This past summer, I was fortunate enough to be paid to spend exorbitant amounts of time listening to music – along with more logistical responsibilities – here at WRMC, Middlebury College’s student-run radio station. Aside from getting a hold of the biggest releases in the college radio world, ...
The word ‘emo,’ with regards to music at least, normally evokes a couple of common reactions for graduates of the American teenage experience. First, a wave of nostalgia washes over your glazed and jaded eyes, bringing you back to those icky formative middle school years where everyone was horrible ...
It’s been two decades since Beck penned the anthemic, self-mocking two-lined chorus that (who knew?) would be swallowed heartily by ‘90s frat bros and despondent weirdos alike. Led by “Loser,” his album Mellow Gold immediately garnered praise with eclectic fusions of anti-folk twang, old-school ...
To anyone who has felt the slightest angst throughout his or her formative years — and I know this applies to all of you — great news: pop punk lives on! But I’m not talking Vans Warped Tour here; I’m talking the hard stuff. The good stuff. The ol’ fashioned, ass-kicking tempos venting those ...
It is Saturday night, roughly 11:50 p.m., and the crowd facing the Chicago-born Chance the Rapper in Nelson Stadium is getting antsy. The show thus far has been nothing if not a tad bizarre, and Chance is running out of concert staples to fill the venue’s echoey crevices. “Smoke Again” and “Juice” ...
If there is one thing the music world could have counted on for 2013, it was that surely, at some point, eventually, Arcade Fire would release a new album. Since 2004’s insta-classic debut Funeral redefined the indie landscape with gusto and grandeur, few things have been more certain than a (roughly) ...
A little less than two years ago, Drake’s second album Take Care – an 80 minute epic on love, failed relationships and the pressures of budding fame – was released to staggering success. Demonstrating marked growth in maturity and spawning as many singles as the standard Beyoncé album (as well ...
The era of indie rock is dwindling. Thirty years or so is a good run, all things considered; but the young teens of today simply aren’t interested in taking the time to hone their six-string skills for the heartthrobs of freshman year creative writing class when more immediately accessible instruments ...
In case anyone was wondering, the litmus test for giving an artist free reign to spit outright venomous obscenities that pass unexamined by the critical eye is being really, really clever -- a 16-year-old Earl Sweatshirt proved as much back in 2010 on his semi-eponymous debut mixtape. One has to wonder ...
“Oblivion” is the result of some macabre thought-experiment, wherein every device necessary to tell an effective story is eliminated in favor of Tom Cruise’s face and the basic tropes of pop science fiction. It’s a structure that broaches questions about why we care about science fiction in ...