Best Albums of 2014

Here it is, the article I know you all have been eagerly anticipating: the Great Lakes Escapes Best Albums of 2014. First of all, don't let anyone tell you there wasn't very much good music released this year. My "Best Songs of 2014" Spotify playlist approaches 250 songs, and that's while exercising all the restraint I could muster.

You'll notice that this list only covers music. I saw approximately two new movies and watched approximately four currently-airing television series, so I'm far from an expert in either category. I did, however, listen to at least 75 albums, EPs, and compilations released this year, according to my distressingly inaccurate Last.fm profile. That number probably breaks 100 if I include all the Bandcamp and YouTube listens not tracked by that service.

Anyway, the second thing you'll notice is that this is not a traditional "Top 10" list. Making ranked lists is stressful and annoying, and the only clear ranking I have decided upon is that of the #1 album, which kicks off the list below. Instead, I picked 10 albums I felt compelled to write about, even if they weren't actually among my 10 favorite albums of the year (only about half actually are).

Also check back for the "Best EPs of 2014" list coming soon, because, as I'll explain, this year was really more about great EPs than it was about albums, for whatever reason.

Best Album of the Year (and Best Album by a Band I Had Previously Never Heard Of):

Home, Like Noplace is There by The Hotelier

This album came as a huge surprise to me and, apparently, everybody else that heard it. In the midst of an "emo revival" that sees most such bands treading the pleasant, but ultimately boring twinklecore sound characterized by bands like You Blew It! and Dikembe, The Hotelier stands out with a refreshingly honest look into the tortured soul of a man who has clearly been through a bit of shit since the band's last album was released.

Christian Holden's lyrics are phenomenal, literary, and uniquely able to avoid many of the clichés that plague most emo albums. However, it is his passionate, tormented delivery of those lyrics which sets this album well above any other released this year. Every word sounds as painful and desperate as the actual words deserve to be sung.

Beyond that, while the album is generally rather sonically dense, each song truly sounds distinct from each of the others on the album. Although the record consists of only nine songs, this is another extremely difficult feat in the emo genre. The band crafted each song with unique, inventive structures that keep the album sounding fresh and increasingly rewarding with each subsequent listen. Each song flows effortlessly between frequent changes in tempo and sonic density, resulting in one of the more creative releases of the year.

Yet, despite all this, the album is remarkably cohesive, with a consistent tone and theme running throughout each song. Even for those who normally stay as far away from emo as possible, I cannot recommend this album highly enough.

Best Album That Is Unfortunately Just Not All That Exciting:

Till Midnight by Chuck Ragan

This is a great album. Each of the ten songs is honestly fantastic in its own right, which is something I rarely say about albums. Many albums have no bad songs, but few have no songs that are less than excellent. The only issue with this album is that it just doesn't do much to excite the listener.

The songs are all very well-written, with a pleasant tone and creative use of a variety of instruments. The songs are also structured somewhat atypically, at least as much as can be done within the folk/rock genre, with powerful bridges and soaring choruses. But unfortunately, the album tends to blend together a little bit and drag somewhat near the end. Still among the best released this year, although I didn't find myself as compelled to listen repeatedly as I did with other albums.

Album That Shows the Most Potential In a New Band:

PUP by PUP

This album is the complete opposite of Till Midnight in terms of excitement. When I first heard this album, PUP's debut, I loved the second track, "Reservoir," but the rest all seemed to be a rather average approximation of post-hardcore in the vein of The Bronx or Polar Bear Club. However, repeated listens kept revealing new strengths in the album, as well as more tracks that got buried in my head. "Reservoir" still remains the best banger you'll hear all year, but "Dark Days" might actually be the best track.

The band still has a ways to go in terms of consistency, but the better tracks on this album indicate that the ceiling is very high for these guys. The album is still quite good as it is, and PUP plays with such energy and fire that it will be hard to ignore them for long.

Album That Did the Most to Change My Opinion of a Band:

LP3 by Restorations

After the band's first two albums, I had made up my mind about Restorations, and I just wasn't very interested. The songs all dragged, sounded the same, and had only one volume and intensity setting. Even after learning to appreciate LP3, their earlier work still does almost nothing for me. The musicians were clearly very talented and ambitious, but that doesn't always mean the songs are going to be all that enjoyable.

This wildly creatively-titled album shows the band expanding in a different direction for once. The songs are still very experimental, riff-heavy, guitar solo-heavy, and shouty, but the band managed to do so in a variety of ways on this album. About half the songs sound like they could have appeared on Restorations' prior album, LP2, but the other half are really special.

On these songs, placed intermittently throughout the album, the band leaves much more space in the sonic landscape than they typically have, and this results in some of the most beautiful songs of the year. This is most evident on the stunning single, "Separate Songs," where the extra room in the song allows for some glorious tones that would have been covered up under dense riffs on earlier albums. The mood created on the song is still intense, but in a different, more morose way, and it makes the song so much more dynamic. The punches of heavy guitar cut through the song with more impact and the balance between the verses and chorus is that much more interesting because of it.

I could talk all day about the pinched-harmonic squeals in the background of the second pre-chorus of that song, or the way the distorted guitar drops off abruptly before the second verse, leaving just a lone keyboard playing for a brief moment. It is these little moments and flourishes that make this album stand out, but it is also the moaning bridges in the back half  of "All My Home" and "The Future" that make for one of the more brilliantly melancholy albums of the year. (The band is still kind of a bummer live though.)

Most Fun Album of the Year:

M.I. by Masked Intruder

This album was the least surprising entry on this list. Fun is what Masked Intruder stands for. From their goofy gimmick to the nature of their songs, the band lives and breathes an upbeat attitude. The songs are all top-notch as well, and I have to give them props for not relying entirely on their "criminals in love" gimmick. While about half the songs are typical Masked Intruder offerings, the subject matter on the other half takes notable steps away from any reference to cops, crime, or jail time.

Not every song is amazing, but each one is catchy as hell and energetic, resulting in one undeniably awesome album. Their harmonies and hooks are even better than the last time around. Even if you hate the gimmick and hate how sugary their brand of pop/punk is, it would be hard to have a bad time listening to this album. While the album is really fun and infectious, in an attempt to maintain some critical integrity, I will expand my analysis a little in order to justify the album's place on this list.

It would have been very easy for Masked Intruder to spit out a repeat of their debut album, but they chose to push themselves a little, and the album is all the better for it. They throw in keyboards and acoustic guitars where necessary, change up the tempo and time signatures on a few songs, and even included a freaking a cappella doo-wop song. You have to commend them for expanding their sound at least a little bit, and they really hit it out of the park.

Biggest Disappointment of the Year:

Throw Me In the River by The Smith Street Band

The Smith Street Band has been one of my favorite bands for the last few years. Their debut album, No One Gets Lost Anymore, is still pretty untouchable in my book, and their most recent EP, 2013's Don't Fuck With Our Dreams, is their best set of songs to date. Furthermore, freaking Jeff Rosenstock produced the thing, and he is not only a great songwriter, but a very creative and talented producer. As a result, my expectations for this album were pretty astronomical, however unfair that may have been.

Unfortunately, this album just doesn't live up to the standard the band has set for itself thus far. I haven't quite put my finger on the reason why, but I think it is a combination of a number of factors. Most importantly, despite song titles like "I Love Life" and "I Don't Wanna Die Anymore," the album generally lacks the uplifting nature of their earlier work. Gone are the inspiring bridges, the incredible energy, and hopeful lyrics that made me fall in love with the band originally.

Furthermore, the album comes across as rather one-dimensional and static. The whole thing is pretty loud, and this takes away from the importance of lyrics that featured so prominently in the band's other work. Wil Wagner also seems a little obsessed with throwing in little lyrical allusions to his and other band's songs. This is a bit distracting for the listener who catches them, as it seems like he included each one simply for the sake of the reference rather than because the song actually called for it.

Ultimately, I think this album is just the sound of a band in transition. The band has been getting heavier and more electric with each release, and have pretty much abandoned their folk/punk-ish sound entirely as of now. Plus, even artists as incredible as Frank Turner have their missteps as they continue to push themselves and try new things. This is still a decent album, and this is a very talented band that I'm sure will right the ship by the next time we hear from them. And besides, everybody else I've read on the Internet seems to love the album, so what the hell do I know?

Best Use of Creative Pronunciation:

Dark Arc by Saintseneca

There is a lot more about to love about this album besides the singer's frequent use of atypical pronunciation. This is an excellent, dynamic indie/folk album that uses unique instrumentation and song structures to great effect. The songs are catchy, heartfelt, and creative, and the album flows between tracks in a deliberate, natural manner. I probably could have come up with a better one-line descriptor for it, but I don't think I've ever heard an album where I so often thought the singer was singing a different word until he was halfway done singing it.

I don't simply mean that I'm mishearing the lyrics, either. Zac Little sings with a unique inflection and accent that is quite endearing and captivating, but it also produces a penchant for unconventional pronunciations. This is especially evident on drawn-out words, such as when he sings "indoors" in the first line of "Daendors," one of the album's standouts. Even after dozens of listens, I still think he's saying "in dark" until, all of a sudden, he isn't. Sometimes, the actual word only becomes apparent in the context of the full line, such as the word "solace," in "Falling Off," which he pronounces like "soulless."

Luckily, this happens no more often than once or twice per track, and this habit does not distract from the album's strengths. In fact, it actually comes across rather naturally in the scope of the album as a whole and only adds to the list of things that makes this a great album.

Most Overrated Album:

Transgender Dysphoria Blues by Against Me!

Okay, I understand why people are talking about this album so much. Its subject matter deserves to be written about, and I'm glad that discussion of transgender issues is occurring openly and more frequently. I'm also glad that transgender people have a semi-prominent figure who can bring awareness of these issues to others and can act as a role model to some.

However, from the standpoint of the album's musical relevance and excellence, this album is extremely overrated. It seems as though one punk-related album is chosen each year by music reviewers to unanimously place on their "Best of" lists. This year, it was this album, as it was with Against Me!'s New Wave in 2007, even though that was probably the band's worst album yet at the time. Yes, Transgender Dysphoria Blues is emotional, honest, and ground-breaking in terms of lyrical content, but the songs are really just okay.

The album is poorly-produced, which takes away from the energy of many of the tracks. The songs, while largely catchy and uptempo, are honestly kind of boring and unimaginative. Some, such as "Osama bin Laden as the Crucified Christ" and "Drinking With the Jocks," are abrasive and obnoxious, but not in a good way. And, while the explicit nature of the lyrics adds some fuel to the fire, Laura Jane Grace has written about the same topics in the past in a more subtle manner to much greater effect, such as on "The Disco Before the Breakdown" and "Searching for a Former Clarity." Even "The Ocean," while not a great song, was much more musically interesting than anything on this album.

The album has been referred to as a "return to form" for Against Me!, but I honestly feel that it is merely a continuation of the bland musical direction they've been heading in starting with New Wave. It seems that this is another example of AM!'s problem of the band being bigger than the songs. It's a solid effort and it has a handful of great songs, but by no means should the album be winning any awards or making any top ten appearances.

Best Album That Would Have Been Even Better to Me Eight Years Ago:

You're Gonna Miss It All by Modern Baseball

This is a very good album. It's also a very juvenile album. So, while I enjoy it quite a bit currently, I have a feeling it would have been pretty life-changing if it came out when I was 16. The album is squarely in the pop/emo realm, and contains one of the genre's and year's best tracks in "Your Graduation." Unfortunately, much of the album's subject matter comes across as rather immature and immaterial, most of the songs being about petty frustrations with girls. And, while the references to iPhones and Instagram are cute and mildly funny, they serve to distract from the emotional core of the album, despite the fact that many listeners will probably check their Instagram profile on their iPhone during the album's half-hour runtime.

Nevertheless, these are topics which do not hold much artistic merit or weight, considering they are extremely trivial aspects of people's lives. To place these subjects in a song in a serious setting indicates that the author places disproportionate importance on these things, which, to me, is a sign of a very immature person.

Modern Baseball is a good enough band that they do not need to rely on such quirks and gimmicks to stand out, which makes the social media references that much more annoying. They have great potential that is demonstrated by this album's better tracks, but they fall short of that mark a little too often. All told, this is a good album that I listened to a lot, but it seems like it just needs to grow up a little.

Best Album That Literally Nobody Heard:

The Cathedral by Meridian

Okay, that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but I'm pretty sure this one is well off almost everybody's radar. And that's a bummer, because the title track and "If You Let Me" are two of the best tracks I heard all year. The rest of the album didn't really approach the bar set by those two songs, but this album definitely still deserved more attention.

This album saw Max Stern (of Signals Midwest fame) give his acoustic side project the full-band treatment, jumping between a few genres in the process. While I expected the songs to fall on the folky side, as the first two tracks do, about half the songs explore a grungy pop/rock sound, not unlike that of early Weezer. It works about as often as it doesn't, but it's an interesting step in Stern's development outside of Signals.

Other albums I loved, roughly in order:

Best Album That Was Shorter Than Several EPs This Year:

Never Hungover Again by Joyce Manor

Best Album by a Band That Needs to Stop Letting One of Its Songwriters Write Songs:

Rented World by The Menzingers

Best Punk Album by an Indie Band:

Here and Nowhere Else by Cloud Nothings

Best Punk Album by a Band With a Chick Singer:

Teenage Retirement by Chumped

Best Album by a Singer Not Named Aaron West:

We Don't Have Each Other by Aaron West & The Roaring Twenties

Best Album by a Band Content to Never Evolve:

Report by The Copyrights

Best Album by a Bunch of Old Dudes:

Metropole by The Lawrence Arms

Best Quiet Album by the Singer of a Loud Band:

One Week Record by Chris Cresswell

Best Album I Discovered off Others' Year-End Lists:

Comfort In the Discord by The Holy Mess

Best Album That I Expected to be Terrible:

Upside Down Mountain by Conor Oberst

Chuck

2004 was the year mainstream pop/punk decided to grow up. Just a year earlier, blink-182 had completed its evolution by releasing its self-titled album, which ditched the dick jokes in favor of pianos, WWII-inspired monologues, and Robert Smith collaborations. This year, Good Charlotte, Green Day, New Found Glory, Simple Plan, Sugarcult, and Sum 41 all followed suit with varying degrees of success.

Sum 41's Chuck was the culmination of a transition that began on their third album, 2002's Does This Look Infected? While about half of that album showed growth in the form of songs erring on the latter side of the pop/punk equation, the other half was still written for the radio and MTV commercials. The result was a disjointed effort, stuck somewhere between the band's past and its near future.

On Chuck, however, the band fully committed to the new style, managing to create a cohesive product that was at once its heaviest and lightest output. The intro didn't start with the words "Children of the beast embrace," and the band indulged its metal influence in the form of actual songs, rather than by pretending to be an '80s hair metal band. For a band that made its name on immaturity, even relative to many of its peers in the inherently immature genre that is pop/punk, Sum 41 was actually largely successful on its fourth album.

The album's default sound is a heavier-than-usual punk sound that retains a strong sense of melody, and it works quite well with Deryck Whibley's voice and the album's big production. On "No Reason," "Open Your Eyes," and album closer "88," the band really sounds at home, providing three of their strongest tracks to date. Though they occasionally sound like they're trying to too hard to be The Offspring, most of these songs hold up tremendously well to date.

It's the other songs on the album where it gets interesting. The rest of the tracklist is split between the band's hardest and softest songs to date. On the heavy side is single "We're All to Blame," which executed the loud/soft dynamic better than I had remembered. But the other songs in this style provide the most obvious missteps on the album, such as "Angels With Dirty Faces" and "The Bitter End."

On the other side of the dichotomy are the lighter, acoustic-based songs, all of which still sound pretty good after 10 years. "Some Say" still sounds a little too much like Oasis, but "Slipping Away" and "Pieces" are both quality tunes, despite the former's significant lyrical cringeworthiness. Lyrical complexity has never been one of the band's strengths, although the music is often strong enough to overcome this fault. (The only word longer than one syllable in the chorus of "No Reason" is, in fact, the word "reason.")

At the end of the day, Sum 41 was never going to write a groundbreaking album (and 2011's Screaming Bloody Murder showed they probably shouldn't try to), but Chuck was about as strong of an album as an early '00s mainstream pop/punk band could write while still experimenting and stepping outside of their comfort zone. And, to my surprise, I actually enjoyed it better now than when it originally came out. This was also their last album with Dave "Brownsound" Baksh, who left prior to 2007's too-poppy Underclass Hero. That album saw the band begin to fade into general obscurity, remembered only when nostalgia creeps up and tempts you to play "Fat Lip" on your friend's old iPod on a road trip. But, listening to Chuck again shows that maybe they should be remembered for just a little more than that.

The Weezer-ification of Modern Pop/Punk

It is not unusual for punk bands to congregate around a single influence or set of influences. For as much as punk pretends to be revolutionary and different, the vast majority of it just sounds like other bands. The Ramones, the "first" punk band, just ran '50s pop/rock through bigger amplifiers and distorted guitars and sang about edgier topics. Now, there is a whole genre of punk referred to as "Ramonescore," featuring notable acts such as The Queers, Screeching Weasel, The Lillingtons, and Teenage Bottlerocket, who even managed to directly steal the lyrical content of an early Ramones song.

Punk music is, almost by definition, a simple form of music, so it can be difficult to sound unique within its confines. This has always been an issue of varying severity. At its most acceptable, bands simply take the influence of earlier bands and modernize it before expanding their influence and moving on. At its worst, bands rip off other bands' sounds and release the same albums year after year. Many of the bands on Fat Wreck Chords in the '90s sounded a whole lot like NOFX, and Tim Armstrong is content to sign Rancid rip-offs like Left Alone and Time Again to his Hellcat Records label. (Armstrong even guests on their songs, despite the fact that they clearly worship the guy. Weird.)

The really special bands in punk have managed to invent whole subgenres that have blown up since then. Black Flag invented hardcore, The Misfits invented horrorpunk, Descendents invented modern pop/punk, Operation Ivy invented skacore, Rancid invented streetpunk, and so on. Since 2000, two bands have defined the shape of punk to come more than any other: Hot Water Music and Against Me!, who both, coincidentally (or maybe not), came from Gainesville, Florida.

Hot Water Music, who adapted a lot from earlier bands like Leatherface, essentially invented what has alternately been termed "beardpunk," "gruff punk," and "orgcore," after the sound's popularity among the readers and writers of Punknews.org. For a while, it seemed as if every new band sounded like they had listened to way too much HWM growing up. Some bands, such as Alkaline Trio, The Lawrence Arms, and The Gaslight Anthem had clearly listened to quite a bit of Hot Water Music in their younger years, but made the sound their own.

However, many bands, like Red City Radio, Nothington, Iron Chic, and countless others, felt no shame in jumping directly onto the bandwagon. Unfortunately, most left behind the technical precision of HWM's rhythm section that made them so special, instead simply adopting their heavy, anthemic sound and rough, manly gang vocals. Some have even become influencers themselves, such as Dillinger Four, whose throaty, bass-heavy brand of orgcore has informed Banner Pilot, Off With Their Heads, and Dear Landlord. It now seems as if every punk band wears flannel and rocks a full beard.

Against Me! further pushed orgcore forward while also almost singlehandedly inventing the modern version of the folk/punk genre. Shortly following AM!'s ascension to the punk mainstream, folk/punk was dominating the new music landscape. Entire record labels were focused on the stuff, with new bands copying not just AM!'s sound, but also their DIY mindset and general aesthetic. Notable acts such as Fake Problems and Cobra Skulls were labeled AM! rip-offs when they debuted, although, to their credit, they have both since expanded their sound considerably.

AM! abandoned the sound they created almost as quickly as they founded it, but in their absence, Andrew Jackson Jihad, Ghost Mice, and Defiance, Ohio took up the torch. They absorbed the folk side of the sound and ran with it, including traditional folk instruments and producing a decidedly more upbeat version of the early AM! sound, complete with whiny vocals and much less serious lyrics.

All of this is a long-winded way of explaining that punk has always been a music that goes through certain trends. Obviously, many varieties of punk exist at the same time, but the popular boom of new bands often seems to convene around a similar sound that changes every few years. The currently booming sound is that of Weezer.

Booming is probably not an adjective often associated with Weezer, but nevertheless, pop/punk bands have been increasingly turning to the Weezer goldmine from the early '90s. Many bands are digging in the '90s alt-rock realm and modernizing the sound in their own way, but a lot of the attention seems to be focused on pre-hiatus Weezer.

While I was not nearly musically conscious in 1994 and 1996, the years of Weezer's first two releases, I can feel the band's influence still very present in the music of this up-and-coming generation of pop/punk bands. Their unique use of soft/loud dynamics, heavily distorted guitars, plodding riffs, catchy melodies, falsetto backing vocals, and self-deprecating, nerdy lyrics has proven to be quite the treasure for new bands looking to update a classic sound.

I first noticed the beginnings of the trend in 2011 when Bomb the Music Industry! released Vacation, an album that was equal parts punk, Brian Wilson, and Weezer. The Sidekicks followed less than a year later with Awkward Breeds, an indie-punk record clearly influenced by Weezer and other '90s bands (like Third Eye Blind). The trend continued as I discovered bands like Sundials and Joyce Manor. This was all harmless and fun for a while, but this year, the trend has simply gotten out of control.

Lately, the trend has been nearly epidemic. Instead of adopting their sound as an influence, bands have simply been including Weezer songs on their albums. The Menzingers' recent single "In Remission" is a little more shouty than Weezer ever got, but the first half of that song is straight-up Weezer. (That the video is a near copy of the video for "Undone (The Sweater Song)," save the dogs, doesn't exactly help discourage the comparison.) Besides that song and the Smashing Pumpkins song that precedes it on the album, the band's songs are very much their own.

Masked Intruder's "Weirdo" captures both the sound and the spirit of several early Weezer songs (think Pinkerton), while the rest of the album is essentially a Ramonescore album (full circle, see?). Chumped, a female-fronted pop/punk band, just released a Weezer song called "Hot 97 Summer Jam," which may or may not be a reference to the year Weezer started going downhill. BtMI! singer Jeff Rosenstock's side project, Antarctigo Vespucci (which also features Chris Farren of Fake Problems), released a mini-album of Weezer songs earlier this year, although that shouldn't really surprise anyone who follows those bands (BtMI! has covered both of Weezer's first two albums in full at separate concerts).

Beyond that, bands like Meridian are getting in on the more melancholy side of the Weezer trend. Even though singer Max Stern's two bands had previously associated almost exclusively with post-hardcore/twinkly emo and folk/rock, he threw a couple Weezer songs in on Meridian's latest record. (Although some YouTube digging reveals that his passion for Weezer had presented itself earlier.) The Swellers got a little Weezer-y on their latest effort, and You Blew It!, another 2010s emo band, even released a 5-song EP of Weezer covers, titled You Blue It!, earlier this year (which feels a little half-assed, now that I think about it).

Like I said, it's epidemic. Where will this trend stop? Is it time to add Weezercore to the list of punk sub-subgenres? How much more Weezer can the world take, especially now that Weezer itself has started releasing music again? Are they aware of this trend? Are they trying to cash in on the momentum and hype surrounding their music? And what will follow Weezercore's inevitable decline? Let's all pray the grunge revival stops here.

2004

So, I've been reading The AV Club's awesome Fear of a Punk Decade series with earnest over the past few months, as it slowly gets released, and I realized what has bugged me about the articles so far. The series concerns itself with many of the most important albums, bands, and movements of 1990s punk, but, unfortunately, I view all of these albums as a relative outsider.

Yes, I grew up with the albums and bands, and I cherish them just as much as (or maybe even more than) the people who were conscious of their existence in the '90s, but they aren't really mine. Even though the songs have racked up thousands of plays in my CD player, iTunes library, and Spotify over the years, I didn't live the albums. I wasn't there when they were being released. I didn't feel the hype of the artists and the excitement of their shows. I didn't have my life changed by these bands in the same way; more accurately, they just calibrated and corrected my taste in music as it worked its way off of training wheels.

Property of Zack did a great job examining the cultural and musical impact and legacy of albums released in 2003, but their tastes seemed to skew toward the pop/emo side of things. In 2004 was regularly subjected to the likes of Incubus, Lostprophets, and even Courtney Love due to their ubiquity on Fuse, but I always found them to be thoroughly dull and uninspired. I was also bombarded with the aforementioned pop/emo, from bands like Hawthorne Heights, Armor for Sleep, and My Chemical Romance. Although I found myself enjoying the occasional song by these bands, I never took to them like I did so many other artists.

So I decided that I wanted to write about the albums I truly grew up with, since no one else seems to be doing it at the moment. The first album I bought (besides my regrettable boy band purchases in the late '90s/early 2000s) was Good Charlotte's The Young and the Hopeless, a few months after its October 2003 release, so 2004 was about a year or so into my musical journey. I feel that a decade removed is a decent perspective from which to view music, so now seems as good a time as ever to look at what 2004 meant to me and what it means to me now.

I'll do my best to write solely about the albums and artists that I was listening to at that time, ignoring great albums released that year that I later discovered, like Descendents' Cool to Be You or The Hold Steady's debut, Almost Killed Me. I also will do my best not to exclude artists that I quickly abandoned or shunned, instead choosing to explore when and why I moved away from them when they once meant so much to me.

So that's it. I don't have a timetable or a schedule or anything. I'll just write when I feel like it, and I'll try to keep it short-ish, as I tend to ramble when talking about music and/or reminiscing, which could be a lethal combo in this setting. That's all for now. Bye bye.

SONG OF THE DAY: "Resuscitation of the Year" by The Flatliners

I'm coming out of a fairly rough time in my life. I won't go into many details, but I feel like it's finally over. This has been a very good week, and I'm in a very good place mentally, professionally, and physically.

The Flatliners are quite an incredible band, and they deserve a better introduction than the one I'm giving them. Their 2010 album, Cavalcade, stands as one of the truly great and uniquely awesome punk albums ever to come out in the 40-year history of the genre. Their most recent album, last year's Dead Language, nearly equals the power of its predecessor. The songs are just as good, if not better on average than those on Cavalcade. If anything, the only thing Dead Language lacks is the same immediacy felt on Cavalcade, and, as such, the impact is somewhat lesser.

Nevertheless, this song speaks directly to my current situation. This song is not among the top 10 (or maybe even 20) best songs by this band, but it is a decent introduction to the band and album. However, the words and emotions portrayed on this song sum up my experiences so perfectly, it would be a crime not to choose it. The incredibly heartfelt way in which he screams about coming back to life again, the way he speaks of the debt he eternally owes to his friends for being there, it's just perfect.

One of my favorite things about music is its ability to translate very specifically to my own life, letting me know that I'm not alone and there are others going through the same thing. And, more importantly, there are others who have gone through the same thing and survived it, coming out on the other side a better, stronger version of themselves. That's what "Resuscitation of the Year" is about: coming back to life. And that's the way I feel today. I hope that feeling never goes away.

SONG OF THE DAY: "The Beach" by Parov Stelar

Okay, I'm getting really bad about these SotDs. Sorry. Things have been busy around here. Anyway, I gotta go to bed, like, now-ish, so here's a really quick song for ya. Parov Stelar is a dude who plays a kind of music often referred to as electro-swing. Most of his stuff is a lot more upbeat and dancey than this, but I really like this song. So, chill out a little tonight and throw this one on your next hangout playlist!

SONG OF THE DAY: "Childhood" by Downtown Struts

Downtown Struts are a band formed in 2008 in the great city of Chicago, IL, though they also feature two dudes from the Bay Area. These influences result in a blend of Cali street punk and Midwest pop/punk for a sound that is rough around the edges but distinctly melodic and upbeat. I saw them open for The Lawrence Arms on New Year's Eve, and it was a bummer to see the crowd relatively motionless for the entirety of their set. It's a shame, because they are actually a very good band. I think this is mostly because they are not very well-known and their music doesn't have the manic pace that the other three bands playing that night have.

With one full-length, a few EPs, and a split 7" under their belts, we see them starting to move into new territory, carving out their own unique sound among the often similar-sounding bands who play Midwest punk. Their most recent new song, "Childhood," came out on a split EP with Nothington, which featured a new track and a cover from each band. Downtown Struts' cover was of New Order's "Ceremony," which I highly recommend checking out if you like that song or what you've heard from Downtown Struts. The cover is a great choice to pair with the original, which is a step away from punk. It is clear that New Order and similar bands are becoming an increasingly greater influence on the group.

If "Childhood" is any indication, the new album from Downtown Struts has a chance to really break some ground in the punk scene. Their 2012 album, Victoria!, had flashes of this new sound, but although the album was well-received, it wasn't really anything all that new, and it largely flew under the radar. I expect them to turn heads with whatever comes next. Give "Childhood" a listen to see where they've come from and where they're headed!

SONG OF THE DAY: "Pray For Rain" by The Ergs!

The Ergs! were a pop/punk band in the vein of Screeching Weasel, The Queers, Chixdiggit!, and a million other bands that sound like these guys. They played fast, snotty, poppy punk songs mainly about girls and being young. If that sounds like nothing new, well, you'd be right. But sometimes you don't need to do anything especially new, you just have to take a classic sound and do it really well.

That's what The Ergs! did. They were one of a long line of great punk bands coming from New Jersey, the same scene that has produced bands like The Bouncing Souls, Lifetime, The Misfits, Saves the Day, Streetlight Manifesto, The Gaslight Anthem, and many, many others. During their short, eight-year run, The Ergs! released two classic albums and a whole bunch of EPs, splits, and singles. Their debut album, dorkrockcorkrod, came out in 2004 and instantly made a huge impact on the scene.

But lead singer/drummer Mikey Erg had different plans for the band. He had long expressed a desire to be more than just a simple pop/punk band, and they proved it with their second and final real album, 2007's Upstairs/Downstairs. A lot of the same short, fast punk was still on the album, but there were also touches of other things. They dropped a random country song with "Stinking of Whiskey Blues," and "Books About Miles Davis" sounds like an old soul song played by a pop/punk band, which is kind of what it actually is.

Some people think the band got a little experimental on Upstairs/Downstairs or felt that the album that followed would have been the one where all the experimenting came together in a much more logical way. But, the band broke up a year later, so we'll never know. Most fans prefer dorkrockcorkrod or the half-album Jersey's Best Prancers that came between the two. "Pray For Rain" is one of those perfect pop/punk songs that you can listen to endlessly and never get sick of. As such, it's become something of a signature song for The Ergs!, and it's easy to see why. It's a love song about a hopeless guy who can't figure out a way to get the girl to return his love. It's fast, ultra-catchy, self-deprecating, and simple. And sometimes, that's all you need to make a great song. It even ends with a clip of Henry Rollins being cynical and angry, as usual. Check it out!

SONG OF THE DAY: "Everlasting Light" by The Black Keys

Okay, it's late and I'm feeling somewhat lazy right now, so I'm going to pick a song everyone knows by a band everyone knows. But it's still a good song, so deal with it. Plus, they're from Akron, and that's cool. 

Brothers is a great album. After five albums of varying levels of quality and success, the band finally broke through to the mainstream with this one. As such, it's generally seen as the first album where The Black Keys started going in a poppier direction. I don't really care about things like "selling out" as long as the music is good, and I especially don't care when I don't know a band's underground/indie past. In fact, one thing I respect about The Black Keys is their willingness to experiment, as they did on Blakroc.

The single "Tighten Up" was and is a super cool song. I love the whistling and the change in tempo about two-thirds of the way through. That was all I knew about the band for some time, but then they got huge and continue to be after the release of the less good, more poppy El Camino. "Lonely Boy" is catchy and had a hilarious video, and "Little Black Submarines" is an undeniably tight song that sounds like Zeppelin at their best, but the rest of that album was rather unmemorable. Brothers was likely a creative peak. I mean, listen to those first four songs. Most bands are lucky to have one song in their whole discography that is as good as any of those four songs.

"Everlasting Light" starts things off in the best way. That intro gets stuck in my head for days at a time, so, I'm bringing you all down with me. Listen and enjoy!

SONG OF THE DAY: "Ruby" by Cheap Girls

Cheap Girls is a band that's very much in the middle of the whole '80s/'90s alt-rock revival scene. They sound like the direction The Replacements were starting to go in before they started getting bad and broke up. The band's biggest downfall, unfortunately, is their lack of diversity. Their songs are all catchy, upbeat, fun songs with loud guitars and good lyrics. Not great lyrics, but good lyrics. This sound usually works well for them, but they come off seeming like a one-trick pony.

Cheap Girls will be releasing their fourth album, Famous Graves, on May 13th, so we'll see if they've started branching out a bit. The first single, released a few days ago, indicates that they probably haven't, but I'll wait until I hear the whole thing before passing final judgement.

But that's enough negativity about this band, because I actually do like them quite a bit. In fact, one super cool thing they've been doing is releasing acoustic versions of their entire albums. They did so for the first two albums they released, and I actually find myself enjoying the acoustic versions more than the official albums sometimes. I think his voice works a lot better on acoustic songs, and I was happy to see that they included a single acoustic song on their most recent album. It's a trend I hope they continue. But, of course, they released the electric version of that one acoustic song as a bonus track, so I'm fairly certain they just record every song they write both ways. They should try swapping a few electric versions out on their albums. Or I guess I could just do that and create my own versions of their albums. I don't know.

Okay, that's way more than enough rambling for now. Just listen to the song. It's called "Ruby." Enjoy!

SONG OF THE DAY: "Bury My Bones" by Pure Love

Okay, so, real quickly, because it's Friday night and it's been a crazy day and I have things to do, here's the SotD!

Pure Love is a British band that formed about two years ago when Frank Carter of the U.K. hardcore band Gallows quit to pursue other interests. Gallows was a very abrasive-sounding band that was quite angry most of the time. That's all well and great if you're in that mood, and, for what it's worth, they were actually much better than most of the bands in that genre. They went beyond just making loud, scary, angry music, instead making thoughtful, almost beautiful arrangements that was also loud, scary, and angry.

I prefer Pure Love much better. They released their first and only album thus far, Anthems, in 2013 to a decidedly mixed response. There were some real bangers on this album, like "Bury My Bones" and "Handsome Devil's Club," but the entire album was just pretty okay. But, "Bury My Bones" should be played at every sporting event for the rest of eternity. It pumps me up so much and just has that sound that would totally work in an arena setting.

This song was the first single from the first album, and the first taste the world had of Carter's new group. It served as a great introduction, leaving no question about what the album would sound like and embody. The first line, right off the bat, reads, "I'm so sick of singing about hate / It's never gonna make a change / It breaks me down, bit by bit / Keeps me steadily feeling sick." So, right there, at the very beginning of the song, you get an explanation of why Carter left Gallows and why Pure Love sounds totally different.

I loved that direct declaration of his intentions. When that song came out, I thought it was the most badass line I'd heard in a while. He basically said that he was was done with his past, and this is the new me. Judge as you will. Listen to "Bury My Bones" below and get ready to put it on your next pump up/party playlist!

More Callahan Thoughts

I'm realizing now, after letting some hours pass and letting others' comments sink in, that I complained a lot about the current system of Callahan voting without offering up any concrete solutions, other than delaying voting until Nationals is finished. I also realized that I hate when people are negative without suggesting ways to improve something, and I don't want to be a hypocrite. So, here are my thoughts on how to make the Callahan Award a more accurate representation of the best player in the game.

While it's great that Skyd has continued to allow the Callahan to be decided entirely college players, I don't think this is the best way to manage the rapidly growing attention the sport has been receiving. Despite the increased media attention on players and tournaments, we are still at a point where the vast majority of college players never get to see the elite players in person, yet they vote on them anyway.

The fact that the biggest individual award in the entire sport is decided solely by anyone who plays is insane. Giving a casual B-team player who has heard of a few of these guys the same voting power as someone who actually played against these players is ridiculous. The fact that the votes are not weighted more heavily for those who write about and report on the sport on a weekly basis is wrong. Reporters often spend entire weekends watching these players in person for several full games. Surely they have a better idea of how good the nominees actually are than those who have never seen them play.

While tournament recaps, player write-ups, and game videos are great, not everyone reads or watches them, and they still do not provide the same experience of seeing games played in person. I propose that the vote be split 50/50: the collective votes of all USAU college division members combine for 50 percent of the Callahan vote. The other 50 percent goes to the collective votes of all players on teams at the College Championships, plus the votes from writers and reporters for major ultimate news sources.

By doing so, the most informed voters get more say in the matter, but the rest of the ultimate-playing populace still gets a large say in the matter. I think this will allow a better consensus on the winners, and it will ensure that the Callahan Award winner is the player who truly deserves it the most.

On the Callahan Award

With the college ultimate season finally revving up after a very long winter, I've been thinking a lot about the game and how it has changed over the years. I've also been thinking about the Callahan Award, which will be voted on in the coming months.

Skyd Magazine lists three main criteria to be considered when voting for the Callahan that I'd like you to keep in mind while reading:

• A. Overall offensive and defensive abilities
• B. Dedication to ultimate and leadership ability
• C. Sportsmanship

Okay, first of all, sportmanship is a joke. Based on Nick Lance's and Dylan Freechild's wins, nobody is really taking that into consideration when voting as much as USA Ultimate would like. Furthermore, Skyd insists that "All candidates should be judged by their performance only during the 2014 spring college season." Again, that won't happen, but it's something to keep in mind. Here are some thoughts I have about the award:

                                                                Source: SkydMagazine.com

1. Voting for the Callahan should take place after Nationals.

I think it is a crime that all the votes have to be placed before the biggest tournament of the entire year. This is when the truly great players separate themselves from the ones who disappear on a stage like this. This tournament also has the highest level of exposure, meaning fans will actually get to see the players for whom they are voting. Voters will also get to judge players based on their performance against the toughest competition of the year, instead of judging them based on a sweet scoober they threw against a team that finished 10th at D-I Regionals.

I understand it will never happen though. USA Ultimate uses the platform and exposure of Nationals to highlight their star players and do a whole ceremony and everything. If voting and awarding of the Callahan happened a month later, no one would get to actually see it, it wouldn't be on ESPN's coverage, etc. But if they truly want to award it to the best player, this is how it needs to be done.

A quick comparison to college football: do you think Manti Te'o would have won the Heisman after his abysmal, invisible performance against Alabama in the 2013 National Championship game? Probably not.

2. Too much importance is placed on the Callahan nominees' videos.

This is nothing new. It's been this way since ultimate videos have existed. This catch alone essentially won the Callahan for Joe Kershner in 2008. Nick Lance won in 2012 because of his video. No doubt about it. Yes, he's a great player. Yes, he's now a star on one of the best club teams in the world (Johnny Bravo), and yes, the video was awesome. It featured some of the craziest throws I've ever seen, displayed all parts of Lance's game, and was edited extremely well. It was amazing. There was no way he wasn't going to win.

But, I'll be the first to admit that I voted for him to win the Callahan that year, even though I had never heard of him before that video came out and I had never seen him play a full game before. That is just wrong. How can you really say whether someone is the best based solely on a highlight reel? I can show you a hundred athletes who aren't near the top of their sport who happen to make pretty cool plays pretty frequently. But it is over the course of a whole game where you find out how good they really are.

Furthermore, many of the plays featured in Callahan videos are made during club seasons or previous college seasons, thus going against Skyd's recommendation that only a player's performance in the spring of that year should be considered. Nick Lance's video did not do this (see Jay Clark's comment below), which makes the video even more impressive. But most of the videos do, possibly because they want to show that the player can compete on the highest level, or they just need to fill up more time. Freechild even used video from his freshman year.

But to again parallel this award to college football, that would be like giving the Heisman to Jadaveon Clowney based on his one hit on that Michigan running back. No one would even know Clowney's name if it weren't for that hit. He may be freakishly athletic, but he's not an especially great defensive end, and he should not have even been considered for the Heisman.

3. The Callahan should be awarded based on a player's achievements, not their talents.

This ties in with the last point I made, but it's worth exploring on its own as well. Georgia Tech finished 12th at Nationals in 2012. Respectable, but not dominant. A truly great player, and one who encompasses everything the Callahan award stands for, is able to bring his team at least to the quarters or semis. Sure, it's great to be the best player on a pretty good team, but if you're the best player on one of the best teams, that's on an entirely different level.

This is where Skyd's second criterion, concerning "leadership abilities," comes into play. Lance might have been a great player, but he was not the greatest leader, at least not in his ability to get his team to perform its best.

4. Alex Thorne should have won the Callahan in 2012.

I feel like I've been ragging on Nick Lance too much. In reality, I think he's a tremendous player, and I really admire his abilities. I just think he was not the best player in college that year, and his Callahan win represents a lot of what's wrong with the voting process. But now, let's focus on why Alex Thorne deserved to win.

First of all, his team won the championship, and he was easily the best player on that team. After watching the championship game against Wisconsin, it was very clear that he was playing on an entirely different level from everyone else. He stepped up and played the best game of his life when it mattered the most.

It was a rather windy game, but he seemed completely unfazed by the weather. His throws were perfect, even when throwing an outside-in flick around a cup two-thirds the length of the field, like he did to his brother, Max, multiple times. His hucks were spot-on, and more than that, they seemed effortless. He was totally in control of that game and remained calm throughout the whole thing. It was like he wasn't even trying.

Alex Thorne is an incredibly pure thrower with so much natural throwing ability. Thorne has more command over the disc than anyone I've seen in the college game. He also was a huge part of Pitt's signature comeback win against Carleton. To be the best player on the best team, play your best game when it counts, and not win the Callahan is messed up.

5. Tyler Degirolamo should have won the Callahan in 2013.

I had the pleasure of watching Nationals in person last year, and I couldn't help but draw comparisons to the previous year when it came to the Freechild/Degirolamo fight for the Callahan. Freechild had the better video and the flashier moves (give-and-gos, high release flicks, stuff that shouldn't work but does, etc.), but Degirolamo was clearly the better player. He proved it throughout the weekend and it was especially evident during the semifinal game between Pitt and Oregon.

From 2012 to 2013, Degirolamo became a whole different kind of player. He used to be the best deep threat and probably the most athletic player in the game, who had the ability to occasionally huck it for a score as well. By 2013, he was a complete player. He remained the most unguardable deep cutter, and teams adjusted their entire defense around him. So, he decided to become a handler half the time. There were many points where he touched the disc every other throw. He was the most important player for Pitt that year on offense, and he is the reason they skated through Nationals without much of a challenge. Oh, and by the way, he was one of the best defenders in the game as well.

Freechild is very good, but he never took over games at Nationals the way Degirolamo did. Teams didn't have to change everything about their defense when Freechild stepped on the field.

6. Jimmy Mickle should win the Callahan in 2014.

Now, by saying this in February, I'm already contradicting several of my points stated above. But if Jimmy Mickle doesn't win the Callahan, I'll be shocked. Essentially, unless somebody comes out of the woodwork to wow people, the voting this year is between Mickle, Freechild, and Will Driscoll. I don't think people want to see Freechild win again, and Mickle is way better than Driscoll. More than that, Mickle is way better than most college and club players in the country.

Watching Mickle play for Johnny Bravo in the Club Championships proved that he is one of the best players in the world at any level. He single-handedly dominated against Chain, and he played well against Doublewide while Thorne and Degirolamo were non-factors. (Degirolamo didn't even touch the disc that game until the last few points, while being a part of about four turnovers prior to that.)

Mickle's play at last year's College Championships proved that he can carry his team when they need it most, as he did during Colorado's comeback against Oregon in pool play. Freechild is close, but other than him, Mickle is by far the best player in the college game, and if he plays anywhere close to his ability, there is no way he should not win the Callahan.

7. There should be a Callahan equivalent for D-III ultimate.

Full disclosure: I'm currently in my fifth year playing for a D-III program.

Come on, USAU! There are more players in D-III ultimate than in D-I, and there is clearly support for a similar award, considering Callahan and NexGen nomination videos from D-III players have emerged in each of the last few years (Tommy Li, Spencer Sheridan, Greg Wakeman), even though those players didn't have a chance of winning. And these are great players in their own right who deserve recognition.

People know the names of the big players in D-III now that coverage has increased and the D-III Championships have become more established. Everyone knew who Rhys Lindmark was when he was tearing it up in 2012. People saw Ultiworld going nuts about Nick Mathison last year. Jordan Rhyne could definitely have started on any D-I roster in the country. Marques Brownlee, Charlie Enders, Scott Graber, Tim Kreutzfeldt, Nihal Bhakta, Jonas Cole, Tim Fergus, Zach Purdy, and others have made a name for themselves in recent years.

I believe D-III coverage still needs to expand more before we can get truly unbiased votes that aren't based on hype or hearsay, but I think it's time to start thinking about it.