Saves The Day - At Your Funeral

At Your Funeral is the opening track from Saves The Day's third album Stay What You Are. It is probably their most popular track and was played tones on mtv2 back in the early 00's. Due to it being played so much I haven't listened to it for years, but the singer was recently on a Podcast I listen to discussing the song and hearing it brought back all kinds of memories.

The song was written after the singer as a young man went to hang out with a band he really respected at practice and all they did was drink and smoke, so he ended up being disappointed with the experience and saw this as the end of that relationship and having those guys on a pedestal and therefore wrote this song on the back of this. 

It is the typical pop punk 3 barre chord track but they do so much to make it a great track.

Covert Flops - Spy School Dropout

Covert Flops are an Indiana 3 piece (Chad (guitar vox), Adam (drums), Billy (Bass vox)) and if you like The Lillingtons, Ramones, Queers etc then you'll like these guys. Titled Mission: Implausible, they have released a new album and it is more of what you'd expect from them. They're still singing about spies and they're still influenced by The Ramones and The Lillingtons' The Backchannel Broadcast album. They're still lots of fun. The album's available via Mon's Basement Records

This track is called Spy School Dropout... 

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Teenage Bigfoot - The CIA Killed Bill Hicks

Teenage Bigfoot are a trio from Philadelphia featuring Tiffany Tavella (bass/vocals), Joe Gdowik (guitar/vocals) & Jake Wunderlich (drums). They've been plying their fun, 90's pop punk influenced wares since 2013 and have built up a solid back catalogue of music. Their latest release is a new album titled Weapons Against Darkness and it's pretty damn impressive. 

Pop punk influenced it may be but it's the powerful, punchy brand of pop punk, not the anodyne kind. It's pacy, bounce around party music for punks who want to go to a show and get all sweaty.

It's available now on Bloated Kat Records as a name your price download.

This is a highlight, it's titled The CIA Killed Bill Hicks...

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Kill Lincoln - That Song

The DC ska-punks released a cover of the Bouncing Souls track That Song as part of the compilation "Having a Bad Time, Wish You Were Here" which is available on vinyl + digital from Bad Time Records. It is a great version of an already brilliant track.

Enjoy!

Postage - 80-85

Postage are a "mid tempo loud abrasive melodic pop punk" band from Albany, New York, who's line up is Mike Moak (guitars/vocals), Tyler Paige (guitar), Chris Millington (drums) and Eric Pressman (bass). The members are genre veterans having served their time playing in bands such as Signal Lost, Male Patterns, Mystery Girl and After the Fall. 

They released the 4 track Flexi ep in 2019 and then a split single the following year with Mikey Erg. Their Self Titled album is now available to check out in it's entirety and a very enjoyable listen it is. Several of the tracks which were originally on those earlier releases have been given a loving polish. 

All the tracks are catchy and worthy of  multiple plays and I am going with 80-85.

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The Mighty Mighty Bosstones - I Don’t Believe in Anything

The latest album from The Bosstones, which came out a few months back now, is a glorious example of the band at its greatest, ska- punk acolytes that can write one hell of a catchy, lyrically smart track. For me, you have to go all the way back to 2000’s Pay Attention to find an album that is song for song this consistently solid in The Bosstones’ back catalogue.

I am going with I Don’t Believe in Anything which offers some insight as to how the near-forty-year-old band chose to keep their hands busy over the last year.

The Copyrights - Part Of The Landscape

Midwest poppy punks The Copyrights' first album in seven years, Alone In A Dome, came out a few weeks back via Fat Wreck Chords and ahead of the release, they premiered new single "Part of the Landscape." It's an anthemic punk song with a huge-sounding chorus that should instantly scratch an itch for longtime Copyrights fans, or just as any fans of melodic punk in general.

Vocalist/bassist Adam Fletcher tells us, "'Part of the Landscape' was the first song Luke brought to the table when we started the process of making a new record. After we had recorded it, we all agreed that it was a stone-cold jam, and it gave us some momentum to keep working towards having enough new songs to make a whole album. Growing old in a crumbling midwest city is something I think many people can probably relate to. The line 'you're gonna die alone in a Bucky dome' was the inspiration for the album title and the video. A 'bucky' dome is a reference to Buckminster Fuller; he was an author, futurist, and designer most known for his geodesic dome design. We shot some of the video in Fuller's original geodesic dome home that he lived in while he was in Carbondale."

Check it out below...

The Exbats - Ghost In The Record Store

Tucson's amazing The Exbats have released a new video for The Ghost in the record store. From the band's new album Now Where Were We is out now via Goner records.

Exquisitely amazing and seasonally apt video features the actual cool record store Wooden Tooth Records. A catchy and great track.

This is The Ghost in the record store.

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Vista Blue - Ya Bang!

Vista Blue released a 4 track ep titled New Nightmares and the songs are inspired by a quartet of horror movies; Halloween III, Candyman, Terror Train & Friday the 13th VI.

As always with the Nashville power pop outfit what we get is a very catchy collection of songs and you can get the ep as a name your price download on their Bandcamp.

This track is the Friday the 13th VI inspired one, or to be more specific it's inspired by the cop in that movie who has a laser scope that he says he's been dying to use. He says, "Wherever the red dot goes... ya bang!" It's one of the most famous and cheesiest quotes from the series and there's a clip of the scene here. 

A fun love song, this is Ya Bang!

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Surfbort - Youth Group Therapy

An album that's providing me with much pleasure this morning is Keep On Truckin'. It's by Surfbort and it's essential listening. It's packed with should be hits. It's commercial enough to pick up mainstream acclaim but cool enough to keep us more discerning types happy too. 

We've already had the pleasure of a few of the tracks such as FML, White Claw Enema Bong Hit and new single Big Star but by no means are they the only high points. Songs such as Open Your Eyes, Dicks In Space, Youth Group Therapy (just to name a few) are equally infectious. It's an album that's consistent throughout. 

With so many great highlights to select from, I'm going with Youth Group Therapy.

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Dazy - Invisible Thing

In August of 2020, James Goodson, a music publicist based in Richmond, started posting songs on Bandcamp under the name Dazy. Goodson played all the instruments on that song, recording them with a sloppy lo-fi urgency, but the songs sounded huge. Dazy’s music is sticky, fuzzy, overwhelmingly catchy power-pop, and it’s got hooks for days. Goodson didn’t make a huge deal about pushing those songs out to the world, but the songs were too good to stay hidden on Bandcamp.

After a series of two-song singles, Goodson released a couple of slightly longer Dazy EPs, Revolving Door and The Crowded Mind, earlier this year. This week, he announced plans to release everything he’d made with Dazy thus far on a new cassette called MAXIMUMBLASTSUPERLOUD: The First 24 Songs. That compilation, which is already out in the world, includes three new songs, including the single “Invisible Thing.”

Hearing all 24 of these short, compact bursts of melody in a row is just crazy. This doesn’t sound like the kind of thing that an active band or artist would make. Instead, MAXIMUMBLASTSUPERLOUD sounds like a greatest-hits compilation from one of those ’90s bands that signed to a major label after Nirvana but then never blew up even though the songs all kicked ass, since they wouldn’t go along with the label’s plans to record in a pro studio. But this is all just one guy, and he’s still cranking these bad boys out. There’s not one skip on this collection; it’s nuts.

It is the single that I am going with today. This is Invisible Thing.

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Capgun Heroes - Stuck withYou

Chicago-based punk band, Capgun Heroes play fast, hooky pop-punk in the vein of the Ramones, Screeching Weasel, and Riverdales. They are are Joe Capgun (vocals), Matt Cappy (guitar), Andy Hero (guitar), Nick Hero (guitar), Jimmy C. (bass), and Scotty (drums) and if you like your punk rock with plenty of buzzsaw guitars, saccharine melodies and tons of energy, then they have got you covered on their debut full-length. Throughout the dozen songs that make up ‘Last Call For Adderall’, they don’t exactly hide the fact that they worship at the altar of the Ramones, Screeching Weasel and Riverdales to name but a few. But Capgun Heroes bang out these tunes with so much enthusiasm that it goes a long way.

It’s nothing you haven’t heard before and the vocal harmonies aren’t always as airtight as you’d like them to be. But honestly, it doesn’t take away from the fact that Capgun Heroes delivered a fun debut with ‘Last Call For Adderall’.

I am sharing the track "Stuck With You" which has really solid riffage that leads to a bombastic chorus with all instrumentation kicking in gear. It's a catchy enough song, but the real winner on the song are the drum fills. They feel all off and weird and wrong in a way that ends up memorable and fun.  Falling off the rails?  Almost, but it feels so good.

https://capgunheroes.bandcamp.com/album/last-call-for-adderall

Slothrust - The Next Curse

Slothrust (pronounced sloth-rust) is an American alternative rock band from Boston, Massachusetts. The band consists of Leah Wellbaum (vocals, guitar), Kyle Bann (bass), and Will Gorin (drums) though Brooks Allison has been on bass duty on their recent tour. Wellbaum and Gorin first began collaborating as students at Sarah Lawrence College. After performing in various school groups, the two joined to create music with a "heavier" sound. In search for a bassist, Bann later joined the band.

The name Slothrust came together as a combination of Wellbaum's former project "Slothbox" and "rust" to signify time passing.

After a number of singles they released their latest album Parallel Timeline last month.  It’s a new direction for Slothrust, and one that might require a few listens to fully adjust to, but once that adjustment takes place, don’t be surprised if it draws you in for repeat listens.

I am sharing The Next Curse which features Lzzy Hale of hard rock group Halestorm. It oozes a confident attitude with powerful vocals alongside a gliding melody and gradually echoing poetic words with gritty guitars.

The World is a Beautiful Place & I am No Longer Afraid to Die - Infinite Josh

The long, melodramatic band name. The expansive and oft-shifting lineup. The grandiose, post-rock-infused approach to emo. The World Is A Beautiful Place & I Am No Longer Afraid To Die have always been about going big. 

Their latest album is titled Illusory Walls and it finds the Philly-based unit reduced to five members: David Bello on lead vocals and guitar, Katie Dvorak on lead vocals and synth, Steven Buttery on drums and percussion, Josh Cyr (the band’s sole remaining founding member) on bass and backing vocals, and production maestro Chris Teti on “guitar, vocals, bass, and programming.” Structurally, they are as close to a “normal band” as they’ve ever been. But returning past their scene’s expiration date with a scaled-down lineup has not in any way hemmed in this band’s ambitions. If anything, this is TWIABP’s heaviest, proggiest, most audacious release to date.

TWIABP could have returned with just the final two tracks, called them an album, and no one would have flinched or complained. These are two incredible pieces of music, sprawling in scope yet densely packed with sound and self-referential Easter eggs, each one a journey unto itself. Both of them instantly rank among this band’s finest achievements. The first of the two is the track I am going with. Infinite Josh is a title that calls back to the band’s 2011 EP Josh Is Dead and music that keeps stacking upon itself, building ever skyward in prismatic echoes and choreographed lightning. “Our dreams get drowned in a river of present needs,” Bello repeats in one of the album’s most affecting metaphors. “The years float by like fallen leaves.” Bello’s poetic imagery moves along the horizontal axis, yet the music behind him keeps moving vertically, intensifying as it goes. It’s like watching all creation spiral upward into oblivion.

The Last Gang - Shameless

The biggest surprise album during 2018 for me, was The Last Gang’s Fat Wreck debut (but sophomore album) Keep Them Counting, so the news of the release of Noise Noise Noise has been one of excitement and anticipation.

Noise Noise Noise has many of the same elements that made Keep Them Counting such a pleasant surprise; hard hitting lyrics, Red’s distinctive vocals, catchy guitar riffs, however Noise Noise Noise wears its reggae ska punk influence on its sleeve, with Red stating she listened to a lot of Trojan Records artists in writing this album. This adds another layer and depth to the album, making Noise Noise Noise an accomplished, albeit unexpected entry into The Last Gang’s catalogue. 

‘Shameless’ is a melodi earworm that will stick in your head, and allows Red to exercise her vocal chops in a way that fans haven’t experienced before.

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Dillinger Four - Gainesville

I've been on a bit of a Dillinger Four kick recently and in particular their latest release Civil War as it gets a lot of flack, which is undeserved in my opinion.

In many ways they are what modern "punk" bands wish they were. Their songs are structured like 80s straight-edge hardcore anthems, but the band is generally too drunk to play them. If they only abandon a couple songs midway through their live shows, that’s considered a success. They rarely tour, much less play outside of the Midwest USA; and, if they had their druthers, they’d probably never leave Minneapolis ever again. Any opportunity that's come along that might in some way further their career, they've taken off running in the opposite direction. They are music's underachiever laureates; either dumb geniuses or genius dummies. But despite their slacker approach, or perhaps because of it, while they may not be a household name like some of their peers, they somehow became what is quite possibly the most beloved, most influential punk band of their generation. The band ushered in a new era of plainclothes punk, putting the emphasis back on substance over style - still fast and abrasive, but with a wiseass edge to it. Their four albums are brilliant, but their productions are so distorted and odd that it's like they're deliberately trying to turn people off - an open challenge to discover the perfect songs buried underneath the mess. What you'd see is exactly what they are: four working class, often intoxicated, self-professed fat guys from Minneapolis. Everything about Dillinger Four comes off as one big shoulder shrug. Hell, their official website is still hosted on Angelfire! The members routinely pass up offers to play tours and festivals that their peers would kill for. Sometimes it's due to work obligations — they all own, manage, or work at bars in Minnesota, with the exception of drummer Lane Pederson who, somewhat miraculously, is a successful clinical psychologist with three books under his belt. Other times, they refuse to miss family obligations like their kids' or wives' birthdays. But most times, they just plain ol' don't feel like it. They could have made a ton of cash, but you have to respect them sticking to their values also. Most wouldn't. They got asked about a festival and replied with "Why would we play something we wouldn't dream of attending ourselves?" Fair point...

I am sharing Gainesville from Civil War which is my favourite on the record, if not one of my favourites of all time. Because of the lyrics "And It Feels Like Summer In October, And I Hope This Day Is Never Over" Gainesville has become the anthem for The Fest, a week end festival in erm Gainesville, which happens every year in late October. It's an uplifting song about not wasting your life waiting for things to happen and instead going out and getting them yourself. This is summed up perfectly in the bridge of the song "Time Was Wasted, We're Moving Way Too Slow, Lets Go Before We're Old, Time Doesn't Wait For Me". This is a fantastic sing-a-long, fist-in-the-air song that I have had stuck in my head all week!

Loose Nukes - Inferno

Formed in 2016 and from Houston, Texas, Loose Nukes released a split 7" with Under Attack earlier this year and now the Black Mass demos LP which features 11 hard hitting cuts.= has come our way.

If you like your punk music to pummel you senseless then you can find the album on Bandcamp. 

This track's called Inferno...

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Thrice - Summer Set Fire to the Rain

Thrice released their 11th studio album Horizons/East last month, the southern Californian band’s third since ending a hiatus in 2015, with an already 12th album forthcoming in the works titled Horizons/West. It's an album I've been sat on for a couple of weeks. With lots of clear influences and varying tracks, I've not been sure which to go with. You have some very Brand New sound tracks from Devil & God sounding, Daisy and even Science Fiction. There is also some that sound a bit Deftones where one could be on In Rainbows. Interesting times.

I have settled on Summer Set Fire to the Rain and it is a triumphant roar unlike anything we’ve heard from them before. Heavy and melodic in equal measures it has some great riffs too.

THICK - Your Mom

Born from the DIY/all-ages scene in New York, THICK make music with the raw defiance of punk and addictive melodies of pop, punchy and catchy and wildly tongue-in-cheek. With their live show typically spawning a mosh pit described by Stereogum as “more like an aggressive hug,” the Brooklyn-based trio brings an unchecked intimacy while building a deep and unshakable solidarity with the audience. 

I am going with the epic speedball punk track “Your Mom” which I would probably describe as 90's influenced Riot Grrrl music. It is a track from their 2019 Epitaph release "5 Years Behind".

Elway - The English Wishbone

Elway has emerged from the Pandemic with some new music, and they’re leading the way with their latest song, “The English Wishbone”, the A-side of a 2-track single which also features 'Kronos V. Kairos'. The title is a reference to Sam Russo and James Hull of Apologies, I Have None — both “twiggy, waifish Englishmen” who remind vocalist Tim Browne of a wishbone and the B-side is possibly a Simpsons reference? This new single somehow has two(?) choruses and some absolutely ripping lead guitar, so check it out and get saved.