Author Archives: ike

The noisy, tattered demo version of P.S. Eliot’s “Troubled Medium” blows me away every single time.

Stuck in my head song of today: Paramore – Hard Times. Put on your dancing shoes!

I love love love Incredible Doom.

Musically the best thing so far this year has been Joe Talbot in his throaty drunken voice shouting “I KISSED A BOY AND I LIKED IT“.

Could be really great and all, but I really do miss the Annie Clark from that Kerosene cover.

The Beths released a great debut album a while back. Just found out they will be playing in my town in just a couple months.

Gorgeous stuck in my head song of today: Fear of Men – Island.

Now that we lost the Arcade Fire to electronics, Merge obviously decided we need another Funeral-like knockoff.

But hey, instead of whining, why not post my favourite song of this year?

2018 keeps on failing to deliver great new albums.

Since I’m off Twitter, I’ll be summoning this site back to life for posting irregular updates about what I’m up to. Mostly music-related, I guess.

Best albums of 2017

Big Thief – Capacity Listen to “Mythological Beauty” (YouTube) Aye Nako – Silver Haze Listen to “Particle Mace” (YouTube) Beaches – Second of Spring Listen to “Arrow” (YouTube) Katie Von Schleicher – Shitty Hits Listen to “Paranoia” (YouTube) Menace Beach – Lemon Memory Listen to “Suck It Out” (YouTube) Vagabon – Infinite Worlds Listen to […]

Best albums of 2016

Amber Arcades – Fading Lines Listen to “Fading Lines” (YouTube) The Julie Ruin – Hit Reset Listen to “I Decide” (YouTube) Eleanor Friedberger – New View Listen to “Sweetest Girl” (YouTube) King Gizzard & the Wizard Lizard – Nonagon Infinity Listen to “Robot Stop (Live)” (YouTube) Parquet Courts – Human Performance Listen to “Dust” (YouTube) […]

Best albums of 2014

Fear of Men – Loom Listen to “Descent” (SoundCloud) September Girls – Cursing the Sea Listen to “Heartbeats” (YouTube) Death Vessel – Island Intervals Listen to “Ilsa Drown” (YouTube) Hookworms – The Hum Listen to “The Impasse” (YouTube) Clark – Clark Listen to “The Grit in the Pearl” (SoundCloud) Cold Beat – Over Me Listen […]

Neutral Milk Hotel @ Le Trianon, Paris

Jeff Mangum wrote just a few handfuls of songs, and with those and the help of a couple of friends he released two of the best albums in the entire history of music: Neutral Milk Hotel‘s “On Avery Island” and “In The Aeroplane Over The Sea” – then he disappeared. This was in 1999, and between then […]

Hospitality @ Vera

Drove all the way up to Groningen to see Hospitality at the Vera this weekend. It was a lovely show on a couple of levels, not in the least because I never expected to see them live, ever – they’re not particularly huge here. As a matter of fact, their debut album caught me by complete surprise because […]

Kurt Cobain died 20 years ago today

Seeing exactly this at my parents’ house is how I found out about Kurt Cobain’s death in April 1994. Although I was as shocked as anyone, I didn’t know about the full story until years later, when I saw BBC’s The Seven Ages of Rock. I’ve always known about it by and large – heroin addiction, unable to cope […]

Speedy Ortiz & Eagulls @ Paradiso

Went to see Eagulls and Speedy Ortiz yesterday. Regardless of how damn good (and loud) Eagulls were, their show was WASTED by the headliners. Not only the sheer genius of Speedy Ortiz’s songs, but the way they just as easily hurled through them – amazing. I dearly, dearly missed “Fun”, my all-time Speedy Ortiz favorite. […]

Some duelling thoughts about bands reuniting

The Pixies* are getting a lot of hostility over releasing a bunch of new, supposedly mediocre, if not downright terrible songs – I can’t judge, because I haven’t heard any of them: “I’m reading a press release for EP2 and weeping at the downright awfulness of the legacy fucking parody act that is using the […]

Last year’s best albums

Beaches – She Beats Listen to “Send Them Away” (YouTube) Scout Niblett – It’s Up To Emma Listen to “Gun” (YouTube) Eefje de Visser – Het Is Listen to “Er Is” (Bandcamp) Yo La Tengo – Fade Listen to “Ohm” (YouTube) Phosphorescent – Muchacho Listen to “Song For Zula” (YouTube) Speedy Ortiz – Major Arcana […]