figure that it’s in his autobiography) and others are horribly tragic situations that were deeply personal to Mozz and responsible for shaping him as an individual. Ultimately, these fragments were some of my favorite aspects of Morrissey’s story that I just never happened to know about growing up. There are obviously “spoilers” about Morrissey’s life in the following paragraphs, so if you are that much then I suggest reading the book yourself.

  Morrissey was almost killed by an exploding glass door at a hotel in South France.

You know, for someone who sings about “ten ton trucks crashing into us” and “hanging the DJ” you’d figure that Mozz had a couple close encounters with the cold icy hand of death in order to warrant such topics. His life story revealed that people around him had significantly more encounters with the grim reaper than he ever did. In fact, one of the only instances Morrissey almost died (regardless of whatever he says in his lyrics) happened in the south of France at a spa inside of a luxury hotel. Apparently, as he was exiting the hot tub or whatever bullshit he was doing, his attempt to open the entirely glass door resulted in the whole thing exploding over the entirety of his body. Now, I guess one could think that he did it to himself after slamming the door in a fit of embittered angst, but apparently, the difference in pressure from inside the spa due to heat caused it to explode, piercing the majority of his body with shards of glass. There are certainly gaps in my knowledge of Morrissey solo material, but I’m sure there has to be a song regarding the incident. And if not, then he better write it soon. I’d imagine it would go something like this:

              “Glass door, I can’t see through you

            You’re cracked and broken, so so cracked and broken.

            Explode on me like I explode on the world

            Glass door, you cut right through me.”

  I mean there might be more flowery language that I can’t be bothered to include right now, but he should probably let me ghost write it for him. Either way, nothing really happened to him after that. Apparently he laid there for a while as he pulled the emergency cord and all the paramedics said were “You could ‘ave been kill.” Fame, fame fatal fame I suppose.

  Morrissey watched the girl who sings on “Bigmouth” get ripped in half by a boat and it was basically his fault.

Her name was Kristy MacColl and she had met Mozz sometime in 1985. He knew that when they met “a friendship for life was born.” Unfortunately, that was not the case, due to the fact that Morrissey encouraged her to take a trip to Cancun (oddly a favorite vacation spot for Mozz) in the year 2000. Kristy took the trek out to Mexico with her two children, and on her first day there, an out of control speedboat was racing towards her two children. Naturally, as any (good) mother would, she leaped in front of the boat to protect her kids and in turn, was blown to pieces. I know I’m injecting an inappropriate amount of brevity into a horribly tragic situation, but when I first read the anecdote I wouldn’t believe it. I honestly thought it was a nightmare Morrissey was describing, but it wasn’t. Mozz invited his dear friend out to Cancun, and the day she got there she was torn in half by a boat. That’s that. It’s one of many instances where the people around Morrissey were dealt a significantly worse hand than he was. I suppose the question about “why he’s always so miserable” is starting to make sense.

On the subject of Mexico and Cancun, Mozz apparently has a rabid following throughout certain parts of the country.

 This next thing I can’t even offer an explanation for, because Morrissey himself doesn’t even really offer an explanation. I mean, I guess I’m sort of downplaying The Smiths’ influence on popular culture and music throughout the majority of the world, but fucking Mexico? Really? According to Mozz there are literally honchos with “still ill” tattooed across their necks and Hatful of Hollow flags replacing the white, green and red Mexican flag. Mozz says it himself; “nothing the world holds could match the love awaiting me in Mexico City.” And you know what? Good for him and Mexico, because for all the lamenting Mozz does regarding the lack of a #1 hit (about a cumulative 200 pages), it seems that every song is a #1 hit in Mexico. Mozz takes plenty of time and energy to describe how gigs play out in a multitude of countries and venues, and by far, Mexico seems to reside the closest to his heart, above gigs in Manchester, California and New York. What do we take away from this besides the fact that Mexicans love Morrissey? I suppose how the words of a single individual resonate within a culture drastically different from his own.

  Morrissey and a group of his friends were attacked by either a vagabond or a specter in the Saddleworth Moor.

On a seemingly random day, Morrissey and a handful of colleagues took a trip to the Saddleworth Moor, a mostly abandoned area in Northern England. Mozz was accompanied by Linda Sterling, a close friend and graphic designer, as well as James O’Brien, a director Mozz had been working with. Why they were exploring an abandoned moor isn’t necessarily explained in full detail, but it was either to scout a location for a video or to explore a somewhat historical part of England or some other shit that only Morrissey would possibly think of. He goes great lengths to describe the impenetrable fog and overall eeriness of the environment, and in standard Scooby Doo fashion, their vehicle is jumped by what they described as a “boy roughly of 18 years wearing only a humiliatingly short anorak coat that was open to expose the white of his chest an the nakedness of the rest of his body.”

Now, initially, the group phones the police to report that someone was in distress, but then the idea that what they saw was a ghost starts getting thrown around and I’m throwing my hands in the air. Really Mozz? I love you, I really do, but I don’t think the world needs to know about your ventures into ghost hunting. The passage was sufficiently creepy, but it again fits into the criteria of all the passages I’m discussing: an interesting part of Morrissey’s life that no one would know about unless they were there or they cared enough to know. As I read on however, he got to some semblance of a point and expressed his discontent at the possibility of an area so close to him existing in such decrepit and miserly conditions. It was an attempt to show his humane side and really express how poorly he feels about people living in misery. Mozz and the group tossed out the idea of a ghost and figured the boy was someone held against his will and raped (I’m serious it’s on page 237 of my edition), or perhaps he was the diversion in a ploy to have innocent, helpless explorers surrounded and plundered. Regardless, the anecdote helped showcase a lot about Mozz’s worldview: his remorse for those less fortunate, his acknowledgement of the cruelty sometimes found in humanity, among others. Basically, it taught me Mozz was at one point, a ghost-hunting moralist.

Borderline unhealthy obsession with obtaining a number one hit on the Billboards

Okay, look, I understand that any self respecting musician wants to obtain some kind of quantifiable level of “success.” Back in the 80’s, I suppose this meant reaching number one on the Billboards, since there wasn’t anything like getting “Best New Music” on Pitchfork or whatever bullshit happens nowadays. So I completely sympathize with Morrissey and The Smiths’ plight to obtain a chart topping hit. But the problem here is that Mozz was obsessed with it. Every song between “Still Ill” and “Everyday Feels Like Sunday” and on, I was greeted with an overzealous litany denouncing the heads of Rough Trade records and the bossmen behind the music industry at the time. I love Morrissey and I love The Smiths, but after the sixth occurrence (which was exactly the same as the previous five) I started to realize that this obsession might actually be a more deeply rooted problem within Mozz himself than an actual problem with the music he was responsible for.

Regardless, I cut Mozz some slack every single time. If I was responsible for “This Charming Man” or “Suedehead” I would be outraged as well if they weren’t recognized as the greatest songs in England. At the same time however, his blind rage towards the lack of a song merely labeled as “number one” made it seem like he was turning a blind eye towards the countless fans throughout the world and the legacy he was leaving behind. The cynicism and despair you find in his lyrics really became palpable once the subject of scoring a number one hit became a running theme in his autobiography. The reason I find this interesting enough to bring it up has to do with the fact that I never really imagined Morrissey to be as bleak as he portrays himself to be in his lyrics, but alas, he actually is. In 2009, when Years of Refusal is released, record label executives tell Mozz, “we think you’ll be very surprised by its chart entry,” in regards to lead single “I’m Throwing My Arms Around Paris.” The song debuts at position 21, and Morrissey claims “the child within [him] is finally murdered.”

Morrissey’s autobiography is a rich, verbose look into the life of one of the most influential pop stars of all time. The topics I listed are a small sample of vignettes that I found particularly interesting. The rest of the book is filled with insight into the man’s love for music, the adoration he has for his fans, his controversial and scathing political views and more. Despite all of his complaining and diatribes against anything, one gets the sense that few people exist who are more passionate about themselves and art than Morrissey.

Have A Nice Life - The Unnatural World

           Depression has always been a cause for countless undesirable outcomes: social detachment, malnourishment, divorce, apathy and in the most extreme of situations even suicide. But deep inside the very same malignancy there often exists wells of the most hideous beauty. Look back to the writing of F. Scott Fitzgerald or the music of Ian Curtis and you’ll find beacons of crippling glory proving that even the darkest corridors of the human mind can yield some semblance of relief.

            Enter Connecticut duo Have A Nice Life, whose 2008 debut Deathconciousness was a monolith of anxiety, imagined occultism, ennui and hopelessness. A double album spanning countless “post” genres (punk, rock, shoegaze, industrial, goth), the LP may have as well come packaged with pain pills and a noose. The duo is comprised of Dan Barret and Tim Macuga, and the two ensured to leave absolutely no cavern of bleak introspection unexplored. Deathconsciousness was a record lacking the need to exist temporally or permanently. The album came out, and the duo seemed to fizzle out of existence just as quickly as they appeared, leaving the world with Atlas’ burden to carry. The group periodically released smaller pieces of music, but nothing as monumental or crushing as the debut.

            Six years later, Have A Nice Life return with The Unnatural World, a suicide note of sorts, told through their now signature amalgam of post punk, post rock, goth and industrial broodings that is eschews the sprawling nature of the debut LP, instead focusing on a more concise and streamlined songwriting approach. What The Unnatural World gives to us sits somewhere between the troubled musings of a deeply disturbed man and the convalescence of an entire psychiatric ward, all backed by the ethereal and expansive songwriting of Barret and Macuga. Where Deathconsciousness was the audible version of House of Leaves, a hedge maze of emotions and meanings all difficult to discern but all certainly about the same thing, The Unnatural World is a trembling hand offering up Barret’s still beating, bloodied heart.

            A minimal amount of research will show you that Barret was a victim of severe depression which eventually almost culminated in his suicide, and traces of that can be found in older Have A Nice Life lyrics, but within the sonic chambers of The Unnatural World we can peer into a man who has recovered from his anguish, but the ghost of his depression still taps on his shoulder every now and then. Album highlight “Burial Society” opens with gossamer piano flutters and a seemingly innocuous drum beat as Barret pleads “close my eyes a better man / or, imagine I can imagine such a thing.” The song translates everybody’s desire to improve themselves but hitting a brick wall of self doubt and anxiety into a gorgeous post punk ballad that crescendos imperceptibly into glimmering guitars and Barret shouting “cut my wrists / slit my throat / take this body and string it up.” On paper it sounds awfully macabre and mawkish, but the duo’s ability to find beauty in depression is perhaps their biggest talent.

            And it isn’t just with slow, dreary ballads that Have A Nice Life is able to express their anguish. “Defenestration Song” and “Unholy Life” are both songs you would dance to, but you’d have your head hanging low in a dimly lit room. The former begins as fervently as Joy Division’s classic “Disorder,” infectious bass and drums galvanizing even the most downtrodden of goths as a two note guitar riff bleeds into the song like an open wound. Barret’s mantra of “is this what it’s like / is this what it’s going to be like” ends the song with a sense of feigned acceptance to the dredges of day to day life.

            The record continues this back and forth of sorts between droney, harrowing ballads and slightly more energetic post punk pieces to ensure you don’t slip too far into your Xanax binge. However, the black cloud looming over the shoulders of Barret and Macuga never ceases to peer over your shoulder as well. Even “Music Will Untune the Sky,” the most glorious, hymnal track on the record deals with the Nietzschean dismissal of God as Barret pleads “I am the only one / sorry, Lord” over an increasingly amplifying wall of reverb. It’s a beautiful affirmation of the human will and self worth, but it still reminds us of our mortality and impermanence.

            Have A Nice Life have never created music that is easy to listen to. Their tracks are dense, overwhelming, bleak and at times devastating. But as I said earlier, their ability to draw inspiration from crippling depression results in something chimerical in nature: music that is beautiful and harrowing while serving as a reminder of what it means to be a human with faults and cracks. The frailty of closing track “Emptiness Will Eat The Witch” is a perfect example of what I mean. While the majority of the songs on The Unnatural World make sure to express a fair amount of anger, fear and malaise, they do it with such acrimonious contempt that they resemble rebellion as opposed to surrender. With “Emptiness Will Eat The Witch,” the saccharine and ethereal synthesizers carry the abnormally paper thin and frightened vocals, a divergence from the fervency of the other tracks. The song drifts like fog, cold and hazy with occasional percussion breaking up Barret’s layered hymn of “you are no one.” The album ends with the affirmation that acknowledgment of our own unimportance is perhaps the most difficult truth to accept, but to accept it is the biggest victory. Barret has yielded to the lack of control we have over our lives, and that is perhaps what is meant by an “unnatural” world.

-Wilson De Gouveia

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance // A Reflection

                     You know, I’m not sure if it’s just me, or society and people in general, but I don’t think that enough time is given to introspection and inner reflection anymore. I’m talking about actual, concentrated, guided meditation with an end goal of reaching a specific kind of enlightenment or a less structured approach involving any semblance of inward thought with a goal of deviating from the burden of what exists outside of us (the weather, a job, chores, errands, whatever). Given my limited understanding of the world as a whole and the lives of people that exist within it, I don’t want to sound out of line when I say that this sort of thing is rather important.

            Honestly, I’m guilty of my own accusation. I find myself succumbing to a day to day routine of waking up so I can go to work, so I can have enough money to survive, so I can be alive to experience the next day and so on and so forth. I was a student of literature and philosophy, two subjects that have become (at least to the majority of the country I live in) completely impractical. But to say that those subjects and what they offer are impractical implies that a person is viewing them through far too rigid of a lens. Again, I’m going to admit that I too have been guilty of having a perceptive lens that is too rigid or narrow, and more often than not, it leads to a less than desirable quality of life, despite that quality of life appearing to be “easier.”

            The word “quality” is an interesting word. It’s a word that almost everyone knows the definition of intrinsically, but it is still somewhat difficult to define. “Quality” also plays a central role in Robert M. Pirsig’s 1974 philosophical text Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. I mentioned earlier that introspection is a concept that has seemingly become too far removed from the day-to-day life of most 21st century Americans. Pirsig’s novel (hereby referred to simply as Zen) makes a great effort at ensuring that how one perceives life is just as, if not more important than how one lives it. In my eyes, living life is far simpler than perceiving it. After all, as Socrates said, “the unexamined life is one not worth living.”

            I want to make sure to briefly go over what Pirsig covers in Zen before going into how I believe a book from the mid 70’s can still provide invaluable advice for living in 2014. The novel centers on a motorcycle journey across the country taken by the narrator (Pirsig) and his son Chris. Throughout the journey, the narrator goes on several dissertations (known as Chautauqua in the book) that cover several themes that the narrator and his former ghost known as Phaedrus have been struggling with. The topics range from the reconciliation between a classical and romantic understanding of life, the search for “quality” as the unification between the two and the reintroduction of ancient Greek philosophy into our current mythos.

            In a nutshell, a classical understanding of life implies full use of logic, reason and an appreciation for the inner workings of objects and subjects. Adversely, a romantic viewpoint focuses on esthetic beauty and an appreciation for subjects and objects as a whole. Pirsig found that motorcycle maintenance serves as the ideal metaphor to simplify the two. Classical appreciation of a motorcycle involves understanding how and what each specific part of the motorcycle does and for what reason. A romantic understanding would focus only on the motorcycle itself – how beautiful it is, the fact that it works and what it can do for the rider.

            In this day and age, I think the majority of people live their life through the classical understanding, that is, only worrying about what to do and how to do it in the most rational way possible (“I need X amount of money to be happy, so I’m going to do Y because it’s the easiest and most lucrative”). There is, of course, nothing wrong with this way of thinking, but in my eyes, it limits the overall quality of someone’s life. For Pirsig, quality not only served as the unifying thread between the classical and the romantic, it preceded both of them so that without quality, neither could exist. Think about it, if a motorcycle was manufactured without quality in mind, the inner workings of the machine would fall apart and the whole thing would be rendered useless. On the same page, if the inner workings of the machine were to fall apart, than it’s romantic qualities would be adulterated as well since there would be no reason to appreciate it. I also want to point that although it seems like classical understanding is more important than romantic, I don’t believe that to be true. Romantic understanding asks someone to appreciate the whole of something and what it does in general. Without that sort of appreciation, what point is there in appreciating the inner workings?

            Naturally, when Pirsig realized this, he decided that life shouldn’t be lived one way or the other, but rather through a melding of the two, with “quality” serving as the ultimate goal. This is when the philosophical musings of the narrator’s ghost, Phaedrus, come into play. Although described as the narrator’s “ghost,” Phaedrus is essentially another side of Pirsig (most likely the side that existed before he underwent electroshock therapy in the early 60’s). These musings are important given how disconnected from reality the narrator feels during his motorcycle trip across the country. It isn’t until his former self merges with his current self that the proper way to live – through a combination of classical and romantic understandings – is revealed to him.

                     So, why does any of this matter to anyone anymore? The most important lesson to take away from Zen is one that I already mentioned towards the beginning of this piece. Pirsig goes into a great deal of inward reflection throughout the book, and it was made painfully clear to me that everyone should do the same. Reflection and introspection allow the individual to obtain not only a better understanding of themselves, that is, their goals, shortcomings, desires and needs, but a more lucid picture of external life and how to perceive it. I’ve noticed that most people perceive the world in one specific way and that’s it. There are people that view seclusion in nature as the only correct way to live just like there are people that believe having as much money as possible leads to the highest quality of life. Truthfully, there’s nothing wrong with either outlook. What is wrong however, is the belief that one is better than the other. To me, that outlines the essential benefit of Pirsig’s reconciliation of the classical and romantic understandings of the world.

            I don’t want to make this sound like it’s a “new dilemma” or anything, because it isn’t. Towards the later half of the book, Pirsig goes into his own summary of ancient Greek thought to show that this dichotomy, this very same “argument” has been occurring since the beginning of advanced thought and inquiry. Pirsig draws parallels between the disagreement among the sophists’ quest for arête (excellence) and Socrates’ commitment to truth as the greatest good in ancient Greece, claiming that the same argument has been going on for thousands of years. I don’t believe Pirsig was the first to notice this, but when Zen was published in 1974, it made plenty of waves regarding this topic.

            Another integral part of Zen that everyone should attempt to incorporate into their lives is Pirsig’s notion of quality. A couple paragraphs up I mentioned how quality is a difficult word to define, but somehow, everyone essentially already knows what it is intrinsically. Pirsig viewed quality as a highly metaphysical concept as opposed to the basic notion of quality we’ve incorporated into our lives. The everyday notion of quality is the definition everyone knows, as in, “this is a quality meal” or “this bedframe is of high quality.” In those examples, quality means the same thing, but it actually doesn’t. In the first, the word implies that whatever food you’re eating is pleasing to your sense of taste. In the second, it describes that the bedframe was built correctly and has little probability of falling apart. To me, the notion that the word “quality” can mean the same thing in different situations while having completely different actual meanings describes the metaphysical definition of quality Pirsig is talking about.

            Now, I guess anyone can argue that “quality just means that something is good” but I don’t think that’s right. When something is “good” it means that it meets a certain standard, and that standard is usually different from person to person. A metaphysical concept of quality is more closely related to Plato’s theory of forms, such that quality is a pre-existing truth that is immutable and unchanging, and all subjects and objects that want to contain quality have something to reach for (just how a drawing of a triangle for Plato is simply a recreation of the ideal Form of a triangle).

            The question, I suppose, is how in the hell does this play a role in actual real life? Well, since quality is immutable and permanent, it is always going to precede an object or subject. This gives each subject or object a “goal” of sorts to work towards. A subject or object can be anything – a song you’re writing, a stool you are building, a business transaction or a vacation you are planning. So long as the immutable notion of quality is something you’ve assumed, you will ensure it is contained in whatever it is you are working on. In turn, this will ensure that both that classical and romantic aspects of whatever it is you’re working on are not neglected.

            All of this stems from making a tenacious attempt at inward reflection in order to understand how a specific goal plays a part in your life, as opposed to it just existing as something you do. This hunt for quality that Pirsig drove himself crazy obsessing over can be toned down so you don’t go insane, but instead help give meaning to whatever you do. A musician who sets his heart towards writing a quality song will not only ensure that it sounds beautiful as a whole (romantically) but have individual movements, bars and verses that make up parts of the whole.

            Zen teaches the reader that there is no need to polarize every little aspect of your life so you can only perceive experiences and sensations one way or the other. The book elucidates the benefit of being perceptually aware and understanding that maybe your way isn’t always the right way. To set your sights on quality is to think one step ahead of yourself and block yourself from obsessing on one particular aspect of your life, because there will always exist something grander and more important than that one particular. It’s advice that is invaluable and timeless, and I urge everyone to read through the book while you still can.

    -Wilson De Gouveia

Top 50 Albums of 2013

50. Deerhunter – Monomania

            I’ve been a longtime fan of Bradford Cox and his incessant jamming and creativity, whether with Deerhunter or his solo effort, Atlas Sound. This year, Deerhunter returns with Monomania, the sixth studio album in their catalogue. While not as a wayward or experimental as some of their previous albums, Deerhunter have crafted an almost perfect, albeit modest, execution of the American garage rock sound. Gone are the sprawling, psychedelic hallucinations of songs like “Nothing Ever Happened” and “Helicopter.” Instead, Cox and his gang have fuzzed out their six strings and donned leather jackets and sunglasses to produce a sound that is decidedly different but still all too familiar.

49. Whirr – Around

              Whirr is a band that has been dazzling me since their inception. I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a band whose name matches up with their sound as much as Whirr, and they’ve had two distinct namesakes (formerly Whirl). The band has perfected the current state of shoegaze music (not discrediting mbv, but that’s a different beast), offering rises and falls, crescendos, reverbed female vocals and sprawling guitar effects. On Around, the band condenses their sound into 4 tracks, the majority of which almost hit the ten-minute mark. It’s certainly more ambitious and monolithic than their previous effort Pipe Dreams, but for a band as expansive and ethereal as Whirr, it only makes sense.

48. Have Mercy – The Earth Pushed Back

              There’s nothing better than a band who reminds you of your teenage years, and if you’re anything like me, Have Mercy is gonna be that band. New-ish to the ever growing Topshelf Records roster, Have Mercy recreates the pop punk/emo anthems of years past with a more than helping dose of the “emo revival” sound that seems to be taking up everybody’s time. Catchy hooks, super ultra tortured singing about “how I know that you know that I know that you don’t really care” and being “the loneliest ark,” all the while channeling the greatest parts about old Drive-Thru bands and dudes like Manchester Orchestra and Brand New. Call it a guilty pleasure or not, these guys from Baltimore made a record that fits right in with bands like The World Is… and basically the rest of their label. I mean let’s be real, last time I saw them live they were opening up for Knapsack.

47. Volcano Choir – Repave

              With the dissolution of Bon Iver, superfans of Justin Vernon’s symbolic croon and anguish were left with a pit in their hearts and no outlet for their emotional wounds. Thankfully, Mr. Vernon went to work again with Collections of Colonies of Bees to release Volcano Choir’s second full length. Honestly, this collection of songs plays more like a natural continuation of Bon Iver, Bon Iver’s orchestral chamber rock. I can just picture Justin Vernon telling the backing band to just “make music that sounds like a more rocking Bon Iver.” Standout tracks like “Comrade” and “Alaskans” bleed emotion like open wounds. Sparse guitar picking and gentle pianos carry the weight of the latter while the former centers on a repeated explosive climax that culminates in an auto tuned Vernon spewing “give it another fortnight/eye to eye the culprit/just ride the fucking pulpit” reassuring us that he stills waxes abstract poetry no matter what he’s singing over.

46. Modern Life Is War – Fever Hunting

              I remember when it happened. “Finally,” I thought. “A new Modern Life Is War record.” How sad of a day it was when to my chagrin, I was underwhelmed by their effort. Who wouldn’t be when the iconic Witness, the band’s swan song and a nearly perfect hardcore record, was released 6 years prior. Upon further listening I realized that I was comparing Fever Hunting to closely to Witness and I failed to realized that the new record was undoubtedly a reaffirmation of the bands ability to write anthemic and meaningful hardcore music. The catharsis found in “Brothers in Arms Forever,” the rancorous condemning of “Chasing My Tail,” and the explosive energy of opener “Old Fears, New Frontiers” are unequivocally demonstrations of the band every former hardcore kid knew and loved returning like a bitter, contemptuous phoenix.

45. Tiny Moving Parts – This Couch Is Long and Full of Friendship

            2013 has certainly been a prolific year for emo bands, and there has been numerous articles on the internet detailing the emergence of an “emo revial.” Tiny Moving Parts are a major contributor to this revival, and they didn’t seem to get the recognition they deserve. Tiny Moving Parts give us an earnest and candid slice of the math-rock infused Midwestern sound, complete with half shouted/half yelled lyrics of science experiments, love loss, and old friends. The musicianship is intricate and involved, and as the onslaught of finger tapped riffs and tangled bass lines swarm in, it becomes difficult to believe the band is only made up of three dudes. The lyrical content is at times way to emo (“throwing up no throw up/because dry heaving is the new black”) but it’s delivered with such fervor and panic you can easily forgive these dudes. And yeah, these guys are “twinkle daddies.”

44. Daylight – Jar

              Daylight’s musical evolution has been an interesting to witness. From theemo punk days of the Sinking EP to the grunge tribute of 2013’s Jar the band has definitely come a long way. Earlier tunes were at times far too saccharine in a punk rock way, but with their latest effort we see these dudes paying an enormous tribute to Nirvana and the grunge scene of the 90’s. It makes for a more nostalgic experience as opposed to the immediate emotional connection that was established in their earlier songs. It’s a shame that Balance and Composure’s new record came out this year as well, because this would have placed higher on the list as the “indie alt rock guitar record” to listen to this year.

43. Iron Chic – The Constant One

              I slept on this record when it came out and I’m still fucking kicking myself about it. That’s oddly appropriate given the lyrical content and what this band stands for: self loathing, ennui, loss of identity, a search for purpose. There’s nothing quite like a great punk record reassuring you that somewhere out there, somebody is having basically the same exact problems you’re having. Iron Chic writes absurdly catchy songs, each one with sing-alongs, woah-ohs and essential crowd surfing opportunities. Every time I hear the beginning to “A Serious House On Serious Earth,” with the martial drumming and the rising feedback, I’m already shitting myself ready to sing along: “you had a heart of gold/I know because I fucking sold it/and truth be told/I couldn’t even say what I did with the money.”

42. My Bloody Valentine – mbv

              This is no Loveless. At first I was taken aback. I didn’t know what to think. “What happened to my golden boys and girls of shoegaze?” I preserved and kept listening and realized it wasn’t that bad, just a little different. A whole lot darker and experimental. At times crushingly dense and difficult to understand, but othertimes offering the same serenity and tranquility everybody knows and loves from Loveless. It’s a disappointment of sorts in my eyes, but like Modern Life Is War, it stems largely from the importance of their previous record. It’s still monumental given the magnitude of a band like My Bloody Valentine and we can at least all be thankful that we have another record to add to their ever-challenging body of work.

41. Defeater – Letters Home

              As someone who was fully invested into the tough guy hardcore scene a couple years ago, I can safely say that I’m a bigger advocate of the hardcore that’s interweaved with melody and passion. Defeater have always given us music for the hardcore intellectual, offering narratives and converging story lines in their songs, all the while pushing the boundaries of what it means to be a “hardcore” band. With Letters Home the band continues to delve into the lives of a family ripped apart by World War II, and they offer us their take on the tragedy in their usual fashion. Nevermind the precision and emotion dripping from the music itself, the centerpiece of the band has and always will be the tortured, embittered howls of vocalist Derek Archambault. Listening to Defeater’s music is almost always a mentally taxing experience (in a good way mind you) and it’s no different this year.

40. Pissed Jeans – Honeys

              The reason Pissed Jeans are so amazing deals mainly with how perfectly they express how pissed off they are about growing up and becoming adults. The band writes songs about screaming at your fellow employees at whatever stupid grown up job you have, meeting someone and realizing they aren’t who their online profile says they are and signing up for a health care plan. All these themes are delivered in a flurry of noisy and discordant punk rock all the while frontman Matt Korvette’s disgusting snarl drills a hole in your ear. Honeys is the record to help you through your midlife depression and make you want to spit in your boss’ face at the same time.

39. Waxahatchee – Cerulean Salt

              I’m a sucker for heartfelt and shattered music and whenever I can take the time to listen to a musician spill their guts out into the world I’m gonna give it a chance. Katie Crutchfield writes almost overwhelmingly sentimental songs about failed relationships and waking up late. Cerulean Salt is carried largely by Crutchfield’s honeyed, fragile voice and her guitar, but the addition of sparse, well placed percussion gives her sophomore album a more explosive dynamic than last year’s American Weekend. Crutchfield is essentially the current generation’s Elliott Smith.

38. Kurt Vile – Wakin On A Pretty Daze

              The first time I listened to Kurt Vile’s newest record I thought I acquired a bobo copy that had incorrect track lengths. But as I listened on I realized that this crazy motherfucker just decided to jam out, but in the most laidback and effortless way. I’ve always described Kurt Vile as the laziest guitar prodigy ever, and Wakin On A Pretty Daze is basically his testimony to the accusation. A lot more involved than previous records, and just a little bit trippier, Kurt Vile wrote the swan song for every musician too high to pick up their instruments.

37. Danny Brown – Old

            Danny Brown is one of the most virulent personas in the hip-hop game. His trademark nasally voice is instantly recognizable and his rhymes actually form a narrative. The old Danny Brown used to rap about eating pussy, drugs and other banal shit, and somehow still managed to make it interesting. The new Danny Brown on the aptly titled Old, raps about more serious topics, from the crushing hopelessness of life to the realization that recreational drug use has transformed into a crippling addiction. Old is a fantastic album because it’s a rapper who never really took anything seriously eschewing that attitude and seriously attempting to speak some form of truth about his life.

36. Frameworks – Small Victories

              I love when bands from my home state put out amazing music. I love it even more when it’s a screamo band that’s actually making waves in the scene. Gainesville’s Frameworks blend the best aspects of the atmospheric, cascading style of screamo with the aggression and fervor of more intense bands in the genre. Despite being only a four song EP, Small Victories does wonders at demonstrating everything the band is capable of. The most important aspect of a screamo band is their ability to create emotions out of music that may initially sound unpleasant. Frameworks transcend this task throughout the entirety of the EP, culminating in the final track “Old Homes,” a sublime blend of Envy’s crescendos and Touche Amore’s zeal. Their full length coming out on Topshelf is gonna be something to look forward to without question. 

35. Kilgore Trout – Immemorial

              Another excellent screamo EP places on the list, this time from Richmond’s Kilgore Trout. Forget the fact that their name comes from the infamous Kurt Vonnegut character, the band draws influences from the most visceral screamo bands of the early 2000’s, especially the sound coming from several European bands (I’m looking at you Louise Cyphre and June Paik). The five tracks on the EP shift from scathing sonic assaults to melodic, yet still impatient and seething lulls. Listening to the EP is honestly like reliving the previous golden era of skramz, and it’s a true delight to still have active bands producing music like this.

34. Burial – Rival Dealer

              I don’t think there’s a more present and prominent enigma in electronic music than Burial. Equal parts reclusive and prolific, each new installment of Burial’s discography is like a new edition to the New Testament. His most recent EP is among the most breathtaking of his releases, and we find him pushing the boundaries of his music as he shifts away from the predominantly subdued and hushed tendencies of his previous efforts. Within seconds of the first track, we’re treated to an actual pulsing, thriving house beat that might actually give listeners used to his older sound a heart attack. Despite all of this, the EP is still decidedly a “Burial” EP, complete with his signature pitter-patter drum sounds and clanking metal samples. The prominence of warped vocal samples exceeds his previous works, but it shows a natural evolution in his sound. It’s a shame this came out so late in the year, otherwise it may have ranked higher on my list.

33. Autre Ne Veut – Anxiety

              2013: the year hip-hop, R&B and electronic music finally consummated. Autre Ne Veut’s latest was one of the first outstanding LP’s of the year, and on it the New York based singer blends the best parts of 90’s pop and the current trends of electronica. From the immediacy of the first track “Play By Play,” I knew this dude had something great on his hands: gentle croons, jarring and dizzying production and lyrical content that aptly coincides with the name of the record. It’s basically a perfect record for the neurotic romantic who still wants to be able to dance along.

32. Merchandise – Totale Night

              Tampa, FL’s Merchandise continues their post punk/Smiths worship on Totale Night, a harrowing attempt to escape each of their hardcore punk pedigrees. A slightly more “pop” affair than last year’s Children of Desire, we’ve got elements of The Cure, Joy Division, New Order and The Smiths strewn throughout all five of the songs. Vocalist Carson Cox’s bellow remains a centerpiece for the band, especially on the ballad “I’ll Be Gone.” Not to discredit the swirling guitars and synths surrounding him, but there’s something about the plaintiveness of his vocals that channels a side of Morrissey nobody can really hear anymore.

31. Iceage – You’re Nothing

              Danish teen punks Iceage have perfected the art of not giving a fuck on You’re Nothing. Advancing both sonically and lyrically since their debut album, these dudes have given us another barrage of angst and despair. The best part about Iceage comes from having seen them play live and realizing that these kid flailing about just as much on stage as they are while they’re recording. Equal parts punk and post punk, You’re Nothing is a requiem for the disgruntled asshole inside all of us.

30. A$AP Rocky – Long Live A$AP

              I guess part of a hip-hop’s artist success is attributed to how quickly they can blow, and A$AP Rocky took care of that almost effortlessly. After his mixtape launched him into instant fame, there was a long, desperate lull before his debut album dropped; but goddamn was the wait worth it. A$AP’s appeal is certainly his “give no fucks, I’m rich and pretty” attitude, and on Long Live A$AP it shines through radiantly. The record offers compelling production, captivating guest features, the song “Fucking Problem” and a song Skrillex made that isn’t terrible. Sounds good to me.

29. Baths – Obsidian

              Compared to Baths’ previous effort Cerulean, this year’s Obsidian took a devastatingly sharp turn towards depressing. I suppose it makes sense, since Will Wiesenfeld, the man behind the music, nearly succumbed to a bout of e. coli during the production of the record. I can best describe Obsidian as “The Postal Service for the even more depressed.” It’s an electronic record that hardly sounds electronic, with orchestral strings and swells cushioning the pillowy beats and synths, all the while Wiesenfeld’s falsetto filters in between the spaces. It’s a perfect companion for a rainy day or for the recovery from an irrelevant disease like e. coli.

28. Speedy Ortiz – Major Arcana

            This is definitely the record I regret sleeping on the most. Speedy Ortiz offers us the best Pavement/Built To Spill/(good) Modest Mouse worship in recent memory. Jangled riffs and catchy choruses are plentiful, all the while singer Sadie Dupuis drowsy voice laments about memories from high school and self doubt. Major Arcana is a shining beacon for guitar driven rock in a haze of stuffy electronic music that’s coming from every which way.

27. The World Is A Beautiful Place And I Am No Longer Afraid To Die – Whenever, If Ever

            In addition to having either the best or worst (depending on how you look at it) band name ever, The World Is… have provided us with another solid addition to the emo revival of the year 2013. Essentially an orchestral emo band, The World Is… plays with at least 8 people on stage, and they do their best to recreate that sensation on record. Guitars, synths, violins and trumpets blaring every which way, meanwhile three distinct voices are shouting about taking a rocket to space or carving initials into a tree. The band does a great job of deviating from the expected tropes of the ever-present “emo revival,” and as such, have done their part in breathing new life into a kind of music I hope never dies.

26. Caravels – Lacuna

              Las Vegas, NV’s Caravels have put out EP after EP after EP for as long as I can remember, and this year we’ve finally been given a proper full length. Ten tracks of tangled and tumbling post hardcore infused scream, conjuring up images of older bands like Native Nod and Moss Icon. Any fan of “guitar rock” will find something to obsess over in this tundra of a record, as will any fan of passionate and emotive music. The record serves as a reminder for the impermanence of things as well as the overwhelming beauty of what we currently have.

25. Locktender – Kafka

              Locktender is a relatively unknown band that rose from the ashes of an even more unknown band called Men As Trees. Stylistically, the two bands play the same style of music: cathartic, winding and expansive screamo infused with post rock tendancies. Locktender has taken a noticeably more “metal” approach, but the premise remains the same. Songs that wind and twist, scathing growls, blistering drumming and soaring guitars meshed with lush instrumental breaks. Locktender’s Kafka is heavily influenced by the writings of Franz Kafka (who would have thought) and each of the five songs on the record are directly related to five of the aphorisms from Kafka’s text “The Zau Aphorisms.” As such, the lyrical content deals with several distinct philosophical ideas that I won’t go into here. Just listen, because this record is essentially the screamo equivalent to Deafheaven’s Sunbather.

24. The Appleseed Cast – Illumination Ritual

              In my eyes, The Appleseed Cast have consistently been putting quality music for so long, they can essentially do no wrong. Illumination Ritual is a deviation from the post rock tendencies of the last few records and finds the band exploring the stylistic choices they unraveled in earlier records like Mare Vitalis. Essentially, the band has resurrected the indie take on Midwestern emo they breathed life into during the late 90’s and have given it a modern “rock” sound. It’s nothing new, but the album reeks of a nostalgia that I can’t shake.

23. Brighter Arrows – Dreamliner

              Brighter Arrows is the weirdest emo band you’ll most likely ever listen. In fact, I have doubts about calling them an emo band since they incorporate such an eclectic mixture of sounds into Dreamliner. The tracks contained within the record resemble a ghost haunting you, as the band mixes dissonant and discordant rock music with a more traditional emo sound that they explore on their previous EP, Division and What It Is to Abide. If you’re looking for an “emo” band that doesn’t sound like any other emo band out there, you would be doing yourself a favor by checking out Brighter Arrows.

22. The Men – New Moon

              NYC’s The Men are a band that embodies Darwin’s theory of evolution in a musical sense. I’ve witnessed their progress from a noise rock band during the days of Leave Home to the alt/country/indie band we have on New Moon today. I hear traces of Creedence Clearwater Revival and Fleetwood Mac, while still discovering traces of the punk and hardcore roots the band naturally seemed to grow up with. Regardless, The Men are most likely “your favorite band’s favorite band” or whatever that dumb expression is, given their uncanny ability to shift and transform while still offering quality music. I said they are a band that personifies the natural theory of evolution, but it isn’t only because they are adapting to a changing musical landscape. The Men seem to actively seek a growth and evolution in their sound as opposed to remaining stagnant, and that’s ultimately the band’s greatest feat.

21. Disclosure – Settle

              Electronic dance music is undoubtedly all the fucking rage right now, and honestly, I’m not necessarily the biggest fan of the genre. But when a group does it right, effectively and earnestly, a great piece of music is the result. Forget Daft Punk’s lackluster effort at revitalizing disco, Disclosure’s Settle is most likely the great “dance” record to come out all year. The sounds and themes are all encompassing, and the guests they brought on board compliment this British duo’s uncanny ability to produce music perfectly.  Settle is music made for cocaine and MDMA and there’s absolutely nothing to be ashamed about that.

20. Local Natives – Hummingbird

              To me, Local Natives are the greatest indie band everyone forgets about. Their debut album was an amazing collection of guitar pop, and their sound has matured significantly on Hummingbird. Tribal drumming, claps, soft ballads, ringing guitars and vocal harmonies are threaded throughout the entirety of the record. Local Natives are a band that are fully comfortable with the music they’ve chosen to play even though it may sound “kinda sorta” like some other bands out there. I don’t necessarily subscribe to that theory, since I find their music to conjure up images of beaches I’ve never been to and drunken house parties I’ve long forgotten about.

19.  Little Big League – These Are Good People

              To this day I can’t decide if Little Big League is an indie rock band or an emo band, but I suppose it’s best to just call them a little bit of both. They have the ebb and flow that make up the majority of bands falling into the “Midwestern” sound while maintaining a pop sensibility that makes them accessible by nearly anyone, while at the same time propelling their songs forward with the tenacity of the most aggressive punk bands. Michelle Zauner’s candied vocals will be sure to melt the hearts of emo boys everywhere (I mean, fuck, I still swoon every time I hear here croon on standout track “Settlers”) and the rest of the band do their very best to demonstrate that even the softest of punk bands can fuck you up.

18. Foxing – The Albatross

              I’m calling it now; The Albatross might be the contender for this generation’s End Serenading or American Football. It has every characteristic of an iconic, sappy emo record, but it does so without being overbearing or corny. Lush brass instruments fill every other song, while twinkly, mathy guitars carry the barely whispered vocals. The record paints images of snowy mornings, evenings alone in a bedroom and memories of loved ones. I suppose all of those comparisons are going to inevitably result in someone thinking this is a sappy emo record to cry to, but it’s really something special from a recently formed band.

17. Wild Moth – Over, Again

              Equal parts Joy Division, Bloc Party and Japandroids; Wild Moth aren’t afraid to make dancey punk for sappy drunks. Over, Again is fueled by an undeniably punk attitude but the band maintains a brooding, ominous sensation throughout the entirety of the record. I gave those comparisons, but listening to the record it’s sometimes even hard for me to acknowledge that they are accurate given how original I find this band to be. If you’re in the mood to break glass but you don’t really want to make a mess, Wild Moth would make an ideal soundtrack.

16. Crash of Rhinos – Knots

              When a band like this starts making noise on Pitchfork, you have to assume they’re doing something right. These Brits take the best parts of Hot Water Music and Small Brown Bike and the result is a twisting whirlwind of twinkly emo jams. I hate to sacrifice originality in this write up, but I believe the band offered the best possible description about themselves: “We make a racket. Five voices, 2 guitars, 2 basses and a drum kit.”

15.  Pusha T – My Name Is Name

              Finally, in the year 2013, after years and years of delay, Pusha T’s debut album dropped and holy shit what a banger. I guess with his pedigree (Kanye’s blessing and full involvement in GOOD Music) it would be incredibly unlikely for it to be anything else, but every time I think about why Pusha T kicks so much ass I get a little confused. His flow is basically the laziest of all time and he constantly raps about pushing dope. But then I remember that in hip-hop, confidence is key, and this dude is one confident motherfucker. In a year where minimalism in hip-hop has reigned supreme, My Name Is Name set the tone for the movement (alongside Yeezus). Regardless, there are still a heaping amount of raging tracks (see “No Regrets” and “King Push”) to balance out all that hip and savvy minimalism. Like I said earlier about The Men, Pusha T will always be your favorite rapper’s favorite rapper.

14. Lemuria – The Distance Is So Big

              Powerpop sweethearts Lemuria returned triumphantly this year with The Distance Is So Big, a grander and more complete statement than their previous effort Pebble. This time around we find Sheena Ozzy and crew expanding on their established indie twee sound by offering explosive reprieves in tracks like “Brilliant Dancer” and more orchestral compositions like in “Oahu, Hawaii.” The record is a testament to their level of comfort with their music while at the same an exploration of untouched aspects in their songs.

13. James Blake – Overgrown

            The world’s favorite British siren strikes again, offering us an even bigger and more robust sound than his debut self-titled record. A little bit of research on the Internet quickly reveals that Mr. Blake openly loves hip-hop (he’s moving in with Chance The Rapper for fucks sake) and Overgrown stops at nothing to make this point totally clear. From the obvious, like RZA’s feature on “Take A Fall For Me,” to the subliminally hip-hop tinged production strewn throughout the album (title track “Overgrown” and the one-two banger of “Digital Lion” and “Voyeur”). James Blake is without a doubt one of the most interesting new artists, and of the few electronic artists I can actually respect. With Overgrown he shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.

12. Chance The Rapper – Acid Rap

            The biggest newcomer in hip-hop is without a doubt Chicago based Chance The Rapper. With a single, free, debut mixtape, Chance was able to garner an amount of fans that would take other rappers an entire career to establish. Of course, the rabid fanbase is entirely justified because Chance is an incredibly talented rapper, possessing a flow that is entirely unique and characteristic of his music. Not only that, but the dude can sing better than most people. Acid Rap is a refreshing breath of fresh air in the sense that it strayed from the stark minimalism taking over a couple of the biggest acts in hip-hop by offering a variegated and robust approach to modern hip-hop.

11.  Arcade Fire – Reflektor

            Part of me wants to rate Reflektor higher than this, but in my eyes, these dudes have already won a Grammy and have been around for basically forever. Having said that, I can understand how and why the band decided to release The White Album of our generation. Reflektor proudly and skillfully weaves together almost every single important form of rock music from the last couple decades into one single, cohesive album. Everything from disco, funk, punk, folk and electronica is present and executed to the best of the band’s ability. Reflektor is a piece of art from a band that has already mastered their craft and decided to try to take on everything else.

10. Lil B – P.Y.T.

            It’s the year 2013 and Lil B is my friend. Few hip-hop artists have been able to make a bigger name for themselves simply by fucking around on the Internet as Lil B has. His catalogue of music is at times overwhelming and absurd, but every now and then The Based God drops a mixtape that is interesting and compelling the whole way through. The serious songs are quality hip-hop and the comical songs still have their merits. Lil B’s ability to rap over almost anything is astounding and his selection of beats on P.Y.T. are among his best. Thank you Based God!

9.  Balance And Composure – The Things We Think We’re Missing

            Balance and Composure have successfully made the transition from punk band with alt-rock tendencies to an alt-rock band with punk tendencies, and I don’t think anyone in their fanbase is upset about it. The Things We Think We’re Missing is a collection of songs that could all be featured on your local rock radio station sandwiched between Foo Fighter’s “Everlong” and Matchbox 20’s “Bent.” That description sounds ridiculous, but I don’t give a damn and I honestly don’t think Balance And Composure cares either. Perhaps a more acceptable description to just please everybody would be something like the transition Brand New made from Deja Entendu to The Devil and God are Raging Inside Me.

8. Pity Sex – Feast Of Love

            Fuzzed out emo songs are undoubtedly quick ways to make my best of year list, and Pity Sex stopped at nothing to give us just that. Half of their appeal lies in their simplicity, but every song featured on Feast Of Love gives off such a warm and comfortable glow that makes the simplicity of the tunes all the more memorable. The two pronged attack from vocalists Brennan Greaves and Britty Drake has always been a central part of Pity Sex’s sound, but some of the stand out tracks on Feast of Love only feature Drake’s saccharine, barely audible voice (“Keep” and “Fold”). Regardless, the album makes a “happier” leap from the slightly more depressing Dark World, but it’s a leap that gives their music a slightly more fluid quality. On top of that, they have one of the best band names in music right now.

7. Touche Amore – Is Survived By

            I’m having trouble thinking of a band that gets better and better by writing the same record over again other than Touche Amore. Is Survived By is filled with the same existential quandaries that riddled their previous records, as well as the stop and go rhythms the band creates by melding adrenaline-riddled post hardcore and calmer, melodic refrains. I suppose if something isn’t broken you don’t have to fix it, and Touche Amore consistently makes some of the highest quality music in the new “melodic hardcore” scene. Jeremy Bolm still screams the effigies of every disgruntled punk out there, and the rest of the band still plays their instruments like their lives depended on it, and ultimately that’s all the matters.

6. Vampire Weekend – Modern Vampires of the City

            By now, I don’t think anyone expects anything else other than quality music from these motherfuckers. Honestly, I wanted to hate this record because of the craze Vampire Weekend creates, but I simply couldn’t. The record is amazing. Socially aware pop songs riddled with all of the member’s personal touches. The distorted vocals on “Step,” the congo-like percussion of “Everlasting Arms,” minute 2:30 on “Obvious Bicycle” if you want to get really specific, it’s all great. It’s funny to think how a band whose claim to fame was the heavily guitar driven “A Punk” ended up putting out the best record of their career while featuring as little guitar as possible. At this point, Vampire Weekend could rewrite a Journey record and still receive praise I guess.

5. Rhye – Woman

            I remember when I first heard the song “Open” after Woman got BNM on Pitchfork and no one knew who they were. I thought to myself, “Gosh this lady’s voice sure is beautiful” and then kept listening to the record. I researched the group afterwards and nearly jumped out of my window when I discovered the faces behind Rhye were two guys. The band channels all of the amazing aspects of Sade and sensual R&B and molds it into a hipster friendly formula. It’s an astonishing record, with some of the most lush and gentle production of the year and one of the most outstanding vocal performances throughout all ten songs. Rhye makes the kind of music you listen to with the person you love and even though you know other people can listen, each and every song belongs only to the two of you.

4. Kanye West – Yeezus

            What more can be said about Yeezus that hasn’t already been said by literally everyone in the entire world? Kanye went fully orchestral with 2010’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy and I guess he quickly tired of that. Yeezus is a dark and gritty record, shorter and more aggressive than any other record in Kanye’s catalogue. Listening to the record all the way through is analogous to having sex revolving entirely around BDSM, safety words and all. In the year of minimalist hip-hop, Kanye West reigns supreme; proving once again that no matter what kind of egomaniacal nonsense spews out of his mouth, the man has an incredible ear and passion for his music.

3. Deafheaven – Sunbather

            Sunbather is the ultimate crossover album. The San Francisco based outfit amalgamates their favorite parts of black metal, shoegaze and post-rock in an effort to create one of the most aggressive and beautiful rock albums of the year. The songs on Sunbather literally soar and crash like a fucking phoenix, all the while vocalist George Clark howls into your ear about the dissonance that exists between the haves and the have nots. It’s truly a beautiful and majestic piece of music that not only defines Deafheaven as a force to be reckoned with, but also makes a statement about musical genres and how the lack of barriers between them are just as important as the actual barriers.

2. The National – Trouble Will Find Me

            The National always have and always will hold a special place in my heart. I’ve realized that as this list draws closer to the number one spot, a certain amount of bias affects how I ordered it. Trouble Will Find Me is an exploration of existential defeat and ennui, a litany of dealing with depression and growing old. It’s both a pleasurable listen and a coping mechanism for the devastating cruelty of the outside world. Somewhere inside the songs of Trouble Will Find Me is a personal message for each and every person listening, and that is the crowning achievement of the record.

1. Drake – Nothing Was The Same

                        I’m the kind of person that would write fan fiction about Drake. I have dreams about meeting Drake and doing cocaine with him. I incorporate Drake lyrics into daily conversation. I make an effort to defend Drake when someone tries to insult him. At times, I find myself asking myself if I would take a bullet for Drake. Basically, what I’m saying is that if I sound like Drake’s biggest fan it might be because I am, and if you’re reading this list and want to disregard this record being number one, that’s fine. But in reality Nothing Was The Same is a fucking statement. It’s another step in a man’s journey to greatness. There have been countless works of art detailing a journey very similar to Drake’s: Ayn Rand’s “The Fountainhead,” the movie “Scarface,” and plenty of others I can’t be bothered to mention. If you don’t like Drake, I suppose that’s fine as long as it’s for a serious reason. If you don’t listen to Drake because he’s “soft” or because “he fucking sucks,” open up your mind and give it another listen. 

People In London are Living in Chinese Shipping Containers

    A couple of days the ago the Huffington Post published an article about young adults in London desperate for affordable housing living in renovated Chinese shipping containers. The project, known as MyPad, isn’t Apple trying to pull a fast one on the world, but rather a solution proposed by the YMCA to alleviate the housing crisis that London has been facing for a while.

  Now I suppose a normal person would develop an aversion to living inside of an old Chinese shipping container almost instantly, but in this scenario, the containers are actually fucking sick. These motherfuckers come equipped with air conditioning, en-suite bathrooms and a goddamn flatscreen TV. The catch? To be honest, there really isn’t one since Londoners are only paying £75 (about $120) a week.

  A different article in the Daily Mail offers us actual evidence of someone living in one of these boxes and being as happy as a fucking clam. Louise Stephenson states “The idea of being able to get your own place for £75 a week and not have to be living with a shared bathroom in London is just unheard of.” Her testimony offers insight in two ways: people in London are stoked to live in shipping containers and there appears to be a lack of bathrooms in London as well.

    If this were taking place in a city somewhere in Kansas or Nebraska or some shit I would question the overall aptitude of those states a little bit more since they have plenty of space for new housing. But in a city like London, where costs of living are comparable with NYC it makes a lot more sense. In fact, the housing crisis fucking over all the Brits is virtually the same as the one ravaging NYC: the rents are way too high and there aren’t enough physical housing options.

  So can this sort of gig work out for people in NYC? The only attempt at a Chinese living alternative here led to hundreds of people crammed into rooms separated by chicken wire, rat feces and dead bodies. For the most part, NYC residents are paying thousands of dollars a month to live in spaces most likely smaller than the revolutionary MyPad, and instead of a brand new flatscreen TV they get a brand new case of bedbugs. Offer any 20-something year old in Brooklyn their own studio apartment for under $500 a month and they’ll most likely offer to sell you a bridge right then and there.

    Maybe other major cities will catch on to this trend or something similar, but for now London is finalizing the plans to build two of these 21st century trailer park sites in the northeast part of the city. Whether or not it succeeds in alleviating the strain of the housing problem is uncertain, but at least humanity has found one more arbitrary purpose for something that came from China.

  -Wilson De Gouveia

Scientists Have Discovered a Way to Eliminate a Weed High

Or in other words, scientists have basically wasted their time. Instead of working on a way for cancer to stop killing people or making a more efficient condom or fuck, even scientifically fixing our government somehow, scientists have instead figured out how to prevent weed from getting people high. An article on Gizmodo explains how a group of researchers from the University of Maryland determined that a drug known as “Ro 61-8048” can help take all the fun out of weed.

  I want to get scientific for a minute just so everyone understands that there’s a hell of a lot more stuff going on when you take a rip out of your friend’s new bong besides super chill vibes and an insatiable desire to listen to Radiohead songs backwards. Basically the reason weed is so awesome has everything to do with dopamine, a neurotransmitter that’s responsible for everything from motor control to decision making and most importantly, your brain feeling like everything is awesome.

  Dopamine: The dopest shit ever, know what I mean?

  So when someone you know is clearly a pothead and according to him has to “wake and bake otherwise the day is ruined,” homeboy is actually hooked on all the dopamine fogging out his brain. And homeboy keeps smoking because the brain thrives on knowing what activities help feed its dopamine boner, which inevitably leads to the ritualistic bedtime blunt session.

  Why exactly did these researchers feel the need to prevent weed from affecting your dopamine levels? Well, according to a previous article, unbalanced dopamine levels may be the cause of a handful of mental conditions like ADHD or schizophrenia as well as affecting more day-to-day concepts like motivation and enthusiasm. The new compound specifically prevents THC from releasing extra dopamine, essentially teaching your brain to believe that weed is boring and useless. From a practical standpoint, this new compound can help the millions of people with a marijuana dependence break their horrible, terrible habit.

Marijuana: The culprit who must be stopped

  Realistically, more than half of those millions of people were just dudes on probation who needed to take a break from the ganja for a while and not people teetering on the verge of schizophrenia whose only cure is to cut back on the weed. I guess there’s also the people who are prescribed medicinal marijuana but don’t like the whole being high part, but truthfully I don’t think I’ve ever met a single person like that.

  So science, in all its boundless glory, has figured out a way to make the most innocuous and chill drug completely pointless just because they could. I don’t suppose that maybe discovering a research chemical that does the same thing for other drugs, like say I dunno, heroin or methamphetamine or something is on the radar since those definitely aren’t ruining people’s lives.

  -Wilson De Gouveia

Touche Amore - Is Survived By // A Review

                      Touche Amore might be the most existentially troubled band in the current scene of hardcore music.  Since the beginning of their career, vocalist Jeremy Bolm has held a vice grip on the hearts of hardcore kids everywhere, belting out lyrics about love/hate/loves with cities and keeping to himself while he loses touch with everyone else. I mean, their success definitely makes sense given the amount of angst and heartbreak that exists throughout their fanbase (I am speaking through experience of course). On top of Bolm’s Holden-esque diatribes lies the actual music: a blend of melody, beauty and aggression that has become the standard for other bands in their company (from veterans like Pianos Become The Teeth and La Dispute to newcomers like Xerxes and Saintly Rows). The Los Angeles based band has returned with their third album, Is Survived By, and I think they’ve figured out their key to success: if something isn’t broken don’t fucking fix it.

            I’m going to be completely honest and say that the only way Touche Amore could disappoint me would be to write a record that strayed away from their previous material. There’s just something about the rise and fall of their songs, the expected but always captivating clean guitar break in the middle of their songs and the faltering cadence of Bolm’s vocals that rips through me like the end of Garcia-Marquez novel. Is Survived By opens up with “Just Exist” and goddammit I told you these dudes have a lot of questions to ask about life. Bolm professes “I was once asked how I’d like to be remembered / and I simply smiled and said ‘I’d rather stay forever” as guitars wash over Elliot Babin’s calculated drumming. I could name at least six other Touche Amore songs that kick off the same way, and somewhere deep down inside of me I can find room to criticize that, but I’m a sucker for fervor and passion in my music and since these dudes bring those both to the table I think I can let it slide.

            See here’s the thing, for a while (and I guess still to this day) hardcore music has been largely about aggression, brutality, moshing and for the most part, fucking shit up. So on that note, bands like Touche Amore are like an intellectual amongst a pack of meatheads. “To Write Content” is a perfect illustration of the band’s focus on creativity and beauty. Bolm spends much of the song waxing (super) poetic about the troubles of writing meaningful words that can resonate with all of the ears and eyes that are paying attention. Listening through the song you can tell that Bolm isn’t the only one with a penchant for pulchritude and meaning. The rest of the band makes it a point to impress and dazzle beyond the standard hardcore tropes (ie “that breakdown was really heavy” or “yeah that band is heavier than lead”). Bolm finishes up by shouting “so expose what hurts you the worst/the exchange deals a handsome return” before a distraught voice in the background poses the question “are you in?” And as the last notes fade away, it seems like the voice was addressing the band itself, and as one entity the band proclaimed, “yes goddammit!”

            I’d be fooling myself if I said that the band’s greatest strength isn’t also the crack in their armor. Just how many times can the band reinvent the wheel without changing a single aspect of it? Earlier I said that if the band were to stray from their sound I might end up displeased or unfulfilled, but at this point, Touche Amore are three records deep in a sound they have worked meticulously to perfect. The band seems to think less of what they sound like (they apparently fucking nailed that already) and more about what the whole point of them doing this whole thing means. Album closer and titular track “Is Survived By” seems to be the band’s thesis and raison d'être. Clayton Stevens’ and Nick Steinhardt’s guitars wrap and coil around Babin’s martial drumming before Balm lets the audience know that this is about to be “a song of thanks sung by a hack” and the instruments burst and bloom in traditional, trademark Touche Amore fashion. The track highlights everything that makes the band notable. Precise transitions between the pummeling segments and the melodic breaks, drumming that shape shifts between punk blast beats and intricate fills and of course, Bolm’s signature aphoristic lyrical approach. Here he explains exactly what the band means to these people when he yells “so write a song that everyone can sing along to / so when you’re gone you can live on, they won’t forget you,” which is a statement most people can apply to themselves. It doesn’t have to be by a song, but deep down we’re afraid of dying and fading into nothingness and we’d all like to be remembered for something. Here, Touche Amore let’s everyone know they’re just as afraid.

The Last of Us // My Thoughts

            This is kind of late, but I’ve just finished playing Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us. I’ve grown out of playing a lot of video games recently, but I am still a proponent of the medium as an art form, and this title was no exception. Naughty Dog have made a huge impact on the current generation of console games with their excellent Uncharted series, and they have outdone themselves on every level with The Last of Us. 

            On a purely technical level the game outperforms nearly every other game I’ve played on the PS3. The attention to detail is superb, the visuals are alive and breathing, the motion capture had me thinking I was watching a movie at certain times, and the voice actors did an incredible job of giving an identity to every character. However, at this point in the “console wars” it seems that all of that is expected and I can’t help but think that games need to exceed in an element that is often neglected: story telling and player immersion. These two aspects are the crowning achievements of The Last of Us.

            Before continuing I just want to mention that there are going to be spoilers throughout the remainder of this article so if you haven’t played it (and at this point I would imagine most people have since I put it off for a while) I suggest buying a copy or borrowing it from a friend because it’s fucking incredible. The game begins with a prologue that introduces one of the game’s main characters as well as establishes the beginning of the bacterial outbreak that consumes what seems like 99% of the population. This segment prepares the player for how cripplingly bleak and dire the remainder of this experience will be. It also gives the player the backdrop for Joel and his actions, starting as a recently divorced single parent in Texas who lost his daughter attempting to escape all of the chaos and becoming a hardened smuggler surviving in a quarantined camp in Boston 20 years later.

            From here, the game advances like a fucking Hemingway novel. Joel is paired up with Ellie, a younger girl who happens to be immune to the cordyceps infection. Joel is instructed to transport Ellie to a group of Fireflies (rebel factions operating against the martial law) in order to receive further examination. From here, every single obstacle the game throws at you causes the relationship between Joel and Ellie to bloom. Inevitably, Joel connects with Ellie on an incredibly deep level that he felt cheated out of after his daughter was stripped from him. The game is so riveting that I found myself connecting with Joel and Ellie in ways that other games dream of accomplishing. There were times where I would scream “No, Ellie!” as she was grabbed by a clicker or assaulted by a hunter and I did everything in my power to make sure she was safe.

                        The game takes both characters on a massive westward sprawl, starting in Boston and going through Pittsburgh, Wyoming, Colorado and Utah. For the majority of the game, Joel ruthlessly kills hundreds of humans in order to keep Ellie safe. It took me a couple hours of gameplay to realize that I was slaughtering innocent people (initially I was thinking ‘fuck these assholes I need to protect Ellie’) and then I reconsidered just how much of a “good guy” Joel is. Don’t get me wrong, I love the guy, but if you’ve played the game you know exactly just how many innocent lives you ruin whether by Molotov cocktails or shotgun rounds or shivs.  It’s clear that Joel is trying so desperately to protect Ellie because he was unable to protect his own daughter and 20 years later he is still encumbered with guilt. This is reasonable and almost certainly what I would do if I were placed in Joel’s position (even though realistically someone like me would get killed off in like six days).

            Playing through the game I was reminded of Cormac McCarthy’s excellent novel The Road. They both have a similar premise as well as an incredibly compelling narrative made all the more palpable by the relationship between a parent and a child. However,the two differ in their endings, and the ending presented for The Last of Us is, in my opinion, the reason why the game is so perfect. After arriving in Salt Lake City and finding the hospital where the Fireflies are hiding, the rebel group takes Joel and Ellie captive. Joel discovers that Ellie is preparing to undergo surgery in order to extract the vaccine. The only catch is that she will die in the process. At this point, Joel loses his mind (understandably) and takes out the majority of the Fireflies in the hospital in an attempt to rescue Ellie. He reaches the operating room and the player is forced to shoot unarmed doctors and escape with Ellie.

              I want to reiterate that nearly every single moment of the game has been perfect up until the ending, but the last 30 minutes of the game are why it shines. Joel loves Ellie and I have no doubt about that, but the final moments of the game delve into the reasons why he loves her. After their escape, Joel and Ellie are headed back to Wyoming to reunite with his brother. In the car, Ellie asks about what happened in Salt Lake and Joel lies to her, explaining that dozens of people just like her have been found and that attempts to find a cure have ceased. During a hike back to the camp, Ellie expresses her own guilt, recalling how her friends died in front of her and how much she would like to make a difference for all of the death and tragedy that has consumed the world. Joel consoles her and tells her she has to keep finding reasons to fight. Ellie agrees begrudgingly and asks Joel one final favor: to promise that everything he said about the Fireflies was true. A plaintive Joel says “I swear” and a crushed Ellie says “okay.”

            Is Joel the good guy? Did he wrong Ellie? Would Ellie have chosen to sacrifice herself if she knew what actually happened? Despite his fervor and tenacity, the ending reveals that Joel is a broken man. He tells Ellie to keep finding things to fight for, but if we ask ourselves what Joel has been fighting for, the reason is undeniably Ellie. He led the only person keeping him alive to her death, and despite the possibility of a vaccine, Joel chose to keep Ellie alive. Surely you can say that he kept Ellie alive for her own good, but I would argue that Joel kept her alive mainly for his own good. After failing to protect his daughter, I can guarantee you that Joel was a fucking wreck and the 20 years we didn’t see consisted of him trying to determine if there was any semblance of a point to stay alive. Eventually, he found the best reason within Ellie.

            Joel’s love for Ellie is as intense as his guilt for losing his daughter, and his love for Ellie prevented her from performing the single sacrificial act that would eradicate all of her guilt. The ending of the game left me in a moral quandary. Initially I was ecstatic that Joel and Ellie made it out alive but as I thought about it on my front porch I realized how Joel’s actions were carried out selfishly. But at the same time, his care for Ellie is undeniable and the player is able to find solace in their relationship staying afloat. Ultimately, the game’s ability to portray the “good guy” in a different, morally questionable light is the most jarring aspect of the ending. The ending offered an emotional impact outside of “fuck yes the main characters are okay.” It truly puts into perspective every single action Joel carried out throughout the game and gave deeper insight into the relationship that I found myself captivated by.

            Prima facie, The Last of Us is a video game, and one of the defining aspects of a video game is the fact that the player is in control of what the characters do. This is true for The Last of Us in the sense that you choose how to kill someone or what items to collect or whether to sneak by or not. What the player is not in control of is the outcome of the story and this is important, because despite The Last of Us being a video game, the title’s main objective is to tell a story. Think of the great novels and films you have experienced throughout your life. Did Hemingway care if the reader would be upset about Catherine’s death in A Farewell to Arms? Does David Fincher lose sleep at night because some people disagree that Edward Norton’s character was Tyler Durden the whole time? Of course not, because they were telling a fucking story. Naughty Dog was telling a story with The Last of Us, it just happened to be a story that the audience could participate in, and unfortunately (or not depending on how you look at it) the story ends in a way that might upset or bother some people.

            However, the entire point of a riveting, compelling story is that it forces the audience to think about what happened. To consider the moral weight of the situation presented by the storytellers. To succumb to the ebb and flow of the events as they unfold. Naughty Dog takes these aspects into consideration when making their games. Of course they want to ensure that their game is enjoyable to play, but that is the goal of every producer and developer out there. The team behind The Last of Us had a vision where the decisions of the characters hold weight and affect each other in a realistic and honest way. They could have taken the route of the countless vapid action or shooting games plaguing the industry (Call of Duty, Battlefield, etc, etc) but instead decided to set a landmark not only in storytelling but also in the videogame as a form of art.

-Wilson De Gouveia