oh man this is hard coz Reptilia is one of the harder songs from 00s indie rock, but then so is He War… and if you did Xiu Xiu there’s one or two people around here you could get on to tell stories about old mate. i uh haven’t spent a great deal of time with any of these albums as a whole… i learned about Xiu Xiu with Boy Soprano and every time i wanna listen to Cat Power i just end up putting Moon Pix on. Room on Fire got played a bit in my house growing up but that feels like the most embarrassing option lol. i don’t really know any Ween
oh believe me, i know. lol. we are going to do Xiu Xiu regardless, and that will be accounted for. A Promise is not my favorite Xiu Xiu album but it’s at least an entry point.
re: You Are Free, the only Cat Power album i really got deeply into was Moon Pix. i tbh am not sure what YAF tends to be a favorite among a lot of people because i didn’t feel it as much from what i’ve heard. but i haven’t listened deeply either.
i was a big Ween fan growing up (mostly the earlier 90’s lo-fi stuff) and Quebec has steadily become like the fan favorite album, which surprises me. but it’s also interesting to talk about
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Liz will you two ever maybe do Relationship of Command by At the Drive-In? it’s goofy but i feel like it holds up in a way a lot of my favourite albums from the 00s don’t
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maybe! i dunno! i don’t know it personally but there’s a lot of things we could do in the future. i’m trying to not commit to stuff unless one or both of us feels strongly about something/it’s the result of a poll right now though.
also only 6 hours left to vote in the above twitter poll if you haven’t!
kinda hard to mention ’ relationship ’ while not also bringing up ’ in casino / out ’ but both slap p hard. i might listen to either one today since it’s been such a long time. they’re definitely a product of the early 2000s tho. i wish i knew why cedric deleted his twitter but i’m also p afraid to know at this point since all my heroes keep turning out to be like. . .terrible.
but whatever, the dude is a literal scientologist unironically so like things getting any worse than that i really cannot take
@ellaguro i’m gonna second lydia’s notion that i think you should listen to relationship of command. it’s def kinda weird if you’re not in the right angstzone or whatever but there’s a lot of heart put into that album in particular.
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i would be there for any and all episodes about at the drive-in records. even acrobatic tenament! the furiosity of youth comes through strong in that record. but i am here in a big way for a promise too
i’m about to admit something: i haven’t listened to any of atdi’s other albums
i like the less produced feel of acrobatic tenament. it feels more like a punk album than relationship of command for it, which is not better, just a different flavor. i recommend all their albums, excluding the new one.
sorry for the atdi talk in the thread liz!
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new Kitschfork episode!
we talk about grunge and the complicated history of Pearl Jam, the only major grunge band still standing. we also talk about their reputation as both most popular band in the world in the 90’s and 00’s rock forum nerd punching bag… extremely beloved live act, etc… and ofc talk about their (probably) weirdest album, 1996’s “No Code”
this is our longest ever episode, and it was a very weird revisit to me as someone who heard it when it came out (i was 9!). definitely in the same category as our episodes on Tori Amos and Bjork in terms of how personal it is.
also here’s an image i found with the polaroids that come with the packaging for the album
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we FINALLY have a new episode out!
we talk about the general background of Modest Mouse and the music scene of the Pacific Northwest for what feels like the billionth time for this podcast. we talk about this album’s place in the culture of the time, and its commentary about the paving (and “mall fucking”, to use a term from Isaac Brock) of America. we also talk about the now 10 year old official Pitchfork documentary about the making of this album. and unfortunately Jeremiah Green’s recent passing.
this episode is even longer than the previous episode. though it’s for something a lot of people have probably heard, so that’s maybe justified. we’re also finally going to get back to the 2000’s and our poll winners with the next episode.
anyway, enjoy!
and here’s a link to the Pitchfork documentary about the album btw:
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this was a great listen, thanks for calling my attention to that doc too. kept yelling ”omg they’re such babies!!” while watching it. i used to idolize these guys when i was a teenager but had no idea they were barely older than that when they recorded this
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thank you! yeah from my experience when you’re in high school you just assume everyone is infinitely older than you, so even a few years seems like it might as well be thirty years. it’s weird (and sort of depressing) to think about how stuff made when they’re that young is fertile period for so many bands and artist.
also the Sufjan Stevens Michigan episode which is like our first of Kitschfork season 2 (aka the Best New Music era) and the winner of the first poll i made is coming probably on Friday. me and my co-host Max’s opinions diverge pretty widely on this one.
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new episode is out finally!!
Max and i go all cottagecore to talk about an 00’s (and beyond) indie rock staple artist, Sufjan Stevens - and his 2003 breakout album “Michigan”. this is the first of our two twitter poll albums that we’re covering - tho we’ll definitely do more in the future.
i talk a bit about the history of Pitchfork’s “Best New Music” which launched in 2003 and helped catapult albums like this to wider visibility. i also talked about the weird history behind the Pitchfork review of this album. and then we get into talking about general twee indie tropes of the era, the long tail of influence of Sufjan, the fact that the whole 50 States Project thing was basically just a publicity stunt to gum up PR, etc. oh yeah - Max also really hates Sufjan, so we have a debate about that.
also for any of you Sufjan fans: i found a big scan of the map with the different locations covered in the songs for this album that i thought was neat
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new Kitschfork episode is out!
we double dip on two shorter releases from a couple NYC artists that got a Pitchfork Best New Music in 2003: !!! (chk chk chk)'s “Me and Giuliani” single, which is an excuse to us to talk about 00’s dancepunk revival… a genre we feel very non-plussed about but have some good bitching about. and then we get to TV on the Radio’s first major release, the “Young Liars” EP, which is a much more interesting musical snapshot of a particular place in time. but also i don’t feel like it invites as much productive bitching and we don’t have tons new to say about it. but there are still lots of fun tidbits in this episode! and lots of sirens and car horns in the background to add that extra urban flavor, for some reason (i didn’t edit this episode lol).
the video for Staring at the Sun (a song that i swear i must have heard multiple times on TV before actually properly hearing it for this podcast) is fun btw, if you’ve all never seen it before:
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tweeted this episode out also just now if anyone wants to share it!
https://twitter.com/ellaguro/status/1661797300312702985
and here’s the article i mentioned on the episode about the interpolation of video game music in indie pop
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Excited to listen to this! One time a friend of mine played me a !!! song called “Californyeah” while we were tripping on acid in a Florida swamp. The depths of immediate visceral hatred I felt for that song… I could not take it. The layers of intensely self-satisfied posturing and fake-ironic partyboy goofiness really did my head in. I said out loud, “This song is making me a nihilist.” The amount of grief I gave that friend over this song… The poor guy. But this band sucks so hard.
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i was such a big dancepunk person until i realized that dancepunk began and ended with the rapture’s “house of jealous lovers” and that was it
excited to get into this one!
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yeah i should clarify that we’re going to do the Rapture and that Max in particular is a Rapture/Liars fan (i’m also a Liars fan) so it’s more !!!'s version of dancepunk we’re non-plussed about. i also think it was a little sleepy for the TV on the Radio portion of the episode because we spent all our productive bitching for !!! lol.
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Liars is good!
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!!! carrying on but Out Hud disintegrating after two records is proof that there’s no justice
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