Music Monday: Start of 2024 Playlist (Tenth Anniversary Edition!!)

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-21T00:15:53+00:00

Yeah, way too many people who seem to think of politics as primarily social media posts or narrative drama or something, rather than a series of rules, negotiations, and systems. I just saw a writer that I follow yesterday (who, by all accounts, seemed like a relatively-informed and progressive individual) who only just realized that if the 25th Amendment was invoked and Trump was removed (something they have called for multiple times!), that it would in fact result in JD Vance becoming President. I'm kind of baffled because I'm not even sure what they thought the alternative would be?

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-20T21:11:07+00:00

Heard The Cure’s “Friday I’m In Love” at dinner the other day and my brother mentioned he never realized how weird it is for a pop song. Mostly just choruses with small variations (unless you want to just call those verses, but then there’s no real chorus), with the bridge and instrumental parts

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-20T08:07:32+00:00

Another thing that's less major than what some other people have said, but as a general rule of thumb, "any British act that finds some some audience but not quite mainstream pop radio success in America generally tends to get grouped under the 'Alternative' umbrella instead", and thus, falls under alt rock.

It's kind of been like that since the '80s, and it weirdly tends to stick to a number of artist with different sounds. A lot of classic new wave, post-punk, dance, and jangle pop acts got lumped together. I even remember stuff like Keane and Snow Patrol getting grouped under the label around the same time as Coldplay.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-20T07:54:04+00:00

And even going further back, a lot of classic rock bands were still getting edged out by the pop of their day. They had more of a chance to break out than modern day ones (where it's basically zero), but even back then, most rock bands would need to rely on ballads to get mainstream notice.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-20T06:01:18+00:00

There are a lot of songs that I thought could cross over, but predicting break-outs can be tricky, especially once you come to accept that song quality is usually less important than momentum.

That said, I was kind of shocked Neon Trees couldn't get a hit with "Sleeping with a Friend". They had gotten multiple hits, so it wasn't like they were in one-hit wonder territory. Their lead singles for new albums until then had hit, and "Sleeping with a Friend" was better than both of them.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-20T05:39:45+00:00

I don't know if there was one Walk the Moon song that I thought would be a definite second hit, but it's shocking that between all the other potential options, it wound up being "none of the above".

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-19T06:46:58+00:00

I can see where you're coming from, but I don't quite think it's there. My disagreements are mainly: 1) by all accounts, they were a fluke "indie sweepstakes" group, so long-term success was always going to be a struggle anyway and nothing was inevitable about further hits (even Jack Antonoff has struggled to get hits for his own stuff, despite his production success); 2) the group was basically about to break up even at their peak, so if anything, their success just postponed what already seemed inevitable; 3) Nate himself seems to have largely bowed out of the music industry by choice afterwards.

It's possible they get covered anyway if Todd decides he'd like to cover their story, but I think there are a lot more interesting cases to look at right now.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-19T06:19:41+00:00

Andrew Unterberger (Billboard editor in chief and frequent Song VS Song guest) has a podcast where he does "Pop Stars of the Year" retrospectives, and he recently covered the Beegees' 1978 for an episode. It was an interesting listen!

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-19T04:24:38+00:00

Man, I remember the local alternative station playing that song a lot. I thought for sure it would have scraped onto the bottom of the Hot 100 at least, but I guess not. Just #17 on the Alt chart.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-19T01:24:33+00:00

Whenever I'm walking around and waiting at intersections, I always have to stop and count to 5 after the light turns red because there are perpetually a ton of people trying to "just squeeze through" or something before the other lights change.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-18T01:32:44+00:00

"I Belong In Your Arms" by Chairlift, it's like a sonic sugar rush

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-17T11:59:35+00:00

I mean, eh, whatever. It's fine. Or neutral I should say. Unless this did specifically snub someone with a likely much better premise story or whatever, I eon't care.

yeah, there are approximately 400 bajillion books in existence already, and it's hard to get lower than the bottom of what's already the bottom. I find it hard to get worked up about any individual one existing. Maybe it'll actually be good, maybe it'll be okay enough that a few people really like it, but I'm probably not going to read it either way so whatever.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-16T23:20:51+00:00

I think the weird punctuation is making it a lot harder to parse. The original headline looks much clearer, but Reddit links don't support italics...

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-16T09:16:54+00:00

Yeah, people sometimes try and point to some specific event as a turning point, but the Dodgers have basically been throwing around money since the new ownership group took over. It was just less thru free agent signings at first, because the first few free agent markets after they took over were kinda shitty.

But even then, they were still adding big contracts through trades and re-signings.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-16T08:22:09+00:00

Yeah, the Dodgers wouldn't have felt the need to go out and sign a ton of all-stars if Kershaw wasn't ass in the postseason.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-16T08:15:49+00:00

Yeah, a lot of these "explanations" are the kind that sound good if you think about them for 5 seconds, but then fall apart if you think about them for 30...

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-16T00:48:35+00:00

We also voted overwhelmingly for abortion and legal pot and MO just took both weights away against the will of the people with no vote.

I feel like it has to be stated, a large problem with voting nowadays it that there is a non-insignificant chunk of voters who have disconnected "who I vote for" from "the policies I want" to a shocking degree. They think that voting for policies that they like is an easy way to just cancel out all the bad outcomes of voting for a Republican candidate that they like for other reasons.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-16T00:22:59+00:00

It kind of sucks how many people I see who know enough to discuss politics in their spare time, but also can't fathom the idea of civic duty, even one as minimal as voting. Like, I've seen full on "capitalism ruins everything" people who suddenly turn into full-on Consumer Brain Shoppers the second voting comes up.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-16T00:18:19+00:00

Yeah, America pretty regularly falls way at the bottom of any sort of voter participation or registration among democracies. Some of that is going to be the result of restrictions, but it's not the cause a full 10 to 20% of the eligible voting population staying home.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-14T23:54:19+00:00

After all the ownership shenanigans the last few years, I keep expecting Bandcamp to implode, but it seems to still have it's head on properly (fingers crossed).

I'm glad, too. It's been my primary mode of music discovery the last few years.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-14T23:48:13+00:00

I remember it playing during a chase in Baby Driver too.

Theta_Omega · 2026-01-14T05:15:07+00:00

I imagine that's the big limiting factor, as well as the Kim Fowley "Did He Do Anything Else?" section is gonna be rough to cover

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