https://bandoftownies.com/music daily 0.75 2023-11-12 https://bandoftownies.com/media daily 0.75 2018-11-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1541691740688-2OJFRRDWMA1D91TW8338/34342304_666374107027559_475325353498247168_o.jpg Media https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1541691769756-FZHAV8WLR0S52FQTHEGQ/42327108_762968310701471_149635522426306560_n.jpg Media https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1541691779692-5NWUPTDA6WCF1EFPATOE/42551292_762968320701470_5034540104362754048_n.jpg Media https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1541691821981-J0VA2FJXPCVQW8DYLTHY/42347401_762968327368136_3483281106269110272_n.jpg Media https://bandoftownies.com/blog daily 0.75 2026-01-01 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2026/1/1/townie-tunes-2025-our-favorite-albums-of-the-year monthly 0.5 2026-01-03 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/d97c9887-4703-4d48-ac05-fa248d0f11ac/2025+best+albums.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2025: Our favorite albums of the year - Make it stand out Band of Townies: Favorite Albums of 2025 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/ebd328b3-dfe2-4b3f-a238-f2f3b0bd4693/Geese+Getting+Killed.jpg Blog - Townie Tunes 2025: Our favorite albums of the year - 1. Getting Killed ~ Geese Getting Killed feels like spinning yourself to the liminal space between transcendence and puking up breakfast. Like the first taste of an especially peaty yet not especially expensive Scotch. Like when Townes Van Zandt threw himself off a fourth-floor balcony at the University of Colorado not because he wanted to fall but because he wanted to know what it feels like just before you fall. Like waking at 2:00 and understanding the utility of military time because the shades are drawn and it could be AM or PM or Tuesday or happy hour or you’re late for work and is it February already? Getting Killed is as brown as Mollusk era Ween, as ambitious as Yoshimi era Flaming Lips, and as beloved as Funeral era Arcade Fire. I’ve heard folks say that they haven’t been as excited about what a rock band might do next since Radiohead’s Ok Computer, and this comparison doesn’t seem batshit crazy. Song picks: “Half Real” and “Taxes” Lyric: “The lord has a lot of friends, and in the end, he’ll probably forget he’s met you before.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/c9aa5abf-f6a4-44ba-a692-a666c82e5a75/florry+sounds+like.jpg Blog - Townie Tunes 2025: Our favorite albums of the year - 2. Sounds Like… ~ Florry Sounds Like… sounds like Neil Young, Daniel Johnston, and Drive-by Truckers—three of my all time favorites. Its songs are crisp and sad and funny and beautiful and wholly original. To interpolate their opening track: I give this record a five out of five. How’d they make a record like that? Song picks: “First It Was a Movie, Then It Was a Book” & “Pretty Eyes Lorraine” Lyric: “Guess that all I really wanna do is you with your pants off” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/5134bee8-1566-4a93-a8ea-cb71891de0c0/craig+finn+always+been.jpg Blog - Townie Tunes 2025: Our favorite albums of the year - 3. Always Been ~ Craig Finn Craig Finn would have been my favorite writer even if the ink on his quill had dried after Boys and Girls in America. Instead, he’s spent the 20 years since then holding steady with his rock band and releasing a string of intoxicatingly depressing and increasingly beautiful solo albums. Always Been tells the story of an agnostic ex-marine who becomes a preacher because “a man needs a vocation.” There’s a world behind every Craig Finn character, and on this record and its companion book Lousy with Ghosts Finn reveals more than a taste of their triumphs, heartaches, sins, and mediocrities. Song picks: “People of Substance” and “Fletcher” Lyric: “The highway goes forever, but your funds will fence you in.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/f79a2961-ccfd-442d-bbd3-52403712b88d/West_End_Girl_by_Lily_Allen.jpg Blog - Townie Tunes 2025: Our favorite albums of the year - 4. West End Girl ~ Lily Allen It may be true that all happy couples are alike and each divorced couple divorces in their own way, but the stages of divorce that Lily Allen describes on West End Girl will feel familiar to anyone how who’s survived this life stage, even if they’ve never been (or been with) a nonmonagomummy. Allen rose to fame in the Myspace-mp3-pirating era of the naughties. I remember enjoying her catchy melodies and clever lyrics, but I don’t remember her songs hitting as hard as they do here, even if—or maybe because—here is a place that she has come to hate. Song picks: “Tennis” and “Dallas Major” Lyric: “Lie to the children, the ending was mutual” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/9a4b088a-1683-46be-80de-11f899ea4e2e/bleeds+wednesday.jpg Blog - Townie Tunes 2025: Our favorite albums of the year - 5. Bleeds ~ Wednesday I don’t know whether to be inspired, infuriated, or infatuated by another band that writes a song called “Townies” as perfect as the second track on Bleeds. Wednesday bill themselves as creek rock, but their creeks are swarming with townies doing townie shit, like cracking teeth on cough drops, mouthing off to bikers at stop lights, stokin’ bonfires with leaf blowers, smoking weed out of Pepsi cans, chopping ketamine with motel room keys, and driving to airports with the e-break on. Song picks: “Townies” and “Gary’s II” Lyric: “I find comfort that the angels don’t give a damn” https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2025/11/25/a-townie-tribute-to-the-80s-our-favorite-music-from-our-least-favorite-decade monthly 0.5 2025-12-04 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/ec3af487-30f7-4a87-874b-808477694107/80s+cover.png Blog - A Townie Tribute to the 80s - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2025/1/16/how-to-fix-the-most-common-problems-in-consumer-research monthly 0.5 2025-05-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/2ac4cb2e-6eab-4364-bc57-58f3b09dce49/Slide2.jpeg Blog - How to fix the most common problems in consumer research - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1736608015070-J4LZR2AV3FC1RTEGACE6/Slide1.jpeg Blog - How to fix the most common problems in consumer research https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1736608014923-7PLAGBHU5FKR6H29ST4B/Slide2.jpeg Blog - How to fix the most common problems in consumer research https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/c6120e64-c090-4802-af43-013bf5257c67/Slide3.jpeg Blog - How to fix the most common problems in consumer research - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/fa7898a1-4d8f-42fa-ba71-c2d3697cadeb/Slide5.jpeg Blog - How to fix the most common problems in consumer research - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/b6ad93e8-18e7-4f80-abd4-3956a70558a9/Slide6.jpeg Blog - How to fix the most common problems in consumer research - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/541a5158-855a-434d-90c9-78c6dac45301/Fig+3+simonsohn+et+al+2014.jpg Blog - How to fix the most common problems in consumer research - Make it stand out Source: Simonsohn, U., Nelson, L. D., & Simmons, J. P. (2014). P-curve: a key to the file-drawer. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 143(2), 534. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2024/12/28/townie-tunes-of-2024-our-favorite-albums-and-songs monthly 0.5 2025-05-19 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/c3009820-07ea-434d-b532-4bc2d3b87465/2024+best+albums+image.jpg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2024: Our favorite albums and songs - Make it stand out Band of Townies - Favorite Music of 2024 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2024/4/19/what-are-your-favorite-taylor-swift-songs monthly 0.5 2024-04-19 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/f6ce5867-ca8b-4947-92d2-fa46befe8530/Lily+Taylor+Swift+songs.jpg Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/8819d7b2-c73f-4151-a560-6209e4b83c3b/TS+I+knew+you+were+trouble.jpeg Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 5. “I Knew You Were Trouble” from Red (2012) It makes me feel excited. I don’t know why it does. Lyric: “No apologies, he'll never see you cry Pretends he doesn't know that he's the reason why You're drowning” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/ad159ff6-6ee4-40cc-b928-156aaecf0ddf/Taylor_Swift_-_Love_Story.png Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 4. “Love Story” from Fearless (2008) This Taylor Swift’s version of Romeo and Juliet. I like how at the beginning she seems calm but then she surprises you and the music gets bigger and louder. Lyric: “Romeo, save me, they're trying to tell me how to feel This love is difficult, but it's real” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/2480456e-101d-480a-98ae-53ee067eaae2/Lavender+Haze+TS.jpeg Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 3. “Lavender Haze” from Midnights (2022) It feels like dark and purple. I think that’s why she calls the album Midnights and the song “Lavender Haze.” Lyric: “All they keep asking me Is if I'm gonna be your bride The only kinda girl they see Is a one-night or a wife” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/030c296f-c127-4626-b510-76279e9f91f7/Taylor_Swift_+Bad_Blood.png Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 2. “Bad Blood” from 1989 (2014) It feels like it’s fire, and in the video, it is fire. All the girls in the video are actually Taylor Swift’s friends. I like how in some of the parts she talks lower and then the beat becomes bigger and so does her voice. Lyric: “Band-aids don't fix bullet holes You say sorry just for show If you live like that, you live with ghosts” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/95c089bc-7cf0-47a2-93cd-0cd91e46cdd2/Taylor_Swift_-_Look_What_You_Made_Me_Do.png Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 1. “Look What You Made Me Do” from Reputation (2017) I like it because it’s dark and I like dark things. And I like the melody. I also like how whenever it has a big beat she talks and when the beat stops, she stops. Lyric: “But I got smarter, I got harder in the nick of time Honey, I rose up from the dead, I do it all the time” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/3d9ff178-7511-4a39-9576-32592e696127/TS+last+great+american+dynasty.jpeg Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 5. “The Last Great American Dynasty” from Folklore (2020) I wasn’t paying enough attention to Taylor Swift until Folklore. The album came out when I was locked down during Covid, so I listened closer than I had previously. The entire collection of songs shook my perception of her (far more than “Shake It Off”). I was expecting self-indulgent pop cliché. Instead, I heard a meticulously crafted indie folk album with songwriting even stronger than that of her collaborators, including Bon Iver, the National, and Jack Antonoff, all of whom I adore. I could have picked half the songs on this album, but I went with “The Last Great American Dynasty” because it applies the detail (e.g., “she stole the dog and dyed it a key lime green”) that has always made Taylor a great songwriter to an empathetic portrait of philanthropist and Standard Oil heiress, Rebekah Harkness. I love the image of Rebekah—and Taylor—riling Rhode Island royalty with champagne pool parties attended by Salvadore Dali and their “bitch pack friends from the city.” Lyric: “There goes the loudest woman this town has ever seen I had a marvelous time ruining everything” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/4b87185f-ad55-4a1f-bcba-72dabd43c2f7/Taylor_Swift_-_Tim_McGraw.png Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 4. “Tim McGraw” from Taylor Swift (2006) Before Taylor Swift, I found Eric Church. Rolling Stone made a big deal about him back when I used to care what Rolling Stone made a big deal about, and so I listened to Carolina and Chief on an iPod touch. One track rose above the rest. A nostalgia pixie stick called “Springsteen” in which Church remembers being 17 cruising in a jeep under the stars with a girl on his arm while the Boss sings “like a soundtrack to a July Saturday night.” When I heard “Tim McGraw,” the first Taylor Swift song to catch my attention, I thought gosh ‘dern, she made Church’s “Springsteen” even better. Then I learned that she wrote “Tim McGraw” five years before the release of “Springsteen.” When she was fourteen years old. In a math class. “Tim McGraw” is early Taylor at her best: songs about teenage love, lust, longing, and loss that make you feel like you’re fumbling on the backroads in the backseat of his Chevy truck. This song avoids the clunky abstraction that sours me on some of her other early work. Each line hits like Tyson in the 80s, an aged single-malt, or “Wish I didn’t know now what I didn’t know then.” Even if she never wrote another verse, “Tim McGraw” would qualify Taylor Swift for the songwriting hall of fame. Lyric: “When you think happiness I hope you think that little black dress Think of my head on your chest And my old faded blue jeans” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/3be491a3-930c-4156-9b74-00a6b178866f/Miss-Americana+and+heartbreak+prince+TS.png Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 3. “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince” from Lover (2019) Taylor has always been a master of the coming-of-age Americana love drama; a lady-Springsteen with an even better ear for a hook. On Lover, and especially on this song, she combines what she does best thematically with post-Lorde delivery, Antonoff production, sad humor (“the damsels are depressed”), and the Swiftiest high school superlative in the yearbook. Lyric: “We're so sad, we paint the town blue Voted most likely to run away with you” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/4c444e9f-076e-4aa6-8892-95fa496c4b11/Taylor_Swift_Style.png Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 2. “Style” from 1989 (2014) Many artists have gone from niche to pop (Fleetwood Mac, Metallica, Goo Goo Dolls, Black Eyed Peas), but none with as much style as Taylor on 1989. The album transformed Taylor Swift from a country pop star to the sun… a 2x1030 kg ball of nuclear fusion around which we all orbit. And “Style” is my favorite song on the album. It combines Max Martin mathematical melody with Taylor’s insistence on meaning and grammar. It’s sexy and fun and makes me want to jump out of a giant cake wearing only sequins and gold. Lyric: “Midnight You come and pick me up, no headlights A long drive Could end in burning flames or paradise” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/c080f831-4ff2-44de-92ae-7a2256a552e8/betty+TS.jpeg Blog - What are your favorite Taylor Swift songs? - 1. “Betty” from Folklore (2020) Betty is the final song in Taylor’s teenage Rashomon love triangle. In it, we get the perspective of James, the 17-year-old boy (or girl?) who was busted by Inez for cheating on Betty. The character development is worthy of Jason Isbell or Craig Finn (my favorite songwriters), the melody is the squishy inside of freshly baked bread, and James’s fragmented self-awareness is pure seventeen. Consider his plea for forgiveness: “Slept next to her, but I dreamt of you all summer long.” Lyric: “I'm only seventeen, I don't know anything But I know I miss you” https://bandoftownies.com/blog/bot-favorite-music-of-2023 monthly 0.5 2023-12-31 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/578590fe-b452-46f0-aa0a-c7452b14eeb4/Screen+Shot+2023-12-28+at+6.47.35+AM.jpg Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 1. Guts ~ Olivia Rodrigo Olivia Rodrigo taught my daughter the fuck-word. And one of the few things that I enjoy more than hearing a six-year-old chant “seeing you tonight, it’s a bad idea, right?” is hearing her belt the answer, “fuck it, it’s fine!” “Bad Idea Right” is just the appetizer. Guts is stuffed with bangers and ballads. Humor and heartbreak. Poetry and punk. Taylor Swift and Riot Girlll. Redemption and self-doubt. Ego and id. Class and integrity, just like a goddamn Kennedy. Pretending to be older while knowing one’s age and acting like it. Having the sun in your motherfucking pocket. Guts is where Rodrigo stops being “great for her age” and starts belonging in the same conversation as Joni, Emmylou, Fiona, Beyonce, and Lana. Lyric pick: “I want to meet her mom to tell her her son sucks” Song picks: “Get Him Back” & “The Grudge” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/5731d391-e115-4084-a476-3894a9b2a8a8/Screen+Shot+2023-12-28+at+6.54.17+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 2. Weathervanes ~ Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit Jason Isbell sees people. Not just the color of their skin or the make of their step side or even the characters in their tweets. Sometimes, all he can offer is empathy, like when he repeats “I want to hold her until it’s over” (“Death Wish”) or when he documents a husband descend from a twenty-foot ladder to a failed attempt to swap “copper from the worksite” for a “pocket full of pills.” Other times, he tries to find meaning in the muck of an abortion (“White Baretta”), a racist father (“Cast Iron Skillet”), a mass shooting (“Save the World”), or the death of friend and fellow musician Justin Townes Earle (“When We Were Close”). Weathervanes is every bit as sad, shrewd, and beautiful as Southeastern, Something More Than Free, and Decoration Day, my favorite Isbell albums. Thank you for your grace. Lyric pick: “If His love is unconditional, why do I feel so miserable?” Song picks: “If You Insist” & “White Baretta” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/377b8440-12e2-44b3-96ee-533feacd8f8a/Screen+Shot+2023-12-28+at+7.00.17+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 3. Time Ain’t Accidental ~ Jess Williamson The best time to listen to Time Ain’t Accidental is driving a hundred down 1,392 miles of desert highway from Austin to Santa Monica wearing your best boots after a pool-bar romance flared like pine straw in gasoline because you’ve been chasing spirits and lovin’s hard. But the best thing about listening to Time Ain’t Accidental is that it puts you in that car with her, whether you’re two-stepping through Topanga Canyon, praying in a candlelit bedroom, or drifting somewhere West of San Antone. Lyric pick: “I read you Raymond Carver by the pool bar, like a lady” Song picks: “Stampede” & “Time Ain’t Accidental” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/10af9a41-218e-4531-aa5b-d6c956e84ad8/Screen+Shot+2023-12-28+at+7.04.40+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 4. the record ~ boygenius The first full length record by boygenius lives up to the second part of the group’s name. I wanted to interview Phoebe Bridgers, Julien Baker, and Lucy Dacus, but it wasn’t necessary, as they answer my questions directly on the record. *see below Lyric pick: “Once I took your medication to know what it’s like, and now I have to act like I can’t read your mind” Song picks: “Not Strong Enough” & “True Blue” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/949cf938-0d82-41a4-9bb7-e39bd7fe1a41/Screen+Shot+2023-12-28+at+9.09.10+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 5. Rat Saw God ~ Wednesday Listen 1: Rat Saw God sounds like Sonic Youth with a pedal steel fetish. Listen 10: Wednesday are like the Hold Steady, Mountain Goats, Drive-by Truckers, and my other favorite lyricists. They capture the moments that make life horrifying and strange and mundane and beautiful ultimately worth living: watered down liquor, sex shops with biblical names, lice-ridden children in a baby pool, parents fighting in the yard in their underwear, hot breath looming off the trunk, cross-armed folks at a rest stop waiting in line for Panera Bread, a dude passed out on the couch at a New Year’s party playing Mortal Kombat, friends drinking Benadryl until you see shit crawling up the walls, a bird flying repeatedly into the same window refusing to learn or to die. Lyric pick: “At night I don’t count the stars, I count the dark.” Song picks: “Chosen to Deserve” & “Quarry” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/4ab97a2e-b8cf-4e51-b41f-a7e9ed1cac22/Screen+Shot+2023-12-31+at+9.42.25+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 1. Petrodragonic Apocolypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation ~ King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard This is the greatest & goofiest album with the greatest & goofiest title by the greatest & goofiest band to patrol Planet Earth today. Let’s just call it PDA to make things easier. PDA is 7 songs, and the first 6.5 are unrelenting prog metal. If you took the band that released Infest the Rats’ Nest in 2019 and had them listen to Tool for a few years, you’d get PDA. All of the long songs (Motor Spirit, Flamethrower, and most especially Dragon) are accomplishments. Dragon is perfect. But my favorite song on PDA is the shorter and more accessible Witchcraft. When you just sit back and listen, you can bob your head along, but if you dig into it, the polyrhythms are crazy. I think guitars and vocals are 4/4 while the drums are 7/8, and then they throw an extra 3 beat measure to get themselves to sync at 35 total. The beats turn around on themselves a lot. Just when I start feeling dizzy from trying to figure it out, they slam into the easy and heavy 5/4 rocker riff. So freaking good. Oh and it has a great bass jam, a dizzying middle section, a lively scream, lyrics about a mischievous cat messing up witches’ incantations and thus creating a world-destroying petrodragon, and possibly the best “Wooo!” of the KGLW catalog. Witchcraft is so perfect that I haven’t even mentioned Gila Monster (the most accessible song on the album), Supercell (catchy chorus!), and Converge (heaviest tune on the album). PDA is straight 10/10 in my book. When Spotify put out my year in review, my top 5 most-listened songs were from PDA. Oh, and it has the coolest album cover art that I’ve seen in years. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/24727c6f-6772-4df2-924d-7af1e58b027b/Screen+Shot+2023-12-31+at+9.49.44+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 2. O Monolith ~ Squid These guys caught me seriously off-guard, and they won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. Spotify calls them “anxiety rock”, and that works for me. Think bands like Protomartyr, or the calmer side of Black MIDI. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/40e39d02-3a69-442f-826e-376e9521cf94/Screen+Shot+2023-12-31+at+9.51.38+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 3. In Times New Roman ~ Queens of the Stoneage What a comeback! In the 6 years since the last QOTSA album, Josh Homme has faced a nasty divorce, drawn-out custody battles, and a cancer diagnosis. He channeled all of that into one of the most cohesive albums in this band’s history. Some of the puns in the song titles may roll eyes, but that’s excusable because it’s so catchy and groovy. Key track: Sicily. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/f892c183-fb45-465f-812b-517f74f07786/Screen+Shot+2023-12-31+at+9.54.26+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 4. The Silver Cord ~ King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard This came out as the “yang” to the “yin” that is my #1 album of the year. Heavily electronic and Krautrock, The Silver Cord has new songs that are loosely-based on/rooted in the songs on Petrodragonic Apocalypse, but with a very different vibe. There’s lots to like. The regular version of the album is short and punchy, 7 songs for a total of 28 minutes. The extended version is the same 7 songs, but stretched and explored for 88 minutes. Needless to say, the extended version is both more ridiculous and more interesting. This style isn’t always my favorite, but there’s lots to sink your teeth into. I’m looking forward to seeing how these electronic tunes get mashed up live with their metal counterparts. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/18651f1d-00d6-40d4-ae3e-c14ecb4bd629/Screen+Shot+2023-12-31+at+10.00.54+AM.png Blog - Townie Tunes 2023: Caleb and Adam Discuss our favorite music from the past year - 5. Intercepted Message ~ Osees This band started out as Orinoka Crash Suite. They then shortened that to OCS. That became Orange County Sound, which led to The Ohsees, which led to Thee Oh Sees, which led to Osees. They change their name to be difficult on the music media, which makes them ok in my book. Intercepted Message is one of their easier listens. It’s synth-y, it’s poppy, and it has a killer cover of “The Fish Needs a Bike” that you will not be able to get out of your head. There’s a lot of fun silly stuff here, but the crown jewel is the closing somber track “Always at Night.” https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2023/11/5/early-aughties-music-fantasy-draft monthly 0.5 2023-11-10 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/89e8711d-a087-4e56-be99-20374af61aef/Slide3.jpeg Blog - Early Aughties Music Fantasy Draft - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/29be581b-e302-4266-8ccc-7db630cb694d/Slide2.jpeg Blog - Early Aughties Music Fantasy Draft - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/20478b85-31bc-45b7-a859-ccf3f45d797f/Slide5.jpeg Blog - Early Aughties Music Fantasy Draft - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/efcb1b73-7d34-4fe4-9969-01169dd03337/Slide1.jpeg Blog - Early Aughties Music Fantasy Draft - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/b90ab969-5831-431f-bd8d-ed7e331cdce2/Slide4.jpeg Blog - Early Aughties Music Fantasy Draft - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2023/6/2/chatgpt-reviews-the-10-most-popular-albums-in-my-high-school monthly 0.5 2023-06-07 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/816807f2-2ba5-4050-8f14-5e2bd6c66b2a/Slide1.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Wikipedia https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/35980e3e-58c4-4079-8e42-264be285c911/Slide2.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Wikipedia https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/7fe584ff-02d6-419a-96ab-5eb30414955f/Slide3.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Wikipedia https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1fb03c1b-0d67-42e6-9da0-386d9ca01aba/Slide4.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Wikipedia https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/5afafd50-b3f3-46ca-ac93-11717a29b5d0/Slide5.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Amazon https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/8c9ef38d-a093-4555-b3f6-3382d6450aae/Slide6.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Wikipedia https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/71f0ec5f-f458-4d3f-a840-a2133a535db0/Slide7.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Amazon (Red Hot Chili Peppers) and Wikipedia (Martha Stewart) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/4018004c-94a7-4d7d-97ec-37600d04c7bf/Sublime+Dr+Seuss.jpg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image sources: Wikipedia (Sublime) and Britannica (Dr. Seuss) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1811c44a-eac7-4a54-8aa7-adb61b17a5f8/Slide8.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Wikipedia https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/cb5ce892-f9c3-4da4-b4e5-8f59f492b8aa/Slide9.jpeg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image source: Wikipedia https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/45761fb5-1e12-4c84-aa72-396b0f809aa5/Blink+182+Gladwell+image.jpg Blog - ChatGPT Reviews the 10 Most Popular Albums in my High School - Make it stand out Image sources: Amazon (Blink 182) and Wikipedia (Gladwell) https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2022/12/28/townie-tunes-of-2022 monthly 0.5 2023-01-01 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/9ad35656-4c8f-478a-a7c4-a0edfd23012a/BETH_ORTON_1000px.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 1. Weather Alive ~ Beth Orton I forget whether it was Daniel Johnston or Tom Waits (or both) who preferred to write songs on instruments they were less familiar with. There’s something about the struggle and the strange that can breed beauty, and Beth Orton’s Weather Alive is pudding for the proof. Orton switched from guitar to a three-hundred pound piano that she played while her children were at school. The result is striking: a collection of songs that keep your feet inside lambskin slippers while your mind trespasses space and time. Weather Alive reminds me of Astral Weeks (Van Morrison), On the Beach (Neil Young), or Bloodflowers (The Cure), but for a different time and age. I’m 20 when listening to Astral Weeks, 30 when listening to On the Beach, and Venmoing the piper when listening to Bloodflowers. Weather Alive is an album for middle age. That sweet spot between weddings and funerals when you question if there had ever been a spring. When you throw your cards as far as you can but learn that California’s out of reach. When you learn your love will be forever young even though your body will not. When your only choice left is to bleed or rust in the rain. When you see how to see, waiting for the dust to land. Song picks: Friday Night, Unwritten Quintessential Lyric: “When the sea comes in it’s hard to believe it will ever go out again.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/500316fd-b6e7-4ede-9c69-4122d56c9d5d/Big-Thief-Dragon-New-Warm-Mountain-I-Believe-in-You.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 2. Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You ~ Big Thief It took me time to warm to Big Thief. I missed their first two albums completely. “Cattails” captured my attention in 2019, and I connected with a few other tunes on U.F.O.F. and Two Hands. But there was something about Adrianne Lenker’s voice and the occasional discordant guitar solo that left me unfulfilled before I heard Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You. Maybe the music has become less edgy. Maybe I’ve warmed to Lenker’s vocals. Whatever the reason, I gave this album the time and attention I neglected to offer Big Thief’s previous work, and what a reward I reaped. Lenker is one of the few lyricists today in the same league as Craig Finn (see #9), although she is more a Dickinson or Frost to Finn’s Berryman or Bukowski. The band, who would sometimes compete with the Lenkerverse on prior albums, are in bloom as cinematographers adding texture, layer, and perspective like the leaves, like a butterfly. Song picks: Little Things, Certainty Quintessential Lyric: “Could I feel happy for you When I hear you talk with her like we used to do? Could I set everything free When I watch you holder her the way you once held me?” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/848709cf-fa43-4f47-9e7e-787f0fd78ac3/angel-olsen-big-time.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 3. Big Time ~ Angel Olsen Angel released my favorite song of the year (“All the Good Times”). This 2022 record is more country and less distortion than her critically acclaimed work that I don’t love big time like I love Big Time. When the drums kick in at 2:36 in “All the Good Times”, you know that life is about to get better, even if the future is not what you were promised. Here’s to all the good times, both past and yet to come. Song picks: “All the Good Times,” “Big Time” Quintessential Lyric: “Never thought the day would come When I would find someone To love me only” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/5217b775-07f4-4fba-b073-e827960560d6/Sudan-Archives-Natural-Brown-Prom-Queen-STH2449.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 4. Natural Brown Prom Queen ~ Sudan Archives I love musicians who can only be categorized with a Vitamix, and Natural Brown Prom Queen is a smoothie of Beyonce (see #23), FKA Twigs (#20), Missy Elliot, Moses Sumney, Doja Cat, Sufjan Stevens, bananas, and kale. Song picks: Yellow Brick Road, NBPQ (Topless) Quintessential Lyric: “I’m not average” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/418c6d99-4ebc-4295-94d7-7d7694d9e024/Harry-Styles-Harrys-House.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 5. Harry’s House ~ Harry Styles Harry’s House was my summer aperitif. It goes down easy on a parkway, porch, lawn, bbq, bike, beach, or boat. It tastes like JT and Janelle Monae, but with floral undertones and a lighter aftertaste. Song picks: As It Was, Cinema Quintessential lyric: “I bring the pop You got the cinema” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/41f31746-7877-4b5b-92f4-1dbed80461e0/Arctic-Monkeys-The-Car.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 6. The Car ~ Arctic Monkeys Remember when the Arctic Monkeys were a punk band? They transformed from the sound of barfing on the bouncer while getting thrown into the Soho A.M. to the clink of Courvoisier in crystal over white linen and lamb so gradually that I struggle to remember their fake tales of San Francisco or the time they went all in on you looking good on the dance floor. To quote Andre 3000, they’ve come along way baby, like them slim-ass cigarettes. Song picks: Body Paint, Jet Skis on the Moat Quintessential Lyric: “You do your time traveling through the tanning booth So you don’t let the sun catch you crying” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/e1287345-8eed-40ae-8205-cfda4ac8ab6c/Beach-House.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 7. Once Twice Melody ~ Beach House Like Bob Marley or War on Drugs, Beach House subscribe to the ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ approach to making music that sounds a lot like themselves but nothing like anyone else. Once Twice Melody dominated my 2022 Spotify Wrapped playlist courtesy a February release date, four discs, and offering a melody I could (literally) work with (more than once or twice). Song picks: Superstar, Runaway Quintessential lyric: “If it hurts to love You better do it anyway” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/45afc23d-1240-4cd8-a400-9f80669db2bc/YYYs+Cool+It+Down+Artwork.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 8. Cool It Down ~ Yeah Yeah Yeahs Cool It Down accompanies last year’s Ignorance (The Weather Station) to illustrate that global cataclysm serves as potent a muse as love, loss, and little surfer girls. I’ll be content spitting off the edge of the world if this is the soundtrack. Song picks: Spitting Off the Edge of the World, Burning Quintessential Lyric: “Oh, how the world keeps on spinning It goes spinning out of control” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/081243f4-d066-4b7e-8f72-91799d71ba0b/craig-finn-rentals-cover-main.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 9. A Legacy of Rentals ~ Craig Finn Finn’s band, the Hold Steady, sing about townie parties that sometimes go off the rails. His solo albums describe the same characters when the party ends. Instead of having massive nights and getting bent down at the party pit, they are improvising eulogies, dodging parkway barricades, botching drug deals, watching cavemen in cartoons, and sleeping off hangovers in superhero matinees. Song picks: Messing with the Settings, Jessamine Quintessential lyric: “This probably isn’t where I see myself forever But for now, it’s pretty much where we are” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/8bf2a5ee-3678-4623-8f2d-3819c95975d3/1975+-+Being+Funny+In+A+Foreign+Language.jpeg Blog - Townie Tunes of 2022 - 10. Being Funny in a Foreign Language ~ The 1975. Leave it to the 1975 to make yacht rock cool. And make no mistake, “Oh Caroline” and “Looking for Someone to Love” is yachtier than a Loggins, Hall-Oats, Steely Dan triple bill. Song picks: Oh Caroline, Part of the Band Quintessential lyric: "I like my men like I like my coffee Full of soy milk and so sweet it won't offend anybody" https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2022/11/16/pantheon-for-the-digital-age monthly 0.5 2022-11-22 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2022/9/23/90s-nostalgia-our-favorite-music-from-the-1990s monthly 0.5 2022-09-24 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/e69b2fb3-639b-4cdb-b561-03599c26be99/90s+nostalgia+music.png Blog - 90s Nostalgia: Our Favorite Music from the 1990s - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2022/5/4/which-rock-record-is-your-favorite-academic-article-calebs-picks monthly 0.5 2022-05-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/72ff8478-9e73-4a4e-b5ac-87fcfaf67df4/Slide1.png Blog - Which Rock Record is Your Favorite Academic Article? (Caleb's picks) - Make it stand out Year: 1974 Authors: Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman Title: “Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases” Source: Science, 185 (4157), 1124-1131. Comparable album: Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (The Beatles) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/da9a966b-3fd6-476a-8454-13efa4ed9560/Slide2.png Blog - Which Rock Record is Your Favorite Academic Article? (Caleb's picks) - Make it stand out Year: 1986 Author: Grant McCracken Title: “Culture and consumption: A theoretical account of the structure and movement of the cultural meaning of consumer goods” Source: Journal of Consumer Research, 13(1), 71-84. Comparable album: Workingman’s Dead (Grateful Dead) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/62b0f951-c495-4ccf-bdf9-f39bad083fe7/Slide3.png Blog - Which Rock Record is Your Favorite Academic Article? (Caleb's picks) - Make it stand out Year: 1998 Author: Thomas C. Veatch Title: “A Theory of Humor” Source: Humor, 11(2), 161-215 Comparable Album: Boys and Girls in America (The Hold Steady) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/bdfe9a1a-bbb3-4f51-878e-4699310723c1/Slide4.png Blog - Which Rock Record is Your Favorite Academic Article? (Caleb's picks) - Make it stand out Year: 2006 Authors: Matthew J. Salganik, Peter Sheridan Dodds, and Duncan J. Watts Title: "Experimental study of inequality and unpredictability in an artificial cultural market" Source: Science 311(5762), 854-856. Comparable Album: Are You Experienced? (The Jimi Hendrix Experience, North American edition) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/50bec59f-c5e9-408b-b6d0-2007e085c194/Slide5.png Blog - Which Rock Record is Your Favorite Academic Article? (Caleb's picks) - Make it stand out Year: 2011 Authors: Joseph P. Simmons, Leif D. Nelson, and Uri Simonsohn Title: "False-positive psychology: Undisclosed flexibility in data collection and analysis allows presenting anything as significant" Source: Psychological Science, 22(11), 1359-1366. Comparable Album: Nevermind (Nirvana) https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2022/1/15/townie-music-review-2021 monthly 0.5 2022-05-04 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/e7c08b5b-6f70-4abf-8d2c-21eba4612616/2021+best+albums+image.jpg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/7875c656-08f8-476a-8e58-92cf300cfde1/Weather-Station.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 1. Ignorance ~ Weather Station For the second year in a row, my favorite album is by a Canadian whose previous work I had somehow overlooked. Ignorance is a collection of delicately arranged songs that make global struggles (climate change, capitalism) feel personal and personal struggles feel universal. Highlights: “Atlantic,” “The Robber,” “Subdivisions” Lyric: “I should get all of this dying off of my mind I should really know better than to read the headlines” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/0ddaa22b-cfb1-4483-ad68-5aad00a0b198/The-Hold-Steady.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 2. Open-Door Policy ~ The Hold Steady The Hold Steady returned with their best album in over a decade. The characters have matured. They continue to seek but fail to find enlightenment, but instead blacking out during killer parties in Ybor City or getting dusted in the dark in Penetration Park, they’re now marooned from anti-psychosis meds, falling in the fountain, drowning in the Pacific, or limping home to Scranton. Highlights: “Unpleasant Breakfast,” “Me & Magdalena,” “Lanyards” Lyric: “You just can’t keep throwing up And then cover it with sawdust And expect us not to notice And pretend it didn’t happen” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/41b2aa17-b985-4bee-bc77-70b516633402/Lucy-Dacus-Home-Video.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 3. Home Video ~ Lucy Dacus Lucy Dacus’s third and best solo album is retrospective without being nostalgic. She recounts awkward liaisons, lousy poetry, bible camps, deadbeat fathers, dead-end relationships, and boys who will never be Marlon Brando. Highlights: “VBS,” “Brando,” “Thumbs” Lyric: “Your poetry was so bad It took a lot to not laugh You say that I showed you the light But all it did, in the end Was make the dark feel darker than before” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1148cd0f-32b8-4af1-949e-3c2a7d4be02c/SturgillSimpson_DoodJuanita_Cover_3600px-1626876769.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 4. The Ballad of Dood & Juanita ~ Sturgill Simpson Sturgill has been breathing life into country music since 2014’s Metamodern Sounds in Country Music. On this album, Sturgill channels Willie Nelson’s Redheaded Stranger to craft a concept album about a half-Shawnee born in Hardburly in ’29 who sets off on a mule with his hound and Martin Meylin rifle to hunt down the nogoodnik who kidnapped his Juanita. The frontier mythmaking is so thick you’ll taste the moonshine and smell the pine. Highlights: “Ol Dood (Part 1)”, “Juanita,” “Go in Peace” Lyric: “Left the varnish off his words, feared no beast nor man Didn't want to end up in his debt 'cause it'd damn sure get paid He was harder than thе nails hammered Jesus' hands Hе was the one they called Dood Son of a mountain miner and a Shawnee maiden” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/c54ecace-c222-408c-9346-77f0ee2cb5b7/I-Don-t-Live-Here-Anymore-Cover-Artwork-scaled-1.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 5. I Don’t Live Here Anymore ~ The War on Drugs The War on Drugs continue to paint hurt, hope, love, loss, and nostalgia in abstract strokes that make their work instantly recognizable yet entirely their own. Highlights: “I Don’t Live Here Anymore,” “I Don’t Wanna Wait,” “Occasional Rain” Lyric: “Ain't the sky just shades of gray Until you seen it from the other side? Oh, if loving you's the same It's only some occasional rain” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/48d5d7c9-c7c1-4983-8849-3e233bbac49e/adele+30.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 6. 30 ~ Adele When I listen to Adele, I hear two different artists. There’s elevator Adele crooning the schmaltz that saturated most of 19 and 25. And then there’s the Adele that brings it in songs like “Rumor Has It,” “Rolling in the Deep,” and “Set Fire to the Rain.” The opening track on 30 made me worry I was in for another album of snoozers, but things pick up quickly beginning with “Easy on Me” and only get better from there. The stretch from “Easy on Me” through “All Night Parking” makes this my favorite Adele album, even if the songs near the end start to get sleepy again. Highlights: “Oh My God,” “I Drink Wine,” “My Little Love” Lyric: “When I was a child, every single thing could blow my mind Soaking it all up for fun, but now I only soak up wine” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/bcb7c609-35ab-40f4-996e-5c2db45d9772/James-McMurtry.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 7. The Horses and the Hounds ~ James McMurtry McMurtry has never spared detail when describing the characters in his songs. As he’s aged, so have his characters and the details have become richer, more complicated, and more glorious. Highlights: “Canola Fields,” “Jackie,” “Ft. Walton Wake-Up Call” Lyric: “In a way-back corner of a cross-town bus We were hiding out under my hat Cashing in on a 30-year crush You can’t be young and do that” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/5617b28f-fd82-42ca-941f-ed114a3fc622/Chemtrails_over_the_Country_Club_%28front_cover%29.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 8. Chemtrails over the Country Club ~ Lana Del Rey Lana continued her hot streak by releasing two stellar albums in 2021 (see #17 Blue Bannisters). Chemtrails lacks the consistency of her 2019 masterpiece NFR!, but “Waitress,” “Chemtrails Over the Country Club,” “Breaking Up Slowly” and “Dance Till We Die” stand with the best songs in her deep and delightful catalogue. Highlights: “Waitress,” “Dance Till We Die,” “Breaking Up Slowly” Lyric: “I smoke cigarettes Just to understand the smog” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/b5cfb245-7b06-4aec-b754-db798d240f17/Dawn-Richard.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 9. Second Line ~ Dawn Richard Dawn Richard melds R&B, funk, jazz, pop, hip hop, soul, EDM, NOLA, raunch, and Janelle Monae to create my favorite dance album of the year. Highlights: “Boomerang,” “Bussifame,” “Mornin/Streetlights” Lyric: “Relax, enjoy the ride I’m giving you” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/37e33707-e21f-428a-a60f-a73de6ec7344/Japanese+Breakfast+-+Jubilee+_+Album+Art.jpeg Blog - Townie Music Review 2021 - 10. Jubilee ~ Japanese Breakfast Jubilee blends the sound of 80s icons (Prince, Madonna) with contemporary indie idols (The XX, Mitski) to create an album that is so delicious I’m willing to overlook the gratuitous violins. “Be Sweet” is the “Blinding Lights” of 2021, but without being over-played. Highlights: “Be Sweet,” “Slide Tackle,” “Posing in Bondage” Lyric: “I can feel the night passing by like a mistake waiting for me” https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2021/11/5/40-songs-for-calebs-40th-birthday monthly 0.5 2022-11-04 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/51a89d8c-b34f-4760-895a-70e084a26fdd/CW+40+birthday+songs.jpg Blog - Caleb's 40th Birthday Playlist - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2021/10/townies-albums-of-the-2000s monthly 0.5 2021-10-08 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633136936841-GECZSVA9JLRTG45RRJ1Q/naughtiestmusic.png Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631392591073-G6KMVYGP6886RXV8V3MI/hold+steady+BAGIA.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 1. Boys and Girls in America - The Hold Steady (2006) Boys and Girls in America changed the way I write songs. Its unprecedented ambition-to-pretension ratio also changed the amount of bullshit I was willing to tolerate while listening to other artists. After hearing the Hold Steady, abstractions like “the horizon has been defeated” or bongwash like “the tires are the things on your car that make contact with the road” no longer held my attention. I wanted to hear about girls who spend a week getting high after putting $900 on the fifth horse from the sixth race, Izzy Stradlin-lookalikes who wake up quoting Tennyson in the chill-out tent, and drunk and exhausted but critically acclaimed poets who miscalibrate their aerodynamic capabilities. Quintessential Lyric: “There are nights I think Sal Paradise was right Boys and girls in America They have such a sad time together.” Song Picks: “Stuck Between Stations,” “First Night,” “Party Pit” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631392931672-DIYX3HPM2YP0T8FOVCL3/sufjan.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 2. Come on Feel the Illinoise - Sufjan Stevens The plan was to create an album for each state. Sufjan’s home state inspired the 2003 gem “Greetings from Michigan: The Great Lake State,” an album that I nearly included on this list. But after Sufjan crossed the lake to document Illinois in a seventy-four-minute masterpiece of maximalist folk, I think he must have realized that there was no way to repeat the magic on this album for the remaining 48 states. Quintessential lyric: “I hide in my bed with the lights on the floor Wearing three layers of coats and leg warmers I see my own breath on the face of the door” Song Picks: “Chicago,” “John Wayne Gacy, Jr.” “Casimir Pulaski Day” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631393081908-84J5R3J2HDO2YMGSDUXO/decoration+day.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 3. Decoration Day - Drive-by Truckers (2003) Decoration Day features a little bit of twang, a lot of guitar, and three of our generation’s greatest songwriters singing about blood feuds, religion, incest, bank foreclosures, drinking, unplanned pregnancy, loaded shotguns, and running off with the maid of honor while the bride’s left standing at the altar. Quintessential lyric: “By the time you were born there were four other siblings With your mama awaiting your daddy in jail” Song Picks: “Decoration Day,” “My Sweet Annette,” “Marry Me” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631393196338-3XDYG9983IWZYP99X0W3/stankonia.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 4. Stankonia - Outkast (2000) Outkast was the gateway drug that got me hooked on Tupac, Nas, and A Tribe Called Quest. Quintessential lyric: “Inslumnational, underground Thunder pounds when I stomp the ground Like a million elephants or silverback orangutan You can't stop the train” Song picks: “Ms. Jackson,” “Spaghetti Junction,” “Humble Mumble” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631393325688-7LM9NLYS4EJ78JAAQO71/separation+sunday.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 5. Separation Sunday - The Hold Steady (2005) Separation Sunday is my favorite concept album, though the concept is the druggy little messed up teenage life of a hoodrat named Hallelujah (her friends called her Holly), a sweet girl with some not-sweet friends who walks around on shady streets half-naked and three-quarters wasted, and gets screwed up by religion, screwed by soccer players, dusted in the dark up in Penetration Park, and strung out on the banks of Mississippi river only to be reborn crashing into the Easter mass with her hair done up in broken glass and limping left on broken heels. Quintessential Lyric: “I guess I heard about original sin: I heard the dude blamed the chick, I heard the chick blamed the snake. And I heard they were naked when they got busted, and I heard things ain't been the same since.” Song picks: “Your Little Hoodrat Friend”, “How a Resurrection Really Feels,” “Cattle and the Creeping Things.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631393674896-FDV45BZ32JJNWCRCWQY9/frightened+rabbit.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 6. Midnight Organ Fight - Frightened Rabbit (2008) Midnight Organ Fight burns like a brushfire on a cold, stormy night. The flames roar and retreat but never cure your longing for human heat. Quintessential Lyric: “You’re the shit and I’m knee-deep in it.” Song picks: “Fast Blood,” “I Feel Better,” “Head Rolls Off” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631393801537-3FCNHPTRMMN1EOOFF7NY/in+rainbows.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 7. In Rainbows - Radiohead (2007) In Rainbows is neither the most ambitious nor the most influential Radiohead album, but I’ve listened to it more than any of their other albums (The Bends is a distant second). Radiohead merge the angst (“15 step”), the discordant (“Body Snatchers”), the sad (“Nude”), the creepy (“House of Cards”, “All I Need”), and even the romantic (““Weird Fishes / Arpeggi”). This album earns bonus points for being a great case study on pricing: Radiohead let fans pay whatever they wanted to download the album when it was released. Quintessential Lyric: “Don’t get any big ideas They’re not gonna happen” Song picks: “House of Cards,” “Nude,” “Reckoner” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631393898564-EK9QMP042NPF7H6G87EU/white+stripes.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 8. Elephant - The White Stripes (2003) The White Stripes channel everyone from Led Zeppelin (Seven Nation Army) and Dusty Springfield (“I Just Don’t Know What to do With Myself”) to Shel Silverstein (“The Hardest Button to Button”) and Chicken Soup for the Soul (“Little Acorns”) to create a sound that is all their own. Quintessential lyric: “I had opinions that didn’t matter I had a brain that felt like pancake batter I got a backyard with nothing in it Except a stick, a dog, and a box with something in it” Song picks: “I Want to be the Boy to Warm Your Mother’s Heart,” “The Hardest Button to Button,” “The Air Near My Fingers” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631394029620-C3BFS33LPABH65I9CUSU/yoshimi.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 9. Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots - The Flaming Lips (2002) In “All We Have is Now,” the Lips sing: “As logic stands you couldn’t meet a man who’s from the future. But logic broke.” This dizzying concept album about an adolescent Japanese girl taking vitamins and honing her karate chops to take on an army of evil-natured pink robots is an ode to the beauty of broken logic. Quintessential lyric: “I don’t know where the sunbeams end And the starlights begin It’s all a mystery.” Song picks: “Fight Test,” “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1,” “Do You Realize” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631394159422-GGVJ7L5PE5W6ODT4G997/bright+eyes.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 10. I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning - Bright Eyes (2005) Bright Eyes had flirted with brilliance before (“Something Vague”, “Bowl of Oranges”) but had never released anything as consistent or resonant as “I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning.” From the opening plane crash (“It’s your birthday party – Happy birthday, darling!”) to the closing Beethoven tribute (“Fuck it up boys, let’s make some noise”), this album is pure, uncut Conor Oberst. Quintessential lyric: “I have my drugs, I have my woman They keep away my loneliness My parents they have their religion But sleep in separate houses” Song picks: “First Day of my Life,” “Road to Joy,” “Lua” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631394318150-3EO4QKEIGGESEZ17NVNZ/southern+rock+opera.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 11. Southern Rock Opera - Drive-by Truckers (2001) To paraphrase Springsteen, I learned more history from Southern Rock Opera than I ever learned in school. Far from the racially blind nostalgia that fueled Skynyrd’s fans and that Tom Petty repeatedly try to walk back, the Truckers describe the good and bad, light and dark, love and hate, young and old, kind and cruel, redeeming and unforgivable. Quintessential lyric: “Ain't about no hatred, better raise a glass It's a little about some rebels, but it ain't about the past Ain't about no foolish pride, Ain't about no flag Hate's the only thing that my truck would want to drag” Song picks: “Zip City,” “Three Great Alabama Icons/Wallace,” “The Southern Thing” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631394575880-S3KDVO8W2HY19VX9XNNR/sources+tags+codes.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 12. Sources, Tags, and Codes - …And You Will Know Us by the Trail of the Dead (2002) When I was in college, I had one of those pre-iPod mp3 players that could only hold 15 songs on it. 11 of them were from this album. Quintessential Lyric: “You'll never see the light In the darkest night Never see the light Never see the light When the boredom comes If you're one of the boring ones” Song Picks: “It Was There (That I Saw You)”, “How Near How Far,” “Sources, Tags, & Codes” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631394724636-A0CVE5QT12FRAOMNH2FV/gnarls.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 13. St. Elsewhere - Gnarls Barkley (2006) “Crazy” stands with “Billie Jean” and “Waterfalls” as examples of pure pop perfection. In the summer of 2006, you could hear this song on top-40, alternative, hip-hop, R&B, college, and even classic rock radio stations. And “Crazy” is just the tip of the icechip. The whole album is brilliant, from the Violent Femmes cover (“Gone Daddy Gone”) and Confucian rapping (“Feng Shui”) to the soulful odes to oddity (“Who Cares”) and depression (“Just a Thought”). Quintessential Lyric: “I remember when I lost my mind There was something so pleasant about that place” Song picks: “Crazy,” “Just a Thought,” “Who Cares” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631395066493-P8QFR654NIZDGZJTO5AN/back+to+black.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 14. Back to Black - Amy Winehouse (2006) Winehouse became a tragic cliché joining rock and roll visionaries (Robert Johnson, Hendrix, Joplin, Morrison, Pigpen, Cobain) who burn out by 27, but “Back to Black” shows that she was never fated to fade away. Quintessential lyric: “I told you I was trouble, You know that I’m no good” Song picks: “You Know I’m No Good,” “Tears Dry on Their Own,” “Rehab” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631395113702-4WHZTJX0EQ0HII6EJLBP/iron+and+wine.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 15. The Creek Drank the Cradle - Iron & Wine Sam Beam’s lyrics, voice, guitar, and production paint meticulous portraits of the dust hiding between the cracks of an antique rocking chair. Quintessential lyric: “We found your name across the chapel door Carved in cursive with a table fork Muddy hymnals and some boot marks where you'd been” Song picks: “Over the Mountain,” “Muddy Hymnal,” “Southern Anthem” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631551579496-NZGRNCXUJ8TEQ1WECBVM/modest+mouse.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 16. Good News for People Who Love Bad News - Modest Mouse Modest Mouse married the ominous jangly indie dirges of their youth (e.g., “Dramamine,” “Custom Concern”) with a patchwork of punk, pop, folk, and Swordfishtrombones to craft their biggest, bounciest, boisterousest, and best work to date. Quintessential lyric: “If God controls the land and disease And keeps a watchful eye on me If he's really so damn mighty Well, my problem is I can't see Who would wanna be Who would wanna be such a control freak?” Song picks: “Ocean Breathes Salty, “The Good Times Are Killing Me,” “Bukowski” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552131099-Z1H2LDWEUIZ5ONRAUS5S/picaresque.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 17. Picaresque - The Decemberists Rumor has it that Colin Meloy ordered a subliminal learning cassette to improve his athletic prowess, but the company was out of the subliminal sportsman and sent him a vocabulary enhancer instead [see below]. The result? An album of suicide and murder ballads cloaked in aristocratic argot: palaver payments, barrow boys beneath the tamaracks, barren baronesses in palanquin pachyderm parades, and rakes and roustabouts with debonair and charming airs. Quintessential lyric: “Find him, bind him Tie him to a pole and break his fingers to splinters Drag him to a hole until he wakes up, naked Clawing at the ceiling of his grave" Song picks: “The Mariner’s Revenge Song,” “We Both Go Down Together,” “The Bagman’s Gambit” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552169768-PW520TU9O9LWAJU3MT9H/devotchka.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 18. How it Ends - Devotchka Devotchka broke out of burlesque houses to craft gipsy jingles with strings, accordion, theramin, tuba, bouzouki, tenor triangle, and an ensemble of percussion instruments I’m not knowledgeable enough to name. Their name and sound are Eastern European, although they hail straight outa Colfax (or some other Denver avenue). Quintessential lyric: “There's something missing When you're kissing me It's subtle yet it's gone” Song picks: “How it Ends,” “Such a Lovely Thing,” “We’re Leaving” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552197557-BTV9MVRCQYUQ2FPR85G7/wilco.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 19. Yankee Hotel Foxtrot - Wilco An album with twin towers on the cover that was originally supposed to be released on September 11, 2001, Yankee Hotel Foxtrot got Wilco dropped from its record label before becoming essential listening for hippies, frat boys, and acid-eating prep schoolers (link below). A lot of the lyrics are gibberish (“I am an American aquarium drinker, I assassin on the avenue”), but the music is magical. This album made it silly to describe Wilco as being an “alt country” band or to overlook Jeff Tweedy as being a visionary talent. Quintessential lyric: “I would like to salute The ashes of American flags And all the fallen leaves Filling up shopping bags” Song picks: “Jesus, etc.”, “I’m the Man Who Loves You,” “Ashes of American Flags” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552222386-ALL4VMQ4E4MZZO998L4L/59+sound.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 20. The ‘59 Sound - The Gaslight Anthem As the title suggests, the Gaslight Anthem’s finest work is unapologetically nostalgic, although it sounds more like Bruce Springsteen fronting the Ramones than Doo-Wap, Elvis, Jackie Wilson, or anything resembling 1959. Quintessential Lyric: “I always dreamed of classic cars and movie screens, and tryin' to find some way to be redeemed” Song Picks: “The Backseats,” “59 Sound,” “Old White Lincoln” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1632068554937-64N5U0HQK9UKIUG0KVUV/az+welcome+back.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 21. Welcome Back Dear Children - Arizona “Welcome Back, Dear Children” is disturbing at moments, beautiful throughout, and, will challenge even the most austere listener. “Te Amo Tanto” is an astounding opening. Like Pearl Jam’s “Once”, Jeff Buckley’s “Mojo Pin”, or Elvis Costello’s “Welcome to the Working Week”, the song boldly proclaims, We are here, we have something to say, and you better fucking listen. The album follows with bangers (“Sommersby,” “Splintering”), dreamers (“Diventa Blu”, “Waking Up”), pop nuggets (“Some Kind of Chill”, “Stay with Who You Know”), and a song (“Through the Soot”) that sounds like Elliott Smith playing country music. Tragically, I can’t find this album on Spotify. You may have to patronize Bandcamp or Amazon to hear it. Quintessential Lyric: “I know you hate the dark, so now I’m pearly white” Song picks: “Through the Soot,” “Splintering,” “Te Amo Tanto” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552282505-D8KJ9OOGZVBYCAN0VXM0/stay+positive.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 22. Stay Positive - The Hold Steady Stay Positive is prototypical Hold Steady: meat-and-potatoes rock and roll sagas of slapped actresses, Zeppelin snobs, punks, skins, greaser guys, and hoodrat miscreants drinking atop water towers, abetting townie knifings, and getting nailed against dumpsters, subpoenaed in Texas, and sequestered in Memphis. You don’t have to dig deep into “One for the Cutters” to find the seed for our band. Quintessential lyric: “Me and my friends are like The drums on “Lust for Life’” Song picks: “One for the Cutters,” “Yeah Sapphire,” “Sequestered in Memphis” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552357802-2MBZN7CTL5BX8E2XWGGS/for+emma.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 23. For Emma, Forever Ago - Bon Iver I would have ranked this album higher if I understood what Bon Iver (nee Justin Vernon) was singing. What the words lack in meaning, they make up for in feeling. And the feeling in these songs will bury you like a blade of grass in the Wisconsin snow. Quintessential Lyric: “In the morning I'll be with you But it will be a different kind And I'll be holding all the tickets And you'll be owning all the fines” Song Picks: Flume, Skinny Love, Stacks https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552306528-PWWO1IVMS0YOLJ20V82I/dirty+south.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 24. The Dirty South - Drive-by Truckers DBT were on fire in the Naughties. The Dirty South continued the momentum of Southern Rock Opera (#11) and Decoration Day (#3) by painting the duality of the southern thing in all its dirty, speedy, boozy, illicit, and goddamn lonely glory. Quintessential lyric: “The preacher on the TV says it ain't too late for me, but I bet he drives a Cadillac and I'm broke with hungry mouths to feed.” Song picks: “Where the Devil Don’t Stay,” “Daddy’s Cup,” “Puttin’ People on the Moon” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1631552334988-9BNM3W3FMRJYHJY84J4M/national.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - 25. Boxer - The National The National didn’t resonate with me until I moved to Milan and it rained for 20 days straight. They now accompany Nick Cave (who sounds like them) and Radiohead (who do not) as my go-to when the sky feels too heavy. Quintessential Lyric: “We’re half-awake in a fake empire” Song picks: Slow Show, Fake Empire, Start a War https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1632156874103-GEYTRMDFIZCG16706MV9/trouble.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Trouble - Ray Lamontagne (2004) Easy folk with a voice so raspy and full you’d swear he traded his soul for it at the crossroads. Lyric: “Been so long since I seen your face, or felt a part of this human race, I’ve been living out of this here suitcase for way too long." Key songs: Trouble, Shelter, How Come, Jolene https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1632157385523-O0U8GKIEHN2V2ZP714E6/nick+cave.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Abattoir Blues Tour - Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds (2007) Deep, dark, and rocking. Imagine gothic cathedrals in Europe dripping with Nick Cave’s signature tenor. Simply magic. Lyric: “He’ll wrap you in his arms, tell you that you’ve been a good boy, He’ll rekindle all the dreams, it took lifetime to destroy” Key songs: O Children, Red Right Hand, Stagger Lee, Babe You Turn Me On, and Lay Me Low https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1632157621268-SC5PJJJ2ZAQGCVUWIZRE/govt+mule.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - The Deepest End: Live in Concert - Gov’t Mule (2003) Live album recorded in New Orleans in 2003 as a tribute to the band’s late bassist Allen Woody, this album has so many special guests it’s sick. Les Claypool, Jason Newsted, George Porter Jr., Dave Schools, Mike Gordon, Rob Wasserman, and Victor Wooten added their low end charm. On horns Karl Denson and the Dirty Dozen Brass Band wailed. Bela Fleck on banjo, and Sonny Landreth on slide guitar, just amazing. Lyric: “Fate should not have blinded me, for your beauty steal my eyes, And what good is my wisdom, when there are no words to say, how I feel everyday, But I shall return.” Key songs: John the Revelator, Beautifully Broken, Time to Confess, Banks of the Deep End, 32/20 Blues (!!!), I Shall Return, and of course, Soulshine https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633019922041-71DF61QFBMA0AUO256O0/funeral.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Funeral - The Arcade Fire (2004) Something about this music used to transport me away, like a good book, fusing the reality of our cruel world and the playful whimsy of what could be. Lyric: “ As the day grows dim, I hear you sing a golden hymn, It’s the song I’ve been trying to sing…". Key songs: Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels), Neighborhood #4 (7 Kettles), Wake Up, Haiti https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633020146785-HXHSTKMDXXO9FPWPMSYD/up+from+below.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Up from Below - Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros (2009) Desert vagabond music. Hippy drum circles. New age crystal singing. Just a few of the images conjured by this amorphous arrangement of musicians. This might be the perfect road trip album, and that’s a tough category. I know it could be perceived as cheesy, but I remember hauling our huge camper trailer down the highway with my family singing “home is wherever I’m with you,” and living it. Lyric: “I was only five when my dad told me I’d die. I cried as he said son, ‘twas nothing could be done. Now all the fists I’ve thrown just tryin’ to prove him wrong, after all the blood I spilled, just tryin’ to get killed” Key songs: 40 Day Dream, Home, Up from Below, Jade, Brother, Om Nashi Me https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633020795081-DF6EZYNM2WIJMIEE63UD/ocms.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Old Crow Medicine Show (2004) Americana? Bluegrass? Drug-fueled hillbilly hootenanny hooligans? These guys were discovered by Doc Watson buskin outside a pharmacy in Boone, NC in 2000. What a story they can tell. Lyric: “I made it down the coast in seventeen hours, picking’ me a bouquet of dogwood flowers, and I’m hopin’ for Raleigh, I can see my baby tonight” Key songs: Tell it to Me, Big Time in the Jungle, Hard to Love, CC Rider, Take ‘Em Away, and of course Wagon Wheel https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633020974422-PESZJWD0ABBZDK1HITNY/Emotionalism.jpeg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Emotionalism - The Avett Brothers (2007) Americana at its finest. A mix of bluegrass, folk, and rock with songwriting chops to match these brothers’ angelic harmonizing. So many good songs but this album made me fall in love with the Avett Brothers. Lyric: “I once heard the worst thing a man can do is draw a hungry crowd, tell everyone his name in pride and confidence, but leaving out his doubts” Key songs: Shame, The Weight of Lies, The Ballad of Love and Hate, Salina, Living of Love https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633021096558-VSW9XV1KUZ279GQ63V1B/trey.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Trey Anastasio (2002) Self-titled (literally;) album from the guitar virtuoso of Phish, released during the band’s first hiatus. This band included influences from jazz, funk, High-life African, and latin. High energy shows and driving beats accompanied Trey’s psychedelic noodling on guitar. Lyric: "Quietly you say to me, the time has come for you to be alive again” Key songs: Alive Again, Cayman Review, Push on ’Til the Day, Night Speaks to a Woman, Last Tube, Ether Sunday https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633021217980-TRF9BPG50XSPF34D7JFO/black+keys.jpg Blog - The naughtiest music: PWT pick our favorite Albums 2000-2009 - Attack & Release - The Black Keys (2008) Dirty low-fi grunge rust-belt Ohio garage blues, until A&R. This Danger Mouse produced album elevated The Black Keys into stardom. Lyric: "Walked into the battle blind It happens almost all the time The yard is kinda overgrown And all those happy times are gone” Key songs: I Got Mine, Psychotic Girl, Lies, Oceans & Streams, Things Ain’t Like They Used to Be https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2021/3/22/billboard-hits monthly 0.5 2021-03-22 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1616423188737-A2VOQJFMY97C1DB2E49W/Billboard+Hit+Blog+Cover.jpg Blog - Townie Picks of Billboard Hits https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2021/2/26/ranking-the-discography-of-the-greatest-songwriter-of-all-time monthly 0.5 2021-02-26 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614348024363-Y21UC0QKII1M6PROD9AL/Boys%26Girls.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 1. Boys and Girls in America (The Hold Steady) Year: 2006 How to listen: Strung out on the banks of the Mississippi River with a wad of racetrack winnings, a suicidal poet, and the homecoming queen. Favorite Songs: Stuck Between Stations, The First Night Sample Lyrics: “There are nights I think that Sal Paradise was right. Boys and girls in America, they have such a sad time together.” “They started kissing when the nurses took off their IVs. It was kind of sexy, but it was kind of creepy.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614348126806-A29MRH029ZZZCZ0OPD9T/separation+sunday.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 2. Separation Sunday (The Hold Steady) Year: 2005 How to listen: In a confession booth drinking gin from a jam jar. Favorite Songs: Your Little Hoodrat Friend, How a Resurrection Really Feels Sample Lyrics: “I guess I heard about original sin: I heard the dude blamed the chick, I heard the chick blamed the snake. And I heard they were naked when they got busted, and I heard things ain't been the same since.” “I’ve never been much for conversation, I kind of dig those awkward silences.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614348380970-05Y7Q44XWU02QYB8F87U/THE_HOLD_STEADY_STAY%2BPOSITIVE.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 3. Stay Positive (The Hold Steady) Year: 2008 How to listen: Busting curfew atop a water tower on the last day of school with the dudes from Dazed and Confused. Favorite Songs: Sequestered in Memphis, One for the Cutters Sample Lyrics: “Me and my friends are like the drums on ‘Lust for Life’” “When one townie falls in the forest, can anyone hear it?” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614348597758-BQ8YPAC8RQ5FY6NE4ABY/THS+ODP.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 4. Open Door Policy (The Hold Steady) Year: 2021 How to Listen: Rekindling an old flame with a vanilla vodka and Diet Dr. Pepper. Favorite songs: Family Farm, Me & Magdelena Sample Lyrics: “She had the aura of an angel, but she had a couple problems. I guess the big one is she's someone else's wife.” “There’s something in the silence that hurts a bit to hear.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614348762996-9YZYLXBPX2WROIEPZP47/clear+heart.jpeg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 5. Clear Heart Full Eyes (Solo) Year: 2012 How to Listen: Falling off the wagon watching your ex leave the party with someone new. Favorite Songs: Jackson, Balcony Sample Lyrics: “Stephanie was long on looks and short on mental health. She said depression is an ocean and it's prone to tides and swells.” “When you come back from the hospital, we can’t go back to the Wagon Wheel, and if we do, we can’t go every night.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614348986885-452SHGJQRXUINDZ4TXDZ/almost+killed+me.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 6. Almost Killed Me (The Hold Steady) Year: 2004 How to Listen: Cruising Ybor city high on special sauce, pixie powder, and swizzle sticks. Favorite songs: Killer Parties, Most People Are DJs Sample Lyrics: “If she says we partied, then I’m pretty sure we partied.” “Mary got a bloody nose from sniffin’ Margarita Mix.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614349373246-7CSMSSU8AROV6UVXVBFQ/CraigFinn_INeedANewWar.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 7. I Need a New War (Solo) Year: 2019 How to Listen: Lying awake on a cigarette-stained couch waiting for an unemployment check that isn’t going to arrive. Favorite Songs: Magic Marker, Something to Hope For Sample Lyrics: “I let you take my medicine, Cause I was hoping you’d be wild.” “Everybody’s family until they don’t get paid.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614349507340-SF1JS7RNPMPXGFI9UD1J/Lifterpullerfiestasandfiascos.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 8. Fiestas & Fiascos (Lifter Puller) Year: 2000 How to Listen: Covered up in powder drugs with Nightclub Dwight and the Eyepatch Guy while the Nice Nice burns. Favorite Songs: Candy’s Room, Nice Nice Sample Lyrics: “She’s small and she’s sweet, but she’s a straight-up thief.” “One night Dwight got all goofy with the roofies, now they call him the fiddler on the roof.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614349680605-4TKIZYLPI0ZNGG9KTC0M/HoldSteady_ThrashingThruThePassion.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 9. Thrashing Through the Passion (The Hold Steady) Year: 2019 How to Listen: Stranded at the airport at a transitional time. Favorite Songs: Denver Haircut, Entitlement Crew Sample Lyrics: “Mutually assured destruction is often times a no-brainer.” “Hold Steady at the Comfort Inn. Mick Jagger’s at the Mandarin” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614349824174-9L6OVLWOD1G2PV2L5AUD/heaven+is+whenever.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 10. Heaven is Whenever (The Hold Steady) Year: 2010 How to Listen: Lying on the floor listening to your records. Favorite Songs: The Sweet Part of the City, Hurricane J Sample Lyrics: “You can’t tell people what they want to hear if you also want to tell the truth.” “She said the theme of this party is the Industrial Age, and you came in dressed like a train wreck.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614350118961-0TOOURMDYCB9RHXTXQWT/we+all+want+the+same+things.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 11. We All Want the Same Things (Solo) Year: 2017 How to Listen: When you realize that you’re the oldest person at the party but you’re not quite ready to leave. Favorite Songs: Ninety Bucks, God in Chicago Sample Lyrics: “She can’t pay up, but she still wants to rock.” “Well the bartender’s friend sold us something I think was probably coriander.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614350265335-PBNZCO03BI48KE19CBMP/hold+steady.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 12. Teeth Dreams (The Hold Steady) Year: 2014 How to Listen: Kickin’ it again with the Cityscape skins and an out-of-towner who isn’t sure why you brought her. Favorite Songs: I Hope This Whole Thing Didn’t Frighten You, Spinners Sample Lyrics: “Heartbreak hurts, but you can dance it off.” “Flying all around like a fist in a fight.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614350575876-LAJS6LTXDTXZ9JUQMMIL/faith+in+the+future.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 13. Faith in the Future (Craig Finn) Year: 2015 How to Listen: Getting friend-zoned by a girl named Sarah, Christine, or Sandra from Scranton. Favorite Songs: Newmyer’s Roof, Christine Lyrics: “It’s hard for me to concentrate with all the killing and kissing.” “She's got medical reasons for all these prescriptions, I suppose that's enough explanation.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614350912951-3R4GI6Q28YHC220H0MWO/half+dead.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 14. Lifter Puller (Half Dead and Dynamite) Year: 1997 How to Listen: Dripping wet with pink oxide and white wine cooler at a Jones Beach afterparty. Favorite songs: Nassau Coliseum, Half Dead and Dynamite Sample Lyrics: “Your kisses taste just like Skoal Bandits, They're minty fresh and fucking gorgeous.” “She thinks that I’m the way that James Brown sings.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1614351155086-Y4KO77NJG7WHA5DUU3R6/lifter+puller.jpg Blog - Ranking the Discography of the Greatest Songwriter of All-Time - 15. Lifter Puller (self-titled) Year: 1997 How to Listen: Partying on an empty tennis court waiting for the school year to begin. Favorite songs: Star Wars Hips, Solid Gold Sole Sample Lyrics: “The dance floor looks like Normandy, the smoke, the foam, the misery.” “You look so cute like that, I want your autograph.” https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2021/2/16/dominion-kingdoms-ranked monthly 0.5 2021-02-18 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613486902698-SNFELAZ7R36XA7BCYQ84/dominion-prosperity.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 1. Prosperity What gives the kingdom its flavor? The Colonies and Platinums -- I refuse to say “Platina” – make the games longer, the stakes higher, and the deck-building more fruitful. Playing feels like: Going all-in before the flop. Strengths: It is possible to earn over 100 points in a game, and 50 in a single turn, once the piles empty and the Cities bloom. Many of the cards, including Forge, Bank, Bishop, and Mint, have no parallel in other kingdoms. The possible combinations in this kingdom are killer: City-Goons-King’s Court, Mountebank-Counting House-Bank; Working Village-Rabble-Peddler. This is also Andrew’s favorite kingdom. He writes, “Off-the-board points, Colonies, Platina, King's Court. What more could you want?” Weaknesses: Colonies, Mountebanks, and Goons make the slogs extra sloggy. Favorite Cards: City, Goons, King’s Court https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613487212930-CB5H2VNGYNBK6TO8A6SS/empires.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 2. Empires What gives the kingdom its flavor? Split-piles, castles, landmarks, and the ability to take on a Trumpload of debt. Playing feels like: A Zoom party in the Roman Republic. Strengths: The castles, Groundskeeper, and many of the landmarks let you rack up points without needing to buy victory cards. The game changes dramatically depending on which landmarks show up. My favorites are the Wall and the Bandit Fort, both of which levy taxes progressive enough to make Elizabeth Warren blush. Weaknesses: This kingdom is nearly perfect, but I have one minor grievance: why doesn’t the Overlord give you victory points when you play it as a Groundskeeper? Humbug! Favorite cards: Catapult, Castles, Overlord https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613487639767-IYNDKDZKRBMYQSKK9S47/adventures.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 3. Adventures What gives the kingdom its flavor? The Travelers and Events make it possible to create super-hands, and congregating Bridge Trolls makes it possible to buy cards for nothing. Playing feels like: Eating candy for dinner. Strengths: The card lineup in this Kingdom is unmatched. Weaknesses: I am terrible at Adventures because I’m a sucker for Travelers, Pilgrimages, Lost Arts, Inheritances, Training, Pathfinding, and, of course, Balls, not to mention other moves that are fun but get in the way of winning. Favorite cards: Bridge Troll, Lost City, the Page-Treasure Hunter-Warrior-Hero-Champion sequence. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613487857887-NE95K7NNR36WT1C4OPXU/renaissance.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 4. Renaissance What gives the kingdom its flavor? You can bank coins (coffers), actions (villagers), cards (Sinister Plot), turns (Fleet), and benefits from price discounts (Canal) to waste management services (Cathedral, Sewers). Playing feels like: Watching your lancer win the joust. Strengths: I’ll let Penny and Andrew take this one… Penny: “As a Shakespeare scholar, I love the idea of murdering your entire Acting Troupe to get four villagers. Sinister Plot offers greater flexibility for draws. Crop Rotation is beneficial for the second half of the game (after one has accumulated a number of green cards). But my favorite is Star Chart. Does it slow down the game? Yes. But worth it. With this project, one may review one's entire hand PLUS top-deck any card.” Andrew: “Projects (favorites are Capitalism, Cathedral, Crop Rotation, Sewers, Silos, Sinister Plot), so many rewards for trashing (although the Cathedral is dangerous), Inventor (and the introduction of villagers allows for multiple inventors to be played). Do you buy the Swashbuckler?” Weaknesses: They’re hard to find with this Kingdom. I suppose there is not as much variability in Renaissance as the top three. As a result, it’s difficult to score a huge turn or a blowout victory. Favorite Cards: Flag Bearer, Recruiter, Swashbuckler https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613488090209-VH7WNYS5VJBN171IH3QP/dominion-base.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 5. Base What gives the kingdom its flavor? The base cards are the microbes from which all of the other kingdoms evolved. Playing feels like: A first kiss. Strengths: Can’t beat the real thing. Weaknesses: None… except maybe the Vassal. That card is kind of sucky. Favorite Cards: Chapel, Throne Room, Bandit https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613488288355-7NU7BFHKW1THZL139ZQ0/dark+ages.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 6. Dark Ages What gives the kingdom its flavor? Trashing, sneak attacks, and ruins, which are the waterboarding of Dominion tortures. Playing feels like: Finding a mint-condition Mickey Mantle in a mountain of garbage. Strengths: “Rats” is the most dangerous, and probably the most interesting, card in the game. Ruins combined with Rats, Death Carts, Graverobbers, Mercenaries, Foragers, Altars, Junk Dealers, Rebuilds, Counts, Hermits, and Fortresses pave many paths to victory, and even more to defeat. Weaknesses: The Knights are a royal pain. And, as Penny like to say, it takes a long time to get anything done in the Dark Ages. Favorite Cards: Rats, Count, Cultist https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613489507455-7NBWNL8BNJ9LV8PZ2N0N/menagerie.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 7. Menagerie What gives the kingdom its flavor? Ways (a backup option for action cards), Horses (ephemeral Laboratories), and cards (like Animal Fair and Fisherman) that change prices depending on your past shenanigans. Playing feels like: A stampede. Strengths: The Ways, Events, price fluctuations, and formidable card lineup make every deal different. Weaknesses: Not beginner friendly. Favorite cards: Black Cat, Coven, Animal Fair https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613497329470-Y2BJ2RPL4MK21680HLJR/dominion-seaside-featured.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 8. Seaside What gives the kingdom its flavor? Duration cards make waves that don’t crash until your next turn. And the nautical art. Playing feels like: Walking the plank o’er insufferable seas. Strengths: The attacks (Sea Hag, Ambassador, Ghost Ship) are Ramsey Bolton-fierce. Along with cards like the Pirate Ship and Treasurer Map, they force you to calibrate your temporal discounting rate. Favorite cards: Pirate Ship, Treasury, Tactician https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613497539104-RSV0HU6JUOJCTT9Q281J/dominion-intrigue-featured-edited.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 9. Intrigue What gives the kingdom its flavor? The ability to mess with other people’s hands. Playing feels like: Being forced to pay for something you neither need nor want. Strengths: This kingdom will keep you on your toes… Weaknesses: But then it will swipe them, scrape off your nail polish, and auction your hang nails on eBay. Favorite cards: Swindler, Masquerade, Torturer https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613497659751-LLS5VUWLSC7OCLJFC11B/alchemy.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 10. Alchemy What gives the kingdom its flavor? The best action cards require potion and coin. And you can use the Possession to buy stuff with another player’s hand. Playing feels like: A caffeine addiction. Strengths: I’m on a 14-game winning streak with this kingdom. Weaknesses: The kingdom is relatively small, so I use essentially the same strategy every game (top-decking as many Alchemists as I can buy). Also, attempting to possess while already possessing another player’s hand seriously disrupts the space-time continuum. Favorite cards: Alchemist, Golem, Herbalist https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613497842305-ISI5ZRT8QTF2EOHYL5WB/dominion-cornucopia-randomizers-1.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 11. Cornucopia What gives the kingdom its flavor? You are rewarded for diversifying your card portfolio and winning Tournaments. Playing feels like: Training for a decathlon. Strengths: I love the incentive to diversify and that Tournaments become both better (when you have Provinces) and worse (when others have Provinces) as the game progresses. Followers, which both makes your opponents discard and gives them a curse, might be the most brutal card in the Dominion kingdom. Weaknesses: I find it ironic that a kingdom that rewards variety offers only 13 cards. Favorite cards: Tournament, Followers, Jester https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613498010896-6RKL90G7068U29GSXYLV/dominion-hinterlands-kingdom-cards1.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 12. Hinterlands What gives the kingdom its flavor? If there’s a flavor to this kingdom, it is somewhere between vanilla and unsalted crackers. Playing feels like: A familiar, though not unpleasant, commute. Strengths: The perks that you get for purchasing the Border Village (another card worth up to 5 coins), Ill-Gotten Gains (others get a curse), Nomad Camp (gained to your kingdom), Inn (shuffling actions back into your kingdom) and Mandarin (top-decking your money) are swell. Weaknesses: The kingdom offers what my marketing textbook would call an “incremental innovation.” Favorite Cards: Highway, Haggler, Spice Merchant https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613498166014-0EMM4CRHN6A3ER7NX66I/guilds.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 13. Guilds What gives the kingdom its flavor? Coffers, which lets you deposit spare coins for a rainy draw; and overpaying, which gives some cards a side-hustle when you leave a tip. Playing feels like: A sober conversation with your financial planner. Strengths: Coffers, overpaying, and getting rich while smiting others with the Soothsayer, the Lloyd Blankfein of Dominion cards. Weaknesses: The kingdom includes only 13 cards, some of which are kind of sucky (Masterpiece, Advisor, Herald). Favorite cards: Soothsayer, Plaza, Doctor https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1613498320316-7O7VW2DRB0Y2D67N4C6I/nocturne.jpg Blog - Dominion kingdoms, ranked - 14. Nocturne What gives the kingdom its flavor? Hexes, which lack the punch of a curse but are more needlessly complicated than ruins; boons, which feel like they should be more helpful than they are; and Night Cards, which add a layer of bureaucratic red tape. Playing feels like: Insomnia Strengths: The Shepherd / Pasture combo makes collecting Estates a viable strategy. Weaknesses: The Night Phase, which either frustrates or bores me, depending on how the cards land. Favorite cards: Vampire, Werewolf, Cursed Village https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2021/2/1/the-gravel-project monthly 0.5 2021-02-01 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1612190139959-QYM51GZJ4OEYACM1ECFR/The+Gravel+Project.jpg Blog - A Townie Tribute to the Gravel Project The Gravel Project (left to right): Dave Fox, Andrew Gravel, Jordan Gravel, Brandon Mayes https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/12/20/best-music-of-2020 monthly 0.5 2020-12-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608474815849-S6JXQINXKH5DNUORU87Z/shauf_neon_skyline.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 1. Neon Skyline - Andy Shauf Since March, I’ve been locked away from friends, bars, and the mundane misadventures that used to define my life. But, thanks to Shauf's masterful songwriting, I could vicariously waste time with Judy, Charlie, Claire, Rose, and all of the other townies at the Neon Skyline. Sample lyric: “I’m wasting time. Sometimes there’s no better feeling than that.” Song pick: “Try Again” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608475121222-NM73YK3VTZZ2TA6N1RC1/Fiona_Apple_-_Fetch_the_Bolt_Cutters.png Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 2. Fetch the Bolt Cutters - Fiona Apple An album that more than lives up to the hype: dog barks, hand claps, alliterative scats, windworn philosophy, survivalist feminism, and oceans of soul. This is the music Yoko Ono would have made if she had John Lennon’s ear for melody. Sample lyric: “I would beg to disagree, but begging disagrees with me.” Song pick: “Ladies” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608475322757-4MITJ6FXIW27RZEA3ROP/perfume_genius_set_my_heart_on_fire_immediately.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 3. Set My Heart on Fire Immediately - Perfume Genius Perfume Genius makes me miss David Bowie less. Sample lyric: “Touch me deep before you leave, just enough to find me.” Song pick: “Without You” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608475448824-7G5GEBEJ1BBFYPDMM4VF/Taylor_Swift_-_Folklore.png Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 4. folklore - Taylor Swift Saying that this is my favorite Taylor Swift album is like saying that JT is my favorite NSyncer or that Mary is my favorite Trump. It's not even close. Folklore combines the character sketches of Swift's best early work (e.g., "Tim McGraw," "Our Song") with the consistency of 1989, and the indie aesthetic of Bon Iver, Jack Antonoff, and the National. Sample lyric: “Every time you call me crazy, I get more crazy” Song pick: “Last Great American Dynasty” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608475608605-L6WNNC51M9FYLBNUC1QJ/Reunions_Jason+Isbell+and+the+400+Unit.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 5. Reunions - Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit Another home run from Isbell and his Unit. This album inspired its own blog post back in May. Read it here. Sample lyric: “Be afraid. Be very afraid. Do it anyways.” Song pick: “It Gets Easier” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608475772071-JEY7GXMULEQG4VBB315N/Punisher+_Phoebe+Bridgers.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 6. Punisher - Phoebe Bridgers Phoebe Bridgers’ songs have more shades of blue than eskimos have words for snow. Sample lyric: “I’m not angry, that’s just my face.” Song pick: “I Know the End” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608475925114-UM06ZPKP34TQNX3L83HH/sault+rise.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 7. Untitled (Rise) - Sault No Blood Orange or Solange in 2020? No problem. Sault released two albums to quench your thirst for soulful, funky, trippy, experimental R&B. Sample lyric: “They’re not gonna conquer us. Feel the resistance.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608476052766-7D21RRBN2IBR3JKTC0JE/live+forever_bartees+strange.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 8. Live Forever - Bartees Strange Strange is an alchemist who forges gold from Kings-of-Leon-arena-rock and Sault(see #7)-Sweatshirt(Earl, that is)-space-aged R&B in his phenomenal debut. Sample lyric: “Don’t come up out of the crib if you ain’t strange, babe.” Song pick: “Mustang” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608476298687-NK1WFENZK1K97BRUEM17/alexander+decatur+county+red.jpeg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 9. Decatur County Red - Jessi Alexander Songs about southern highways, drinking, Mama, and George Jones. My favorite country album of the year. Sample lyric: “Fifty-hour week, no fun, no sleep, pulling that overtime. It's a delicate dance working like a man while you're keeping your apron tied.” Song pick: “Mama Drank” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608476484259-EH5Z7R6DU02TWFLD4NI3/THE+UNRAVELING_Drive-By+Truckers.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 10. The Unraveling - Drive-by Truckers DBT fully embrace their role as the "Dance Band of the Resistance" on this politically charged album about addiction (Heroin Again), suburban decay (21st Century USA), ineffectual politicians (Thoughts and Prayers), and human right catastrophes (Babies in Cages). Sample lyric: “Men working hard for not enough at best. Women working just as hard for less. They get together late at night at bars, and bang each other like crashing cars.” Song pick: “Armageddon’s Back in Town” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608477129565-F9K9JDYRSC0OAIPDMBJZ/stapleton+staring+over.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 11. Starting Over - Chris Stapleton The title is misleading. Starting Over continues Stapleton's brand of country, soul, rock. I'm happy to have been misled. Sample lyric: “You want me to say that I want you stay, so you should probably leave.” Song pick: “Starting Over” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608477339525-UL0DF4HXW6EZVU3MP3BN/Springsteen_Lettertoyou.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 12. Letter to You - Bruce Springsteen Springsteen and E. Street Band recorded this album using the approach that created Darkness on the Edge of Town, the River, and Born in the USA. The result is an album that sounds like something they might have recorded in the late 1970s. It's also Springsteen's best work in decades, an album built for aimless Friday night driving while searching for a party that you’re sure is just around the corner... a needed feeling in 2020. Sample lyric: “I’m the last man standing now.” Song pick: “Ghosts” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608478127901-5YGIWERQE1CUXDOIYEB7/a+hero%27s+death_fontaines+dc.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 13. A Hero’s Death - Fountaines D.C. The soundtrack of angry Irish rain. Sample lyric: “The clouds cleared up. The sun hit the sky. I watched all the folks go to work just to die.” Song pick: “Living in America” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608478316686-PY9JISJUGQVF8W4XRD7D/run-the-jewels-4-rtj4.png Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 14. RTJ4 - Run the Jewels Run the Jewels are often compared to Public Enemy, but they have thirty extra years of music to sample. I also think that RTJ’s flow, lyrics, and beats are more versatile than Flav et al. Sample lyric: “If even one scrap of what Jesus taught connected, you'd feel different.” Song pick: “Walking in the Snow” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608478668164-ZZD2JTLP6NDABG640HC9/haim-women-in-music-part-iii.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 15. Women in Music, Part III - Haim My poolside album of the summer. Sample lyric: “You say there's no stupid question, only stupid people. Well I've been feeling pretty foolish.” Song pick: “The Steps” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608478840521-VQLPE0VOLJAR3Z8PJWZH/wilson+dixie+blur.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 16. Dixie Blur - Jonathan Wilson Laurel Canyon country for the 21st Century. Graham Parsons would be proud. Sample lyric: “Missing someone is a kind of hurt a heart should be grateful to feel.” Song pick: “‘69 Corvette” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608478967675-7TKIZBIQ8ZE4FDHONLPD/Lianne_La_Havas_-_Lianne_La_Havas.png Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 17. Lianne La Havas (self-titled) Pairs perfectly with a Black Manhattan or Campari Spritz. Sample lyric: “You can find me dancing on my own.” Song pick: “Bittersweet” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608485338109-QLCA2WVN8X6J5HJB637T/Fleet+Foxes+-+Shore+-+Art.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 18. Shore - Fleet Foxes Fleet Foxes have made four excellent albums.This is my second favorite (after 2011's Helplessness Blues). Sample lyric: “May the last long year be forgiven.” Song pick: “Maestranza” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608485467052-Q58LUCVJY77YYGY02MPO/american+head_the+flaming+lips.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 19. American Head - The Flaming Lips Their best album since Yoshimi. Feels just as trippy but more grounded. Sample lyric: “"Mother, I've taken LSD. I thought it would set me free, but now I think it's changed me." Song pick: “Mother Don’t Be Sad” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608485603910-V1LTD4P02PSR4UIKY956/margo+price.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 20. That’s How Rumors Get Started - Margo Price Another triumph from the Loretta Lynn protégé. Sample lyric: “Way back in the good old days, things weren’t really all that good.” Song pick: “That’s How Rumors Get Started” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608485768958-EYHMO8W0L2WGBF9YI4ZU/gold+record_bill+callahan.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 21. Gold Record - Bill Callahan An auteur at the top of his game. Sample lyric: “I protest his protest song. I’d vote for Satan if he said it was wrong.” Song pick: “Pigeons” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608485912595-D8CZS0QYOMTDGZE8817M/Good+News_Megan+Thee+Stallion.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 22. Good News - Megan Thee Stallion Megan was everywhere this year from writing op-eds in the New York Times to crushing the charts with an ode to vaginal lubrication (see WAP). Sample lyric: “I’m the hood Mona Lisa” Song pick: “Body” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608486121124-NANPNSZ3922UJWI69XJ7/Silver+Tongue_Torres.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 23. Silver Tongue - Torres I will never understand how Torres gets dropped from her label while Muse sells out stadiums. Silver Tongue and Sprinter run laps around the vampire schmaltz that saturates Muse's catalogue. (The rest of PWT dig Muse - I’m the outlier here.) Sample lyric: “You make me want to write a country song [that] folks here in New York would get a kick out of. I'd sing about knocking you up under the Tennessee stars in the bed of my red Chevrolet pickup.” Song pick: “Good Scare” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608486061459-S15T2JRL7QRLQXY61Y3V/halfwaifcaretaker.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 24. Caretaker - Half Waif Contemporary trip hop. Sample lyric: “If this doesn’t change me, nothing will.” Song pick: “Ordinary Talk” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608486354145-FNMJRY0C3OJREAFEVEF7/gr%C3%A6+Moses+Sumney.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 25. Grae - Moses Sumney I first heard Moses Sumney on a Grateful Dead tribute album, which is like discovering the Waggles on a Slayer bootleg. This album took a few listens to grow on me, but that is true of most music that eschews easy. Sample lyric: “If there’s no pain, is there any progress?” Song pick: “Cut Me” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608486534434-BP4VR5WA02SAAKGEDMAU/Alfredo_Freddie+Gibbs+and+The+Alchemist.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 26. Alfredo - Freddie Gibbs / Alchemist The lyrics are straight outta the early 1990s Compton. The beats might still be ahead of their time in the 2090s. Sample lyric: “I'm the reason your mama be smokin' that Brillo.” Song pick: “God is Perfect” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608486655706-AN7H3FPUGL0UYYV6D4DE/steve+earle+ghosts+of+west+viriginia.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 27. Ghosts of West Virginia - Steve Earle & the Dukes The Godfather of alt-country dropped the most cohesive album of his career and his best in decades. Sample lyric: “Half a life is better than nothing at all.” Song pick: “Black Lung” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608561871191-QQK8WSWFFYROI918VPXG/daughter_lydia+loveless.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 28. Daughter - Lydia Loveless I discovered Lydia Loveless nearly a decade ago on "Bootliquor Radio." She was good then, and she keeps getting better. Sample lyric: “I've been patiently taking my time. Or I'm just lazy, your guess is as good as mine.” Song pick: “Daughter” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608561968926-ZYK2XDCX0OK4V9BDHXMG/Bonny+Light+Horseman_Bonny+Light+Horseman.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 29. Bonnie Light Horseman (self-titled) I didn't know I needed a collection of old-timey Irish ballads, but I'm happy I got it. Sample lyric: “I've wandered through Kerry and I've wandered through Claire, from Boston down to Jersey, from there to God knows where. And I've never met a cailín’ with such beauty blessed, as the one so fair in the magpie's nest.” Song pick: “Magpie’s Nest” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608562149735-NOGNF2228OWWV8OKESL8/Saint+Cloud_Waxahatchee.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 30. St. Cloud - Waxahatchee The music stands up with Dylan's best work from the late 60s. The lyrics are a step below, but it's only one of those little steps that are easy to trip over because they’re so short and that make you wonder why in the world the builder bothered to build such a diminutive step in the first place. Sample lyric: “We do stupid things in the right way.” Song pick: “Ruby Falls” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608563906405-SZSCDPVI20RZMG7XIJM2/Melee_Dogleg.png Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 31. Melee - Dogleg Best hard rock album of the year. Reminds me of And You Will Know Us by the Trail of the Dead. Sample lyric: “Any moment now I will disintegrate.” Song pick: “Headfirst” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608564045115-YCB7Q8JY10JF1IKAZFKA/Superstar_Caroline+Rose.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 32. Superstar - Caroline Rose Snarky self-affirmation with a side of rock and roll. Sample lyric: “I’m so in love with myself; it’s so romantic.” Song pick: “Feel the Way I Want to” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608564177202-FQIK4H442BEVVODQ9ZYN/mcbryde+never+will.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 33. Never Will - Ashley McBryde Sample lyric: “It ain’t murder if I bury you alive.” I'm not sure that her arguments would hold up in a court of law, but they sound great on a twangy rock and roll record. Song pick: “Martha Divine” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608564333513-ARKQR6FOT5N66M2VWYQL/Heavy+Light_U.S.+Girls.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 34. Heavy Light - US Girls Part Bowie. Part P.J. Harvey. All delightful. Sample lyric: “There’s nothing to lose when you become a sound.” Song pick: “Born to Lose” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608564444258-LGDBTJNQJUTFEP048OL8/A+Written+Testimony_Jay+Electronica.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 35. A Written Testimony - Jay Electronica Reminds me of another rapper named Jay. Sample lyric: “Spread love like Kermit the frog that permeate the fog.” Song pick: “Ghost of Soulja Slim” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608565041360-8JC5U4YQ5GDQY4YPIYGW/Lukas-Nelson--Naked-Garden.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 36. Naked Garden - Lukas Nelson & The Promise of the Real Nelson and crew don't break new ground with Naked Garden, but they continue to till rich soil. Sample lyric: “Focus on the peace that music brings. Nothing else matters.” Song pick: “Civilized Hell” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608565171926-F6JZZDZQ7FR396QYHRBR/ashley+ray+pauline.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 37. Pauline - Ashley Ray Packed with Americana, wit, and wisdom. Sample lyric: "Behind every good man, there's a better woman.” Song pick: “Lawrence, Kansas” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608565329281-MFP7DQAVPH2DZI1VL7QA/The-1975-sleeve.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 38. Notes on a Conditional Form - The 1975 If 'bombasticity" is a word, it describes this album. Sample lyric: “My generation wanna fuck Barack Obama living in a sauna with legal marijuana.” Song pick: “Birthday Party” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608565462362-FVXZ1SP03S7EXFFW33E2/The+Slow+Rush_Tame+Impala.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 39. The Slow Rush - Tame Impala Some records demand close attention. Others are better as background music. Tame Impala records fall halfway in between. It's best to attend enough to appreciate the arrangements but not to prevent you from drifting with sound. Sample lyric: “Eventually, terrible memories turn into great ones.” Song pick: “Lost in Yesterday” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608565695900-DLQ3F6OT39KCAZ7PJCQN/_Inlet_Hum.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 40. Inlet - Hum Adam loved this album so much it has its own post. Check it out Sample lyric: “Everything here isn’t true.” Song pick: “Step Into You” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608732819793-AMCEHFOKG3VWHNTMI9P7/EveryBad.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 41. Every Bad - Porridge Radio According to Wikipedia, Porridge Radio's music was inspired by the Brighten sea. It must be a sea where shudders and raincoats are more useful than sunscreen and water wings. Sample lyric: “I’m bored to death, let’s argue.” Song pick: “Born Confused” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608732937299-57IUB26PA3E0WBHS29FQ/total+freedom_kathleen+edwards.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 42. Total Freedom - Kathleen Edwards After her last record, Edwards took a sabbatical to open a cafe. She was probably good at making coffee, but she is definitely great at writing songs, and I’m glad she’s back at it. Sample lyric: “We had a tour bus with a bed in the back. We bought a rock and roll dream. It was total crap. We toured the world, and we played TV. We met some of our heroes. It almost killed me.” Song pick: “Options Open” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608733428474-0ZLALMDRYC7GOVM0KVJU/andrews+old+flowers.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 43. Old Flowers - Courtney Marie Andrews Confessional piano ballads with a country lilt. Sample lyric: “I know I can’t change, but for you I’d compromise” Song pick: “Guilty” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608733509307-KDO2FZNDYI6U1N5JR4EB/Rough+and+Rowdy+Ways_Bob+Dylan.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 44. Rough and Rowdy Ways - Bob Dylan Like Leonard Cohen, Dylan has aged into his voice. His words continue to be timeless. Sample lyric: “I paint landscapes, and I paint nudes. I contain multitudes.” Song pick: “I Contain Multitudes” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608733679792-C6V30X4RXB2CMEUW80JU/Myopia_Agnes+Obel.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 45. Myopia - Agnes Obel The best way to listen to this album is when you realize that you're dreaming but you’re not yet awake. That is to say, "Broken Sleep" and "Myopia" live up to their titles. Sample lyric: “The camera’s rolling, what will you do?” Song pick: “Broken Sleep” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608733799606-HWQIHMEQZFN8Y7GXLMK6/Dawes-GLWW.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 46. Good Luck with Whatever - Dawes Dawes have yet to make a bad album. Good Luck with Whatever is not my favorite by Goldsmith and company, but "St. Augustine at Night" stands with "A Little Bit of Everything" and "All Your Favorite Bands" as masterworks of nostalgic realism. Sample lyric: “I never put off tomorrow what I should have done today. I always wait much longer than that.” Song pick: “St. Augustine at Night” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608734014198-MLQJ1MQJX0PO88XMGCYA/dbt+the+new+ok.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 47. The New OK - Drive-by Truckers This surprise gift from DBT continued the political furor of The Unraveling by combining topical malaise (“Watching Orange Clouds”), prescient outtakes (“The Unraveling”), and a foot-stomping Ramones cover (“The KKK Took My Baby Away”). Sample lyric: Sarah Palin “made PC worse to mama than the VD daddy brought home from the rodeo. She made it look so easy, all fat Donnie had to do was wear the pants.” Song pick: “Sarah’s Flame” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608734610724-EPSTDFTFYYZ9BUT7HVYO/Always+Tomorrow_Best+Coast.jpg Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 48. Always Tomorrow - Best Coast I remember listening to this album while running the Mission Beach boardwalk at the end of February. Simpler times. Sample lyric: “Let's toast the bad years behind us, and quit pretending this one's better.” Song pick: “For the First Time” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608734721309-97QSDUFOSAU8MDNGJ7WN/The_Killers_-_Imploding_the_Mirage.png Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 49. Imploding the Mirage - The Killers I never know whether the Killers are trying to be Journey or Ween, or whether that should matter. Better to not overthink it and enjoy breathing in the blowback. Sample lyric: “There's gonna be opposition. Ain't no way around it. But if you're looking for strong and steady, baby you found it.” Song pick: “Caution” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1608734838620-6DFKZ9JYXWSQA8Q7UCI8/The_Weeknd_-_After_Hours.png Blog - Best Music of 2020 - 50. After Hours - The Weeknd If you like 80s pop you will love this album. If you don't like 80s pop (guilty), you might dance to it anyways. Sample lyric: “I just pretend I’m in the dark” Song pick: “Blinded by the Lights” https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/11/7/what-are-the-best-tabletop-games monthly 0.5 2020-11-10 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604775202612-5L1CALU8405ST1ARXRBV/Game+Layout.png Blog - What are the best tabletop games? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604769507544-Z5AP1SKCUVHGEEGX89M4/ticket+to+ride.png Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 1. Ticket to Ride Ticket to Ride balances everything I love about board games. Success requires a combination of luck and strategy. It is easy to learn, but difficult to master. Each game requires a different approach, depending on the cards you draw. Most games take less than an hour… unless you are playing with my father, who is still deciding whether to take an orange card or build a train from Omaha to Duluth. The cherries on top? Ticket to Ride has both trains and maps. I’ve yet to meet someone who has played this game and not liked it. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604769858670-JK26IHAOBJ5K00YDNJW7/settlersofcatan.jpeg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 2. Settlers of Catan All of the features that I love about Ticket to Ride, except instead of building a train between Winnipeg and Sault St. Marie, you haggle wheat and wood for sheep and bricks to build roads, settlements, and cities on an ever-changing topography all while trying to avoid being rock-blocked. Settlers can be slow if you play by the rules. But you can get wood (and bricks, rocks, wheat, and sheep) faster by adding a second pair of dice. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604770278032-D9N1U0ECJK9N5N8JFJDM/celebrities.jpg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 3. Celebrities My favorite party game. All you need is paper, pens, a couple of buckets, and a smattering of cultural knowledge. More below… https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604770839872-RKW01WLWTTPPENQ6KJAW/cards+against+humanity.jpg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 4. Cards Against Humanity Cards Against Humanity describes itself as “a party game for horrible people.” It helped ignite my career as a humor researcher, and, provided prescient examples for the benign violation theory. Some might argue that “two midgets shitting in a box,” “kids with ass cancer,” and “Sean Penn,” are not benign. If you find yourself playing with people like this, find better friends. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604771344665-1GQO56NI0CQ0LIDMPS2S/poker.jpg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 5. Poker It’s the only game in Vegas where skill, and the fact that you are not playing against the house, can tip the odds in your favor. But I prefer low-stakes poker – games where whiskey flows, no one remembers who’s turn it is, and bad cards cost you less money than sharing a round of Jagerbombs with townies at the tavern. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604771503336-K1BBAIEBGHXL0LGU6J0R/Dominion_DeckBuildingGame_Setup.jpg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 6. Dominion The online version (dominion.games) of this deck-building card game helped me survive quarantine. Andrew, Penny, and I have played 173 games since March. Our most recent game ended in a three-way tie, bringing our victory totals to 52.833, 50.833, and 69.333, but who’s counting? Dominion earns bonus points for being the only game on this list that works well with two-players. And robots. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604771620736-343SBICIIILK5RPG3J8N/coup.jpg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 7. Coup Coup combines the bluffing of poker with the political strategy of Risk. You start with two players, and need to raise money to kill your opponents while avoiding their wrath. Lying helps, but only if you don’t get caught. Alliances help, but they don’t last. If you lose both of your players, wait a few minutes and try again next round. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604771773939-3OW72ZRVGKULRFGTPL9L/blood+bowl.JPG Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 8. Blood Bowl Blood Bowl offers a rare cross of fantasy world-building and sport. It lets you manage quasi-football squadrons of elves, dwarfs, orcs, goblins, trolls, ogres, rat-mutants, zombies, and, yes, even hobbits. My favorite team was the Grateful Undead. I fielded vampires (“Dark Star”, “Sunshine”), mummies (“Black Peter”, “Bertha”), wights (“Casey Jones”, “Jack Straw”), ghouls (“St. Stephen”, “Sugar Magnolia”) skeletons (“Loose Lucy”, “Candyman”), a werewolf (“Dire Wolf”), and a chainsaw-wielding zombie (“Alligator”). Unfortunately, the Grateful Undead were better at maiming the other team (and sometimes fans) than scoring touchdowns. Blood Bowl is the perfect game for people who like fantasy as much as fantasy football, provided they have the patience to learn the rules (which are complicated), time to play the games (which are long), money to buy the miniature figures (which are stupid-expensive), and the artistic chops to paint them (which is also no easy task). https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604771878438-T9Z5A6T5HCB15V7AE37B/Risk.jpg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 9. Risk Risk would be higher on my list if it didn’t take so damn long. It’s a warmongering game that lets you mobilize armies, build alliances, and roll the dice to do the same thing that Brain (friend of Pinky) does every day: try to take over the world. Risk introduced me to places like Irkutsk and Siam, the difficulty of conquering Europe, and the strategic importance of fortifying Kamchatka, Greenland, and Indonesia. I created a flag (think USSR, but black and with a chainsaw rather than a hammer and sickle) for my army, which I named the “Bad Motherfucker Fascist Empire.” Doesn’t seem as funny now that I’m not 15 and actual fascism has made a comeback. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1604772012106-WIZEU40AP76IUVKTRY7P/balderdash.jpg Blog - What are the best tabletop games? - 10. Balderdash I love the premise of Balderdash: (a) You read an abstruse but factual question: e.g., “what is a natterjack.” (b) Other players bullshit an answer: e.g., “a wrench used to remove sticky peanut-butter jar tops.” (c) You get points when you pick the real answer (a European toad, in this example), other players get points when you pick theirs. You can sidestep Mattel by playing bookshelf Balderdash. Pull a novel off of your bookshelf and ask the other players to bluff its first sentence. I’ll never forget my cousin Eric’s opener for a book called Gossip Girl: “Madison and Meredith are such fucking bitches they probably won’t even get in to Vassar.” (Corrigendum: Vassar is a great school. Our grandmother went there.) https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/10/9/what-are-the-best-drive-by-truckers-songs monthly 0.5 2020-10-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1602255003266-8F37IX9CSOLMG2W8JEIH/DBT+album+covers.jpg Blog - What are the best Drive-by Truckers Songs? photo source: https://www.al.com/life/2019/12/the-secrets-of-drive-by-truckers-trippy-album-covers.html https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/8/30/a-townie-guide-to-spirits monthly 0.5 2020-08-31 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598797415285-RYSESLVJNQDKBM8KMB19/sidecar.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Brandy https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598798120396-BIOZQURRPCJZC6OUMOG7/mai+tai.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Rum https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598798877075-3QLANW26AIT2777HCXOE/boulevardier.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Irish Whiskey https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598800246915-0AQRIDAM18VPO876B2Y9/rusty-nail.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Scotch Whisky https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598803815986-DBQLYHVZSJAVBBJKULMI/moscow+mule.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Vodka https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598810004273-JS73NYFG3VHC2DACDH9D/elderflower-martini.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Gin https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598824479850-KYIPLO3HUVP8V4LIXWFP/oldfashioned.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Bourbon Whiskey https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598824760282-IMNJIMN1JYB1F0FNCBDD/image-asset.jpeg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Tequila https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598826247648-I81CIUJRVOQ02BP8STYL/MezcalMargarita.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Mezcal https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598827296190-N8I7UX67IBUSHFD6WMWV/campari-spritz.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Amaro https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1598885194473-C58PYB1J4ZIYNV3T0WO9/GoT+drink+map.jpg Blog - A Townie Guide to Spirits - Spirits of Westeros If the characters in Game of Thrones drank more hard booze instead of beer and wine, here are the kingdoms where each liquor would reign. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/7/20/country-songs-from-1950-to-2020 monthly 0.5 2020-07-24 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1595604697928-8ZAB38OYRYP502TFWWCJ/country+1950+to+2020.jpg Blog - Country Songs From 1950 to 2020 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/6/30/adams-ode-to-hum monthly 0.5 2020-10-10 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/6/25/the-most-harmful-thinkers monthly 0.5 2020-10-10 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1593145109991-XK2AMSX3KMOEOEU3BIJJ/marx.jpeg Blog - The most harmful thinkers - 5. Karl Marx 1818-1883 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1593145370400-ZYY08LP4RKHFFUD1WFQV/korea+at+night.jpg Blog - The most harmful thinkers - North vs. South Korea From The Economist https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1593145504463-3J2200NV5ZK9U0GZ7MS3/image-asset.jpeg Blog - The most harmful thinkers - 4. Milton Friedman 1912-2006 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1593146156058-GM7YEU8AIYNVTWZ9ORWY/Foucault.jpg Blog - The most harmful thinkers - 3. Michel Foucault 1926-1984 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1593146313719-AU5JGYDBCK4C5PC19XID/galton.jpg Blog - The most harmful thinkers - 2. Francis Galton 1822-1911 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1593146471112-3EMSYM6ESY9VD4KA7ELQ/nietzche.jpeg Blog - The most harmful thinkers - Friedrich Nietzche 1844-1900 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/5/21/ranking-jason-isbell-albums monthly 0.5 2020-05-21 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1590073518790-89XL4QCK98LKAI5C6Z16/Isbell+venn+diagram.jpg Blog - Ranking Jason Isbell Albums - Why Caleb loves Jason Isbell https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/5/1/appreciating-the-music-of-nick-byron-campbell monthly 0.5 2020-05-01 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/4/7/the-best-years-for-music monthly 0.5 2020-04-09 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1586356775384-GUB28LKA2L6TALGFB99C/1994bestyearformusic.jpg Blog - What was the best year for music? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1586357060813-82XLU5R9W8EULU8LL37T/Slide2.jpg Blog - What was the best year for music? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1586357107017-WTN17H32WWGWVJGJ46BV/Slide3.jpg Blog - What was the best year for music? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1586357146487-CY1J6CLB7ONYEGHYLEL4/Slide4.jpg Blog - What was the best year for music? https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1586357203778-PWZ8N8SVGBF559UYPDI6/2015bestyearformusic.jpg Blog - What was the best year for music? https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/3/27/best-nonfiction-books-calebs-picks monthly 0.5 2020-03-27 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585328029584-Y61083U1K1G7J40AJHVE/big+short.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 1. The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine (Michael Lewis) A book about mortgage-backed securities, collateralized debt obligations, credit default swaps, and credit rating agencies has no right to be this entertaining. Lewis’s metaphors are nirvana, resurrection, 72 virgins, a toasted New York bagel with lox schmear, or a slab of uncut black tar heroin, depending on your religious views. “The CDO was, in effect, a credit laundering service for the residents of Lower Middle Class America. For Wall Street it was a machine that turned lead into gold.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585328280738-33RMP3ND1ZJT720YC6YY/fear+loathing.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 2. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (Hunter S. Thompson) Fear and Loathing is glutted with brilliant prose and terrible advice that blurs the lines between fact, fantasy, holiday, and hallucination. I’ve always wanted to write like Hunter Thompson but worried that reviewers might mistake gonzo hypothesis testing for p-hacking. “Take it from me, there's nothing like a job well done. Except the quiet enveloping darkness at the bottom of a bottle of Jim Beam after a job done any way at all.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585328492911-790H5BCLS42L6WS6L04T/enlightenment+now.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 3. Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress (Steven Pinker) Pinker reminds the world how much suckier things used to be before science. This should be required reading for anyone who has ever entertained ideas from Michel Foucault, Alex Jones, or that annoying neighbor who rails against GMOs and refuses to get her kid vaccinated. “The first step toward wisdom is the realization that the laws of the universe don’t care about you. The next is the realization that this does not imply that life is meaningless, because people care about you, and vice versa.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585329378730-WHIKVQ7B4LJ4DZDGV0LQ/sapiens.jpeg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 4. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (Yuval Noah Harari) Harari distills big ideas to their essence. The difference between humans and other primates: “You could never convince a monkey to give you a banana by promising him limitless bananas after death in monkey heaven.” History: “History is something that very few people have been doing while everyone else was ploughing fields and carrying water buckets.” The Agricultural Revolution: “We did not domesticate wheat. It domesticated us.” Eudaimonia: “A meaningful life can be extremely satisfying even in the midst of hardship, whereas a meaningless life is a terrible ordeal no matter how comfortable it is.” Nature vs. nurture: “Biology enables, Culture forbids.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585329223683-JGRDE472Y9RIBYOTYMX4/acid%2Btest.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 5. The Electric Kool Aid Acid Test (Tom Wolfe) Wolfe takes readers into the gut of the counter-culture documenting the rise of a band of Merry Pranksters whose only destination was “Furthur.” This book shows that ethnographers don’t need to travel to Samoa to unearth some interesting cultural shit. “It's great to be a part of the greatest jackoff in history.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585329434067-JM6N7V2RM66L3XG8P5JO/madetostick.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 6. Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die (Chip Heath and Dan Heath) The best marketing book I’ve read. It reveals why most people don’t care about nor understand what you want to tell them. It also reinforces what I believe is the most important insight into consumer behavior: “People don’t buy quarter-inch drill bits. They buy quarter-inch holes so they can hang their children’s pictures.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585329529098-OE60FKZU362N2GEAR04A/boom+town.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 7. Boom Town: The Fantastical Saga of Oklahoma City, its Chaotic Founding... its Purloined Basketball Team, and the Dream of Becoming a World-class Metropolis (Sam Anderson) This non-linear history of Oklahoma City, from the Big Bang to the season that the Thunder traded James Harden, is packed with glorious nuggets of OKC lore, including the man who killed the man who killed Jesse James and the time Wayne Coyne of Flaming Lips fame shut down the airport because he forgot that he had a grenade in his carry-on luggage. “Cities are not microwave popcorn. Unless you are talking, as we are, about Oklahoma City. Oklahoma City is microwave popcorn.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585329640255-IG079BX74N4KEHAS02FO/humor+code.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 8. The Humor Code: A Global Search for What Makes Things Funny (Peter McGraw and Joel Warner) I will be forever grateful to Pete and Joel for dressing an idea I helped birth in the finest ballroom attire. But this book is much more than an attempt to translate an academic theory to the masses. It begins with Pete falling on his face at a Denver dive bar open-mic and ends with him holding his own with comedy’s funniest at Montreal’s Just for Laughs festival (which is a combination of AMA, ACR, and SPSP for comedians). In between, Pete and Joel drink with Mad Men, swap penis jokes with Japanese, and help medicate a remote Amazonian village as part of Patch Adams’s clown pack. “Laughter is medicine, even if it’s not the best. That’s why I plan to keep my clown nose handy. Just in case of emergencies.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585330785437-275VIY8DLFCSH103C4RR/rebel+yell.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 9. Rebel Yell: The Violence, Passion, and Redemption of Stonewall Jackson (S.C. Gwynne) A page-turning epic about Stonewall Jackson, one of history’s most captivating real-life anti-heroes. Gwynne’s storytelling makes David McCullough and Doris Kearns Goodwin feel like the fine print in an iPhone license agreement. “The great and complicated political reasons for secession, thundered about in Congress and in the state legislatures, were not their reasons, which were more like those expressed by a captive Confederate soldier, who was not a slaveholder, to his puzzled Union captors. ‘I’m fighting because you’re down here,’ he said.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1585330150475-VBS9KQHP2TBKPCSHXVBL/everything+is+obvious.jpg Blog - Best Nonfiction Books (Caleb's Picks) - 10. Everything is Obvious: How Common Sense Fails Us (Duncan J. Watts) If you have ever dismissed a social outcome as obvious (and I suspect this is everyone), you need to read this book. Humans are great at crafting stories that make the social world seem orderly. In politics, this leads to overly simple policy prescriptions (“Medicare for all!” “Build a wall!”). In science, it leads to p-hacking. "The real world of human interactions is simply too messy and ambiguous a place ever to be governed by any predefined set of rules and regulations." https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/3/13/best-albums-of-the-2010s-adams-picks monthly 0.5 2020-03-13 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1584121440613-UCE1JZ561KJ8SS0FZQ6R/71c837KdfhL._SL1500_.jpg Blog - Best Albums of the 2010s (Adam's picks) - #1: Tool - Fear Inoculum I mean, how could it be anything else? One of the finest rock bands in history hadn’t released an album since 2006. The pressure from insufferable fans (myself included) made for completely unreasonable expectations, but Fear Inoculum exceeded them. This album has more depth than any previous Tool offering. It’s heavy but not abrasive; they went hard on groove instead. It’s cohesive, but each song is distinct. It’s long, but never drags. It’s mature and contemplative, but there are still little hints of the old “funny Tool”. The artwork is among Alex Grey’s best. The live shows on this tour have been otherworldly good. And Danny Carey is an octopus-bot who has been programmed to destroy rock music as we know it. He makes all other drummers sound like cavemen clumsily bashing clubs on rocks. Check this out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FssULNGSZIA The tipping point for this album is Pneuma, which was easily my favorite song of 2019. The main riff is a mover, and the middle section is among the best few minutes of music that Tool has ever written. That section climaxes in an emotional and visceral way at the 9:59 mark when Maynard comes back in with vocals. At one of the shows on this tour, there was an older couple in front of me who were probably in their late-70s. At that moment of Pneuma, the gentleman turned to his wife… and they started passionately making out. It was such a perfect moment. A song about spiritual transcendence, being performed live for one of the first times, in front of a wildly diverse audience of people losing themselves in the moment. That’s what music is for. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/2/25/best-albums-of-the-2010s-calebs-picks monthly 0.5 2020-02-25 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1582658094841-9DDYHC2AT9FJAOMSE19E/Michael_Kiwanuka_-_Love_%26_Hate.jpg Blog - Best Albums of the 2010s (Caleb's picks) - 2010-2019 Caleb’s favorite albums https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/2/9/politicians-as-game-of-thrones-characters monthly 0.5 2020-02-11 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581283234406-U6WS12ZC4IPLD2HHP095/Slide01.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Donald Trump: Joffrey Baratheon Supporters view them as rightful ascendants, allies are terrified to question their judgment, and everyone else is left wondering how someone so narcissistic, incompetent, and cruel got to be in charge. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581283377341-HBE8JINPPZ02P2U4F0VL/Slide02.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Mike Pence : Stannis Baratheon Stannis was in open rebellion against Joffrey, whereas Pence is as loyal to Trump as season-one-Hound. Nevertheless, this comparison works because Pence, like Stannis, would unquestionably sacrifice his own child if he believed it were the will of God. Hopefully God would step in so we’d have a new Isaac rather than another Shireen. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581286668665-H6H2GLUHRJMCFQIB3I1I/Slide03.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Nancy Pelosi: Olenna Tyrell Strong and intelligent women. Savvy dealmakers and matriarchs. I like both but trust neither. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581286737177-UNUZQAFQYN5GV3LYG3YE/Slide04.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Mitch McConnell: Petyr Baelish Masterful politicians who care only about their own power. McConnell wouldn’t hesitate to help Pelosi poison Trump if he thought it would be politically expedient. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581286961156-NRXPRBPFH1KFK1YM77NH/Slide05.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Joe Biden: Ned Stark Experienced, earnest, and well intentioned, but they underestimate the depths to which their opponents will sink to keep them from power. Even after Ned’s son was defenestrated and Biden’s was implicated, they continued to try to reason with the other side. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287028069-FPVBBW5QE8MS3TVMDJ0M/Slide06.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Bernie Sanders: Daenerys Targaryen Fierce and passionate defenders of the downtrodden who are hell-bent on revolution and have little interest in compromising with anyone who they think is an enemy. I agree with most of what they hope to accomplish, but worry about their zealotry and the violent behavior of their acolytes. (Apologies to the Dothraki for comparing them to Bernie Bros.) https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287098247-0SBZTOUP8QXGJX8QZ4VO/Slide07.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Elizabeth Warren: John Snow They see an enormous threat on the horizon (Winter is coming!) and propose bold solutions that most do not want to hear. John was right to invite the wildlings North of the wall and to bend his knee to Daenerys, and I think Warren is right about the need to reduce the influence of lobbying, implement a wealth tax, and make healthcare a public service. John got stabbed and exiled for his ideas. I hope Warren fares better, but I’m not optimistic. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287253180-UCRQB5GFWGWCSKOMDWJK/Slide08.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Pete Buttigieg: Tyrion Lannister Pragmatic, competent, and stigmatized. I’d be happy to see either in charge, although I think that, like Tyrion, Mayor Pete has a better chance of being hand-of-the-king than at the top of the ticket. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287348830-LOIZX8DQV4ZLNZRSENKK/Slide09.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Amy Klobuchar: Sansa Stark Practical and wise women of the north. Would make fine leaders, even if I don’t agree with all of their decisions. Both also have a history of violence. Unlike Sansa, Klobuchar doled it out. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287477783-JAGKDLYG0LHFS1QXSFG2/Slide10.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Tom Steyer: Jaime Lannister I’m sure that Steyer pushed a few kids out of windows during his Goldman-Sachs-hedge-fund-years, but, like Jaime, he seems to have grown a conscience and is now trying to rage against the dying of the light. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287573970-I1HPQT6Q6R7BQLVYJQ7T/Slide11.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Michael Bloomberg: Xaro Xhoan Daxos If he ends up pulling off a shark-jumping, surprise victory, Bloomberg will be Bran Stark. Otherwise, he is Xaro Xhoan Daxos. Both are rich, ambitious men who think that because they had a little success running a city, they deserve to be king. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287665615-WRGHJ6JDW9J3T3GRHLA4/Slide12.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Andrew Yang: Hodor Yang’s “freedom dividend” is Hodor’s “Hodor.” https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287707239-DZNXKIV58UZAJ6KAKLXW/Slide13.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Lindsey Graham: Grand Maester Pycelle Pycelle was skeptical of the Baratheon-Lannister revolution, but over time he became their most shameless and spineless asskisser. Graham voted against Trump in 2016 and is now one of his most loyal bootlickers. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581287976792-8Z97EORC95BX5V8Y5KZK/image-asset.jpeg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez: Mance Rayder They fight for minorities and the impoverished with a message that those protected by a wall – whether it be of ice or socio-economic privilege – consider radical. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1581288063569-09CAKYAMXG2MNLD5ZZAK/Slide15.jpg Blog - Politicians as Game of Thrones Characters - Stephen Miller: The Night King Hell-bent on destroying anyone who isn’t part of their white tribe. Existential threats to humanity. https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/1/29/which-recording-musicians-most-deserve-tenure monthly 0.5 2020-01-29 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/2020/1/16/how-to-fix-college-football monthly 0.5 2020-01-16 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/bestalbums2019caleb monthly 0.5 2020-01-13 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/townieblogintro monthly 0.5 2022-05-10 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/politics monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/Nirvana monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/Beatles monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/Alabama monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/academic+research monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/Clemson monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/Grateful+Dead monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/Jimi+Hendrix monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/FBS monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/judgment+and+decision-making monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/p-hacking monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/college+football monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/The+Hold+Steady monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/blog/tag/game+of+thrones monthly 0.5 https://bandoftownies.com/home-1 daily 0.75 2018-12-07 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53fe025fe4b09b99036bcf87/1412370553660-JGJWF6DPBVRXOV6TF8RD/EbruYildiz_325_edit.jpg Home https://bandoftownies.com/contact daily 0.75 2018-11-27 https://bandoftownies.com/copy-of-meet-the-band2 daily 0.75 2018-11-28 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53fe025fe4b09b99036bcf87/1410274433797-72A136KIEQM1THNPMZVA/EbruYildiz_646_3.jpg Meet the Band https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53fe025fe4b09b99036bcf87/1410274433212-8JTAJ5JLN9YPNQUFTXXH/EbruYildiz_602_3.jpg Meet the Band https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53fe025fe4b09b99036bcf87/1410274434672-QOTVKNM1TXWO5CUOOM1K/EbruYildiz_693_2.jpg Meet the Band https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53fe025fe4b09b99036bcf87/1410274435231-87CAYRRRATKXQ6GSXTKD/EbruYildiz_735_2.jpg Meet the Band https://bandoftownies.com/live daily 0.75 2014-10-04 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53fe025fe4b09b99036bcf87/1412382515167-NYTYRFP4MI9A3XNUUR27/EbruYildiz_372.jpg Live https://bandoftownies.com/gigs daily 0.75 2025-10-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/d7e5c5df-96f4-4d37-ad41-3b48a43a5618/2022-08-31+11_06_31-Photo+-+Google+Photos.jpg Shows https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/ca7caad4-5479-44cd-ba38-eff02f3b0cef/IMG_0558.JPG Shows - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/learn-more daily 0.75 2018-11-28 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1543354681724-7M3J5DYDHYGKAXWI6NT5/image-asset.jpeg Learn More Our band tries to capture this sound by performing covers lifted from a townie bar jukebox alongside original songs about townies and the boys and girls who party with them. https://bandoftownies.com/caleb-warren daily 0.75 2025-10-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/49513c8a-24f0-47db-bc65-4672f2ce3c35/3.jpg Caleb - Caleb Warren Vocals, Guitar, Harp Caleb grew up partying with townies in Marblehead, parking cars on the beach, driving Park 5 around the neck, and trying to sneak into Maddie’s Sail Loft with FJ and Fernandiesel. At 18, he left home to drift in and out of Atlanta, GA, Boulder, CO, Milan, Italy, and College Station, TX, before landing in Tucson in 2016. Caleb started writing lyrics before he could play an instrument, and has co-written songs with Andrew Gravel (the Gravel Project), Nick Byron Campbell (Arizona, Wages), Josh Edwin (Yellow & Green), and David Bardolet. He picked up the guitar in college, and formed the seedling of Band of Townies in a basement near Boulder with his cousins Eric and Johnny Schmidt (formerly of the Bellmars). Caleb’s songs tell of the people he’s met – or sometimes viewed from a distance – in all of their beautiful, insecure, hungover, love-struck, heartbroken, inebriated, and insane glory. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/59ef4d8a-497a-4fbd-b2f7-3a191a0e94f3/IMG_0674%5B1%5D.JPG Caleb - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/meettheband/john daily 0.75 2025-10-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1556251401419-CTQ8BUIEVW0VJGMXPUU2/2019-04-25+21_01_16-Photo+-+Google+Photos.jpg John - John Sharp Vocals, Lead Guitar John began playing live music in St. Louis, MO, performing in front of live audiences at age 14. Coffee houses and crappy bars littered his experience in stops in Champaign, IL, Tucson, AZ, Portland, OR and Chicago, IL before settling in Tucson in 2014. When you grow up in the Midwest, partying with townies is a way of life. With his buddies from college, John formed Poor Man’s Cow, a band that evolved into a 6-piece jam band modeled after the likes of The Grateful Dead and Widespread Panic. Moving to Tucson in 2014, John continued to write songs about men with women who have gone bad, and sometimes men who just do bad things. He also performed with some smaller acts prior to hearing Caleb Warren’s exquisite pontificating about Madison, Morgan, Tommy, and all the townies that went before. Band of Townies was born, and John will continue to play and sing into oblivion. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/9f8b2e87-fde0-4a19-922c-f2887468af74/IMG_0598.JPG John - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/adam daily 0.75 2025-10-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1556251801857-YNRB0M7KHD80Q8M1HFXU/2019-04-25+21_09_04-Photo+-+Google+Photos.jpg Adam - Adam Lazarewicz Bass, Vocals Sprung from the depths of Malden MA, Adam Lazarewicz has been a member of such bands as Genetic Defect, Tesknota, and the Indigo Girls. After being asked to leave each of these outfits (“How did you figure out the new security code for our rehearsal space??”), he made his way to Tucson, where he was taken in by some sympathetic townies. His guitar has 6 strings, but he thinks that’s too many, so the townies handed him a bass. He wants you to know that he likes you and hopes that you have a nice day. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/acb0aa99-d9b1-48cc-ae7a-ede3583a66b4/IMG_0566.JPG Adam - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/home daily 1.0 2025-05-28 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633268729745-ZLT6KCWUWC9DSIONEW5O/PWT+9+2021.jpg Parties with Townies - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/c126599d-6b22-4172-9930-94b05203502c/BandofTowniesMotoSonora.JPG Parties with Townies - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1556253107188-RBHYHPLX2B1AFPJOTF9S/IMG_20190419_200444+%281%29.jpg Parties with Townies https://bandoftownies.com/parties-with-townies daily 0.75 2018-12-07 https://bandoftownies.com/nate daily 0.75 2025-10-06 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/1633209331589-DE7BXQW2AHS88NM3XB0R/NateHarvey.png Nate - Nathan Harvey Percussion From humble roots in South Dakota, Nathan has sought to experience as much of this world as possible from Tool dungeons and NoFX moshpits to Phish fries and String Cheese jamborees. He draws inspiration from Jazz, Latin, Classical, Jam, Bluegrass, Funk, Soul, Rock, and Kendrick Lamar. Nathan lives for live music, and he lives in Tucson with his wife and children. He enjoys travel, hikes, fine arts, finer food, and the finest whiskey. Nathan loves life in all its subtle shades. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5be07bf196e76f1702026780/bc605538-af36-41e0-8a21-d60692199970/IMG_0568.JPG Nate - Make it stand out Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference. https://bandoftownies.com/readme-horizon daily 0.75 2025-05-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/53fe025fe4b09b99036bcf87/1412690352982-NEV633P54K2ET77XRKMZ/EbruYildiz_386.jpg Readme