The Essex Green was the other really great one if you ask me.

Festivalization of live music in the US was already killing off local live music scenes before Covid. Instead of playing a headlining show at a small club on a bill with 2 or 3 other newer acts bands end up small print acts playing 45 minute daytime sets on the festival circuit.

Not as big of a deal when it was only like Coachella and Bonaroo. But then along came the rebooted Lollapalooza, ACL Fest and regional fests in every part of the country. And the tent-pole fests expanded to multiple weekends. To play the festival and get the fat paycheck for a short set the bands aren't allowed to play shows close to their festival date.

Might be why all those clubs along Belmont (Schuba's/Beat Kitchen/the irish-y spot just west of Ashland) started running stand-up comedy shows in their music rooms about a decade or so ago. Initially just on slow weeknights and then eventually taking over the weekend slots as well. Before the Covid shutdown, Lincoln Hall/Thalia etc were even running "live podcast" shows in lieu of bands.

Indie Rock: Music so good you can't get a lot of people to like it.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Cookie cutter country is where it's at.

Rap music for white people who are afraid of black people. Make Music Great Again!

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Sex isn't dirty, sex isn't a crime. It's a loving act between two or more consenting adults.

-Hank Kingsley

I agree with this, but you're still only looking at 3 months of the year. I never understood the Festival thing. I have too much to do than waste away an entire weekend. If I'm going to see a band I like I want it to be a full 90 minute or longer set. The bigger then venue the worse the sound quality and ability to see the band.

Misfits are Riot Fest is a great example.....I would have gone as a stand alone concert. No chance I'm wasting that at a large festival...silly.

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This guy gets it.

"Your Arms Around Me" by Jens Lekman came on my Spotify discover list. Probably haven't listened to that song since I was a teenager, what a moment. Talk about a track that holds up too.

Of course that's got me listening to all those mid-late 2000's Swedish indie bands. Suburban Kids with Biblical Names, anyone?

The bridge around 2:40 is one of my favorite musical moments, up there with the pedal steel coming in on "Jesus, Etc." or Fripp's solo on "St. Elmo's Fire."

I love the whole Night Falls Over Kortedala album. It's damn near perfect. I remember playing the first three Jens albums a lot back around 2009-2011. Unfortunately, he's only had two more since then, and I remember I Know What Love Isn't being a dud. I'll revisit it and give it another chance but I remember being very disappointed. The last one has a few good songs, and Tracey Thorn from EBTG pops up, which is cool. I don't know much about the rest of that Swedish scene; I always felt Jens was more of a kind with post-Fold Your Hands... B&S or Camera Obscura.

Other songs just/almost as great as that one: "Kanske Är Jag Kär I Dig," "Black Cab," "You Are the Light By Which I Travel Into This And That," "Maple Leaves," "Pocketful of Money," "Rocky Dennis's Farewell Song," "Jens Lekman's Farewell Song," "A Postcard to Nina," "Tram No. 7 to Heaven"

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Saw them play a dingy music room in the back of a bar in New York once. Memorable mostly because local new york shows like that would have too fucking many crappy local opening bands; and when the 3rd or 4th Strokes wannabes took the stage and finished their first song someone with SKWBN (as their fans no doubt refer to them as?) frustrated by the long ass wait for the band everyone who paid to be there was there to see yelled out over the polite between song applause "One More, One More Song!". After a few more people chimed in between the next song with "One More, One More!" singer of the local opener sincerely perplexed into the mic that they had a set list they were working off of so "no need to keep yelling out for another song".

Hives:



The Soundtrack of Our Lives:




Best of the Swedish Aughts**:



**according to members of the band Lacrosse. Apparently they thought of themselves as the next Abba and refused to tour shitty small clubs. so few outside Sweden got to bask in the live warmth of their musical genius, uh-huh

Dunno if it's still the case, but back then Sweden's government would pay performing artists a stipend, hence the outsized musical output

The temerity of a guy calling people cucks while also admitting he's horny for Jens fucking Lekman.

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Furious is a bigfan.

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Sex isn't dirty, sex isn't a crime. It's a loving act between two or more consenting adults.

-Hank Kingsley

It's a horrible cliche, I know, but I listened to "New Slang" for the first time in a long time yesterday. That song still blows me away. I can vividly recall exactly where I was the first time I heard it almost two decades ago. I was happier then with no mind set.

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Although I love Broken Bells, most of The Shins catalog doesn't do it for me.

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Rick Hahn is the best GM in baseball.

I was fumbling around the left of the dial the other night and found a station that played "Together Forever" by Lisette Melendez followed by "New Slang." I was like "whoa, classic B96 music followed by a classic 2000s indie song, am I programming this station?" It turned out to be Lake Forest College's station running on autopilot. Cool.

First time I heard it was on a CD-R of the Garden State soundtrack, which a friend burned for me because she couldn't believe I hadn't seen the movie yet.

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