Gainesville Rock City

Colleen Green “Someone Else”

Sam: Legendary member of the pod’s rare three-timers club, Colleen’s new album is truly sick. Having stumbled backwards into her original music through the discovery of some extremely nice Blink-182 covers (and eventually her full Dude Ranch cover album), this latest collection is by far my favourite yet, amplifying the most unique facets of Colleen’s songwriting while retaining all the cool minimalism that is her stock and trade (even when the guitars border on being described as “lush”). The way this song moves from sorta-shoegaze to precocious pop rules, and as the album opener, it sets the table nicely for what is to come (more sick shit).

Josiah: Hmm nice to see Sam is easing me into what is sure to be the worst month of my life. I’ve been meaning to listen to Colleen Green’s new album for a while, mostly because I think she’s really funny. That’s really the most important trait to me in a rocker. And this song really lives up to its (album title), sounding extremely cool. This certainly has some of the previous Colleen bass-rock charm, but the expanded sound gives it Kurt Vile-esque vibe that means it’ll surely be playing in laid-back roasteries that sell heather grey Alternative Apparel crewnecks, and Lord knows those people make the best coffee.

Jesse Fellows “One Orange (Nectar-Face)”

Sam: Jesse is responsible for some of Southern Ontario’s most underrated pop-punk as the guitarist / vocalist of Shared Arms, and I am simply living for his new life as power-pop solo artist supreme. There is something super Canadian about this whole thing (BTK-ass video included), like this song would absolutely work on an early Big Shiny Tunes between Zuckerbaby and Limblifter tunes. Who says there is no Canadian culture.

Josiah: What’s the impetus for going from harm-soaked Fest guy to Steve Adamyk-style power-pop guy? Not complaining, because it’s definitely a much more palatable palette to be working with. But I’m just curious how it happens? It does seem like an Ottawa thing, although I guess that’s not southern Ontario. Anyway how cool would it be if this was a song by Jesse Farrar.

Angel Du$t “Truck Songs”

Josiah: There should be some sort of Hypernormalisation documentary but about how all of the Pop Wig stuff just sounds straight up unironically 100% good now, and no one knows what to do about it. Turnstile is the only rock band left, and meanwhile Angel Du$t continues their hilariously hokey and cool goofball music. This sounds like Jakob Dylan jamming with the Violent Femmes, who are trying to learn how and when to use their Metalzone pedals. And then there’s a janky violin solo. Mere months ago it would have sounded impossibly stupid, but this just sounds like normal music now.

Sam: As someone who never stopped listening to uncool 90s music, I appreciate how much the gum I like is back in style these days. In the same way that we started doing Blink-155 before the full-on pop-punk revival of the last year+, this move to hokey alt-rock by all the great titans of cool kid hardcore is further proof that I have always been right and my taste has never been bad. Thank you. 

Coldplay x BTS “My Universe”

Josiah: The newsletter is pretty fun, but it’s also so fucking annoying to realize I haven’t listened to any music in a week and then start combing through the same tedious music blogs I used to read/work at. Instead of posting that Dave Grohl did something epic or Death From Above 1979 is back again or whatever, let’s just listen to this Coldplay x BTS collaboration. Coldplay is so sick. BTS is so sick. There’s probably some amazing choreo involved too. Fuck yeah. Park Jimin rocks.

Sam: I find Coldplay’s inexplicable ongoing relevance to be admirable even as it baffles me. Stadium tours! Halftime shows! BTS collabs! None of this makes any sense. Imagine if Starsailor was selling out American football arenas and releasing songs with BLACKPINK. Coldplay! Why Coldplay! It’s even boring to have an opinion about them!