SONG OF THE DAY: "Got Social" by The Swellers

The Swellers are a pop/punk/alt/rock band from the tropical land of Flint, Michigan. The lead singer/guitarist and drummer/back-up vocalist are brothers. They've been a band for over 10 years, but have been continually on the rise and are just beginning to get the mainstream notoriety they've deserved for at least the last five or so years.

They began essentially as a melodic skate-punk band, which is a style so supersaturated with similar-sounding bands that it's been nearly impossible to stand out since the genre got big in the '90s. I first heard the band upon the release of their second album, 2007's My Everest, which remains my favorite, largely due to introduction bias. But The Swellers got smart and tapped into some of their other influences (namely '90s alt-rock) for their next album, Ups and Downsizing, which featured a new, aaaalmost radio-ready sound and a few brilliant songs.

Their next album, Good For Me, released two years later, was viewed by some as a somewhat forgettable misstep as the band tried to hone their sound even further. The songs got a bit same-y and tame for my tastes, and I didn't give the band much consideration when last year's The Light Under Closed Doors was released.

But, when I heard "Got Social," with its heavy riff, catchy chorus, and memorable video, I started paying attention again. The whole album revives the energy, song variety, and, most importantly, LOUDNESS of their earlier work, and it proves to be an exhilarating listen every time. The band often gets correctly stuck with some sort of "'90s alt-rock revival" label, but in this case, it's a great asset to them. Check the tune and video out below!

SONG OF THE DAY: "The Great Depression" by Dave Hause

Dave Hause is/was the lead singer of The Loved Ones, who were one of my favorite bands during my musically-formative years of high school. The EP version of "100K" got semi-regular airplay on Steven's Untitled Rock Show on Fuse, which I watched pretty much daily, but I knew nothing else about the band. However, I distinctly remember riding the bus to school and listening to "Suture Self" and "Jane," which I got from www.fatwreck.com (where they're still available for free!), and wondering why I hadn't ever checked out a full album by these guys. I listened to those two songs on repeat for the rest of the week until I could get to Best Buy to buy Keep Your Heart.

That album was nearly perfect, and it set the stage for my undying love of fast, catchy, pop/punk with words that are worth singing about. I still contend that The Loved Ones-style pop/punk is the greatest genre of music ever created, where there are loads of energy and emotion in equal measure. The band released a second album, Build and Burn, in 2008, which introduced more of an Americana/alt-country sound at times. They released their second EP, Distractions, the following year, but then they sort of fizzled out. While they never officially broke up and seem to mention the possibility of releasing another album every year, frontman Dave Hause grew impatient and began touring and releasing albums all by himself.

Hause's first solo album, 2011's Resolutions, continued where The Loved Ones left off with Build and Burn, exploring his folk and country influences in a rock- and punk-influenced context. He then released five EPs over the course of 2012, each of which contained two alternate versions of Resolutions songs and two covers. But upon the release of last year's Devour, Hause perfected the sound he had been approaching for years. His brilliant mix of roots, alternative, punk, and folk rock, combined with his outstanding songwriting, came together to produce one of the best albums of the last few years.

Devour presents a sobering, contemplative look at what it means to live in the post-recession United States, while also examining his own relationships and aging process in this context. The result is a cohesive, well thought-out, important piece of art in which certain motifs appear repeatedly throughout the album. It's catchy, powerful, and heartfelt, but also often dark, moody, and intense. Yet, despite all the bleakness, it still manages to end with a glimmer of hope. On the strong closing track, "Benediction," Hause concludes that as long as we all have each other, we'll be alright.

Listen below to one of many stand-out tracks from Devour, "The Great Depression," a tale of broken promises and misguided plans that led us to a collective, and necessary, redefinition of the American Dream.

We were the Reagan kids
Our heroes didn't work like our daddies did
They dazzled us with TV through sleepy lids
We followed hulking maniacs to Prozac nation
"You can be anything, just get your education"

We were good Christian kids
Went to church on Sunday mornings like mama did
Teenage love made us feel guilty and so we hid
Under those overpasses on summer nights
We'd tear each other's clothes off
And get into fights

Then we roared right through our twenties
Never bargained for a crash
Watched our hollow dreams get buried
Under heaps of plastic trash
Broken promises to children leave indelible impressions
Welcome to the great depression

We were our father's sons
Playing war on weekend days with our plastic guns
Catching up with who we were through the reruns
"Eat your vitamins and say your prayers
You'll become doctors, lawyers and millionaires"

We were misguided girls
Tried to fuck our way through such a distorted world
Confusing love with sex and plastic with pearls
"Get what you can for yourself, leave the rest behind"
It's freedom forever 'til your card gets declined

And we roared right through our twenties
Never bargained for a crash
Watching hollow dreams get buried
Under heaps of plastic trash
Broken promises to children leave indelible impressions
Welcome to the great depression

Did he die for your sins?
Did he leave us for dead?
If you wanted us safe why would you fuck with our heads?
The factory's gone, the loans are foreclosed
But there's some places left that remind me of home
Just give me one place left that reminds me of home

The lifeboat is looking pretty full
If you find some room reach out and give me a pull
The way we learned to live is fading fast
I guess we never bargained for a crash

SONG OF THE DAY: "Where Your Nights Often End" by Into It. Over It.

Into It. Over It. is the brainchild of Evan Weiss, an indie-emo singer from Chicago who has been in and is in a million other bands (Their / They're / There, Stay Ahead of the Weather, Pet Symmetry, formerly of The Progress, Damiera, and Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Start), which are always in alternating states of activity and hiatus. IIOI remains Weiss' only steadily touring and recording band, and is the band with whom he is most often associated.

It's hard to say how many albums the incredibly prolific songwriter has recorded. He has a wealth of material, but they exist largely on non-traditional formats, such as his 2009 "album," 52 Weeks, which includes 52 songs all written and recorded one per week for an entire year. But, for most intents and purposes, his first official album, the appropriately titled Proper, was released in 2011 and was followed by 2013's Intersections, which has been credited by some as helping propel the so-called "emo revival" currently underway in the States.

Into It. Over It. holds a very interesting place in my musical rotation. Whereas I generally listen almost exclusively to complete albums, front to back, that was not the case with IIOI for a long time. Proper contained three truly amazing songs ("Midnight: Carroll Street," "Connecticut Steps," and "Where Your Nights Often End"), along with a handful of other okay-to-good tracks, but I did not feel the album as a whole was particularly strong. So, those three songs, along with his Daytrotter Session and various other acoustic sessions (including his exceptional Smoking Popes cover) got played often, and that was about it for a while.

With last year's Intersections, however, he finally produced a cohesive album that matched the brilliance of the three aforementioned songs. This collection is one whose songs work much better when played together than when played separately, which I believe is the hallmark of a great album; the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, so to speak. So, while I highly recommend giving Intersections a few good listens (Weiss recommends listening to it through headphones), none of the individual songs would appropriately represent the album's merits in a format such as this.

Therefore, I leave you with "Where Your Nights Often End" off Proper, which was the song that originally drew me to Evan Weiss' work. This song contains some of Weiss' signature guitar riffing that seems to somehow exist in its own universe, and it has a vaguely Death Cab-ish vibe that I dig. Hope you dig it, too!

Courage, so careful where
Your nights often end
For someone so lonely you
Got a lot of friends
And they're still all waiting their turn
It's your approval they need to burn on
Outside of day jobs there's cigarettes
That seem to follow up with it

But I can't make the lines out
To carry you alone

A patient, so sterile
Where your night's will never end
In a cadence of plans which
We never could pretend or begin to act out inside here
On the bar stools and discount beer
Within the chorus lines of hand-picked songs
I see that I just don't belong

You play the part of the thoughtless romantic in
The busy rotation of what goes wrong
But I can't make the lines out
To carry us alone

You play the part of the thoughtless romantic in
The busy rotation of what goes wrong
But I can't make the lines out
I'm never gonna make the lines out

SONG OF THE DAY: "Master of Art" by Laura Stevenson and the Cans

I almost forgot to do a Song of the Day today, but there's still time! So, today I bring you a beautiful song by Laura Stevenson and the Cans. This song is on my mind mostly because I had a conversation about her two nights ago with a friend who is literally the only other person I've ever met who has heard of Laura Stevenson (she's even seen her live at a house show!). Crazy!

Laura was formerly a keyboardist in Bomb the Music Industry! and she still tours with them from time to time. So, because of that connection, and for really no other apparent reason other than that she's really good, she is adored by punk fans around the world. Her music is decidedly not punk. And yet, I only discovered her through punk websites. Go figure.

She has released three albums, with last year's Wheel being her best (and my #5 album of 2013!). While she often strides on the folk side of the folk/pop line, on Wheel, she began branching out into heavier, more full territory, not too dissimilar from Company of Thieves' recent work. But no matter what style, her voice is adorable and she's pretty darn cute as well. The song "Master of Art," off of 2011's Sit Resist, is one of her more famous songs, and it deserves to be. I think the video is pretty cool as well. Check it out!

SONG OF THE DAY: "Free Tonight" by Northcote

I first discovered Northcote in 2009 when he (the band is essentially Matt Goud's solo project with the help of some backing musicians) began touring with Dave Hause, one of my favorite songwriters whose own solo career was just in its infancy. I gave Northcote's first EP/album, 2009's Borrowed Chords, Tired Eyes a few listens, and I enjoyed it well enough. His voice was fantastic and the songwriting was great, but it was a bit too somber and subdued for my tastes, and I moved on to other things with the intention of checking back in with Northcote if he released anything new.

Well, that's not what happened. His 2011 album Gather No Dust came and went under the radar and I largely forgot about Northcote's entire existence. But, sure enough, soon after last year's release of the self-titled Northcote and Hause's incredible, career-defining Devour, Mr. Hause announced that he and Northcote would be touring together in support of their respective albums once again.

Now, at this point, I still had not given Northcote a listen. I figured I knew what to expect: quiet, slow, melancholy ballads much like the first time around. And, seeing as I'm rarely in the mood for an entire album of such music, I tossed the album in my ever-growing "to-be-listened-to" playlist on Spotify, where it sat for about a month.

Huge mistake. When I finally got around to listening to the album a few days ago, I was blown away. The only things that remained of the Northcote I once knew were the strong songwriting and beautiful, heavenly voice. Gone were the slow, sad songs, and in their place were incredibly uplifting, mid-tempo songs with fully fleshed-out arrangements, percussion, electric guitars, and horns. I couldn't believe I had been missing out on this all year. It was love at first listen.

Northcote's new album reminds me a bit of Bon Iver, only if Bon Iver's songs inspired me to sing and dance instead of inspiring me to take a nap. Due to Northcote's relative obscurity, there was only one song from the self-titled album on YouTube, and it was not very representative of the whole album. So, I leave you with the single "Free Tonight" from Gather No Dust, which has a nice video and proves to be one of his strongest songs yet. Give it a listen, and prepare to fall in love with acoustic indie music all over again!

Dave Hause and Northcote will be playing at Schuba's Tavern in Lakeview, Chicago, IL on February 13th. Tickets are $12: http://schubas.com/Shows/02-13-2014+Dave+Hause

SONG OF THE DAY: "Maps" by The Front Bottoms

Well, as 2013 came to an end and every publication in the world began releasing their "Best of 2013" music lists, I kept seeing The Front Bottoms' album Talon of the Hawk getting a lot of mentions. I had heard their name before but knew nothing of the band except that they were in the indie-ish scene. Being naturally predisposed to expect "indie" bands to be overly contrived and pretentious, I did not give them much consideration.

However, when I saw them on many of Punknews.org's year-end lists, I began to be intrigued. So, I gave their new album a listen, and, sure enough, they're pretty much all I listened to for the next week or so. Once I checked out singles "Flashlight" and "Maps" from their previous, self-titled album, I began alternating between the two albums, while also alternating between which album I felt was superior to the other.

After much careful consideration, I'm inclined to say their 2011 self-titled album is better. On Talon of the Hawk, they went for a decidedly bigger, fuller sound, but I find myself preferring their simpler, more stripped-down style on The Front Bottoms. I think it fits the simple, meandering, stream-of-consciousness lyrical style much better. It also makes them stand out from the so-called crowd a bit more, and I'm always partial to acoustic music with energy.

The strings on "Maps" add nice flourishes to this track, but really, what gets me here and on so many of The FBs' songs is the drumming. It's so loud and aggressive, and the dude has style for days behind the kit. Below is the simple, fun, charming music video for "Maps," which also contains what may be the best lyrics the band has written to date.

There is a map in my room, on the wall of my room, and I’ve got big, big plans.
And I can see them slipping through, almost feel them slipping through the palms of my sweaty hands.
And I move slow, just slow enough to make you uncomfortable.

You say, "I hate you," you mean it, and "I love you" sounds fake.
It's taken me so long to figure that out.
I used to love the taste, I would do anything for it.
Now I would do anything to get the taste out of my mouth.
And you're so confident, but I hear you crying in your sleeping bag.

But you were broken bad yourself.
You were mad as hell, you felt
if you had done anything with anyone else, it would have worked out so well.

But you are an artist, and your mind don’t work the way you want it to.
One day, you’ll be washing yourself with hand soap in a public bathroom.
And you’ll be thinking, "How did I get here?
Where the hell am I?"
If the roles were reversed, you could have seen me sneaking up, sneaking up from behind.

She sees these visions, she feels emotion.
She says that I cannot go, she sees my plane in the ocean.
And "What about your friends? Don’t you love them enough to stay?"
And I say, "If I don’t leave now, then I will never get away.
Let me be a blue raft on a blue sea, I’ll blend right in."

There is a map in my room, on the wall of my room, and I’ve got big, big plans.
But I can see them falling through, almost feel them slipping through the palms of my sweaty hands.
And I move slowly, just slow enough to make you uncomfortable.

But you were broken bad yourself.
And you were mad as hell, you felt
if you had done anything with anyone else it would have worked out so well.

But you are an artist, and your mind don’t work the way you want it to.
One day, you’ll be washing yourself with hand soap in a public bathroom.
And you’ll be thinking, "How did I get here?
Where the hell am I?"
If the roles were reversed, you could have seen me sneaking up, sneaking up from behind.

SONG OF THE DAY: "Great Lakes / Great Escapes" by The Lawrence Arms

So, in order to help share incredible music with the rest of the world, and to ensure that content is added regularly to this blog, I decided to start a new feature: SONG OF THE DAY!

As the name might suggest, I will, to the best of my ability, be posting a song every day that I think everyone should listen to in order to expose people to great new artists and styles of music. Not everything's for everyone, so no hard feelings if something isn't to your liking. But if you're always on the search for new music like I am, this feature might be just what you're looking for.

I think it's pretty appropriate that I start things off with the song that is the namesake for this blog. "Great Lakes / Great Escapes," off the band's brilliant 2006 album, Oh! Calcutta! might come off as a pretty heavy, loud punk song, but it's the lyrics that make it stand out. So, if you're a lyrics guy like me, I highly suggest reading along as you listen.

The band is also from Chicago, which is fitting for the inaugural SotD post, and they will be releasing their sixth album (and first in almost eight years), Metropole, next Tuesday. Luckily, the Internet exists and I have already given it many thorough listens, and I can assure you the band hasn't lost a step in that span. A song or two from that album will most likely show up as an SotD at some point.

The Larry Arms opened their New Year's Eve show at Concord Music Hall with this song, and that night proved to be one of the best I've ever had (this is how I brought in the New Year; awesome, right?!). The band is great, and their four most recent albums should all be essential listening for anyone intrigued by this song.

So, who knows? This could be the best 2 minutes and 50 seconds of your day. Or the worst. But, hey, you'll never know 'til you listen!

I scratched my name into the table.
The knife and phone just fucking lay there.
I orchestrate a day of routine elements.
These letters are so old and faded.

And in the end we'll burn in history.
I'll take a chance and fall in love tonight.
I'm lost and found, so lost again.
I wonder as I'm wandering.

I used to paint myself with sentiment.
But all my colors turned to gray.
I spent the night out on the wire again.
But I wasn't looking for a savior...

And in the end we'll burn in history.
I'll take a chance and fall in love tonight.
I'm lost and found, so lost again.
I don't worry when I'm wandering.

Great Lake - I don't need a Great Escape.
Tonight, I've got this city on my side. 

And in the end we'll burn in history.
Yeah, I could fall in love with her tonight. 
I'm lost and found, so lost again.
Nothing to do but keep on wandering. 

And we can live with our mistakes.
Yeah, all my friends are going out tonight.
And I can't sit here just waiting for another day to die...

Fuck all this ancient history. (x3)

The Poor Browns

"I...am genuinely sorry for the poor Browns."       - Winston Churchill

The above is an actual quote by Winston Churchill, edited a bit and with capitalization added for purposes other than the Bulldog intended, but I think it applies pretty accurately to the current state of the Cleveland Browns when viewed in this context. At this point, a day after the Browns hired their seventh head coach in 15 seasons, I'm past denial, anger, bargaining, and depression, finding myself firmly rooted in acceptance. It's just sad, and I feel sorry for the team, its fans, and anyone associated with this sorry organization. Everyone does, even the new coach's daughter (and probably Mike Pettine himself as well):

Everyone knows the Brownies have been dreadful ever since returning to league in 1999. But I don't think most people outside of their fanbase, or at least the division, really realize just how bad and how prolonged the misery has been for the team. It's quite ridiculous at this point. So, just to emphasize where I'm coming from with this post, I'm going to briefly outline the history of the New Browns.

Since the franchise was revived 15 years ago, the Browns have:

-finished last in their division 11 times

-had 5 or fewer wins 11 times (including each of the last six seasons)

-started 20 different quarterbacks (yes, more QBs than seasons), including a QB named Spergon Wynn

-had an offense ranked 24th or worse in the NFL 13 times

-had a defense ranked in the bottom half of the league 9 times

-made the playoffs once (blowing a 24-7 third quarter lead to lose to a Tommy Maddox-led Pittsburgh Steelers in the Wild Card game)

-sold out each and every one of their 120 home games

Seeing it all stacked up in one place like that helps to get the point across, but nothing compares to watching them play 16 times every year. Wikipedia tells me that the Bills have a longer playoff drought and a longer sub-.500 streak than the Brownies, but I find it hard to believe that there has ever been a football team with this kind of sustained futility. I have a long-term $10 bet riding on the Browns franchise folding or relocating before winning a Super Bowl, and I feel pretty confident in that expectation. The Browns are horrible, and, having just hired the man behind the Bills' 20th-ranked defense, appear to have no hope.

But the problem is, I go through each of those stages of grief each and every season with the Browns. All but the most weathered and beaten Browns fans do. Their sold-out games streak is proof of this. There are always signs that the coming year could finally be the year that turns the whole organization around. Hell, I'd be fine with just improving enough so that the Brownies are a watchable team that doesn't torture its fans each and every week. But there are always reasons to start believing that next year will be better.

This year is no different. We have a brand new coach (and there's no way he'll be as bad as the last coach...right?), six Pro Bowlers returning in positions that actually matter, a new quarterback (hopefully) whose career we might not ruin this time, and a division that was worse last year than it's been since 2003 (and yes, I fact-checked this). So, there's reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last.

Except, again, this year is no different.

The Browns will either start off well, then get bad, or they'll start off bad, then get good for a few games. Their fans will continue to believe that the team will be better this year, but the Browns will inevitably do everything in their power to piss us off early on in the season. We'll begin begging, PLEADING for the team to at least approach mediocrity, but even that will be far out of reach. Browns fans everywhere will watch, helplessly, as the team sinks further and further toward their unavoidable fate, while their fans will sink further and further toward depression. By year's end, we will have accepted our plight as Browns fans and will look toward the future with apathy and indifference.

But the cycle will undoubtedly continue. This offseason, we'll all convince ourselves that there's no way we'll be as bad as we were last year, and we'll all be eagerly watching with a renewed sense of pathetic excitement come September 7th.

The Beginning

Well, as I sit here, having turned down yet another invitation to go drinking with my friends (for a number of reasons), while listening to “Milo Goes to College” for the 180th time, I’ve decided that I’m going to go ahead and carry out an idea I’ve been toying with for the last few months: starting my very own blog. I’ve always been a pretty private person, more prone to keeping thoughts in my head than speaking them simply because I don’t think that what I have to say is uniquely interesting or worth hearing. I don’t even make Facebook statuses. But I’d like to start being more open about a lot of things, and I’d like to start letting people into my life a little more.

“Okay, that’s all fine and great, but why would you want to start a blog?” you might be (very logically) asking. “There are already way too many blogs/Don’t you have better things to do?/Nobody cares about what you have to say.” I wholeheartedly agree. Blogs are usually a waste of everyone’s time. I regularly read exactly one blog on the whole entirety of the Internet. I don’t really expect anyone to read this or for much to come out of this. The main reason I am starting this blog is because I enjoy writing about things I enjoy, and I feel I have a lot to say, while I haven’t had an outlet to do so in quite some time.

So, since college ended and I do not have as many people to debate (argue) with as I once did, I am going to talk to myself and hope the Internet listens (and maybe even talks back once in a while!). If you’ve gotten this far in this post, you deserve a really good high five the next time I see you! I’ll try to get to the point soon.

What should you expect from this blog, should you choose to read it? Well, one thing is for certain: it’s not going to be anything close to a journal or diary. Nobody needs to hear about what I had for breakfast or how cold it was outside today. Instead, I am going to focus on the world at large. Undoubtedly, much of what I write about will inevitably be music-related, and will unfortunately mostly be music-you-haven’t-heard(-but-not-like-in-a-hipster-way-or-anything)-related, due to the fact that listening to music, thinking about music, forcing others into conversations about music, and begging my friends to listen to certain bands are some of my favorite activities.

These types of entries may take the form of:

-album reviews

-feature pieces (where I discuss something like the scope of an artist’s career or their importance in my life/the greater music world)

-simply providing examples of some of the greatest music ever recorded with a certain theme (such as “The Greatest and Most Profound Punk Albums of All-Time”)
-why '90s pop/rock is the greatest of all pop music before or since

-bands that I just don’t get, no matter how hard I try
-bands that I finally get, but only after trying really hard
-why I bother trying to like a band instead of just listening to bands I already like

Additionally, I will be writing (ranting?) about other topics, such as:

-the dreadful plight of the Cleveland Browns

-why more people should watch hockey

-important thoughts about frisbee

-why I hate smartphones and don’t want one

-why I’m still mad that FlashForward and The Class were both canceled after just one season

-why I think Twitter is stupid

-why I’m sick of older people hating on my generation

-why I both love and hate alcohol

-something that made me fall in love with Chicago all over again
-why society has disappointed on a given day

-why society has amazed me on a given day

I’ll even try to make it interesting, too! Basically, this blog will largely concern itself with music and sports, but could also be about literally anything else that I think is worth writing about.

So, that’s all. I hope you choose to read it occasionally, respond if you feel like it, and maybe even share a piece or two with someone you know if you think I wrote something worthwhile for once. Okay, now I’m done for real. Bye!

-Danny