I want to start out by saying that I've been a pretty big failure at this for the past few weeks. Those couple of 60 & 70 degree days really caught me off guard, and I haphazardly threw my posts together. Vitamin D will do that to a girl.

"Luckily", the sun is gone again, it's cold as the dickens (as my great-grandmother used to say) and I'm ready to buckle down.

Truthfully, I owe a lot to Pitchfork for reigniting my fire.  Pitchfork is definitely one of the most frustrating facets of the music industry, but their review of Lucius' new album was some of the biggest BULLSHIT I've read from them in awhile.

I was really curious about what Good Grief would bring to the table, since their freshman album Wildewoman was such an exciting find for me when it came out. I listen to their song Turn It Around to pump me up almost every day. It's like Jessica's daily affirmation ritual, but not cute. Even with that track being so unbelievably amazing and integral to my every day life, I really believe that Good Grief blows Wildewoman out of the water: not in the way that Wildewoman was "okay" and Good Grief is "better," but more like a continuance of the water metaphor: Wildewoman was a beautiful, splash-less dive from a Junior Olympian who has great promise, and Good Grief was the crazy friend who showed up to the actual Olympics and did the most unbelievable & obnoxious cannonball you've ever seen and all the people in the stands storm the judges table and steal all the number 10 posters and jump into the pool with them.

But not the fucking Pitchfork judge. In this metaphor, Pitchfork isn't the group of international spectators. In this metaphor, Pitchfork is the pissy Olympic judge from Russia who gave Good Grief a 6.3 out of 10 just because emoting makes them uncomfortable.

"As put-together as Good Grief’s presentation is, and as ingratiating as its songs are, the record suffers from a distinct lack of identity..... making Good Grief sound like everything at once but nothing in particular. "

Whatever, Pitchfork. We don't all have concrete identities, and we don't need them either. Have you ever read Humans of New York? Do you think it would be so widely popular if all the people that were interviewed were like "Sup, I'm Kevin and I have it all figured out. Interview over."

Good Grief is full of energy and harmonious belting, and if that's not cohesive enough for you, then you can fuck right off.

With that note, I'm going to be listening to Beau next week (and still probably Lucius).
Beau released a lil baby, self-titled EP last year and I liked 4 out of the 5 songs on it (Soar Across the Sea was not my cup of tea). I'm excited to dive into this new album, although I'm a little disappointed that they kept my least favorite song and cut my favorite.

I'm not sure why I chose to listen to this. Probably because people on Twitter told me to.

Which artists' new release should be my next album of the week? #NewMusicFriday

— Cait Cliff (@Cait__Cliff) March 11, 2016

 It's Jeff, so it's super melancholy, and almost every track is just a different version/demo of songs that have already been released. Honestly, it's a little creepy that he's been dead for 20 years now and 90% of his albums are posthumous releases.

In spite of all that, I still decided that I would lust after it, hoping that with a new album there would be something new to discover about Jeff after all these years.

That doesn't seem to be the case here, but nevertheless I'm still not necessarily disappointed that I chose this album for the week. It's given me a chance to get reacquainted with old favorites and discover new gems that I had overlooked back in the day when I was listening to Hallelujah on repeat.

The final track on the album "I Know It's Over," is both perfection and irony. It's a Smiths cover at Jeff's most vulnerable and emotive. The irony is that we'll never believe it's over.

I'm very excited for this week's selection for primarily sentimental reasons.

First, let me take you back in time. The year is 2010, and my brand new beau has just burned me the very first mix cd of our courtship (I had already made him at least 10 at this point. It's how I show affection). This was a big moment for me, because it is my belief that when someone handpicks a track list for you, it's essentially their way of laying their soul out on the table. Or so I thought.

The track list was pretty varied but was mostly happy, upbeat tracks, perfect for summer love. Reading far too deeply into his selections, I was surprised when there were 2 songs back to back by the same artist: Thao Nguyen.

I thought "wow. these are positively joyful. This guy must be a big fan of hers."

The songs were:

1. Bag of Hammers
2. Swimming Pools



Flash forward to the present. A couple weeks ago I saw that Saintseneca, one of Chris & my favorite bands, would be opening for Thao in April this year. No one ever comes to Cincinnati, so this is a pretty big deal.

I told Chris "it's like our past and present are coming full circle."

He responded with "Who is Thao?"

He's bad at  knowing the names of any artists, so I decided I would play him one of the songs from the mix CD of our youth.

Nothing. Not a single flicker of recognition. Visual artists can be so frustrating sometimes. 

Oh well.

The point is, Thao, I remember you, and I'm looking forward to our week together.

Also, I find it ridiculous that Chris can remember every time it's "my turn" to kill a stink bug in our apartment, but has zero recollection of a song that he listened to, and liked enough to put on a CD for his new girlfriend.

Whatever.