Top8 - 10/28/24

October 27, 2024 - 08:56 PM

Welcome back to Top8! I want to send a huge thank you out to everyone who supported our recent 2024 membership drive. We have brought a lot of new people onboard as sustaining members and if you're one of them, I just want to say thank you so much. We want to keep WTSQ on the air until the sun consumes the earth. Thank you for taking us one step closer. Please send all prophecies of doom to wtsq.org/contact.

I am really excited to bring you all some new songs this week, so let's jump right in.

Heavy Lungs - Get Out

You know that Idles song Danny Nedelko? Well, it's about the dude in Heavy Lungs. The two bands come out of the Bristol, UK scene and have played shows together for years. However, unlike Idles, Heavy Lungs haven't released a ton of music.That is about to change in 2025 with a new album called "Caviar" set to drop. Ahead of that, we have the new single "Get Out". This track has all the intensity that was missing from a lot of the last Idles record. And honestly, intensity is really the core value of this band. This is a track that catches your ears napping in the pit and shoulder checks them right into a bunch of moshing lunatics. And thank god for that. Turn this one up in traffic and get yourself a speeding ticket today. 


Girl and Girl - The Cow

Girl and Girl have already released one of the year's best albums with "Call A Doctor". Now they are back with a profoundly stupid and catchy song. Apparently everyone calls the guy in the band "The Cow" and so he wrote a song about it. It's like a punky Monkees song. By reading this, you've already thought too much about it.


Langkamer - Taking Stones to Joe's House

Another Bristol band, but this time with a very different sound. Langkamer explore 90's slacker rock, ala Pavement but with a bit of alt-country thrown in for sweetness. "Taking Stones to Joe's House" fits in well with the deadpan vibe from that sort of music. The album is titled "Langzamer" even though the band's name is Langkamer, so mind the spelling. 


Hildegard - Cruel

Hildegard is a musical collaboration between Helana Deland and Ouri. The result of this combination is a sultry cloud of music which takes its time seducing you. "Cruel" is a good example of this. The video seems to suggest that this involves a lusty lesbian moment between a soccer coach and a player with a minor injury. Or maybe I am reading too much into it. 


Great Grandpa - Doom

You'll think of Radiohead when you hear "Doom". And that's fair really. There is a lot of that DNA here. But the Seattle band is also really doing their own thing. What starts out sorta evoking a liturgical chant, becomes an absolute earthquake of interlocking rhythms and crushing guitars. This track is only 4:30, but it feels like at least ten minutes because you're taken on such a journey. 


Velvet - Clementine

It wouldn't be Top8 without a shoegaze banger. The NYC four-piece is serving it with all the fixings here. There's a whispery section that becomes loud again. There are 6 metric tons of gauzy guitars. If you heard this song played live, it would take 5 years off your life. 


Soccer Mommy - Abigail

You may not have known that you needed a song about a potential girlfriend in the game Stardew Valley. But Soccer Mommy knew. And this is a beautiful song regardless of if you play the game. If you do, there are a few references to details about the character in the lyrics, such as her purple hair.

Amelia says that Abigail is big with the Stardew lesbians. They also said that **checks notes** she's secretly the Wizard's daughter and that she always wins the egg hunt. She eats rocks and diamonds. She likes combat. You should give her amethyst to increase your relationship affinity. That she draws warriors. And that she's basically a sword lesbian. Full disclosure, I have not played Stardew Valley, but I do love Soccer Mommy, and you should too. 


Phantogram - Jealousy

Phantogram is one of my original WTSQ bands; I heard them on the radio here right when they were breaking into the scene. To be honest, I felt like the band have struggled to capture the brilliance of 2014's "Voices" again. The new album "Memory of a Day" may finally sweep that aside. "Jealousy" is a good example of what it gets right. For one thing, it's loud and punchy. It also leans into the anthemic quality that Phantogram can get even out of a minor key. The band is getting a dense, metal-esque crushing sound on this track.


And this week's extra innings – a few other things I have been listening to, most not new. 

 

Altin Gun - Bir Sigara Ic Oglan

The Dare - I Destroyed Disco

MJ Lenderman - Rudolph

And a playlist of everything.

Thank you for reading and listening. 

-emily

See also

Top8 - 05/27/24

Top8 - 05/27/24

Top8 - 02/26/24

Top8 - 02/26/24