Category: Blog

Daytime Charts 11/16

Post author By WKNC Admin
Post date November 17, 2021

#	Artist	Album	Label
1	JPEGMAFIA	LP!	EQT
2	LAVA LA RUE	Butter-fly [EP]	Marathon
3	INJURY RESERVE	By The Time I Get To Phoenix	Self-Released
4	LITTLE SIMZ	Sometimes I Might Be Introvert	AGE 101
5	PARQUET COURTS	Sympathy For Life	Rough Trade
6	GUSTAF	Audio Drag For Ego Snobs	Royal Mountain
7	ILLUMINATI HOTTIES	Let Me Do One More	Snack Shack Tracks/Hopeless
8	NYLON SMILE	Waiting For Oblivion	Citrus City
9	ZEBRA KATZ	Less Is Moor	ZFK
10	AMERICAN AQUARIUM	Slappers, Bangers & Certified Twangers, Vol. 1	Thirty Tigers
11	GENESIS OWUSU	Smiling With No Teeth	House Anxiety/Ourness
12	FILM SCHOOL	We Weren’t Here	Sonic Ritual
13	ILLISM	Family Over Everything	The CRWN
14	MCKINLEY DIXON	For My Mama And Anyone Who Look Like Her	Spacebomb
15	SPIRIT OF THE BEEHIVE	“The Door Is Open” b/w “The Door Is Closed” [Single]	Saddle Creek
16	ALICE PHOEBE LOU	Glow	Self-Released
17	BICEP	Isles (Deluxe)	Ninja Tune
18	BLACK COUNTRY NEW ROAD	“Chaos Space Marine” [Single]	Ninja Tune
19	BLACK MARBLE	Fast Idol	Sacred Bones
20	CHURCH GIRLS	Still Blooms	Anchor Eighty Four
21	DEAFHEAVEN	Infinite Granite	Sargent House
22	KEDR LIVANSKIY	Liminal Soul	2MR
23	MACHINEDRUM	Psyconia [EP]	Ninja Tune
24	FJAAK	SYS03 [EP]	Self-Released
25	JEWELER	Tiny Circles	Self-Released
26	JIMMY EDGAR	Cheetah Bend	Innovative Leisure
27	JULES	Delta Ajax [EP]	Happy Life
28	LALA LALA	I Want The Door To Open	Hardly Art
29	NATION OF LANGUAGE	A Way Forward	Play It Again Sam
30	PRETTY EMBERS	Under	Self-Released

Daytime Adds

#	Artist	Album	Label
1	NATION OF LANGUAGE	A Way Forward	Play It Again Sam
2	WOOZE	Get Me To A Nunnery [EP]	Young Poet
3	MARY VEILS, THE	Somewhere Over The Rowhome [EP]	PNKSLM
4	SPIRITUALIZED	“Always Together With You” [Single]	Fat Possum
5	MEDIOCRE	Microdose Singles	Dangerbird
6	NYLON SMILE	Waiting For Oblivion	Citrus City
7	LA BONTE	Don’t Let This Define Me	Self-Released
8	TOUCHY	“Secret Melody” b/w “Tout Petit La Planète” [Single]	Dangerbird
9	RUBBER BAND GUN	Cashes Out	Earth Libraries
10	PAPERCUTS	Baxter’s Bliss	Psychic Friends

Weekly Charts

“a touch of the beat…” by Aly and AJ review

Post author By Caitlin
Post date November 16, 2021

ALBUM: “a touch of the beat gets you up on your feet gets you out into the sun” by Aly & AJ

RELEASE YEAR: 2021

LABEL: Aly & AJ Music

RATING: 9.5/10

BEST TRACKS: “Pretty Places” “Slow Dancing” “Personal Cathedrals” “Listen!!!”

FCC: Clean

“a touch of the beat gets you up on your feet gets you out into the sun” could not be a more apt title for this mellow pop comeback-album by Aly & AJ. With a long, Fiona Apple-esque title, songwriting assistance from Sky Ferreira, production by Yves Rothman and an 80s synthpop aura, the influences on this record are tangible but never redundant or gaudy. The upbeat tracks make you want to run through a meadow on a cool 70 degree day and the more melancholic tracks are more a warm hug than a pity party.

There were never “Oh my gosh this is so good I could cry” moments but I think that’s what makes this album special. There are no high-highs and thus there are no low-lows; it’s not mountains and valleys, it’s a steady force, an old reliable. It doesn’t feel bound in time either, it’s definitely an album I could revisit years from now and feel similarly about.

The lyricism has the vagueness that makes a pop album. However, I like the honesty that comes with specificity in lyrics, which is why I love folk music, and pop/indie music that leans folk. This album lacks some of that personality that I look for a record, but I wouldn’t necessarily say that the vagueness works against the quality of the album as a whole.

Released in May of 2021, this 12 track album clocks in at just over 47 minutes. If you’re in need of a pick-me-up as we’re on the cusp of winter and as the days get shorter, it is impossible to listen to “a touch of the beat…” without feeling at least an iota happier. As my dear friend, Deethony Jaythony says about his favorite feel-good albums, this LP is a “glimmer of happiness in an uncaring void.”

Be sure to listen to this album on Spotify, or wherever you choose to consume your music.

Happy listening,

Caitlin

Tags aly & aj, New Album Review, Pop, WKNC 88.1

Music News and Interviews

New Mitski Single, “The Only Heartbreaker” Review

Post author By Caitlin
Post date November 15, 2021

“The Only Heartbreaker,” Mitski’s brand new single, released on November 9, is definitely the most commercial-sounding work that Mitski has released to date, and probably the least “Mistki” song in her repertoire. The production lends itself to 80s dance music, and the lyrics sound detached and impersonal compared to the deeply detailed and personal style of lyricism we are used to hearing from her.

It’s not a bad song per se, but definitely not what I’d expect to hear coming from Mitski, especially after “Working For The Knife” (which I also wrote a review about) seemed like a natural progression for her music.

The music video definitely felt more authentic, however, and seemed to be a reference to her song “A Burning Hill” off of her album “Puberty 2” where she laments “And I’ve been a forest fire / I am a forest fire / And I am the fire, and I am the forest / And I am a witness watching it / I stand in a valley watching it / And you are not there at all.”

With all of this being said, I am excited to see where this fits in the context of the album (her sixth) she just announced, “Laurel Hell,” which is coming out February 4, 2022.

Tags Mitski, WKNC 88.1

New Album Review

New Album Review: “HOUSE OF CONFUSION” by Trace Mountains

Post author By Erie
Post date November 15, 2021

"HOUSE OF CONFUSION" by Trace Mountains album cover

Trace Mountains’ 2020 debut album was a pleasant surprise in a year whose surprises were generally for the wrong reasons. That album, “Lost in the Country”, was this blend of optimism and realness, tackling tough subject matters like mental illness and uncertainty about the future ahead and packaging it in this very neat, jangly project that used all of these themes as undercurrents while its characters journeyed forward into the unknown. Something about the soft, breezy vocals and the hopeful sounding guitar lines really made the album click and was a source of comfort in a scary time.

“HOUSE OF CONFUSION” is a different animal. The winding road in the distance is no longer the focus, the journey has already begun and the speaker is reflecting on the present and past. Album highlight “7 ANGELS” looks at a relationship as a series of plans, both to continue loving and knowing when it’s time to depart. Structurally this doesn’t unfold like a beginning to middle to end narrative, rather it touches on everything at once, the relationship is both coming apart and being forged through shared experience. “AMERICA” uses recognizable iconography of an “open sky” and “moonlit road”, subjects that have defined countless songs, but it uses those as a snapshot of emotions felt around them, asking “makes you feel like you lost it a distance back there, don’t it?” and ruminating on what America is now and what it’s like living in it.

The instrumentals contribute to this light melancholy with a slower, weightier feel. Both “Lost in the Country” and this album have more than just a little helping of country to go along with their indie-rock sensibilities, but here I never feel like the instrumental is trying to pull ahead of the vocals; they’re both sort of staggering side by side. The drumbeat of “ON MY KNEES” is hesitant, it feels like it wants to take off sprinting in a direction but not knowing where to go it instead takes things slow.

On Apple Music, the lyrics aren’t presented in a standard line-by-line structure and rather as a paragraph. I’m not sure if this is an intentional choice, other lyrics sites like Genius have them in the more conventional form, but I really like the visual of seeing every line back to back. It really shows how much of a stream of consciousness this album really is, using roads and nature as a suit of armor to protect from what’s really going on under the surface: a general feeling that life could be better and it’s getting harder to live with increasingly negative thoughts. Trace Mountains don’t offer any solutions to this, rather it sits back and lets the listener connect with the universal concepts, acting as a bath to soak in one’s own uncertainties.

-Erie

Tags Indie Rock, New Album Review, trace mountains

Classic Album Review

Classic Album Review: “Fantasies” by Metric

Post author By Erie
Post date November 12, 2021

"Fantasies" by Metric Album Cover

I’ve written on this blog before about the way I often favor a heavily curated over listening to individual albums after one listen. This is because in judging a body of music one of the biggest factors I weigh is consistency. A playlist full of songs I know will hit beats an album with a minute and a half interlude which brings everything to a screeching halt. There are exceptions to this rule, though, with perhaps the album I listen to the most on its own being Metric’s 2009 album “Fantasies”. And in honor of Metric featuring on the upcoming Rezz album, I want to talk about what just might be the most consistent LP I’ve ever heard.

Consistently good, that is. There are a lot of rough albums where one track was no less awful than the last, but beyond just having an unvarying quality, the quality on “Fantasies” is also really high. Vocalist Emily Haines is the gateway into Metric’s universe, able to go from slow and sensual to opening up the floodgates and surfing on a guitar line to hurtle the listener forward like the first plunge of a roller coaster. And this is all just on “Gold Guns Girls”, she’s able to bring this versatility and creativity to all ten tracks on here.

The name Metric is a really appropriate one for this band, because their instrumentals feel perfectly measured and precise, almost machinelike. Riffs methodically drive the song forward over a drumbeat that can go from a whisper in the background on “Collect Call” to pounding and abrasive, setting the tone early on “Stadium Love”, a very memorable song about the animal kingdom engaging in an armageddon-like fight, “angel vs eel, owl vs dove”. But there’s a ghost in that machine, every note adds to the often tense and desperate feelings of the songs. The world of “Fantasies” has danger lurking around every corner. Iconic opening track “Help I’m Alive” comes to terms with the crushing weight of expectations and how they threaten to devour the song’s narrator. “I tremble, they’re gonna eat me alive” are the first lines Emily Haines sings on the album, ironically delivered to the very crowd causing her heart to beat “like a hammer”.

Earlier I made the claim that this was the most consistent album I’ve ever heard, and that’s a claim I stand by. It’s not just that every track on the album has found its way onto a playlist, and I can count on one hand the number of albums that have done that. It’s that from beginning to end this album fills a very particular niche, walking a very thin line between overblown arena rock (though they would tour with Imagine Dragons six years later) and thoughtful indie to create an album that is both punchy and forlorn, while never wavering from the same tone from the declarative swells of “Sick Muse” to the drawn out sighs of “Collect Call”. The characters that inhabit songs on “Fantasies” are all flawed but hopeful, ready to get out into the world yet already jaded.

“You’re gonna make mistakes, you know” sends off the subject of Gimme Sympathy, whose chorus evokes two of the most iconic bands of all time with “who’d you rather be, The Beatles or the Rolling Stones?” Ordinarily this would sound like a lazy name drop, but when the material is this good, the album as strong in it’s closing line as its first few drumbeats, the comparison really does feel earned.

-Erie

Tags Classic Album Review, imagine dragons, Metric

New Album Review

Album Review: “Valentine” by Snail Mail

Post author By Erie
Post date November 12, 2021

"Valentine" by Snail Mail album cover

When I heard that Snail Mail was releasing a new album, I was taken right back to when I first heard their previous album, “Lush”. That album was one of the defining musical moments of my time in high school, and I’ve been anticipating the project that would eventually become “Valentine” ever since. Now this came out among several disappointing releases for me, but I’m happy to say that “Valentine” did not disappoint.

It starts off with a bang, both the title track and “Ben Franklin” are singles for a reason, and both play heavily to the band’s strengths. Lindsey Jordan’s compelling lyrics have been the face of the Snail Mail brand since its inception, and the way “Valentine” takes what on the surface seems to be a straightforward love song and weaves in themes of jealousy and transience while maintaining an overall fun and driving tone. Pacing is something this album does very well; an album like this where there isn’t that much instrumental variety can often drag but Snail Mail comes at this type of slow, synthy indie rock/pop at all different angles to make it work. The strength of the instrumentals acted almost wavelike across the tracklist, with songs like “Madonna” and “Glory” coming in to balance out slower songs like “c. Et Al.” and keep the album chugging along.

It’s been over three years since the last Snail Mail album dropped, and Jordan had been 19 when debut album “Lush” was released. This means that between albums cycles a lot has gone on in her life and the perspective the songwriting takes has now changed from someone who is just getting started with adult life to someone who would have graduated college if they weren’t busy being a super famous singer. And with the change in perspective comes a change in tone, and in doing so it loses one of my favorite elements of “Lush” when I first heard it. This was such an earnest album, with a bright tone making the songs really come to life and a lot of shouted choruses that made even ruminations on lost love sound fun and upbeat at times, and the album balanced these clashing styles perfectly. For me in high school this was a winning combination that really made “Lush” stand apart from its peers and it’s something “Valentine” has largely eschewed, this is a more weary album. “Automate” features Jordan talking about a rocky relationship, but it feels like a longer meditation delivered with a sigh, the very concept reducing love to machine-like motions.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. Wanting an artist to never evolve and always to sound like their debut is creatively stifling for them, this is just to say that as a listener you might need to alter what you think a Snail Mail album should sound like in 2021. And if you’re able to do that, you’ll find an album that’s perhaps less immediate, but with just as much substance and heart.

-Erie

Tags snail mail, valentine

Blog New Album Review

“Shut the f⁠— up talking to me” Zack Fox Album Review

Post author By Marshall Morgan
Post date November 11, 2021

Editor’s Note: If you can’t tell by the title, this article contains mature themes and language. Reader discretion is advised

ALBUM: “shut the f⁠— up talking to me” by Zack Fox

RELEASE YEAR: 2021

LABEL: Parasang

RATING: 6.2/10

BEST TRACKS: “mind your business” and “get off my d⁠—⁠”

FCC: Explicit language

Twitter personality, comedian, album art designer, and rapper Zack Fox blends humor with pure chaos on his new album, “shut the f— up talking to me.” Fox, well-known for his collaboration with Kenny Beats on their single “Jesus is the One (I Got Depression),” hasn’t exactly won over music critics with his controversial lyrics and outlandish humor. However, his reputation of making “joke rap” doesn’t mean that he isn’t capable of putting out an enjoyable product.

At just under twenty minutes, this album isn’t meant to be revolutionary or inspiring. It’s clear that the goal of this project was to create a short and enjoyable collection of songs that would get some laughs out of the listener. And in my opinion, goal achieved.

Fox’s humor, which is crude and ruthless, is present throughout the entire project. Here are some of my favorite lines:

Raise my hand up in the class and told the teacher, “Suck my d—“
“fafo” – Zack Fox

Kick a b—- n—- off a cliff without no parachute
F— n—- prolly callin’ 12 just like a Karen do
“uhh” – Zack Fox

My n—– barbaric, s— could get ugly as f— like Ed Sheeran
“shut the f⁠—⁠ up talking to me” – Zack Fox

And that’s only a few of them.

While every song has quotable bars, “mind your business” and “get off my d⁠—” are favorites of mine, and not necessarily because of the lyrics. They’re both incredibly fun and catchy, and they give Zack Fox a great opportunity to deliver solid punchlines over some of the smoothest beats I’ve heard this year. Sonically, the other tracks seem to suffer in comparison. For some of the other songs, the vocals reach a level of intensity that isn’t quite matched by the beats, which makes for a slightly awkward experience for the listener.

One example of this is Fox’s collaboration with The Alchemist on the title track, “shut the f⁠— up talking to me.” Here, Zack Fox raps about throwing someone’s baby out of their carriage over a somewhat repetitive instrumental that doesn’t seem to reach a climax.

While these stylistic decisions are interesting, I’m not convinced that they belong together. And although it is nice to see Zack Fox delve into other styles of hip-hop, I would have preferred for the energy in “mind your business” and “get off my d⁠—” to be present throughout the entire project, and I hope his future releases contain more of that energy.

Despite my criticisms of this project, it’s still worth a listen. Fox may not be the most skilled songwriter in the world, but “shut the f⁠— up talking to me” manages to stand out in an ocean of new hip-hop releases. This album is a lot of things, but it’s certainly not forgettable.

Is this an AOTY? No, at least, not for me. But it has some catchy, well-produced songs that you can play at a party. And sometimes, that’s all you really need.

-Marshall Morgan

Tags Hip-Hop, Kenny Beats, parasang, Rap, shut the fuck up talking to me, Zack Fox

#	Artist	Album	Label
1	BLOODY KEEP	Bloody Horror [EP]	Grime Stone
2	ZETAR	Devouring Darkness	Spirit Coffin
3	ANDREW WK	God Is Partying	Napalm
4	ANNIHILUS	Follow a Song From the Sky	Federal Prisoner
5	MASTIFF	Leave Me The Ashes Of The Earth	Entertainment One
6	BLACK WOUND	Unending Labyrinth	Dry Cough
7	MALIGNAMENT	Hypocrisis Absolution	Primitive Reaction
8	IXTLAHUAC	Teyacanilitztli Nahualli	Nuclear War Now!
9	DESTRUCTION	Live Attack	Napalm
10	PISTOLS AT DAWN	Nocturnal Youth	JFL