Focusing on the positives, right? Is that what we're supposed to be doing?
We'll probably whip up a Hot Mix 2020 sometime soon, but New Shit Radars are faster so let's just do this instead.
This month's New Shit Radar is sponsored by the 2020 blockbuster Money Plane starring Kelsey Grammar, Joey Lawrance, and Edge -- who incidentally also won the 2021 Royal Rumble. Incidentally, Kelsey Grammar's character in Money Plane (for unknown reasons) refers to himself as "The Rumble," which means that Edge conquered The Rumble twice in the past year, which is probably a first in the history of humanity. So we supposed it's been a good few months for Edge.
We dedicated our most recent New Music playlist to Money Plane:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0PunOFtcUdbWpI1t6ChS9p?si=NzYw_EzHQPuue6lQlEwcyA
Sedona Loves The Sea Machine
Before Sedona rebranded as a band, her ultra-earwormy cosplay of Madonna's first album was almost definitely one of the best songs from the past 24 months that seemingly no one has heard or talked about.
This horrible trend of dope music getting buried by music writers is beyond old. But that Phoebe Bridgers tho -- her bland unmemorable "rock" is entirely worth encompassing an entire halfweek of CIA-planted Twitter debate. Totally worthy.
We're happy to report that Sedona's new track is dope as fuck, and if the intro is any indication, she apparently loves the Sea Machine pedal as much as we do.
Heele Will Drop New Heat Next Week
The new track is called "A New Friend" and it's coming your way a week from today! In the meantime, enjoy their latest:
Phife Dawg Lives On, New Album Coming Soon
Posthumous Phife Dawg album will be arriving later this Spring. We kinda love the new track "Nutshell Part 2" -- although whenever we hear Busta Rhymes' old-guy-swag, it gives us the same feeling we had watching Keanu in Bill and Ted 3. Try to smile a little bit more in your middle age, fellas. It's not that bad.
Potty Mouth Is Back With Some Non-Album-Track Fire
"Let Go" is their latest. We like the weird synths in this one.
We Like A Non-Weezer Song That's Currently Charting On Billboard Alt Rock Radio Airplay
This is actually huge news since we hated every song that placed in the Billboard Alternative Songs Year End chart with the exception of the admittedly decent "Bloody Valentine" by Machine Gun Kelly. (And if we were forced to choose another at gunpoint, "If You're Too Shy (Let Me Know)" by The 1975 isn't the most unfortunate thing we've ever heard although that's really pushing it.)
There's also a currently charting Weezer single that's ok featuring a string quartet replacing Rivers Cuomo's and Brian Bell's guitars. It's no "King Of The World," but it's fine.
The non-Weezer single that we like is from the unfortunately named I Don't Know How But They Found Me, a two-piece led by the guitarist who replaced Ryan Ross when he left Panic At The Disco in 2009. Accordingly, it reminds us of a bunch of hi-fi alternative radio songs from 2008-2009 -- the era of La Roux's "Bulletproof" and Passion Pit and 3Oh!3 and MGMT and that band who wasn't bad but for some bizarre reason decided it would be a good idea to name themselves Black Kids.
Due to its odd 2009-non-throwback nature, it helped us realize that label consolidation and Youtube and SiriusXM and Spotify and poptimism and American Idol and "music journalists having the final say on the revised canon" have done wonders as far as guiding music to the point where literally nothing is willing to change and charting music sounds exactly the same as it did in the late 2000s. By early 2001, the world was already fully immersed in the first era of "80s nostalgia capitalism," and nothing remotely close to that equivalent is occurring in 2021. Because nothing has changed at all -- long term or short term. Four months from now, the same songs will be charting in roughly the same positions. Four years from now, the same artists will be charting with different songs in the same positions. And yea, this is obviously unsustainable, unless the music business wants to die. In which case, they're doing a tremendous job of self-sabotage.
Anyway, we'll probably place this one somewhere in the Hot Mix 2020 and we can complain more when the time arrives. We're just surprised that labels and promoters are still willing to invest in singles that are actually memorable upon the first listen. And hey, they even have a Bandcamp:
Melvins Have A Weird New Song Called "Fuck You" And Jon Anderson From Yes Has A New Song Called "Go Screw Yourself"
Songs like these are the ones that make the most sense right now. We're happy anyone else gets it.
New Teenage Wrist Album Is Good
We were hoping they would continue sounding like Live's Throwing Copper LP (see 2016's "Stoned Alone") but they have upgraded their sound n stuff and it's good.
After Hours Top 20 Most Played -- Week Of February 8th
For once, here's a chart that doesn't entirely suck. Tell your friends all about it:
| This week | ARTIST Title | Links |
| 1 | EYEHATEGOD High Risk Trigger | Youtube |
| 2 | EMMA RUTH RUNDLE & THOU Hollywood | thou.bandcamp.com/ track/hollywood |
| 3 | GLITTERER Are You Sure? | glitterer.bandcamp.com/ track/are-you-sure |
| 4 | BEDWETTER Headboard | Youtube |
| 5 | WEEZER All My Favorite Songs | Youtube |
| 6 | DAVID NANCE The Merchandise | davidnance.bandcamp.com/ track/the-merchandise |
| 7 | SOMERSET THROWER Accelerate Now | bbbrecords.bandcamp.com/ track/accelerate-now |
| 8 | GLITTERER Didn't Want It | glitterer.bandcamp.com/ track/didnt-want-it |
| 9 | MINDFORCE Reign Of Terror | bbbrecords.bandcamp.com/ track/reign-of-terror |
| 10 | ANXIOUS More Than A Letter | bbbrecords.bandcamp.com/ track/more-than-a-letter |
| 11 | MELVINS The Great Good Place | melvinsofficial.bandcamp.com/ track/the-great-good-place |
| 12 | DAVID NANCE When The Covers Come Off | davidnance.bandcamp.com/ track/when-the-covers-come-off |
| 13 | THIRDFACE Villains! | thirdface.bandcamp.com/ track/villains-2 |
| 14 | CHEVELLE Self Destructor | Youtube |
| 15 | ONEOHTRIX POINT NEVER No Nightmares | oneohtrixpointnever.bandcamp .com/ track/no-nightmares |
| 16 | BAARDVADER Walking On The Moon | baardvader.bandcamp.com/ track/walking-on-the-moon |
| 17 | HIGHER POWER King Of My Domain | Youtube |
| 18 | EMMA RUTH RUNDLE & THOU Into Being | thou.bandcamp.com/ track/into-being |
| 19 | CODE ORANGE Autumn and Carbine | Youtube |
| 20 | HUM Step Into You | humband.bandcamp.com/ track/step-into-you |
Mitski and Angel Olsen (more Mitski tho) have brought the mid-2010s its eagerly anticipated Tori resurgence. Mitski's recent output sounds like the shit that would have been on Lilith Fair had the festival existed in 1992. In that sense, this sounds way more specifically '90s-retro than any of the vaguely '90s sounding Big Muff guitar bands of the past 5 years. 
We never realized Chance is essentially idolized all throughout Chicago, probably more now than any other current rapper. Kanye is global; even back when he felt the most localized, his global ubiquity made true localization seem impossible. Chief Keef always felt localized when profiled in Vice docs and the like, but 2013 was a while ago, and he hasn't truly regained momentum since then. Like many current rappers, Chance is still unsigned and reps locally more than not. Plus, his "Best New Artist" Grammy has brought him one step closer to "beloved" territory - a very exclusive club of extremely famous rappers that include Lauryn Hill, Outkast and a few others. (Kanye is not a beloved rapper. His eligibility disappeared a while ago.) 2017 is Chance's moment, and "All Night" - despite its anti-club anti-label anti-blog subject matter - has been one of Chicago's hottest club bangers of the past year. We've only heard it on NYC's Hot 97 once, but it's a megahit in Chicago, perhaps a sign that a new era of regional hits may be on its way.
This one refreshes. We know it was intended as a throwaway one-off (featuring members of Jackal Onasis, Ian Sweet and Stove messing around with pro-tools), but "Cowboy" felt like it accidentally captured something very specific about last summer. The band name Skatebored suggests a slacker/stoner approach, and the e-drums give it a uniquely hazy, rave quality, but with way more happy strands of weed than ecstasy pills.
Quietly appearing smack in the center of a comp release, this stray track may have gone unnoticed even for Pinback superfans. It's probably a new song and not a throwaway from 2012 or earlier, yet sounding more quintessentially Pinback than almost anything they've released since Autumn Of The Seraphs. When Mom asks "What does Pinback sound like?" you can feel okay playing her this song. Welcome back Rob Crow.
After nearly 25 years of existence, SoCal's finest Spanish-language grindcore band was finally mentioned on prominent music blogs in 2016 thanks to a single they released with the word "Trump" in the title. Go figure. Before instant fact checking was a normal thing, we were skeptical of the kids on the playground who told us that Faith No More's Billy Gould was the bass player for Brujeria throughout the '90s. (To be fair, these were the same kids who started the rumor that Kurt Cobain consumed 4000 calorie breakfasts every day.) However, Wikipedia now confirms it: Billy Gould is responsible for the deeply heavy ass-kicking bass line in the intro of "Mantando Gueros '97" from the Gummo soundtrack CD. '90s grindcore and deathmetal are the true '90s nostalgia bands.
It's time for another exciting edition of "Riffin' on Weezer." *canned applause* (No joke. We're extremely qualified for a weekly talk show where we only discuss Weezer things. Podcast CEOs: Our starting pay rates are very reasonable.) Weezer's 2011-2016 era wasn't so bad compared to the devastatingly grating 2004-2010 era. "King Of The World" could have been a decent Maladroit follow-up single. (A lot of people really love "Beverly Hills" for some reason even though it's just kinda okay. "King Of The World" is objectively better.) // Not sure what else to discuss, but we do enjoy this picture of Weezer (minus Rivers and Pat Wilson) accepting an award for "Buddy Holly" at the VMAs in 1995. (
In 1970, John Lennon wrote, recorded, mixed and mastered "Instant Karma!" with Phil Spector over the course of a single day (January 27th). Its 7-inch was released on vinyl 10 days later, February 6th. It reached #3 on the US charts, went platinum by the year's end, has appeared in Nike commercials and is considered among his most revered hit songs. 
There are fewer charting hits now than at any point since the '60s. Placing blame on playlisting is slowly making more and more sense, as Billboard's own "Hot 100" Spotify playlist contains streams that count toward their own chart results. (How is this not a problem again?) And with so few of those charting hits resembling anything that could be described as "fun," it's incredible that wedding bands and bar bands can still add current charting songs that feel reasonably multi-generational to their repertoires. A few weeks ago at a town fair, we heard a cover band begin their set with "24k Magic" and "Cake By The Ocean" (followed by "Rude," "Locked Out Of Heaven," "Uptown Funk" and 3 hours of '70s/'80s covers). Even Mr. Garrison was feeling DNCE this year. Keep the party alive.
Is this the first time Elton John and Busta Rhymes were on the same song? We should Google this, but we'd rather leave the question open for now.
What's the significance of the recorder?
The most important Twitter moment of 2016 was obviously 
The word "Wormed" keeps reminding us of the word "Marooned," which is also the title of what we thought at the time (age 12) was the most disturbing season 1 episode of Ren & Stimpy or any of the more warped Commander Höek and Cadet Stimpy adventures, like the one when their molecules began to dissipate throughout the atmosphere. We want to believe that John K. is a Wormed fan. We really do.
