Veruca Salt “Eyes On You”

Last year I saw the original lineup of Veruca Salt play together on their first tour since 1997 and was amazed by how much power and chemistry they have together after so much time apart. This year I’m amazed by Ghost Notes, the new album they made once they got back together, which is just as good and sometimes even better than they were in their heyday. It makes me so happy that Veruca Salt have returned at exactly the point in time when their influence would be most apparent in younger bands, and when enough time has passed that people who were around in the ’90s can really understand how painfully underrated and pointlessly mocked they were back then. Rocking well is the best revenge.

Ghost Notes is a great record in large part because the band aren’t trying to reinvent themselves, but instead tried to reconnect with the things that made them special in the first place. Chief among those things is the rapport of Louise Post and Nina Gordon, and their ability to alternate between sharply contrasting one another and blurring together like this Cool Girl hive mind. But there’s also the core of their aesthetic, which boils down to “write highly melodic pop songs, and play them with the raw power of metal.” I’ve written before about how they more than any other band epitomized the aesthetics of alt-rock, and it’s still true now. The genre is all about melody and dynamics, and in giving you the raw thrill of ROCKING OUT. The heavy parts of the best alt-rock songs aren’t just cathartic – they feel liberating, like you’re just stomping on a pedal and immediately feeling free of tension and overloaded with joy.

“Eyes On You” is my favorite song on Ghost Notes, and in another time and another place, it’d be a huge hit. The hooks are amazing, but the feeling of it is even more potent. This is basically a song about figuring out exactly where you stand with someone, and trying to make the difficult decision of whether or not it’s worth holding on to them. It’s an emotional cost-benefit analysis, and I don’t think it comes to a real conclusion. The song just lives in that moment of being totally unsure whether your passion leans more towards anger or love.

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Bilal “Open Up the Door”

Bilal is the kind of artist who expresses himself more in his ability to successfully perform in a range of styles than claiming one of his own, and so he can be sort of hit-or-miss depending on what vibe he’s getting across. But this sort of Stevie Wonder vibe suits him very, very well, and flatters his keyboard playing as well as his voice. “Open Up the Door” is easily one of the best Stevie Wonder pastiches I’ve ever heard – it nails the way Wonder’s melodies often curl into these loose circles, and his world weary but genuinely optimistic world view. Bilal fits so well into this that the song comes across more as him channeling Stevie’s positive vibes than just playing dress-up.

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The Internet “Just Sayin’/I Tried”

This composition is a diptych made up of two very distinct sections, but it’s remarkable how seamlessly they flow together. It’s very easy to not even really notice the shift from the more rhythmic and emotionally sour part into the second half, which has a jazzy, airy style and is far more vulnerable and contrite. It’s the second half that really gets me – the chords are just lovely, and the sentimentality and generosity on display is a lot more potent than the anger and defensiveness of the first section. But I think the point in this song is that all these feelings exist in a continuum, and both parts are equally true in emotional terms.

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Wolf Alice “Your Love’s Whore”

“Your Love’s Whore” is kind of a harsh and provocative title, but this is actually a rather earnest and romantic song about love. The lyrics escalate as it moves along – at first, she’s talking about taking things slow and the possibility of being someone’s “perfect girl,” and then she’s imagining getting older and having a mature but still sexy relationship. She’s getting ahead of herself. When the song reaches its climax, she’s entirely in the moment – overcome with lust, and declaring “I could only love you more!” The whole song is about building and relieving tension, but that moment is so powerful in how it shoves fantasy aside for the passion of the moment.

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Basement Jaxx @ Central Park 7/1/2015
Good Luck / Unicorn / Power 2 The People / Red Alert / Taiko / Back 2 The Wild / What’s The News? / Oh My Gosh / Everybody / Never Say Never / Romeo / Jump N Shout / Buffalo / Raindrops / Do Your Thing / Rock This Road / Where’s Your Head At? / Rendez-Vu / Bingo Bango

Basement Jaxx “Back 2 the Wild (Jaxx Extended Mix)”

The problem with seeing shows in Central Park these days is that the volume of the music is so low that it doesn’t totally register as actual live music. This is a problem for any music that’s designed to physically move you – the bass frequencies are buried, and the snap of beats have little to no impact. When I saw Spoon a few weeks ago, Britt Daniel apologized to the audience for the quiet sound at their Central Park gig last year, and said that he was furious about it. I was at that show, and yeah, it was by far the weakest Spoon show I’ve ever seen, and that had nothing to do with their actual performance. It just barely felt like they were there.

I’ve seen Basement Jaxx once before, and it was one of the most transcendental live gigs I’ve ever witnessed. It was at Webster Hall, and it was very loud and everyone was dancing like maniacs in close quarters. I distinctly remember the floor shaking most of the time. Basement Jaxx’s live band show is a huge spectacle, with lots of singers and dancers and guys in gorilla suits. It’s the ideal manifestation of their musical aesthetic – joyful, soulful, hyper-physical, over-the-top. Their show last night in Central Park was all of these things, but definitely far too quiet. But despite that, the audience went crazy anyway, because how do you respond to all that stimulation without surrendering to it? How do you hear songs like “Red Alert,” “Back 2 the Wild,” “Do Your Thing” and “Where’s Your Head At” without flipping out? Why on earth would you go to a Basement Jaxx show if you didn’t come to dance? The Jaxx machine is so relentless and powerful that being a bit too quiet is not going to stop it.

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Shania Twain @ Madison Square Garden 6/30/2015
Rock This Country! / Honey, I’m Home / You Win My Love / Whose Boots Have Your Boots Been Under? / I Ain’t No Quitter / Love Gets Me Every Time / Don’t Be Stupid (You Know I Love You) / Any Man Of Mine / Ka-Ching! (instrumental) / I’m Gonna Getcha Good! / Come On Over / Party for Two (with Gavin DeGraw) / Up! / Today Is Your Day / No One Needs To Know / You’re Still the One / From This Moment On / That Don’t Impress Me Much / (If You’re Not In It For Love) I’m Outta Here! // Man! I Feel Like A Woman!

Shania Twain “Love Gets Me Every Time”

Shania Twain was way ahead of her time in many ways, particularly in how she and Mutt Lange brought the aesthetics of ‘80s arena rock into country music. Smuggling that type of rock into country was a brilliant move – not just in that it brought a different edge and accessibility to country, but because those aesthetics weren’t really welcome in mainstream rock at the time, and had to go somewhere. The best possible haven for it was a genre mainly loved by working class people who weren’t too cool for big spectacle, sledgehammer hooks, and earnest emoting. It’s an extroverted, populist aesthetic, and when you do it right, it’s always huge.

Shania Twain’s show leans heavily on the rock side of things, and it’s big on crowd-pleasing spectacle like fireworks and pyro. She puts a lot of effort in connecting with her fans, and does whatever she can to get in physical proximity with the audience. (I was particularly fond of her being wheeled around on a trolley around the edge of the arena during “Any Man Of Mine,” which is such a great, inexpensive way to make a LOT of people very happy.) The main thing I got out of seeing this show is just marveling at how well-written all her hits are. She and Lange were remarkably disciplined in their song craft, and while each song is made up of strong, immediate hooks, they never make it feel overwhelming or relentless. I think that’s where the “country” really comes through – it’s very focused music, but she makes it seem relaxed and easy going.

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The Last Hurrah “Can’t Wait No More”

The Last Hurrah’s first two albums bent and stretched a Norwegian take on traditional British and American folk music into odd shapes, with a particular emphasis on contrasting harmony with drones. Their third record, Mudflowers, pushes in a very different direction, with the duo of HP Gunderson and Maesa Pullman going for a more straight forward blend of classic country pop and blue-eyed soul. It’s not as unusual or distinctive as what they had going on their first album, but it suits them rather well. Pullman’s vocal performance is very impressive on “Can’t Wait No More” in particular, with her conveying a wounded cynicism on the verses that shifts into earnest yearning on the chorus.

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Metric “Cascades”

The sound of “Cascades” is heavily indebted to Kraftwerk, which is typically a sign that This Is A Song About The Future And Technology. Thankfully, that is not the case for this song. Emily Haines is instead using a cold, precise, robotic sound to convey the feeling of stoic repression of emotion. This is basically about trying to power through your feelings and keep moving and functioning, and knowing full well that you can only bottle up so much before it spills out one way or another. This is a very melancholy piece of music, but the saddest part to me is the phrase “keep whatever it is that’s compelling you on.” There’s something about the word “compelling” that feels so hopeless, like the singer can’t think of any motivation to stay alive aside from biological imperatives and objective goals.

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Janet Jackson “No Sleeep”

It’s a bit of a relief that Janet Jackson’s first single in seven years doesn’t make it look as though she’s straining to seem young or trying to conform to the sound of whatever was popular on the radio a year ago. “No Sleeep” is just Janet doing one of her core Janet things – ultra-languid down-tempo R&B that conveys an overt yet understated sexuality. This is a song that definitely would’ve fit in pretty well on either janet. or The Velvet Rope, but is clearly coming from the perspective of someone a bit older and more self-assured. There was always a trace of nerves and self-doubt on those old records, but “No Sleeep” is notable in how it seems utterly devoid of anxiety. It’s the sound of feeling truly comfortable in your own skin with someone else, which makes this sort of an aspirational song.

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Astronauts, etc. “No Justice”

“No Justice” is somewhere in the middle of the continuum between ‘70s quiet storm R&B and ’00s post-Beach House indie music: It’s all rather sultry and tonally rich, but the romance is expressed mainly in a guitar tone that’s derived from ‘80s new wave. It’s a very romantic sound, and implies a lot of heavy emotions while taking up very little space in the mix. The power of the guitar in a song like this is how it rings out in the negative space, and floats over a subtle Fender Rhodes groove and mingles with a very earnest falsetto.

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Vince Staples featuring Jhené Aiko & DJ Dahi “Lemme Know”

“Lemme Know” has a strange, just-slightly-off feeling to it, partly because Jhené Aiko and Vince Staples rap all the verses in unison. The effect is pretty similar to when Tricky and Martina Topley-Bird did this trick back in the ‘90s – there’s an implication that the two voices are at odds even if they’re saying exactly the same thing. Aiko’s voice is stronger and more expressive than Staples, who raps with a cold, aloof tone. At different points in the song, the overlap of their performances implies different things – mockery, flirtation, intimacy, a struggle for dominance. It’s all very hazy and ambiguous, but it’s a very seductive sound.

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Bed Rugs “Drift”

There’s so much beautiful treble in this song – the soft clatter of the cymbals, the vaguely dizzy melody of the lead guitar, that ghostly tenor vocal. It’s held together by a gentle but sturdy bass line, but for the most part the music just drifts on by. (Accurate title, then.) The song reminds me of that strangely pleasurable feeling of light-headedness when you get a head rush, or when you’re sick enough to feel a bit out of it but not enough that you’re in any sort of pain.

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Leon Bridges “Lisa Sawyer”

This is a doo-wop song in the style of The Flamingos, and it’s performed and recorded so faithfully that it wouldn’t be hard to convince someone that it’s actually from the late ‘50s or early ‘60s. It certainly has that wonderful, hyper-romantic shimmering moonlight quality to it, and this casual gentlemanly sweetness that’s very seductive in a low-key way. “Lisa Sawyer” isn’t quite what it seems, though. Leon Bridges channels the nostalgic sound of this music as a way of connecting with the past, and telling the story of his mother, who was born around the time this style of music went out of fashion. Bridges’ lyrics loosely sketch out his mother’s biographical details, but his voice fills in the rest with a tone of reverence and pride. It’s a lovely tribute, and I think it’s really powerful as a song in the way it implies that everyone’s life story is interesting and notable and worthy of being sung about.

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D’Angelo and The Vanguard @ Forest Hills Tennis Stadium 6/21/2015
Ain’t That Easy -> jam / Betray My Heart / Spanish Joint / Really Love / The Charade / Brown Sugar / Sugah Daddy -> extended funk jam // Till It’s Done (Tutu) / Untitled (How Does It Feel?)

D’Angelo and The Vanguard “Sugah Daddy”

Due to a rain delay during Gary Clark Jr.’s opening set and the fact that all shows at Forest Hills Tennis Stadium must be over by 10 p.m., D’Angelo had to cut the entire second set of his show on this tour from this gig. And while it breaks my heart a bit that he had to skip “Another Life” and “Back to the Future,” two of my favorite songs he’s ever done, this show was so generous it hardly mattered. Maybe not generous in terms of song quantity – there were only 9 proper songs in a 100 minute performance – but certainly in terms of extended grooves and D’Angelo’s considerable showmanship. After the show my friend Sean pointed out that it’s hard to imagine that the guy up there on stage leading a band through these showstopping funk jams is any kind of recluse, and yeah, it kinda is. But even when D’Angelo is tapping into the most over the top elements of James Brown, Prince, and Sly, he seems a bit aloof and unknowable. I think that’s a big part of his appeal, really – he’s the introvert with a sexy mystique, and the sort of person who doesn’t speak up until he’s fully digested a idea and is ready to express a fully considered thought.

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Shamir @ Music Hall of Williamsburg 6/17/2015
Vegas / In for the Kill / On the Regular / I Know It’s A Good Thing / Hot Mess / Make A Scene / Christmas Card / Demon / Youth / Darker / Call It Off / Head in the Clouds / I’ll Never Be Able to Love

Shamir “Vegas”

Shamir is an incredibly magnetic performer, and so effortlessly charming and talented that I’m absolutely certain that he’s on the precipice of stardom. He definitely has the songs, but even the best of those are improved greatly by his physical presence and the simple thrill of hearing the bass loud enough that it forces your body to move. Shamir had complete control over the audience at this show, and while most everyone who came were already sold on him, I am sure that this would be the case with most any crowd. This was a great show, but I’m excited to see him again when he’s a bit bigger, and the audience is full of raving stans.

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Swim Good x Merival “Since U Asked”

I love the lateral progression of this song – it seems as though it’s set up for something like a verse/chorus/verse structure, but then just drifts through other moods instead. It feels more like a complete thought this way, with the lead vocals establishing a theme and a feeling of incredible intimacy before going to an emotional place where words would only get in the way. (“Words are meaningless and forgettable,” as Depeche Mode would say.) The vocal performance by Merival is lovely, but the samples may be even better, particularly the snippet of piano from Blur’s “Sweet Song” that provides the frame for the first half of the piece. It’s all so fragile and pretty, it feels too delicate to hold together for long.

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Spoon @ Kings Theatre 6/16/2015
Rent I Pay / Knock Knock Knock / Don’t You Evah / The Way We Get By / Small Stakes / My Mathematical Mind / The Ghost of You Lingers / Satellite / The Beast and Dragon, Adored / I Turn My Camera On / Do You / The Fitted Shirt / I Summon You / Rainy Taxi / Inside Out / Don’t Make Me A Target / Got Nuffin // Outlier / Anything You Want / TV Set /// Black Like Me / You Got Yr. Cherry Bomb / The Underdog

I don’t need to tell you that Spoon are an excellent band and play very good shows for the 20th time. You either know this already from your own experience, or should trust me on that.

Spoon “The Beast and Dragon, Adored”

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how rock music has marginalized itself by becoming convinced that it doesn’t matter anymore. This idea starts somewhere in the ‘90s, but really takes hold in the early ‘00s. It manifests itself in many ways – a majority of rock artists preferring to be niche than aim for a larger mainstream audience, bands embracing a retro pastiche sound with the implication that “it’s all been done,” musicians favoring electronic instruments and/or folky aesthetics because they want to distance themselves from “rock.” In some cases, these are logical artistic tangents, and an understandable response to decades of rock primacy. A lot of great music came out of this. Even the bands who really went for it and made ambitious work aimed for a large audience seemed to operate on the assumption that they were either working around rock as a genre, or that they were ultimately making music that didn’t “matter” as much as the rap and electronic music of their day. And for the most part that’s true. But here’s the thing: It might only have been true because they decided it would be.

There is no reason for the public at large to believe in art made by people who don’t believe in their own work. From the ‘60s on through most of the ‘90s, people who played rock music really believed in the cultural relevance of what they were doing, and that belief is crucial in making the audience agree that it is. It was corny to say “I believe in rock,” but lots of people said things to that effect, and totally meant it. You can mock that now, but regardless of what subgenre of rock we’re talking about, it’s all the same — it’s all built on the conviction that the music matters.

One of the smartest things I’ve ever read about rock music, or any kind of performative art for that matter, was a thing a pre-Sonic Youth Kim Gordon wrote in Art Forum about a PiL show in 1983: “People pay to see others believe in themselves.” It’s really as simple as that. When rock musicians, en masse, decided that the didn’t believe in their own genre, a lot of people who cared about self-belief moved on to hip-hop, a genre obsessed with self-affirmation, and EDM, which is about people coming together to will a transcendent experience into existence. And they embraced pop divas, who have all the same iconic swagger as the old rock stars. They paid to see different people believe in themselves.

“The Beast and Dragon, Adored” is essentially about this. Britt Daniel is one of the few notable rock artists of his generation who I think truly believes in rock music, and it shows in the soul of his performances, and his band’s refusal to either abandon the best and sexiest elements of classic rock or simply make the same old music with the same old sounds. When Spoon performs “The Beast and Dragon, Adored,” Daniel sings the chorus with great urgency, like this great epiphany in a song from a decade ago is still fresh in his mind. I think what he says here is the key to making great rock music, and great art in general:

I got a feeling, it didn’t come free
I got a feeling and then it got to me
When you don’t feel it, it shows
they tear out your soul
And when you believe they call it rock and roll

I don’t know if the world really needs rock music to ever be at the center of popular music. I’m honestly not sure if ~any~ genre can do that now, the way people consume music and think about genre is so different these days. But I do believe this: If rock musicians can learn to believe in rock again, the audience will follow.

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Holly Herndon “Morning Sun”

Holly Herndon’s music is done few favors by her most fawning press, which tends to indulge the contrived gallery “artist’s statement” rhetorical of her promotional materials and talks about technology in a way that already seems hopelessly behind the curve. I’m sure Herndon believes what she’s saying and is no kind of idiot, but she’s falling into trap for many contemporary artists, particularly those whose work is mostly abstract: A desire to over-explain the themes they have in mind because they apparently have no faith for their audience to intuit them with just the art itself. I totally understand this, particularly as a person who has gone through art school and has first-hand experience with this sort of thing, but it bugs me because it combines the worst of pandering to media and anxiety about being misunderstood.

Herndon’s music works just fine on its own. It is not a lecture about technology and capitalism, and it is better for that. Herndon is a very gifted composer, and is particularly good with texture and layering, and in letting her tracks gradually build without a forced sense of drama. “Morning Sun” is a pastoral folk song at its core, but it’s inside a tangled net of electronic tones and clicks. The sound implies a natural world in harmony with a synthetic one, but the song doesn’t aggressively nudge you into thinking about that. You just enter the world of the song, and live inside it, and it can just be a simple, lovely thing.

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Bully “Sharktooth”

I’m still not over the novelty of there being several young women making very good, very dynamic, very provocative iterations of mid-90s alt-rock in 2015. I suppose there is a certain inevitability about 20 year fashion cycles in music, but it still seems to me like a resource that had become incredibly scarce is now suddenly abundant. Bully lean in hard on the soft/loud dynamics, but I think what makes them interesting is in the way they lace in bits of glam with the grunge, and how Alicia Bognanno spits out her lines with an acidic whine that’s very similar to Royal Trux’s Jennifer Herrema. That affect is perfect for a song like “Sharktooth,” which is basically just Bognanno telling off some guy who sounds like he may be a junkie, but is definitely kind of a lowlife either way.

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Emily Skeggs “Changing My Major”

I remember thinking that it was very strange that Alison Bechdel’s comic book memoir Fun Home had been turned into a stage musical, and just assumed it would be extremely maudlin and dreary. The actual show is very emotional, but also very dynamic and entertaining, and highlights a dry wit that’s on Bechdel’s pages, but isn’t necessarily the most famous thing about her book. At least in terms of music, this is a fairly traditional Broadway musical, and as such a lot of it isn’t exactly subtle – it is mostly made up of people with bold, clear voices singing their feelings and actions. But I think overall, the show has a depth the book only suggests. Michael Cerveris’ just recently won a Tony for his performance as Bechdel’s closeted father Bruce, and thank god, because he brings out the subtleties of that character’s many layers of repression in a way that highlights the very best of what acting can be. Cerveris’ Bruce and the trio of actresses who play Alison – Beth Malone, Emily Skeggs, and Sydney Lucas – bring out the best in Bechdel’s source material and Lisa Kron and Jeanine Tesori’s book and score, and present highly specific, intricately detailed portrayals of their characters.

“Changing My Major,” sung by Emily Skeggs as the college-age Bechdel, is a particularly charming song, and stands on its own rather well. All you need to know is that this is sung from the perspective of Alison on the morning after she loses her virginity to a classmate named Joan, and it’s her excited and confused inner monologue about the conflict her intense infatuation and her unsure feelings about fully coming out as a lesbian. (“I’m changing my major to…Joan! / I’m changing my major to sex…with Joan!”) This is definitely specific to the circumstances of Alison’s sexuality, but the powerful feeling of experiencing “OH MY GOD MY LIFE IS CHANGED I LOVE THIS PERSON” for the first time is close to universal.

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Belle & Sebastian @ Radio City Music Hall 6/10/2015
Nobody’s Empire / I’m A Cuckoo / The Party Line / The State I Am In / Dirty Dream Number Two / Perfect Couples / Piazza, New York Catcher / Allie / Cat with the Cream / If You’re Feeling Sinister / The Wrong Girl / Dear Catastrophe Waitress / If You Find Yourself Caught In Love / The Boy with the Arab Strap / I Didn’t See It Coming / Sleep the Clock Around // Lazy Line Painter Jane / Judy and the Dream of Horses

Belle & Sebastian “Cat with the Cream”

I’m pretty sure this was the biggest headlining, non-festival show of Belle & Sebastian’s career in the United States. They really went all-out for it – a huge video screen with full-produced videos matched up to some of the newer songs, dancers, a string section, and special guest Dee Dee Penny from the Dum Dum Girls showing up in the encore to sing “Lazy Line Painter Jane.” (I never thought I’d get to see them do that song, and I was beyond thrilled.) But as much as they endeavored to put on a big, lavish show there was a bit of the old B&S ramshackle charm on display – the dancers were definitely not pros, and you could sometimes see the cursor of the computer controlling the video screen appear on the screen itself.

The performance was impeccable, though. Belle & Sebastian became a very tight live band over a decade ago, and they’ve only become more confident. The main attraction of seeing this band live is just to hear Stuart Murdoch’s voice in person – it’s such a gorgeous, delicate thing, and it’s not a surprise that the songs that stripped out a lot of sound to focus on it, like “The State I Am In” and “Piazza, New York Catcher,” inspired the most passionate response from the audience. I was particularly moved by his performance on “Cat with the Cream,” one of the best cuts from the new album. The vocal melody is so simple and lovely, and I love how it contrasts with this trilling, vaguely menacing string section.

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Makeshift Shelters “This Song Is Definitely Not About A Boy”

The title of this song is a lie. This is a full-on emo/pop-punk rant about an ex, but unlike the majority of the music in that genre, this is a woman tearing into some obnoxious dude in great detail. Everything in this song is so vivid, from the opening about this guy telling her not to hold his hand in front of his friends to the bit about him saying he’s an anarchist but holding on to his day job. This is basically a Fall Out Boy song in terms of style and structure, but it’s so refreshing to hear these genre conventions turned back on to suburban punk guys – always a far better target of scorn and mockery than the poor young girls who break their hearts after they get tired of being treated like shit.

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No Ditching “Song for Shelley”

The title of this song isn’t a lie, but it’s not quite what you probably expect. It’s a song about friendship, but specifically one that has become rather strained, largely because of some guy she’s dating who is a total creep. I love that the core emotion in this song is a feeling of want to protect a friend, but trying to be mindful of boundaries. So, instead of directly fighting with her boyfriend or lecturing her about him, she tells him to “fuck off” in her sleep.

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