AprilBlue have been on my radar for a while thanks to its shared songwriter in Azusa Suga of the late great For Tracy Hyde, but I somehow missed last year’s excellent yura. “春の病 (Spring Forever)” has it all: jet-engine guitars, pretty melodies, and catchy hooks. The whole album is just as great.

Skindred – Can I Get A

This band has been around for a while (apparently), but had never crossed my eardrums. This song is a straight-up early 90s-coded earworm that reminds me of bands like Jesus Jones and EMF. Can I get a whop whoop?

Enrose – Take Care

I came to know of Gabi Rose as the touring sax player for Bilmuri where she is not only a force of nature on her instrument but also an incredible vocalist. This song is the first I’ve heard of from her solo work as Enrose. “Take Care” is a bittersweet thank you note to the one who sees all the flaws but still stays. It’s just what I needed this month.

President – Mercy

I’ve given President plenty of chances, but nothing has really stuck with me. Maybe it’s the fact that it sounds a lot like a Deftones song, but “Mercy” is one that’s finally hitting nicely.

Dem crunchy guitars!

Metric – Victim of Luck

As much as Metric have landed on a particular “sound”, they do (as they should) bob and weave within that domain. The Formentera era didn’t grab onto me very hard, but “Victim of Luck” sounds like a return to a more Art of Doubt kind of flavor.

Violet Grohl – THUM

Grunge royalty is alive and well.

PONY – Middle Of Summer

PONY’s new album is all dark and bubbly with hooks for days, and this track is my favorite.

Luli Lee – You’ll Be My Mad Dog

Luli Lee’s new material has a lot more bite, and it sounds really cool.

Knocked Loose – Hive Mind (feat. Denzel Curry)

This song is pure violence. You’ve been warned.

“Anger is a gift.”

Rage Against the Machine’s 1992 self-titled album is stacked with brutal bars and indelible lyricism, but none have stuck with me as long as these almost-whispered words from the song “Freedom”.

Like all songs on this album, the full lyrics of “Freedom” foster teachable moments. This particular song centers around the story of Leonard Peltier, a Native American activist who was involved in a shootout with two FBI agents in the 1970s. Peltier was later arrested and received two consecutive life sentences for the deaths of the agents, though the two other men who fought with him walked free.

Context matters, though. These agents entered the reservation without notice or identification in the midst of multiple FBI raids on reservations in which over 200 people were beaten or murdered for their alignment with the American Indian Movement (AIM), which was begun “in order to address systemic issues of poverty, discrimination, and police brutality against American Indians.”

The group had very reasonable demands, many of which can be simply boiled down to “the United States government should keep all the promises it has made.” As I’m sure you know, the government has never had any intention of keeping any promises or treaties made with American Indian nations, and so AIM engaged in what I would call shenanigans: things like commandeering a replica of the Mayflower on the 350th anniversary of the Pilgrims’ landing at Plymouth Rock and occupying Mount Rushmore. (Did you know that this mount was considered sacred by the Lakota Indians and was seized and defaced with the massive mugs of white oppressors after gold was discovered there? That’s just one of the innumerable injustices levied against Native Americans. Can you blame them for being angry, for organizing, and for sometimes resorting to violence?)

Peltier’s story is an unfortunate reminder of what can happen when the oppressed fight back. It’s not hard to believe that Peltier’s conviction had less to do with any notion that he fired the shots that killed the agents and more to do with his past defiance and activism. He was an ongoing threat, like many other civil rights activists of the time.

All of this parallels the current political landscape. People who dare to demand what they’ve already been promised—to exercise their lawful right to protest and peacefully assemble, record law enforcement activity, lawfully carry a firearm, exercise their freedom of speech, or simply live their lives with promised liberty and the pursuit of happiness—are met with harassment, bigoted legislation, beatings, teargas, false imprisonment, and even public execution.

Are you angry? You should be fucking angry.

But anger on its own is cancer. It eats you from the inside because it has nowhere to go. I love seeing Jennette McCurdy pop up in the media; she’s been through so much yet has clawed her way forward, partially fueled by anger:

“I think of [anger] as such a mobilizing emotion. I think it’s something I really channel in a healthy way and effectively through the things that I write. But it’s something that – I feel like anger just suggests, you know, boundaries that need to be set, messages that need to be shared, conversations that need to be started. Anger is so empowering and important, and I still have a lot of it. So there’s a lot more to come.”

“Anger is a gift” is a call to action, whatever that may look like to each one of us. Some have the privilege and ability to march, to make signs, to shout into bullhorns as ICE agents strapped into bulletproof vest and bristling with weapons declare us the real threat. Some use their voice to create content on social media, exposing truth and encouraging others to do the same. Others barely have the bandwidth to take an hour off from work and go vote. All of this is valid, because it’s all action. I think the lesson here is to let anger move us to do something, small as it may be.

Like Leonard Peltier, we can’t expect our actions to go unpunished. The louder we are, the higher the likelihood and severity of the blowback. I’m not sure of where my stupid blog’s threat level will register in the larger scheme of things, but there is an anger inside of me that can no longer be satisfied by the occasional surface-level conversation with friends:

⁂

This disgusting oppression of trans people has to stop. Let trans people live. Everyone in this country has a right to exist as they choose, so long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else. Being trans hurts no one. And no, having to acknowledge the existence of people you don’t understand isn’t hurting anyone; that’s called bigotry, and we don’t tolerate it.

To be crystal clear:

• Trans people should be able to participate in sports with their identified gender.
• Trans people should be able to use the bathroom of their identified gender.
• Trans people should be federally protected from discrimination in work, housing, healthcare, and public spaces.
• Trans identity should not be banned from discussion in schools.
• Trans people of all ages should have access to gender affirming care.

I also don’t give a damn what any god or precious book has to say about trans people. This country is not a church, and it never should be. If you believe that being trans is a sin, that’s fine. You can take that belief and let it rot you from the inside, but the rest of us don’t have to tolerate your poisoned piety.

Furthermore, all this fearmongering around gender affirming care and public restrooms is not about trans people, it’s about control. Trans people are the ultimate uncontrollable population, because they have taken risks so great just to manifest their true selves that it frightens an establishment that leverages conformity to bend the population to total obedience.

And yet we see the party that has so loudly and obnoxiously clamored for freedom actively work to strip freedoms from trans people. It’s disgusting, and makes it pretty obvious that the oppression won’t stop with them. Anyone who doesn’t align with a very specific identity is next on the list. Just look at all the citizens caught up in ICE’s dragnet just because they’re not white. The “find out” phase is going to come pretty hard for a lot of other people, too.

None of this will come as a surprise to anyone who knows me, but if the polls are correct then my views are not with the majority. That writing this feels in any way risky—because the government is very transparently building a massive surveillance machine, courtesy of those bootlickers at Palantir—is exactly why I’m writing it. Flag me in your database, you sacks of shit. I won’t let fear of reprisal silence me.

If this entire article has done nothing but give my anger a place to go, at least for the moment, then that’s enough, because now there’s more room for love. Big, clear-eyed, compassionate love for my marginalized and hurting brothers and sisters. I see you, I love you, and I will do all I can to protect you. Love is what puts a body between victim and aggressor. Love blocks streets to deter violence. Love stands outside a bathroom so another can use it in peace. Are we going to let the government do to trans people what they have long tried to do to Native Americans and any other demographic that has inconvenienced its steady march toward straight white supremacy?

Not me. 🖕

Fickle Friends – Bleach

It’s taken me a while to warm up to Fickle Friends’ latest album, but this song was an instant fave. So warm and hopeful.

Yvette Young – good morning (feat. Casio DIMENSION SHIFTER)

How dare she make me cry like that? I’ve listened to this song plenty of times before (Covet’s Technicolor is a great album), but all those extra bends and wobbles clobbered my soul.

she’s green – Full Performance (Live on KEXP)

Holy shit, this KEXP set from she’s green is pure euphoria.

deary – Seabird

I’ll confess: I haven’t been all that taken with Deary (maybe I need to listen more intently?), but this new track is so easy to like!

Slowwves – It’s All About Transient Ideology

Slowwves’ debut is one of the best shoegaze albums I’ve ever heard. Few bands conjure that gorgeous wall of sound like this.

Okay, here comes the heavy…

Showing Teeth – Labyrinth

You’re never gonna believe the screams coming out of that little lady.

BABYMETAL – ヘドバンギャー！！ 15th Night Ver. (OFFICIAL)

I guess this is a remake of an old BABYMETAL song. I’m new to the band, so it’s new to me. It headbangs, though!

HANABIE. – ICONIC

HANABIE. are always fun! And hate desk jobs, apparently.

Broken Focus – Live Studio Session (Full S/T Demo Performance)

Hardcore isn’t my usual flavor of everyday music listening, but all 11 minutes of this rendition of their self-titled debut goes hard into the paint.

Hardcore isn’t my usual flavor of everyday music listening, but 1) I do love me some raucous, raw jams and 2) game gotta be respected. When Broken Focus’s first song “Break Me Down” slid into my YouTube feed last year, its endearingly ass-kicking thrift store performance won me over immediately, and I hit repeat on that shit like a dozen times. Their self-titled EP came out soon after, and though it’s only 11 minutes long, every second goes hard into the paint. Each member brings the heat, but hot damn does vocalist Wren Rose’s screams and howls push each song’s intensity into the red. I’m prompted to write about this because the band just released a live version of their EP, and sounds so stinkin’ good I simply had to come here and lay down some massive, long overdue appreesh for these songs. Whichever incarnation you may prefer, you won’t go wrong.

Happy 2026, y’all. We made it, for better or for worse.

I’ve started off the last couple years in a bit of a musical lull, thinking there’s surely nothing new under the sun that could send me down new rabbit holes, and—so far—I’ve been happy to be wrong every time. Seek and ye shall find, right? 2025 turned out to be yet another year full of exciting discoveries. I continued to be drawn to heavier music, found some great new-to-me bands, and enjoyed plenty of new music from my tried & true favorites.

Switching from Spotify to Apple Music really jacked with my listening patterns, though. The downgrade in the app experience also really threw off whatever listening rhythm I had settled into, and I don’t think I ever recovered. As trash as Spotify is as a company, the software is a well-oiled machine, and I miss it a lot.

This year’s report is just a tad different. For the last few years, I’ve essentially been mirroring my favorite artists, albums, and songs from my Last.fm statistics. That approach has been fine, I guess, and the Notables section picked up the slack for music that didn’t make it into the top five, but now I feel like inverting the format: starting with the more organic takes and ending with the metrics-based stuff. I know, so riveting.

Let’s get into it.

Album of the Year

Ghost – Skeletá

Hard Rock / Metal / AOR

This album seemed to find a bunch of new listeners who hadn’t heard of Ghost before, and for good reason. Skeletá is front-to-back nostalgic 80s-coded hard rock bangers with a flair for dramatic guitar solos and earworm melodies. It’s my album of the year on its own merits, but that it also unveiled the whole glorious Ghost discography gives it even more weight.

★ Ghost – Skeletá

Favorites

Ghost – Rite Here Rite Now (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Hard Rock / Metal / AOR

Speaking of unveiling, this live album is what made me finally “get” Ghost. Assembled from the concert film of the same name, its 18 tracks cover a lot of ground, from the band’s earlier doom metal & psychedelic hits to their arena rock era. A lot of fans really love this album cycle for its silliness and levity, and I can see why. The live renditions are full of energy, and the stage performances downright fun.

she’s green – Chrysalis

Shoegaze / Dreampop

This is probably the most beautiful thing I heard all year. I was a hug fan of the band’s 2023 EP, Wisteria, but Chrysalis manages to plunge even deeper into lush, reverbed waters, guided by Zofia Smith’s dulcet voice. she’s green is pretty much the quintessential dream pop band.

Bilmuri – AMERICAN MOTOR SPORTS (420CC EDITION)

Country / Post-Hardcore / Metalcore / ???

This didn’t come out in 2025, but I got to it as fast as I could. Its twangy, chonky fusion of styles is so gosh darn fun, especially paired with Johnny Franck’s earnest vocals. Do I like some flavor of country music now? UNEXPECTED.

★ Bilmuri – AMERICAN MOTOR SPORTS

Spiritbox – Tsunami Sea

Metalcore

This sounds exactly like its title: huge, immersive, and heavy. In contrast to Eternal Blue, this album eschews variation for a laser-focused dark & moody aesthetic. Epic riffs abound. As is often the case for me, hearing many of these songs live has made them even more powerful.

★ Spiritbox – Tsunami Sea

bloom effect – oscilón

Shoegaze / Dreampop

This EP came late in the year, but I found myself playing it over and over. Honestly, a lot of shoegaze music these days is straight up boring, like artists are allergic to melody or something. oscilón doesn’t break new ground, but it’s the gorgeous wall of sound I’m always looking for. “itero” has a particularly catchy hook that I haven’t been able to get out of my head.

Kills Birds – Crave

Indie Rock / Grunge

I’m saying a lot about voices this year. Huh. Well, here we go again: Nina Ljeti is a powerhouse, even when she’s singing off-key (maybe especially when). Crave is thicker and darker than the band’s past work, but I love where they are going. Lead single “Behind” is especially one to not to be missed; the song’s indie, punk, grungy, shoegaze-adjacent brew is an emotional journey.

★ Kills Birds – Crave

Novelists – Coda

Metalcore / Prog Metal

Am I going to say something about vocals again? YEP. Camille Contreras stepped in as the band’s vocalist a couple years back, and her voice and energy have taken Novelists to new heights. Coda is crazy good.

My Last.fm Top 5 Artists

1

Ghost

2,839 songs played

2

Spiritbox

2,216 songs played

3

Pale Waves

1,412 songs played

4

Softcult

1,149 songs played

5

Poppy

1,058 songs played

My Last.fm Top 5 Albums

1

Tsunami Sea

Spiritbox

1,648 songs played

2

Skeletá

Ghost

1,241 songs played

3

Negative Spaces

Poppy

928 songs played

4

AMERICAN MOTOR SPORTS (420CC EDITION)

Bilmuri

812 songs played

5

Smitten

Pale Waves

759 songs played

My Last.fm Top 5 Songs

1

No Loss, No Love

Spiritbox

174 plays

2

Soft Spine

Spiritbox

167 plays

3

Deep End

Spiritbox

158 plays

4

Fata Morgana

Spiritbox

155 plays

5

Perfect Soul

Spiritbox

153 plays

Miniatures – Honey

Bury me in this sound.

Gore. – Wrath

Holy production value. This video is a stunner, a perfect match for such a beautiful and brutal song. Hell hath no fury…

Poppy – Guardian

God, I love Poppy’s aura.

BILMURI – HARD2TELL

It sounds like Bilmuri is continuing to press forward in the “heavy country” category. That breakdown is straight staaank.

Lemondaze – polari

This whole EP is just perfection. It’s everything I love about shoegaze.

HAGANE – Amour Chain

HAGANE are just incredible. Their music always leaves me full of joy and hope.

Belly

December 11, 2025
Granada Theater, 3524 Greenville Ave, Dallas, TX 75206
Box seats x2, $119

Belly is one of my favorite bands, so I was thrilled to find out that they were planning a tour in celebration of the 30th anniversary of their second album, King. Also, as it turns out, there’s no better way to make a person feel old. 30 years. That stings.

Anyways, the show was fabulous, and everyone sounded great. As one would expect, they played all the songs from King, though not in their original order. Gail mentioned that the track sequence had never felt quite right, so they’d reimagined the order of the songs in a way that felt better to them. I’ll have to spin up a playlist to see if I like this incarnation better. Speaking of Gail, what a cutie patootie. I’d spent all these years feeling like she was out of place in a band like Belly, what with her hard-rocking power stance and whirling hair, but damn: I get it now. She was a freakin’ ray of sunshine the entire time. Forgive me Gail; you are Belly. Tanya didn’t do much talking, and Gail seemed to be all too happy to step up and engage. We caught her striking a pose many times for the fans up front taking pictures.

King isn’t my favorite Belly album; the spot is forever reserved for Star. Still, King has some sublime moments. “The Bees” made me cry; “Super-Connected” got me all pensive; “Now They’ll Sleep” rocked all the way down my spine. And after they finished all the songs from King, they took a break and came back with another full set of songs from other albums, soundtracks, and b-sides. Of course, “Gepetto” and “Feed the Tree” got a huge response, but I’ve always loved “Thief”. The mashup of “Shiny One” with the Hendrix cover “Are You Experienced?” was super cool, too.

I closed out last year with a super positive show, too. It would make for a nice tradition.

Setlist

• Puberty
• Now They’ll Sleep
• Untitled and Unsung
• Red
• Seal My Fate
• L’il Ennio
• Silverfish
• The Bees
• King
• Super-Connected
• Judas My Heart
• Low Red Moon
• Gepetto
• Dusted
• Human Child
• Spaceman
• Slow Dog
• Feed the Tree
• Shiny One / Are You Experienced?
• Thief
• Full Moon, Empty Heart

milet – I still

Oh my god, what a vibe. I need to listen to more by milet, because she is an angel.

Astronoid – Depressed Mode (Live at Blackheart Sound)

Astronoid’s new album, Stargod, has been getting a lot of my attention with its mix of metal, rock, and synthwave. This live version of “Depressed Mode” slaps so hard.

Poppy – Bruised Sky (Live from TAAU Tour)

Poppy dropped new track “Unravel” last month, and released another song from her upcoming album this month. There’s an official video for the song, but I like this official live version. What a heater.

Die Spitz – Throw Yourself to the Sword

What a riff!

The Questionert

Lay it on me, Stephen.

Best sandwich?
Prosciutto, mozzarella, sliced tomato, and basil leaves drizzled with balsamic glaze on toasted sourdough bread. Simple and perfect. Oh, you thought I wasn’t going to take this seriously? I don’t joke about sandwiches, friend.


What’s one thing you own that you really should throw out?
ANXIETY LOL. But, um, probably some old clothes or whatever. Actually, you know what? I have a bin full of art projects from high school under my bed that I haven’t looked at since, well, high school. Why do we do this to ourselves? Lugging around things that we feel obligated to keep, but shouldn’t? I feel like this is some kind of metaphor…


What is the scariest animal?
I liked Ryan Gosling’s original answer to this question before he backed down and said “mosquito”. “Man” is the correct answer. Man is the scariest animal.


Apples or oranges?
Nectarines. I’m not here to be constrained by your binary thinking!


Have you ever asked someone for their autograph?
I have not, because people who give out their autograph are famous, and therefore terrifying, and I’m a big fan of dry pants.


What do you think happens when we die?
I’m not exactly sure, but my wish is that I wake up as a younger man. My wife is there, too, happy and healthy. We’re in a modest cabin near the top of a mountain. Our home is filled with all the things we enjoyed in life. There’s a comfortable reading nook filled with our favorite books, and at the end of the house is a room with two comfortable chairs and the best stereo system money could have bought. The walls are covered in records. Outside, there’s an expansive garden and animals that have made it their home. Beyond that, there’s nothing but pine tree covered mountains as far as the eye can see. Well, there is a path. Time means nothing, so we take a very, very long walk down the path. There’s a town at the end. There are no cars, or money, or noise. Our family and friends are there. There’s a diner with the best food I could ever imagine. We enjoy a meal, and point up other paths leading to the town to show each other where we live, and plan to visit each other often. We walk back up the path to our home and watch the sun go down. We go to sleep with the windows open. We’re safe and happy. What will we do tomorrow? We’ll see. Maybe we’ll tend the garden, though it doesn’t really need our help. We could always improve it, though. Maybe we’ll just read next to the window or on the porch. Maybe we’ll sit in those comfortable chairs and put on a record. Maybe we’ll go back into town and meet our friends and family at the diner again. Maybe we’ll do all of these things everyday, forever.

Hey, did I just describe Scandinavia?


Favorite action movie?
Easy. That’s going to be the 2010 cinematic masterpiece The Other Guys, starring Mark Wahlberg and Will Ferrell. And, briefly, Samuel L. Jackson and Dwayne Johnson. IYKYK. Have you ever done a desk pop? You gotta do one.


Favorite smell?
Lilac. You thought you knew me.


Least favorite smell?
Uh… decomposition? Mortality?


Exercise: worth it?
Probably? I’d have to try it to know. As much of a slog as it is sometimes, I’m glad I don’t hire out the maintenance of my lawn & garden, because it does feel good to get outside and move.


Flat or sparkling?
Sparkling. Live a little, folks.


Most used app on your phone?
Instagram. Sure, it can be filled with horrors, but I follow artists and people who usually show me the good stuff. I need to be more like them instead of all, “Argh, this reel angers me so! The injustice! The clowning! I must share this travesty with everyone!” Yeah, no one wants that.


You get one song to listen to for the rest of your life: what is it?
“Just Like Heaven” by The Cure. There can never be a better song.


What number am I thinking of?
Ahhh, you almost got me. You’re not thinking of a number. You’re thinking about my sandwich! I don’t blame you; it’s delicious.


Describe the rest of your life in 5 words?
“I really tried, I swear.”