And welcome back to 35,000 watts, the podcast. My name is Michael Millard. I’m here with Keith Porterfield and Scott Mobley. We are three ex college radio DJs, and we like to talk about college radio stuff and college radio music. Although today, we’re gonna take a little bit of of a turn from that.
After college radio, all three of us actually worked professionally, you know, continue to work professionally in music, either as commercial radio DJs or in clubs, internet radio. Like we all kind of continued our career paths for a while. So we continued to listen to a lot of music and continued to discover new bands and, and we’ve thought that might be fun to talk about. So while we generally, reserve our conversations for stuff specifically tied to our time in college radio today, we’re going to talk about bands that we discovered after we left college radio. I think there’s some, some great ones ones on the list and I’m excited to get into it.
So, Scott, what is the band you discovered once you got out of KTXT? So for my band, and I think we’re all kind of in the same boat here, I kinda wanted to pick something that was something that would have been on KTXT if, you know, if I had been there at the time. And I assume that, that this band probably was played on KTXT at the time. This is an Austin band called And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead. I’m gonna get into their music a little bit.
I’m gonna talk about their sound. But before I do any of that, I want to go ahead and say that this might be the greatest band name of all time. I don’t know that I could make an argument for much else. And what’s great about it is just what it evokes in you know, if if it was just Trail of Dead, that’s one thing. If it was, you will know us by the Trail of Dead, that’s one thing.
But dot dot dot and you will know us by the Trail of Dead tells a story that no other band name could possibly tell. There obviously is a poem before this, and it’s not, we brought you flowers and candy, and you will know us by the trail of dead. You know, there is just something about this name that opens up this this floodgate of imagination that I just love. So that out of the way, and you will know us by the trail of dead, very possibly the greatest, band name of all time. So this is a band that formed in Austin in 1994.
They were a club band there, built quite a following. They were known for these wild, crazy, eccentric live shows that went on for hours and hours and hours. They were one of those bands that they were famous for not stopping playing until the last person had left the building. Like, when they were finally playing to no one, that’s when they stopped playing, which I’ve always kind of found fascinating, maybe a little annoying, but fascinating too. They are labeled as a post hardcore slash experimental band.
I think post hardcore is a fair explanation or description of their music to a certain point. I don’t really like the word experimental for these guys. You know, we’ve talked about some experimental bands in the past. I think a lot of times the better descriptor is eclectic. Eclectic and experimental are two very different things.
Experimental is Radiohead or, you know, to some degree, the Mars Volta and bands like that, that really are challenging themselves with sounds and instrumentation and things like that. Then you have bands that just kinda dabble in different musical styles. Sometimes they’re a hardcore punk band. Sometimes there’s orchestras and strings behind them. Sometimes there’s things like that.
That’s just eclectic to me. It’s not that experimental. I don’t think anybody would listen to this band and go, wow. They’re really doing something radically different than everybody else because they’re really not. But they do sort of had a a unique style.
If I was going to compare them to anyone, it is Sonic Youth. I think Sonic Youth, was definitely the blueprint for what these guys do. It’s sort of the down tune guitars, the sort of pulsing rhythmic guitar playing with a lot of chaos going on around it. They are great at what I like to call beautiful chaos. Their songs sound messy and unorganized and unplanned almost, and yet right when you’re about to fall off the ledge, they rein you back in.
It’s almost kind of how the pixies are always described, the loud, quiet, loud thing, although it’s there’s more to it than that. This band was formed by two guys, Conrad Keeley and Jason Reese. They are the only constant members of the band. They were the first two members. They’re the last two members.
These two guys grew up together, first in Hawaii, and then moved to Austin via Aberdeen, Washington. So that kinda might give you a hint on their sound. There’s a little bit of Melvin’s in here too. They released an album, around ’98, I believe, called Annual Know Us by the Trail of Dead, self titled debut album. It was on a very, very minor Austin based label.
It’s really mostly all the singles they had been selling on cassette tapes out of their cars, you know, when they were clubbing in Austin or whatever. It’s just kind of a compilation, all that. But it is a really good album. It’s a pretty straightforward post hardcore album. It’s definitely all kind of at one loud, you know, erratic pace.
There’s not a lot of diversity on it, but it does have the song Novena Without Faith on it, which is this eight minute epic. Almost grunge, but really more of the hardcore kind of sound, but it’s a fantastic song. And after that, they released another independent album called Madonna. Really not a great album, kind of mellower and not quite as focused as the previous one. Couple of good songs though, one is Mark David Chapman and there’s one called Mistakes and Regrets.
Those are both pretty good tracks on Madonna. Now we get to the good part, 2,001 they signed to Interscope records and they put out in 02/2002 the album Source Tags and Codes. This is widely considered by most of the critical community and most of their fans to be their best album. I will say right now that I disagree, and I’ll get to what I think is their best album here in just a moment. But this album is kind of the one that got them on the map.
It’s the first time I heard them. I remember it being on a ton of, like, year end best of lists and things like that. I bought it solely because of the name of the band. People that know me know that this is right up my alley musically, and fell in love with these guys immediately. It is, a pretty straightforward rock album, in this style, of course, but, it does have the songs It Was There That I Saw You, Another Morning Stoner, Monsoon, Relative Ways.
They’re all fantastic songs. And it is a marvelous album. I just am not in agreement with a lot of the critics that it’s their best album. I wanted to read a couple of things that critics said about this album and the band because I think it’s really they really said some interesting things. So, Uncut Magazine, the quote is, compared to so many noise mongers, TOD understand that restraint enables unleashed firepower to be exhilarating and awesome.
And I think that is a perfect description of what this kind of music is and, like, what Sonic Youth did and what and what this band is doing. The reason the loud rocking noisy stuff works is because of the calm quiet thing that came before it. It’s like the calm before the storm. And then when the storm happens, it’s that much more satisfying. So that’s a really great description of of what these guys do.
I also love noise mongers, and I think that should be a name of a band. Anyway, they follow that up, in 02/2003 with an EP called the secret of Elena’s tomb. It’s really just a filler between albums, but it does have the song intelligence on it, which was their first foray into electronica. The song actually was a minor hit. It was in a couple of TV shows and stuff like that, and also started to show, like, that these guys just didn’t wanna be a sonic youth knockoff.
They wanted to try new sounds and new things. That leads into their 02/2005 album, worlds apart. I said I disagreed with source tags and codes being their best album. This is their best album in my opinion. And the reason I say that is because previous to this album, they really were just a hardcore punk band, a noise band.
Post this album, they kind of become more melodic, a little more poppy is not the right word, but a little more mainstream sounding, a little more easy on the ears. The bridge between those two sounds is this album. This album is is much more diverse. It’s more eclectic than previous releases. It’s not just relying on a hardcore sound.
There’s new styles, new sounds. They’re kind of branching out a little bit. Cover to cover, I think this is their finest work. It did have a mild hit on it called will you smile again for me? When you’re away, can there you are not far from the line before.
I think that if you are listening to this right now and thinking this is a band I might wanna try out, that’s probably a great place to start is right there because the song is heavy and grungy a little bit and has the crunchy guitars and the noise, and it and it builds to chaos and then reins it back in, all the things I’ve been describing. But it also kinda has this beautiful, piano and orchestra part underneath it. It’s got it’s much more of a a big soundscape than these guys really worked with before that. And I I think it really is their finest moment, although they’ve put out about six, seven more albums since then. I’m not gonna go into all of them in great detail.
I will say that, this is a band that because they like to try new things and because they like to experiment a little bit with sounds and and try some different things as they move through their career. These guys are very artistic. They’re, you know, they draw all their own album covers. They’re they’re those guys, and so they’re gonna try different things. Because of that, they are kind of an every other album band.
Following worlds apart, the album that came after that was called So Divided. It’s a much more melodic and straightforward album. It’s not very noisy at all. It’s good, but it’s not great. I don’t think it’s what their fans wanted to hear from them.
There’s a few EPs after that. The last album of theirs that I really, really liked was February Tao of the Dead, which is a little bit of a return to form to the more hardcore sound they’re into. I just heard for the first time the album they put out last year, it’s called 11, and I really didn’t like it at all. I I do say every other album, but it’s not quite that simple. I think there’s maybe two good ones in a row here and there or whatever.
And Keith, I know when we get to you, we’ve had this conversation about the Trail of Dead having this every other album sort of thing. I have a feeling that we might disagree on the the good ones versus the bad ones, and I think that’s really a good thing if if it’s true. It’s just a testament to sort of how wildly different all these albums are, and one that doesn’t necessarily appeal to me might appeal to you. So the elevator pitch here is if you’re a fan of Sonic Youth, if you’re a fan of mid nineties sort of post hardcore noise rock, if you like experimental sounds, although I I kind of dismissed the idea that this band is experimental, they somewhat are. And if if you like bands that that aren’t locked into a sound and wanna try new things, and you love a band with, like I said, the greatest name of all time, then you should check out and you will know us by the Trail of Dead.
Yeah. I I am also a big fan of these guys. Great band. It’s funny. You know, I don’t know that I ever would have thought of comparing them to Sonic Youth.
That’s not a a comparison that ever left into my mind. I don’t really know who I would compare them to. You know, we kinda were struggling. What do you call them? You call them, you know, what do you call it?
Post hardcore or whatever. I have settled on the descriptor prog punk, which doesn’t sound like they could possibly be two things that go together. But listen to these guys and tell me that they’re not prog punk because they are. That’s that’s just what they are. And I weird sound structures, but loud, clattery guitars and kinda, you know, yelped, vocals.
Yeah. I mean, I it’s great, but it is kinda hard to describe. I think what prog punk is a great descriptor for for these guys, but I think that’s kind of what the term post hardcore envelopes in that when they put post in front of something in music, I’ve noticed lately, what it means is that somebody took this established style of music and brought it back to a more mainstream is not the right word, but a more acceptable sound. So you take something like hardcore punk, and then you throw a little melody into it, and it becomes post hardcore. And that’s kinda what these guys do.
They’re making pretty hardcore punk music. And, you know, prog is a nice way to describe it because they are also trying to make a sort of progressive sound as well. It’s the songs are some of the songs are long and, you know, go different directions throughout them and and things like that. I I think that when you really listen to especially source tags and codes, you hear that guitar sound that is so linked to Sonic Youth. That may be where their comparison to Sonic Youth ends.
But they definitely have that sort of guitar sound that Sonic Youth is using around Daydream Nation. And I think that, you know, if you ask these guys who are your musical influences, they would definitely come up, I would think. What these guys don’t do that Sonic Youth does is let a song go off the rails and stay there. These guys always tend to bring it back. Sonic Youth lets a song end and then stands on their guitars for six minutes, and that’s how it ends.
They never they never bring it back home. I shouldn’t say never. They rarely bring it back home. And that’s the difference, I think, between a band like Sonic Youth and a band like this. But I think their sounds are are pretty similar when you really dive into it, especially on their early albums.
Like, that in Source Tags and Codes, really has a guitar sound very much like Daydream Nation or even Goo to some extent. Yeah. I I can I can hear that? I can now that I’m thinking about it, it’s just not a a, you know, a connection I’ve made before. I’m definitely glad that you mentioned Worlds Apart.
I do think it’s one of their best albums too. It has its detractors, and I think that’s because a lot of people wanted to hear source tags and codes part two, and it’s not that. It is more varied, a lot of different, you know, textures and and, you know, you said you don’t wanna use the word experimenting. But with a song like, you know, from us from Russia, my homeland, it’s hard to describe that as anything but experimental. I mean, that one doesn’t have True.
You know, it’s it’s all strings and, like an almost classical arrangement. But, yeah, it’s such a great album. We do differ those on some of the, the, choices for our every other kind of thing. I agree completely. I think that they have a tendency to go every other album, but Tall of the Dead is one that I is not one of my favorites and which you said was one of yours.
I really liked 11, with subtitle bleed here now. The thing about bleed here now for me is that it there are 20 tracks on it, and about eight of those are little noise snippets or bits of songs that never got fully fleshed out or, you know, just kind of, spoken word little pieces and stuff like that. If you clear all of that out and just listen to the 12 or so fully formed songs on bleed here now, they are really good. So I would recommend, you know, making a playlist and and just getting rid of all of that weird Flotsam and Jetsam and just listening to the the fully formed songs on that one. And I think you might like it more.
My favorite of their albums is one you didn’t mention at all. My favorite is called The Century of Self. And it’s the one that came out after So Divided. Man, I love that album. Such so many great songs on it.
I won’t go into all of them, but it does have probably my all time favorite Trey Laudette song on it. And it’s the one of the very first ones called Far Pavilions, which has got a really, like, discordant, repeated guitar part and then kinda drops into, like, a more mellow, section and then come from firing right back out with that, you know, clattering discordant guitar. Just a great song. One of my all time favorites. So, yeah, I would definitely want a Mission Century of Self.
I would say, you know, if you’re gonna check these guys out, put that one on your list because it’s a good one. But, yeah, I agree completely. These are a great band, underrated. And I can understand that a little bit maybe because I think they would be a little hard for the casual music fan to get into just because they are kinda loud and noisy. But, man, yeah, give them a little time, kinda sink into the albums, let it wash over you.
I think you’ll be glad you did. They are just a really great band. Every other album, at least. I really like Century of Self as well. I just the reason I I didn’t mention it is because I don’t know if you know this or not.
That album has become somewhat difficult to get a hold of. What happened, I guess, is that the label that had it dropped it and another independent label picked them up. Both of these labels are are zeros. You know, they’re they’re they’re nobody you’d recognize. And so I think it’s just kind of been in a limbo sort of state or whatever.
So, of all, I went back and listened to almost everything these guys recorded in prep for this, and I couldn’t find that one. And I have a physical copy of it somewhere, but I didn’t take the time to dig it up. So I didn’t get a chance to give that one another listen, but that that’s a good album too. I I like I think I think they’re like like I said, you know, I knew you and I would sort of diverge on this a little bit, whereas, you know, I’m gonna, I’m gonna lean more towards the noisier stuff, and then you’re gonna lean more towards the the maybe more melodic stuff. I think if that dichotomy is what makes this band great, first of all.
And I think if anyone out there that wants to give these guys a try, listen to source tags and codes and listen to worlds apart. I think between those two albums, you get a pretty good idea of just about everything these guys are gonna do. If either one of those albums grabs your ears, then then keep running. But that’s that’s the best place to start, I think. You guys covered it pretty well.
I think both of you are bigger fans of this band than I am. I listened to it because of Keith and didn’t listen to anything until source tags and codes, which I really enjoy. And actually didn’t mention my favorite song on there is actually bottle air. I think it’s how you pronounce it. That’s just a straight rocker front to back.
Just, just a great like rock song. I like that album. I like worlds apart. I didn’t really follow him much after that. So, I don’t have a ton to add.
I do think they probably have the best band name. I’m sure that’s a debate that could rage on. It’s funny. I actually worked, when I lived in Austin, I worked with a guy who was in a band that was kind of ran in the same circles as those guys, and they named their band. I love you, but I’ve chosen darkness.
Oh, that’s a great name. Which is which is also a great name for a band. So they would be in the running for that. And, ironically, they were friends with those guys and and played with those guys a lot. So I don’t know if they were inspired or I I think their their name came after, and you will notice by the trail of dead.
But, yeah, hard to beat hard to beat that. I wanted to mention real quick too. I I only got to see these guys live one time for a band that was famous for their live shows, for good or bad. Some people thought they were terrible. In fact, they just recently posted that they’re they posted that they’re done, but, I think everybody that’s followed this band knows they’re not done.
They’re just taking a hiatus. And the reason they cited is tensions in the music industry, of course, but also their their recent tour apparently was a disaster and, you know, whatever, and then that was the reason. I only got to see them live once. They were opening for somebody, so I don’t think I got the full and you will see us or you will know us by the Trail of Dead show. They were opening for Death Clock.
Are you familiar with Death Clock? Does that make sense? So Death Clock is the like a cartoon band or something of that nature? Yes. They are the band from the cartoon metalocalypse, I think, is what it’s called.
So they played forty five minutes. I don’t think we got what they do I the crowd despised them so I was the only person there that was there to see them and not whatever death clock is and you know I’m in that same breath I’ll mention that I also saw gorillas the same way basically a band playing behind a video screen. So I just need the Archies to go back on tour and my fake cartoon band trifecta will be complete. But so I The Pussycats tour. Yeah.
I I wish I could speak to their live shows because it’s something I’ve always sort of been fascinated with that these guys were a notorious live band. And I I wish I could say that I got to see them live in a in a better environment, but I I did not. I unfortunately only saw them, opening, as an opening band and playing for a crowd that wanted nothing to do with them. So I don’t think I got the full Trail of Dead experience. I have to call Keith and I out here, for something.
I may have to cut this out of the podcast because it’s it’s kind of embarrassing coming on the hills of you saying that, but I’m pretty sure we bailed on not one, but two trail of dead shows in our time in Austin. Because we went to see the opening band. And by the time it came around, the trail of dead was finally gonna take the stage. We were Keith and I being, you know, Keith and I, we’re now like, you know what? We’re tired.
We’re We’re You know? We’ll catch them again. That’s a lot more. They were playing a show in Austin. I think every month, it felt like, like, it felt like they were always playing a show.
So it was like one of those, you know, where you live in a town that has a bunch of really cool stuff, but you never go see it because you always think you have time and then you finally I’ll get them next time. Yeah. Yeah. I think we did that with him because I I I swear we there were two different shows that we went to where they were either part of the lineup or or the actual headliner, and we were really going to see the opener more, and and we just didn’t hang in for the for the full show. Maybe I’m misremembering that.
But When Source Tags and Codes first came out, they did, like, a a sort of dual headliner tour with Superchunk, which that would have been a good show to see. I don’t know why it never, like, floated through my radar, but it it didn’t. Yeah. I definitely remember that at least once. So there may have been another one too.
The time I remember was at Emo’s, and we were there to see Trail of Dead, but we got there. And I wanna say it was the Apple’s in stereo that played first. Does that sound right to you? Yeah. Yeah.
Yep. And I then they left and we waited and waited and Trailer Bed still hadn’t come out. And I don’t know if I was just in a bad mood or if I wasn’t feeling good or whatever, but at a certain point, I was just like, fuck it. I’m not waiting for these guys anymore. Yeah.
And I think we’ve got a According according to their reputation, you would have been there for another four hours if you decided to watch them play. So I think there was a lot of that. The sound was not great. I love the apples and stereos, by the way, and shout out to John Dufalo who, was not the drummer at the time we saw that show. He became the drummer, I think, a year after that show and is now their drummer and does the theme music to this very podcast and did all the music for, 35,000 Watts, the story of college radio.
He is. Yeah. He’s their drummer. He’s in the video. He’s in a couple of the videos, but if you see the video that has Elijah wood in it for dance floor, which is a great track, by the way, you’ll see John, drumming away for apples and stereo.
So shout out to apples and studio, great band. We actually didn’t, I remember enjoying seeing them, but then we just could not hold on for a trail of Darren. So, yeah. That’s yeah. That is what it is, but, so, and you’ll notice by the trail of dead, great name for a band.
My band is, a band that I’m gonna argue has one of the worst names for a band. I discovered one of my favorite bands still of all time. The new pornographers. I don’t think that’s a great name for a band. I, I have to think that if they could go back in time, they would, they would not choose such a terrible name, even just for the, how like looking them up on the internet is always a, an adventure in, in Google searching.
A lot of the time, the new pornographers came together in ’97 was when they first kind of started gelling in Vancouver, Canada, and then they put out their first album in February. It’s, I guess you could call it a super group. He, the main guy, Carl Newman does not like that term. And I I think it’s really more of, you know, you hear a lot of stories about a band and it’s like, oh, well, this guy played in this band and this band and this guy also played in this band and this girl was in the, you know, it’s really more of that. They all were in like two or three other bands.
And I guess you can call something a supergroup maybe when it becomes, like, the best of the bands, like, that they’re all in. They’re the it has the most success. Maybe that’s why they kinda think of it that way. But, it’s mainly Carl Newman, who is just a power pop genius, who kind of is the through line for for the new pornographers. There’s, a few other band members that have rotated in and out.
And then the two other kind of more famous band members are Niko Case, who who does a lot of great indie rock folk stuff, I guess you would kinda call it, and, Dan Behar from a band called Destroyer, who much more we just were talking about this difference. I guess he would lean more towards eclectic than experimental, but very, very different style from Carl Newman. So if you hear a new pornographer’s album, you’re gonna hear seven or eight tracks of just either pure power pop bliss or maybe a nice little ballad thrown in, and then two or three really weird songs by, Dan Behar thrown in, which are also great, but very, very different. Just sonically, lyrically, he’s he’s a different dude than Carl Newman. So it’s kind of interesting that they work together on these.
They came together and and recorded their first album, Mass Romantic in February. That one is is pretty straightforward, but I think right out of the gate, you definitely get a sense of who they are and and what their strengths are. And they really don’t stray that far from that formula up until the present day where they’re still, you know, recording and and releasing albums. It’s power pop in the I I would draw a line. I would imagine if Carl Newman growing up in Canada, you would probably draw the line to Sloan, would be the band that he probably grew up listening to that that would’ve influenced him.
I actually hear some cheap trick in there as well. Just incredibly melodic, listenable, fun music for the most part. And and that’s really what he shines at. Lyrically, maybe a little more challenging than than Cheap Trick. And then when you throw Nikko case in, I think, you know, Nikko case is is somebody who was strong enough in her own solo career that she really is kind of tangentially in new pornographers.
There’s a good chance that if you see them on tour, she might not actually be touring with them because a lot of times her tour dates will will not work out. And I think the reason she sticks with the band the way she has is because every album, Carl Wolf Newman will throw her like two or three, just gyms of tracks where she gets to really just bust out. A lot of times they’re kind of on the more, you know, ballad side of things, where where the music she writes is fantastic. She really gets to shine on the Carl Newman songs, and I really think that’s what keeps drawing her back into the to the fold of new pornographers. A couple other albums, Electric Version came next after, Mass Romantic, I think, 02/2003, and then the two really big ones that I think are their pinnacle.
And all and the albums that came after are really good as well, but I think there’s diminishing returns, but Twin Cinema and challengers, which came out in the mid two thousands, are both really cover to cover solid albums. Twin cinema has what I would consider kind of the quintessential new pornographers track, which is the bleeding heart show. It also has quite possibly my one of my top five favorite songs of all time, which is English, Spanish techno. If you’re gonna model, like, a perfect pop song, that to me is about as close as you can get to it. When people ask me that question of, oh, you know, what is what is your favorite song?
And and you really always have to struggle because it’s like, well, do you mean this or do you mean that? Or, you know, I could inevitably, I will kinda circle back to sing me Spanish techno as just if you wanna turn on a song and for three or four minutes, just be delighted and enjoy it and wanna sing along with it. That’s that’s the track, I think. Transcendental has several of those and challengers as well. Sing along, fun, uptempo pop tracks, and then you mix in a couple really good Nikko case ballads.
And then And then you throw in Dan Behar’s side of things, which is just little curve balls. Like, they’re not so weird that they’re gonna throw you out of of the groove that you’re in on the album. They definitely add the variety that I think the new pornographers albums need. I think Carl Newman has released some, solo work under a C Newman and his albums are also good, but they do suffer from kind of a sameness that if you hear 12 tracks in a row of that, you might start to get a little fatigued just because you’re not hearing that. Whereas if you go to the new pornographers, you’re gonna get like six or seven of those, two or three Niko Case tracks, two or three Dan Behar tracks, and altogether, they just work.
The other thing about new pornographers is that live, they are fantastic, and you do have to catch the full lineup, which again is not always gonna happen. I got really lucky and got to see the full lineup, on the Brill Bruisers tour in 02/2015. So I actually got to see Niko Case and Dan Behar in the whole lineup. Their musicianship is is just on point. They’re they’re the I don’t wanna call them professional musicians because it may it kind of almost downplays their artistic ness of what they do, but, like, they are professional.
I mean, they’re they’re clearly really good at what they do, and they’re they’re just tight. And they for a band that, you know, theoretically isn’t together all the time because they have members that are floating around doing other things, When they get together live, I mean, they nail it. It’s a really good show if you can catch them. If you are not familiar with the new pornographers, I would probably start with Twin Cinema and then follow that up with Challengers as far as two albums to check out. And, yeah, I don’t know what you guys’ experience with is with them, but they are a band that I would have insisted we played on KGXD day in, day out if they had if they had been around when I was there.
Yeah. I don’t have a whole lot to add to that because I’m not a huge new pornographers fan. I think the only one of their albums that I’ve ever heard in its entirety is Twin Cinema. And you’re right. It’s it’s fantastic.
And the title track on that one is really good too. We mentioned a couple of others, but, the actual title track, Twin Cinema, is a great song. I did pick up a couple of just single songs off of the album White Out Conditions at one point or another. One’s called High Ticket Attractions. Another one’s called This is the World of the Theater.
Both of those were great songs. I didn’t have a lot of time to dig deep into these guys when I was doing my prep here, But it was funny because, I was thinking, well, you know, I I got a couple of songs off their most recent album. So I, you know, I know a little bit what they’re up to. And then I went and looked, and they put out at least two albums since then. So pretty prolific.
They they, cranked out quite a few albums. But, but, yeah, I I don’t have a whole lot on them except to say that pretty much every song I’ve ever heard from these guys, I’ve really liked. I’m kind of in the same boat with Keith here that I I too, bought Twin Cinema when it came out. I remember it being very a very heralded album. I really haven’t followed them much since then.
I can’t really tell you why, and I wanted to do that for this. And, you know, life gets in the way sometimes, and I didn’t get to listen to as much music as I wanted to. I will back you up on one thing, though, and this is what I will say to anyone that wants to check out the new pornographers. Listen to the song, The Bleeding Heart Show from Twin Cinema. It is one of the greatest pop songs ever recorded, and I know that sounds like hyperbole, but I promise you if you listen to it, you’ll hear what I’m talking about.
I’m a sucker for a song that starts mellow and builds to a a big climax. That song absolutely does that. When it hits its final stride at the end, you can you can picture, like, children running through a field, you know, or something. It’s just got this it’s so evocative. And it’s in addition to that, lyrically, a very sad song.
But musically, it is the most joyous thing you might ever hear. I just I cannot say enough good things about that song. I actually, for a long period of time, used that song to feel out people’s musical tastes. If I met somebody new for the first time when we’re talking about music, I would pop that song on, and their reaction to it would tell me where we could go musically from there. That that’s how much I adore and appreciate that song.
So even though it’s a band that I haven’t followed much since, and I regret that because I know I’d like them. I I love Twin Cinema, and I love everything about their sound and their dynamic just everything I’ve heard from them I’ve liked I’ve just never have pursued them much further than that album and I I regret that so everybody do what I’m going to do listen to more new pornographers And those of you that have never heard them, start with Twin Cinema and get to the bleeding heart show as quickly as you can. Yeah. Good advice. Twin Cinema, I think, is the starting point.
That song, I think, is in is a specific starting point. I would say if you’re a fan of Arcade Fire, you would almost certainly enjoy, the bleeding heart show. I think you can hear a lot of that. They were kinda doing some of that, like, really anthemic stuff before, Arcade Fire was. Twin cinema front to back is good.
And then I would follow that with challengers. Their the album that came after that is is in the same vein. It’s got, I would say two ballads, slower tracks, the the title track, challengers and a song called go places that I think are actually better than the ballads on twin cinema, whereas the the pop songs are, you know, I I write there with I I’d say twin cinema probably has the edge in terms of of five or six just really twin cinema, the the song, sing me Spanish techno, bleeding heart show. But challengers has my rights versus yours, and and fail safe, and some other really great tracks as well. So if you’re a fan of Cheap Trick, if you’re a fan of Sloan, if you’re a fan of just Power Pop in general, if you’re a fan of Arcade Fire, I all of those, I think you would probably enjoy new pornographers.
Don’t let the name throw you. It’s, again, a terrible, weird, it, and it’s funny. I’ll, I’ll tell this story really quick before I, we move on. I wanted to see what the reasoning was behind calling it the band that because I, I figured there must be a good one. And there was one reference to, a quote by a rock critic, and I can’t remember.
There may have actually just been a writer, not even a or a rock critic who said something to the effect that that rock music is the new pornography. In in which case that makes the the name a much, much better name, because that’s a really interesting concept, and you could dig into that. And that would be a really good reason to name your rock band that unfortunately, that is not the reason they named their band new pornography. So they don’t even actually have that going for it. I was about to give them kudos on that.
Yeah. I was too. I was like, okay, that I, I dig that because that’s yeah. Like the connection, it makes total sense. Personally, if I’m Carl Newman, I would’ve just started saying that that was why I made my band that even if I hadn’t, but the story, unfortunately, is not nearly as good, which is just he saw a Japanese film called the pornographers and just kinda liked the way it sounded.
And then he’d also just really wanted to call a band the new something. I think he was the the example he used in the interview I read was the new Christie Christie minstrels. If you remember them, that was oh, yeah. They were a band. He just always liked the idea of the new something.
Just he just thought that would be funny. So there really isn’t a good reason. And and, unfortunately, the the one good reason that might have existed was not the reason, but don’t let the band name throw you. There is, in fact, no pornography involved at all, and they’re they’re quite a squeaky clean band, in fact. Be sure you put band when you Google it too.
Like, be careful when you Google. You could go wrong in a lot of lot a lot of ways. That was a hard thing to explain to the wife. Yeah. Clear your browser history once you’re done.
Maybe just go straight to Spotify or apple music and search there. That might be a little safer. Maybe not. I don’t know. But, yeah, check it out.
New pornographers start with twin cinema and then work your way forwards and backwards from there. You you can’t go wrong. All right. One of us has left Keith. I’m sure there’s many bands you discovered after you left college radio, but who are we gonna talk about today?
Well, for this one, as anybody knows that’s listened to this podcast for, you know, in the past knows that I have a very much have a a number one band, that being The Cure. They’re my absolute favorites. I I also very much have a number two band that’s my second favorite, and had I never run into The Cure, these guys would easily be my favorite band. For the first six albums of their career, they were called British Sea Power. The most recent album, they dropped the British and are now just going by Sea Power.
And they said that they did that in response to kind of a certain brand of, like, militant nationalism that’s kind of on the rise in the world today, which, you know, as an American, clearly, I have no idea what they’re talking about at all. But to not get kind of, swept up into that that kind of, like I said, the militant nationalist movement, they dropped the British from their name and are now just going as as sea power. So if you’re looking up looking them up now, Sea Power is what you wanna do, but you’ll also find them if you look them up as British Sea Power. They have, formed in the late nineties to early two thousands. There are four original members of the band.
These guys all go by single names, kinda like Cher except without the fabulousness. Although, maybe they’re fabulous. Who knows? But you’ve got Yes. I’m saying, let’s let’s tell them short, man.
Yeah. They could be fabulous. The small guy the first guy is is named Jan, who is Jan Wilkinson. He plays guitar, does lead vocals. You’ve got Hamilton, who is Neil Hamilton Wilkinson, Jan’s brother.
He plays bass and does backup and lead vocals. Got Noble, who is Martin Noble, plays guitar, does backup vocals. And then Wood, who is Matthew Wood, making he’s the drummer. And, you know, I I could say they play guitar, bass, or whatever. Actually, all of these guys kinda play a little bit of everything.
They all play some guitar. They all play some bass. They all play keyboards. Since that point, they’ve added a couple of other members. They’ve added, Abby Frye, who is a viola player, and a guy named Phil Sumner, who plays cornet and keyboards.
And then after the most recent album, the drummer, Woody retired, and they brought in a new drummer named Tom White. So, they had a couple other guys that play with him as part of the band, a guy named, you know, Eamon Hamilton and then guy named Graham Sutton, but those guys were never, like, listed on liner notes as being part of the band. So they are six beats at this point, with three of the original four and then three new guys or say three new guys, two new guys, one new girl. But anyway, their first album came out well, before we get to the first album, let me just talk about the sound a little bit. They are essentially a a guitar rock band.
But as I have said with British rock before, they are a pretty eclectic, kinda weird band. They’re known, for live shows. We talked about Trail of Dad and new pornographers both putting on good live shows. These guys apparently do the same. I’ve never got to see them live, but their shows are apparently known for being really raucous and wild.
Phil Sumner got a concussion, jumping off the, doing a stage dive off the stage at one point in one of their shows and I think it was Hamilton who broke his arm during one of their shows. I mean, they get wild. They’ve got a lot of props on stage. They’ve got a guy that dresses up in a bear costume and comes out and wanders around on the stage while they play at times. They’re just kinda known for being a a wild and out there live show.
Lyricly, honestly, a lot of their lyrics are kinda inscrutable to me, but they do have some themes they come back to. One being, like, science and astronomy, literature, beer. So, you know, these are a few of my favorite things. So, mostly, they work for me as well as as Musically. Just a just a great band and and one that I I really enjoy.
But the first album came out in 02/2003. It’s called the decline of Brigitte Lee Power. And, pretty pretty stunning for our first record, actually. These guys kind of arrived fully formed. Like, everything that they do is present on this album.
It’s got some great songs on it. One of my all time favorites, probably in my top five, surely my top 10, if not top five of their songs, a song called Remember You. And that’s the song, you know, putting my, my old music director, hat back on from KTXT, that’s the song that I think would have done really well for us at the radio station. It’s Remember Me. It’s a guitar rock track.
It’s loud and abrasive and fast paced and just really, really great. And this album in general is kind of like that. It’s got a little bit of a kind of a raw, kind of noise to it, kind of noisy rock, thing going on. There are some other great songs on there. Carry On, kind of lead leads a little bit into the popular side of what they’re gonna do later on.
There’s a beautiful song called a wooden horse that, kinda starts off with a kind of a sparse, verse, but then has a really lush, chorus to it, kind of piano driven. Great song. So, you know, I like these guys right off the bat. I I bought this album when it came out. I can’t remember exactly why.
I think maybe I’d seen reviews of it or something. But I I picked it up immediately, kinda fell in love with these guys. The album after that, the second one is called Open Season. It is much more slickly produced. I think maybe as a backlash to kind of the raw sound of the first album.
You know, like I said, they’re supposed to be they’re known for their really raucous live shows, and I think they were kinda trying to, capture that on the very first album. On Open Season, they swung hard in the other direction. It’s it’s very slick. A lot of the rough edges have been sanded off there. Open Season to me is the probably the one of their albums that, I guess if I have to rank them all, it’s gonna come in last.
I hate to say that because it’s still a great record. It’s, but it’s weird in that there’s not a bad song on it. I just also don’t think that there’s really anything on it that kinda rides it to the heights of the best stuff on their other albums. So Open Season is is a good one, but it’s it’s not their best. And, you know, as far as songs that we wanna play that KTXT on it, I think there’s one called, that we would have done well with called Free Stand Up.
So at this point, you know, I’ve I’ve bought both of the first two albums, liked both of the first two albums, but I wouldn’t say that I was a huge fan at at this point. Then comes their third album, and their third album is titled, Do You Like Rock Music? And sure enough, I do in fact like rock music. This album is fantastic. This is the one that took them from being just a band that I liked to being my second favorite band, one of my all time favorites.
It is by far their most rocking album. I think it’s a really good mix of kind of the raw nature of the first album and then the more slickly produced second album. I think they kind of split the difference on this one and come down somewhere in the in the middle there. It’s got some of the more eclectic stuff that they do on it. There’s a a six minute six and a half minute or so long song called Lights Out for Darker Skies, kind of a a prog rock jam.
But, man, everything on it is great. It’s, the song I would pick for us for KTXT was one called Waving Flags. It’s a fantastic song. It’s got some keyboard in it as well as the guitar. Really great kind of, rock and poppy song.
It also has the first of what will be, you know, something that goes on further in their albums. And I hate to call these songs ballads because they’re really not that, but just kind of the slower, more mellow side of what they do. They’ve it’s got a song on it called, No Need to Cry, which is just beautiful, one of my all time favorite bsp songs. And, I should apologize at this point, I know that their name is now C Power but I’ll probably be calling them bsp through the entire thing because they are always in my heart gonna be bsp. But I apologize, guys, it’s not a BSP song, it’s the C Power song.
But anyway, yeah, great song. This album is one of my all time favorites. You know, if we you know, we did the episode where we did the Alien Abduction albums earlier and we had the the caveat that, you know, it had to be from our time at the radio station. If you removed that caveat and I had to pick my Alien Abduction albums again, this would be, a no doubter. This is one that would definitely go for me, and it’s non negotiable.
This is one of my all time favorite albums and definitely the one that really got me into these guys. It also has the first real, tendencies on a few songs or the first appearance of Abby Fry’s Viola, which I didn’t really know the difference between a violin and a viola. I had to look that up. It turns out that viola’s a little bigger and and has a little bit of a deeper sound. But sometimes, you know, it’s it’s deployed as kind of a textural atmospheric device.
Sometimes it’s deployed kind of as, some bands would deploy like a string patch on a keyboard and sometimes it takes a little more of a front and center place in the songs. But I I think that Abby is kind of a an unsung hero on their, albums going forward, starting here and moving forward just because it’s not a sound you really have in a lot of rock albums. You know, even most rock bands don’t have a full time viola player. And so it’s a neat element that gets added to their sound palette that really starts to show, stand out on this album. And then moving forward is is, you know, takes up a little big big bigger spot in their sound.
After this, they still, you know, put out a bunch of good albums. The next one is called Valhalla Dancehall. The first four or five songs on that album, you think you’re gonna get rock music too. I mean, it starts off very rocking, but then kinda, you know, I’ve got five, six songs in. It turns into the more eclectic side of what they do.
The KTXT song on this one would be one called, Who’s in Control, just a great rocker with some shouted, in fact, screamed vocals at a certain couple of points. But there are some great, great, great, great songs on this album. There’s one called Monk two, which is a great noise rocker. And there’s one of my personal favorites. It’s called Cleaning Out the Rooms, and it is just a master class of starting quiet, getting loud, and then kind of fading back out.
It starts off with some piano, viola, and percussion, and then just builds layer upon layer until you get just a beautiful wall of sound going up. And then the whole thing comes crashing down and kind of slowly fades down to the end where you’re left with just the piano playing again at the end. Beautiful, beautiful song, one of my favorites. And I really think, like I said, just a kind of a master class in in building up to a a really, you know, great crescendo and then bringing it all back down to kinda where you started from. After that, they put out an album called Machiners of Joy, which actually kinda sticks with the more eclectic side of what they do.
It’s weird, but I love every song on it. It might actually be my second favorite BSP album. It doesn’t really have much on it that I think we could have played at the radio station. Probably, if we were gonna play one, it would have been a song called K Hole. But aside from that, it’s it’s probably the strangest album in their category, or in their catalog, I should say.
But but really great. And like I said, the all of the weird kind of experimentation on that one just works. So absolutely, I recommend checking that one out. The album after that was called Let the Dancers Inherit the Party. As the title might suggest, it it oddly enough answers the question, what if c power became a dancy power pop band?
And it turns out they’d be really good at that. Kind of like Valhalla Dancehall, that’s only the first half of the album. You put that on and you’re gonna get about six kind of dancy power pop tracks, and then it turns right back to the more eclectic side of what they do, which I I love, so I have no problem with that. I think that album works really well, but it’s very much one that’s got a side a and a side b on it. On the eclectic side of what they do, some of the slower songs on this one, there’s one called Electrical Kittens as a sidebar, is a great band name, so I call it slower but really, really pretty.
KTXT song on this album would be one that’s, called Bad Bohemian, which has got a pretty funny lyric to it. It’s, kinda skewering the whole, Bohemian lifestyle kind of thing. And then their most recent album is also a really eclectic experimental kind of thing. It’s got a lot more electronics on it than anything else that they’ve done before. It’s, it’s called Everything, Was Forever.
Again, to put my music director hat back on, the song off this one that I would play was one called Transmission. But the whole album is really good, so I would recommend that one as well. You’re not gonna go wrong with any of these guys’ albums, in my opinion. And, you know, if I had to pick one, start with rock music. But, yeah, you could go with any of the of the seven albums, and you’re gonna be pleased.
I think these guys are just a really great, eclectic, weird British rock band. I also love this band, but my relationship with them is a little different. I so I remember stumbling across that first album. So I at the end of every year and it and it gets worse and worse as I get older, but I I don’t I find that I’m not hearing as much new music as I want to. So one of the things I like to do is to go to Spin Magazine or Rolling Stone or Pitchfork or one of these places and look at their top albums of the year lists and look for stuff that that I that I might enjoy.
I discovered British Sea Power’s first album the decline of British Sea Power, by doing just that. I actually remember this vividly. On that day I bought that album, The Arcade Fire’s Funeral, and hold steady separation Sunday those are the three that seemed like they would reach out to me of those three decline of British sea power was far and away my favorite I fell immediately in love with this band that said this is a band, at least for me, that you have to pursue. Like, they’re not in the in the zeitgeist at all. Like, if you don’t want to know they have a new album coming out, you won’t know that.
And so they’ve kind of come and gone for me over the years. Now I did not realize there was an album between that album and rock music. That’s how you know, I I love the band. I love the album. Couldn’t wait to buy what they had next.
For me, that was do you like rock music? I thought that was the next thing that they put out after that. And you are a % correct that album is as advertised a % banger. It is fantastic. It is my favorite album of theirs, but I have not heard I will admittedly say that I have not heard them all.
Now what happened to me after that is the next album of theirs that came across my plate, I think it probably came out before rock music, and like I said, I didn’t know about the second album, was an album called Man of Iran, spelled a r a n. I’m not sure how I’m pronouncing that correctly. It is a basically, an instrumental album that I believe was the soundtrack to a movie. Yes. Exactly.
It does not sound like British sea power. It was not particularly good. In fact, I joked at the time and still do that they put out an album called do you like rock music? I then followed it up with an album that was for the people that answered no. But but that said, I didn’t know any of that.
I thought that was their next album, and I was like, oh, okay. They they lost me a little bit. Whatever. And then they completely disappeared out of my life. I don’t know why I never looked into them again.
Whatever I don’t know why last year in my annual pursuit of new music I stumbled across an album called Everything Was Forever by Sea Power and I remember I messaged Keith at the time and said, there’s a good album out by this band called sea power. Does that, you know, is that British sea power? And he was like, yeah. They just dropped the British from their name, and, that’s a great album. Actually, it would probably have been my favorite album of last year had I not stumbled across Always.
If you don’t know about Always, check them out. We might get to them on a on a later episode. But easily number two, favorite album of the year last year. So that’s kind of my relationship with them. It’s a band that I love and appreciate, and I think they’re fantastic.
And I just haven’t made the effort to keep them around me as much as I think you have to in this band’s case. They’re just not a band that gets mentioned a lot, and and they really should. They’re they’re probably arguably the the best British guitar rock band of the last twenty years. You know? Yeah.
Although albums I mentioned were only the the, like, kind of proper rock albums, but they have done, two or three different soundtrack albums, for for documentary films. They’ve done, a soundtrack album for a video game called Disco Elysium. They did an album called Sea of Brass where they played a lot of their songs with a brass band. So they’re actually pretty prolific, you know, above and beyond their their, rock albums. But you’re right, you do have to kind of look for them.
And at the time that I bought Do You Like Rock Music, I was not looking for them. I, you know, I had the first two, liked the first two, and I just remember one day I was just looking for some new music. It’s just been a while since I bought anything. I just wanted to hear something new and discovered that they had just put a new album. I was like, oh, well, okay.
Great. I you know, I’ve liked these guys in the past. I’ll I’ll give it a spin and see what happens. And, yeah, it was was gobsmacked in my head. I couldn’t believe how good that was as much as I even liked the first two albums and I was, especially The Decline.
I’m a particularly big fan of the decline. But, yeah, what a great album. And from that point forward, I have made it a mission of mine to keep up with them because you’re right. You have to. They’re you’re not gonna get on the news or even in, like, you know, Rolling Stone or something like that, an announcement about their new album.
They’re just a more, obscure band than that. And, yeah, if you’re not looking for them, you’re not gonna find them. And I agree with you. I I was a huge fan of decline of British sea power. I did not hear the second album, but I was a huge fan of that album.
I would almost say it was like a like, that album’s like a nine out of 10 for me. But if that’s true, then do you like rock music is a 17. I mean, it’s just it’s just a phenomenal album, from a band that already proved they could make a phenomenal album, and then they just made an even better one with that that album. I really, you know, now that I’ve I’ve sort of rediscovered them and, you know, whatever, I’d really need to go back and listen to a lot of the the gaps, in between rock music and and this most recent album, which I thought was great. I I really that’s that’s a huge blind spot for me are those albums in between those two, and I I plan to remedy that very soon.
Yeah. There are three of them, and they’re all really good. So, yeah, absolutely check them out. I highly recommend it. I have to agree with the it’s a band you have to keep up with or you’re not gonna hear them because I unfortunately did not keep up with them.
After so decline of of British sea power, we played on the Internet radio station that we ran out of Austin. So I knew it from that and from, you know, just from Keith kind of being like, hey. You you need to check this out. And I I played that entire album a lot. I loved, remember me.
I loved carry on. I loved, what was it? Something wicked, I think, is on the album. Wicked. Yeah.
Great song. Yeah. Just really and and, again, they’re not necessarily opening new horizons of music or anything. They’re just really making good, good, good rock music. You know?
The some bands, that’s that’s all they need to do because it’s the and they are a little more eclectic, obviously, than than just straightforward rock. But, you know, for the most part, if you just want a a band that rocks, like and and you’re you’re like, you know, I’ve I’ve heard it all, and there’s no new rock music out there, and rock is dead or whatever. This would be a really good band to choose and and kinda revive your interest in rock music because, you know, if you like to rock and there’s a band that actually has an album literally called, do you like to rock? I gotta think that’s gonna work out for you in this case. They do not disappoint.
It does in fact rock. They are in fact really good. I I was kinda sampling some of the stuff before the podcast today just to to try to keep up, and I’m realizing, like, I really need to go back and listen to to the albums because I think they’re better than I realized and gave them credit for. But, yeah, just kinda to your point of of there are certain bands that even though they are, I don’t know, underground or obscure, they still will pop up on Pitchfork or AV Club or, you know, some of these new, you know, websites or whatever. And I can’t really recall reading anything about British sea power in the past fifteen years.
I just don’t think I’ve seen a review. I don’t think I’ve seen a, you know, anything about them. So if I guess on the one hand, it’s it’s not great if you’re trying to keep up with them and you’re one of those people that kinda need to be reminded, which I am. On the flip side of that, if you’re the kind of person that is kind of in tune with the music scene but has maybe missed out on a band like, there’s a there’s this band that has an entire catalog of great albums that maybe you’ve never heard. So now you get to go and experience this for the first time because you haven’t heard them or you haven’t seen them on any, you know, best of list or whatever.
So that’s always fun. So, hopefully, there’s someone out there who is maybe missing Guitar Rock and has not discovered a new guitar rock band in a while, and there’s not a a ton of guitar rock albums being made these days. Man, there’s, what, seven, eight hours of of rock music you can go and jam to right now if you go start working your way through the British Sea Power catalog. I don’t know if you guys, I guess, would say maybe start with do you like rock, but I think you could probably start at the beginning if you really wanted to, and you wouldn’t be put off by it, you know, the way you would starting off with, you know, Pablo Honey, for example, with Radiohead. I think it’s very I think it’s very safe to start with decline of British sea power.
Even though rock music is a better album, that album will get you there. And this is this is remarkably accessible music, I think. It’s not this is not a band that really has to grow on you. This is not a band that has to, you know, sort of work its way into your head. You you’ll hear it right away.
This is just a good rock band, and they do try some interesting stuff, and they they’re not boring by any stretch. But this is this is fairly accessible music, I think, for, you know, people that maybe don’t like stuff to be too weird or too out there. I think this is not that. This is this is good rock and roll music is all it is. Yeah.
They’ve got their moments. You know, there’s there’s a fourteen minute song on the first album that, you know, the first time you’ve listened to it, you’re gonna wanna listen to that song because it really is pretty good. That doesn’t need to be fourteen minutes long and you’d be excused if you skipped over it the next time you went through that. So they do have their moments where they go a little experimental, a little eclectic, a little kinda out there. But, yeah, great stuff.
And they do hit a lot of different genres too, you know. They’re they do rock pretty hard in a lot of spots, but, on Valhalla Dancehall, there’s a a song, called, Living is So Easy. That’s probably the most saccharine sweet pop song that they’ve ever recorded. But the lyric to it just skewers kind of the idol rich class. And so the lyric is really biting, on top of this just really cool little pop gem, which is a a dichotomy that I’ve always enjoyed.
I like when a band can take, like, really, upbeat, poppy music and then when you release really listen to the lyrics, you realize that they’ve got actually got something to say here, you know? And so, they’re good at that too. But, yeah, you’re right. Like I said, with the decline, they arrived pretty fully formed. You know, you’re not gonna get, like, you know, a journey to where they get to their sound.
They they sound like British sea power right out of the gate, and it’s good. And if you like that album, you’re almost certainly gonna like all the ones that came after. Three excellent bands to check out if, if you’re kind of in the same age range as as Keith, Scott, and I. Maybe one of them slipped by your radar if you if you haven’t been keeping up. I would say, British c power is probably the most likely one to have slipped by you because of of what we’ve been talking about.
And you’ll notice by the Trail of Dead, definitely, if you if you want something a little harder rocking and and a little more challenging at times. And and new pornographers, you may have missed just because the name put you off or you didn’t realize it was a it was a band and thought it was something that maybe you didn’t wanna check out. But, yeah, go go dig in. They all have a pretty deep catalog. So that’s that’s the fun thing about discovering a band kind of after the fact is you don’t just get one album, and then you have to wait, you know, until they put something else out.
You have an entire catalog already sitting there waiting for you, and I think we can we can all three kinda sign off on all these bands having pretty strong catalog front to back. Obviously, there’s there’s ups and downs, and there’s the albums that are gonna stick out as being maybe, slightly better. But I think you can’t go wrong spinning a you know, if you have a weekend where you’re just like, I I need to dig into some new music. Choose one of these bands and dig into the catalog. They’re they’re all really solid, and all three pretty rocking, actually.
We didn’t mean to do that necessarily. That wasn’t part of the caveats, but all three of these bands rock pretty hard for the majority of their catalog. So if you’re in the mood for some, like, good old guitar rock, I would say any of these would be an excellent choice. So, So, yeah, that’s gonna do it for this episode. We have a film called 35,000 Watts, the story of college radio.
If you wanna watch a documentary film about college radio, well, you can. You can go to 35000watts.com and download it right now. We have also a list of all the episodes of the podcast. We’re starting to get a a pretty good solid list of of different topics. We’ve talked about one hit wonders.
We’ve talked about college radio cover songs. We’ve talked about albums that you could not live without that you had in your college radio DJ booth with you, and and, of course, today talking about bands you discovered after leaving college radio. So those are all listed on the website as well. Say hi to us on social media. Tell us about bands you’ve discovered since you left college radio and and bands you want us to talk about and come back around next time for 35,000 Watts, the podcast.