Author: Cst. Hezekiah J Thundersnort

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Lists

Bringing Up the Rear: Another Useless End-of-Year List at the Beginning of the Year

By Constable Hezekiah J Thundersnort
Subscriber of Spotify Premium, Reader of Pitchfork, Displayer of Dubiousness

Here’s the deal, chuckleheads. You need another best-of-the-year list like you need another lingual frenulum.

I know this. And honestly, the fact that you’re getting it at the beginning (almost the middle, if I’m honest) of the New Year makes it even MORE useless.

I would’ve posted this sooner but Santa decided to bring me COVID this year. Joke’s on you, though, Santa. I love drugs and sleeping anyway!

And yet, I offer this list to you for the same reasons I think ALL music nerds do it — to impress you with my impeccable taste, to highlight records others may have missed and to piss you off so you argue about them. 

Any decent music list needs to do all three. 

In addition, and because I’m a crotchety old goose, I’m going to complain about some of the albums that were snubbed by the OTHER guys.

Sound good? WHO CARES! Let’s light this candle!

The Locals

Just Rats “Now Made with Real Cheese!” — Is this a record from 2024? Yes. Can I do what I want? Also yes. 

This record RIPS. From the ‘80s metal riffs of “Mare Cognitum,” the ‘90s down-tuned ballad-cum-rocker “Exceed Capacity,” to the jazzy, bossa-nova-turned-rager “Velveteen,” this album is chock full of surprises. Fave track: the punk-rock earworm “Intruder Alert.”

Charlie’s Poolhouse “Pollen EP” — Midwest-emo-heartbreak never sounded so catchy as on this debut from this Statesboro quartet. With chunky rhythm and bass guitars, soaring leads and plaintive melodies, “Pollen” is a mature and assured first album. Fave track: the moody, atmospheric rocker “pawn.”

Beneath Trees “Grow the Garden EP” — A two-piece, bluesy, punk-rock band that sounds massive on this four-song EP. Imagine if Jack and Meg switched places. Got it? Yeah, get this one. Fave track: it’s four songs that rock! Throw a dart, man!

Farseek “Intent EP” — Cam Harrison, a carpetbagger from Ohio who now resides in Statesboro, Georgia, has obviously been inspired by his surroundings here in the South. These bombastic midwest emo songs have flourishes of country-tinged jangle pop wrapped up in distorted and ethereal guitars. Don’t get it twisted, though, these songs are virulently catchy. Fave track: “Thanks for Saving My House from Burning Down” and “Doom Scroll” and…well…the whole thing is good, people. It’s four songs.

Femme Reaper “TBD” — Femme Reaper hasn’t recorded any of their songs yet, but if you’ve been fortunate enough to hear them live, you know they’ve got a BANGER album just waiting for a hard drive.

The Rest of ‘Em

I don’t want to put these albums in order because I like each one for a different reason. I get a little twitchy when the “professionals” tell you exactly where an album fits on the list. Like…oh, is SZA’s “SOS” REALLY just a BETTER album than the Mandy, Indiana, record? 

No! That’s stupid. They’re apples and oranges, people.

Anyways…where was I?

Li’l Yachty “Let’s Start Here” — Alright, first of all, the fact that this album didn’t make the final 50 on several of the snootier “Best Of” lists honestly pisses me off. 

Li’l Yachty made a psychedelia-infused-rock-trap-hip-hop record. I DARE you to listen to this album front to back and tell me this is not an inspired artist at work.

One reviewer knocked Yachty for working with specific producers to get a specific sound and I’m like “YOU MEAN LIKE EVERY OTHER ARTIST DOES?” You think people that work with Steve Freaking Albini are less original? People that work with Rick Rubin? The Alchemist? Did Taylor Swift lose her cred when she worked with Bon Iver for her “indie” record? STFU! 

This album is a knockout. It absolutely bowled me over. First time I heard “IVE OFFICIALLY LOST ViSiON!!!!” I rounded up anybody I could find and said “Have you ever heard anything like this?” 

This album is just banger after banger with the exception of a couple of talkie tracks where Yachty waxes philosophical.

One of the best of the year. Period.

Yves Tumor “Praise a Lord Who Chews But Does Not Consume” — this is a post-punk record wrapped in the guise of a club record. It’s danceable and dark, plumbing the philosophical depths of what it means to have a god in the universe. I’m pretty sure this is my favorite album of the year, but don’t pin me down. Fave track: the frenetic, pulsing “God is a Circle.”

Baxter Dury “I Thought I Was Better Than You” — Honestly, I was ambivalent about this album at first, but after a few listens I fell in love with Dury’s cool blasé—disconnected from deep emotion but also somehow rooted in it as well. He sounds like a disaffected, club-worn very English Leonard Cohen. Fave track: the sparse, pulsing “Pale White Nissan.”

Mononegatives “Crossing Visual Field” — saw this on NOBODY’S LIST. Blippy, tweaky, driving punk-rock? Fourteen songs in about 30 minutes? Chant-like, DEVO-esque lyrics? Yes, please! Fave track: the retro-synth-driven “North Carolina Atomic Bomb.”

the GOLDEN DREGS “On Grace & Dignity” — Another album I didn’t see on anybody’s list this year. Stupid. Alter ego of producer Benjamin Woods, the GOLDEN DREGS sound like if the ghost of David Berman took ecstasy and got hold of synths and samplers. These songs are weirdly beautiful, with Woods’ deep, dripping voice lurking over their lumbering tempos. Surprises abound in these songs — a random trumpet, plinking keys, warbling and waterlogged synths muted behind bright, pop melodies. It’s an album you can get lost in. Fave track(s): “Before We Fell From Grace,” “Vista” and “Josephine.”

100 Gecs “10,000 Gecs” — Where their last album, “1,000 Gecs” felt like fuzzy-to-the-point-of-being-unlistenable hyperpop, this album boasts amazing production with moments of delicacy, deft and beautiful guitar shredding, gorgeous rock basslines, irresistibly catchy pop melodies and so much more. Just when you think you have these songs pegged, they flip on you. This album is just an absolute blast. Fave track(s): “One Million Dollars,” “Hollywood Baby,” and “Dumbest Girl Alive.”

Bully “Lucky for You” — You just want to hear a great rock record? Big guitars, killer riffs with screaming vocals? This is it, man. Fave track: “Days Move Slow.”

Mandy, Indiana “i’ve seen a way” — Synth-driven post-rock with an industrial edge, this record pounds its way into your skull. It’s percussive and frightening with disembodied voices speaking in French, shrieking melodies, screaming guitars. What a rush! Fave tracks: “Love Theme (4K VHS),” “Pinking Shears,” “2 stripe.”

Grian Chatten “Chaos for the Fly” — The first solo album from the Fontaines DC frontman is decidedly melancholy. These songs are driven by acoustic guitar and Chatten’s Dublin brogue, embellished with beautiful strings and blippy drum machines and synths. I returned to this album often this year. It’s good for what ails ya. Fave tracks: “The Score,” “Last Time Every Time Forever,” “Fairlies” — jeez, I realize these are the first three songs, but honestly these songs are just so good. The rest are good, too.

Tele Novella “Poet’s Tooth” — Is this album the wet dream of a balladeer? Yes. But there’s something else there. The group describes their music as “coin-operated medieval country songs through a 1950s western lens.” Does that sound pretentious? Hell yes it does. But hot damn these songs are pretty and sad, full of longing and humor and latent wisdom threaded through harpsichords and organs and acoustic guitars and squishy, pork-pie-sounding electronic drums. It sometimes sounds as if Ricky Nelson collaborated with Belle and Sebastian to make a western album. It’s quirky and wonderful. Fave tracks: “Poet’s Tooth,” “Eggs in one Basket,” “Young & Free.”

Deeper “Careful!” — This was a late-year surprise for me. Deeper often sounds like a 21st-century reinvention of The Cars through the lens of early ‘80s post-rock, with angular, weird guitars and synths, and paranoid, quirky vocals. It’s a combination that grabbed me immediately, and drew me back to repeated listens. Fave tracks: “Build a Bridge,” and “Sub.”

Wednesday “Rat Saw God” — This record is something of a conundrum. The first quarter of the album, most notably, “Hot Rotten Grass Smell” and “Bull Believer” makes Wednesday sound like a ‘90s grungy, shoegaze revival band. But that’s how they trick you. The album morphs from scuzzy guitars to country-tinged rock, slowly adding an Asheville, North Carolina, twang that seeps in. Somehow, it works. Even in their straight-ahead rock songs, lead singer Kelly Hartzman isn’t afraid to bring scream therapy into the mix. There’s not a bad song on this album…if you’re flexible enough to handle the mood shifts. Fave tracks: “Hot Rotten Grass Smell,” “Bath County,” and “Got Shocked.”

BTW…if you don’t have tickets to see Wednesday at the Lodge of Sorrow, sucks for you! Go get ‘em now if they have any left!

Alright, that’s it, my little scamps. It feels like I wrote a bazillion words for this article. I have a feeling some of you bailed long ago, but for those who stuck around, please understand that my nipples are fighting my shirt fabric in your honor.

Until next year…

Categories
Live Music: Savannah Scene Police

Scene Police: SOMETHING to see here, folks!

Live Show at Sentient Bean

By Constable Hezekiah J Thundersnort
Inspector of Scenes, Wearer of Band Shirts, Liker of First Albums Better

First things first, chuckleheads: I am a native of Savannah, born and bred on the Southside. 

As a 20th-century graduate of Windsor Forest High and one of its most ardent “Let’s-TP-the-School!” enthusiasts, I’ve seen decades of transformation in this city. I was here when downtown was ghost town. When Broughton Street was mostly empty buildings. When the best venues in town were Congress St. Station and Velvet Elvis — the place where, on Halloween weekend in 1993, Five Eight played the best show I’ve ever seen in my life.

Also, full disclosure: I’m now a quinquagenarian music addict — a Gen X dad from the coolest music era of all time, thankyouverymuch, and Right Reverend Constable Esquire of “We Live Among You,” a budding magazine, whose words you now read, for weirdos in the cultural lowlands of Southeast Georgia. 

Because I’m older than thou, I’ve known Savannah for years and the closest thing we had to a “scene” was when local alternative band City of Lindas got played on the radio. That was it. That was the scene. It would be more than a decade until Baroness, Black Tusk and Kylesa exploded from the underground.

So you can imagine my elation and surprise when I popped into Savannah on a random Friday to see a punk-rock show, and it blew the dad-gum doors off.

“Is there something brewing in Old Blighty?” I asked myself.

Naturellement, it was time to polish the badge, pull out the notebook and activate the noggin. It’s time for an in-depth investigation by…

THE SCENE POLICE!

WEEEEEEWOOOOWEEEEWOOOWEEEEWOOOO!!

Evidence Log

  • Last night, at approximately 1900 hours, The Sentient Bean — a coffee shop usually frequented by tattooed hipsters, daylight entrepreneurs and the crunchy granola set —  hosted a three-bill of local bands.
  • More amazingly, they didn’t bring in the stereotypical acoustic balladeers, the ones that wear the Amish, flat-brim hats and do witty-yet-ironic, bleeding-heart covers of songs like “Gangnam Style” while the shop sells medium-grind-fair-trade-Ethiopian-pour-overs. 
  • Where most scenes tend to revolve around a specific type of music — see the metal boom of the early aughts — these bands were anything but homogenous.

The Lineup

CHARLIE’S POOLHOUSE, “indie pop friends from Statesboro,” played their first show in Savannah on this bill. And while they certainly leaned into pop more than the other bands, they skewed emo, combining plaintive vocals and nimble, chiming lead guitars with distorted rhythm guitars, heavy bass and a drummer (Jacob Televski who also plays in local band Just Rats) who swapped jazzy syncopation and stick-breaking rock with little effort.

In a surprise turn late in the set, the band brought on a cellist who helped them play a stirring ballad with all the feels. Currently, the oldest member of this band is about 20, which is astounding for the kind of music they’re making already. Keep an eye out for more shows from these kids.

FEMME REAPER, making their debut at The Bean show, played a grungy but melodic brand of punk rock. Ominous keyboard undertones bent the sound toward ‘70s metal, but the Riot Girl vocals blasted through dirge with fuzzy distortion. And aside from killer, crushingly loud songs, this band looked like the coolest band you’ve ever seen.

The lead singer looked exactly like Baby Spice…if Baby Spice had smoked their voice into a growl and grew up on the Sex Pistols instead of Robbie Williams; the bassist looked like Lenny Kravitz’s lovechild, throwing their long, knotted locks through the air like they were underwater; the keyboard player slayed in all-black, all-leather pants, boots, frilled cowboy vest and trenchcoat; the drummer was topless and tattooed, playing simple and primal; and the guitarist could’ve been a member of Hall and Oates in a past life.

I’ve yet to see their band photo, but I can already tell you it’s epic.

Their set ran short because they’ve yet to write more than a few songs, but the crowd was just begging them to play the songs again. You’ll want to catch them before everyone else finds out how cool they are.

FARSEEK is a veteran band from Columbus, Ohio, now based in Statesboro, Georgia. The Bean show was the first of their current tour, which will take them down to Florida, into the midwest and back home again. While they bill themselves as a midwest emo band, the description doesn’t paint the full picture. Sure, the lead singer bleats the vocal affectations of his emo compatriots, and the angular, dissonant melodies bring to mind Cursive or American Football, but this band also boasts moody electronics like Death Cab and throws a bombastic trumpet into the mix for kicks and grins. And just as a side note, the drummer for this band — wherever he is — is currently having more fun than you are.

Contemplation and Conclusions

As a seasoned investigator, I’m fully aware the simple playing of music does not a scene make. What does make a scene? I’m so glad you asked, my beautiful little scamps.

Hast this congregation read their scene lore? Has thou read Mark Yarm, who wrote “Everybody Loves Our Town” about the grunge scene in Seattle? Hast thou read “Cool Town” by Grace Elizabeth Hale, which recounts the Athens, Georgia, boom of the ’80s? “Please Kill Me” by Legs McNeil? “Meet Me in the Bathroom” by Lizzy Goodman? Yours truly has, dear congregation, and here are a few things I’ve learned.

To be rad, a scene needs:
  • TALENTED MUSICIANS: I mean. Der. Of course.
  • INFLUX OF TALENT: A stream of creative young people from, say, a university or an art school. The number of visual artists who became rock stars is staggering.
  • DIY ETHOS: When locals start organizing shows, recording their music and helping each other out, cool things are gonna happen.
  • VENUES TO PLAY: This must include all-ages venues. Bar vibes are different than house show vibes. And kids want to see live music. Don’t shut them out!
  • COMPETITIVE LOVE: Bands are always competing, but competition doesn’t mean contempt. When bands support each other, support local music and see the bigger picture, things happen.

BLEEEBOOOPBOPBEEPPEWPEWPEWBOPBOOM — that’s the sound of the Thundersnort Objective Scene Summation and Electronic Rubric (TOSSER) booting up. Believe me, it’s worth the wait…

It doesn’t take a supercomputer to know that Savannah is going to become a significant hub for punk rock and alternative music of all stripes.

Imagine the glorious day of skipping the trip to Atlanta and instead trotting downtown to see bands that rip. That the lonesome punks living in small towns in Southeast Georgia would hear tell of this community of weirdos and find their freak fraternity less than a couple hours away.

I scoured Instagram for videos and photos of the show. I figured the bands on the bill would post photos and videos, thanking the venues and the fellow bands on the bill…which they did.

Quelle agréable surprise to also find that several other local bands were there as well — members of Girlfriend from Hell, Just Rats, Sissy Fists, Small Talk and others took photos and video and hyped their fellow scenesters on social media. At the show, the same crowd bought CDs, t-shirts and stickers to support the other bands.

That right there is beautiful, my little freak nuggets. Brings a tear to my eye, it does.

Here’s to the freaks in Southeast Georgia…wherever you are. There’s a scene here ready to welcome you.

Aw, dangit…somebody give me a hug!

Categories
Uncategorized

‘I’m always trying to get worse’: Why Yuno Miles is the rapper we need today.

YUNO MILES

I’m sitting in a coffee shop because that’s where hip, mysterious writers practice their craft.

I haven’t made a purchase, but I feel like the tradeoff is fine because they’re subjecting me to an adult contemporary Spotify channel that is hypnotically compelling me to grow a handlebar mustache.

We’ll have none of that.

An Artist in M’ Craw

I had every intention to write about Alvvays, a band whose entire catalog I own on vinyl. They’re great, and I’ll get to them eventually, but I have an artist stuck in my craw, and I’m trying to make sense of my fascination with him.

His name is Yuno Miles, a mysterious, masked meme rapper who has made a name for himself by being truly, hilariously awful. On YouTube, he’s sometimes called the worst rapper alive. While this may or may not be true, he’s at least trying to get his name on the list.

If you aren’t familiar with Yuno Miles, I’m not sure where to tell you to start. His first YouTube video upload from 2019 is a song called Pokémon, a free-association screed over video game blips, tubular bells and a trap beat. Here’s a sample of his lyrics…

This ain't Pokémon but I feel like Ash Ketchum/ He lookin' for the Dragon Balls, but he won't even find 'em/ Yo' girl's so ugly I dodged her like The Matrix/ Got my ass beat by a n***a doin' The Matrix/ I just stowed away on an alien spaceship/ I threw away the sandwich cuz it had Mayonnaise on it!/ Hit him in the head with a bottle of mustard/ then he came back and hit me wit a bottle of ketchup...

Truthfully, this is one of his more coherent songs. The song that brought him to my attention (and now boasts 2.8 million views) is “Payday (ft. Yuno Marr),” where he begins to cement his wacky flow — hitting a vibrato-laden high note at the end of every phrase, as does Yuno Marr, who is almost unintelligible. Because my description could NEVER do it justice, I’m including the song here.

The reception to this song is fairly consistent, demonstrated by comments which are vicious and hilarious…

“YOU HAVE A HIDDEN TALENT. KEEP IT HIDDEN.”

“WHOEVER TOLD YOU TO DROP THIS TELL THEM TO PICK IT BACK UP!”

“TALENT CHASES HIM, BUT HE RUNS FASTER”

Wherein This Article Gets Existential…

Obviously, this is not “good” music in the sense that it would be played in the club or in your car or at a party — at least not ironically. And if it’s not “good,” then what value does it have? Is it art? Should we dismiss the music and its creator?

I’m a big fan of the show “Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee.” It’s a show where Jerry Seinfeld picks up a comedian in an outrageous car and they talk about comedy for 20 minutes or so. Oftentimes, the conversations are anecdotes about famous people, other comedians, bad stand-up gigs or simple comical observations, but every once in a while the conversations take a philosophical turn.

In the episode with Will Ferrell, the discussion turns to our current subject. Ferrell says, “I always feel very strange when someone refers to what we do as art.”

Seinfeld, in his typical ranting tone, responds, “Anything you make out of thin air that someone else likes is art.”

Jerry’s definition of art is a far cry from Plato, who developed the idea of art as “mimesis,” a Greek word that means “copying” or “imitation.” According to this definition, the greatest art was that art that accurately depicted or represented something beautiful, meaningful or powerful.

I’m not going to break down the history of art in this rambling epistle, but if you’ve laid eyes on an Andy Warhol print or a Jackson Pollock painting — or Rothko or Picasso or Koons or Marcel Duchamp’s toilet, you know Plato’s definition doesn’t work anymore.

And because I’ve seen these works, I tend to agree with Seinfeld. I think his definition is just as good as the one attempted (with thousands more words) by Encyclopedia Britannica, which basically says art is a “human-made thing, an artifact, as distinguished from an object in nature.” This is why Andres Serrano can pee in a glass, stick a crucifix in it and call it art.

So, with that in mind, let’s turn back to our subject.

Does Yuno Miles “have bars?” I guess we have to ask what that means. Are his bars dumb? Yes! Is his flow lame? Yes! Does he make me laugh? Yes! Is he entertaining? Absolutely! If Miles’ bars consistently make me laugh out loud, I would say, “Yes, he does indeed have bars.”

But the greatest thing about Miles is that he’s in on the joke. He knows exactly what he’s making and why he’s making it. In his videos, he’s always holding money, no matter the song. Sometimes it’s a wad of 20’s. More often, it’s maybe $10 in ones. He wanders around playgrounds and parking lots, randomly sitting or standing or awkwardly lying on tables. His flow is preposterous. He drifts off key. He drifts off beat. He randomly yells or makes stupid noises.

Fantano Gets the Skinny

This week, I had the good fortune to catch “the internet’s busiest music nerd,” Anthony Fantano, interview Yuno Miles (included below if you missed it). I found Miles to be candid, smart, funny and fully aware of how and why he’s achieved his notoriety.

When asked about his equipment, Miles said, “It’s a 15-dollar mic and a hundred-dollar computer.” He records his songs in the basement because he was kicked out of the living spaces in his house — “I mean, the ceiling’s kind of MISSIN’!” When asked why his grandma catches so many strays in his lyrics, he said, “I think she deserves it.”

My favorite moment in the interview, however, is when Fantano asks, “Maybe this is the opposite of what you would ask most artists, but could you see yourself making worse music in the future?”

Miles immediately answers, “Of course, man! Like I’m always trying to get worse….”

The Point de Resistance

I don’t want to pretend I have the supreme taste in music or that I don’t gravitate to the songs of my Gen-X youth, but I am a seeker. I’m always looking for artists that are trying to make something new.

100 Gecs created a blippy, grungy, danceable, lunatic genre called “hyperpop” and honestly blew me away with the craft of their second album, “10,000 Gecs.” L’il Yachty was barely on my radar outside of his sometimes hilarious interviews, but I found “Let’s Start Here” a seismic album that unfortunately didn’t convince the critics that an artist was at work. (I have lots of opinions about this particular snub, but I’ll keep them to myself for this particular article.)

I found Wednesday’s “Rat Saw God” exhilarating. I found Mandy, Indiana’s industrial-electro-pop-art nightmare, “i’ve seen a way,” brash and confident, the production of a great talent. Fontaines DC and Viagra Boys are redefining punk rock in creative ways, and Black MIDI wants to reduce it to rubble and rebuild it in their image.

I love these artists. We need these artists.

But where does young Yuno Miles fit? I would never argue that he is attempting to “push” hip-hop or innovate in any interesting way. He’s not challenging stereotypes as much as he is parodying them. You could compare him to Weird Al Yankovic in that way, but he’s not as interested musical chops, polish or wit in his creations.

He wants to act up, offend ears and make people laugh. He’s not concerned with who likes him, who doesn’t or who is indifferent. He’s just making music and throwing it at the wall to see what sticks. In a word, he’s making slapstick rap.

I’m not here to critique Yuno Miles or dissect him or ponder his place in musical culture. I’m just here to celebrate him.

There are such great gobs of bland songs in the world today. Artists who take themselves too seriously, artists who are desperate to portray themselves as something they are not, artists who pose and preen and seduce and posture.

And then there are artists who just do what they want. They make themselves laugh, make their friends laugh and see just how far they can take the joke.

I celebrate Yuno Miles because he reminds me of how fun it is to make things in your room (or basement), and how consequential it is to bring sheer delight to millions of people you’ll never meet.

He could’ve quit the first time he read a comment that said, “You are WHACK,” but he didn’t. And we’re all better for it.