Indiecast - Car Seat Headrest Re-Records "Teens Of Denial," Ed O'Brien Goes Solo (Again), and We Assess a "Greatest Punk Albums" List

Episode Date: May 22, 2026

The guys start by talking about the newly announced anniversary tour for "Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness," with Steven quizzing Ian on how many times "We Only Come Out At Night" has been played live (2:43). They then talk about Car Seat Headrest re-recording their 2016 indie classic "Teens Of Denial," for dubious reasons (10:50). Then they review the week's new releases, including new albums by Bleachers, Ed O'Brien of Radiohead and Future Islands (24:24). After that, they discuss a recent "Greatest Punk Albums" list, giving their own takes on the choices (38:01). In Recommendation Corner, Ian talks about The Field and Steven discusses Thomas Dollbaum (52:14). See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Indycast is presented by Amazon Music. Hello and welcome to Indycast. On this show, we talk about the biggest indie news of the week, review albums, and we hash out trends. In this episode, we talk about car seat headrest, re-recording teens of denial, new albums by Bleachers and Ed O'Brien, and a recent list of the greatest punk albums of all time. My name is Stephen Hayden, and I'm joined by my friend and co-host. He really wants to hear, we only come out at night on the Melancholy and Infinite Sadness Anniversary Tour. Ian Cohen, Ian, how are you? I love our intro bits where our listeners probably can't tell if it's a bit or not,

because that was my first thought when I saw this announcement. Not only do I want to hear we only come out at night, I want Billy Corgan to do this watch the throne style with Paris, where they play at like eight times, an increasing number of times in a row as the tour proceed. So if I see them in L.A., which I think is the last show, then we'll be playing it 15 times in a row. That would be so sick.

Now, according to setlist.com, how many times do you think Smashing Pumpkins in their career have already played? We only come on at night. Probably less than the special winner's song. That's one for the real heads. I think that's on the, uh, that might be on the aeroplane flies high box set. Give me a number. Twice. No, way more than that.

One more guess. Way more than that. Way up. A shockingly. 26. Three times almost as many times as that. 77 times they've played that song i'm as surprised as you are i i i looked that up i thought we're going to be in the teens at best uh but apparently billy's been playing that song a lot

what about what about the other songs that come after like uh beautiful or whatever you know the or by starlight how many times they play that by starlight well let's look it up yeah smashy Or Lily My One and Only. Okay, give me one song. You give me like 15 songs here. Which one do you want me to do? I'm going to go with Lily My One and Only. Lily My One and Only set list.

They have played that song. It's been played 82 times by Smashing Pumpkins, nine times by Billy Corrigan solo. You know what? I got to respect that. There are no skips on that album, according to Billy Corrigan. Yeah, I mean, he's... Well, look, I mean, it's either play the deep, deep cuts on Melancholy or play songs off his new record. I mean, so it's not a hard choice probably for Billy.

For those who don't know, Smashy Pumpkins announced this week that they're doing an extensive run of concerts. It looks like into the fall called The Rats in a Caged Tour. It's a anniversary tour for Melancholy and the Impenant Sadness. They're doing two unique sets celebrating the album, as well as other unruly hits and dark treasure. It's kind of big language here. I don't know if they're going to be playing the whole record because that would be a concert onto itself. That's 28 songs.

Yeah, two hours. Yeah, and then if you're doing the unruly hits and dark treasures, whatever the hell that means. But they do do long shows. So maybe, I don't know, maybe they're going to do the whole record. And then, you know, what, just straight up, I'm trying to think of the name of the last record and I'm blanking.

Can you name any recent Smashy Pumpkins album and if I recent, that mean, last 20 years? Well, there's the one I reviewed in 2020 called CIR, CYR, I believe.

That one I only remember because I reviewed it. It was like 76 minutes long. It was the one where Billy taught himself how to use logic. So, yeah, I can't think of any other. The computer program, not the school of thought.

We should be clear. He did not learn how to be logical. I saw this other story. This was on KTLA.com. Apparently on Sunday evening in Hollywood, Smashing Pumpkins, they announced this tour, and they held a funeral ceremony for Zero, bidding adieu to the alter ego of frontman Billy Corrigan

that he famously took in the 90s. And then it says, it was held at the Hollywood Legion Theater, the private requiem called Immemorial Zero, drew around 300 people with speeches and a faux eulogy delivered by Corgan's wife, Chloe Mandel, around a chrome casket, and then Howie Mandel gave a speech as well. So, okay, so a couple things I didn't know here. One, was the protagonist of melancholy and the infinite sadness called Zero?

Is that a well-known thing that this, because I know he wore the Zero shirt and there's the Song Zero, but is this well known that this was a character? Is this completely went over my head? Yeah, I think it's, well, we're going to talk about Joe later on for car seat headrest. I think it's sort of like that sort of deal. But yeah, I do know that it was a alter ego. But for all of like the lore and the convoluted stuff that goes into the average smashing pumpkins album, there's probably 12 times as much that never gets made, for example.

Did you know that there was like a plan for a plan for a? cartoon to accompany Machina Machines a God? No, I had no idea. If I don't know the lore of an album I actually listened to, I would not know the lore of Machina either. So, no, I didn't know that. Another thing I didn't know is that Howie Mandel is Billy Corgan's father-in-law. Did you know that?

Well, Chloe Mandel spells her name differently than Howie Mandel. Are we sure? Can we get a fact? Wait, wait, so that's not his daughter? I don't think so. Wait, wait, so Howie Mandel just happened to be there? False solidarity.

Yeah, she's a, I mean, it's funny because like I looked that up too because like her name, it's sort of like on the Simpsons, like, I wonder if Homer Simpson related to this Richard Nixon, no, they spell and pronounce the name differently. It's Chloe Mendel, M-E-N-D-E-L, and

also the first couple of Google terms that come up, when you search Chloe Mendel. How did Billy Corgan meet Chloe Mendel? Is Chloe Mandel Filipino? What is the age difference between Chloe Mendel and Billy Corgan? She's 33, by the way. Good song by Smashing Pumpkins, by the way.

So, again, she's not related to Howie Mandel. But Howie Mandel happened to be here to give a speech after Chloe Mendel, Billy Corgan's wife. So that's the chain of events here? I guess so. The other one, well, there's, the other thing that comes up is like, Howie Mandel did a, I know he did a thing on a podcast where he asked if like Billy Corgan and Bill Burr are brothers. Yes, yes. Yeah.

So, yeah, I do not, I do not think that Chloe Mendel is related to Howie Mandel. So Howie Mandel and Billy Corgan are just bros. Yeah. And he has a wife named Chloe Mendel. Yes. Okay, wow. This is as convoluted as a Smashing Pumpkins album, this whole... That's right.

Are you going to go see this tour? I mean, I might. I mean, if it was coming to San Diego, probably, but, you know, they're playing at the Kia Forum in Englewood. Last time I saw Smashing Pumpkins, they played the hockey arena in San Diego. It was a good tour, but it was also one that was, like, kind of not specific. Melancholy, yeah, of course I want to see that. I think that all of this just speaks to something larger that's been brewing in my mind about

smashing pumpkins. Do you get the sense that, like, Billy Corgan is trying to do some, like, image rehab now or, like, play nice so he can become, if not like a Dave Grohl guy, just the guy who pops up as an alt-rock icon on, like, Coachella sets? I mean, I know he's been up in the business of Youngblood and Somber and those other hymbo pop stars who spell a common word wrong as their name. I mean, do you get, I mean, yes, he also, like a few weeks ago said that when this, you know, because the U.S. wasn't interested in a regime change in the 90s, the CIA put all their attention to killing rock music. I mean, do you get the sense that he's kind of turning a new leaf? I don't think so. I mean, you know, he owns that wrestling league. And I think that he's always been a bit of a heel, deliberately so. So the idea that he would be playing the nice guy, I don't really see that. I just think that they are. an evergreen

touchdown and influence at this point. Any young person that is making rock music or rock-coated music in the case of somber and Youngblood, they're going to gravitate to Billy. Also, Billy picks up the phone and wants to do these things. It keeps them in the public eye. I don't know if they're also calling Dave Grohl.

Dave Grohl doesn't seem to be taking those phone calls as much these days. so Billy is maybe next on the Rolodex Or maybe Jack White says no I don't know what the order is If it's like Dave Grohl, Jack White, then Billy Corgan Or Gorgon's above Jack White Or maybe Corgan's at the top

I feel like Dave Grohl would be at the top Of that rolleract He's your first phone call So if you don't get Dave Groll Then you try to get Billy Or you try to get Jack White I mean Olivia Rodrigo She got custody of Jack White

Sombor got Billy Corgan and I don't know who'd be after that. Who would be the next in line? I mean, sadly, a lot of the 90s alt-rock legends are no longer with us. So Corgan also benefits from that. I imagine Courtney Love would also be down for that, you know? Maybe not to, like, musically collaborate, but just, like, get on the podcast and talk or shit, which is, hey, I'm all for that. Just incoherently babble for two hours.

I feel like that's Courtney loves. I guess she went on Billy Corrigan's podcast and did that. Which I did not watch, I just watched the social media clips, and the people that did see that whole thing basically said it was incoherent for two hours. God bless those two, man. I hope they eventually get together. Again? I mean, again.

I don't know. There were a lot of bad things that happened the first time they did. I don't know if we want to get into that. That's like getting into conspiracy theory type stuff. But anyway. You mentioned Carseat Had Restor, you alluded to it earlier. The 10th anniversary of their, let's just call it, canon 2010's era indie rock classic, Teens of Denial.

That anniversary is this week, and the band celebrated by releasing a re-recorded version of the record called Teens of Denial Joe's Story. And it's actually much more than like a re-recorded version of the record. It's like a reimagining of the album. Some songs have been taken off and replaced by other songs. Some of the lyrics have been changed. Apparently, Will Toledo, the frontman of Carseat Headrest, is religious. And he took out all the swear words on this record.

It also took out, I think, the drug references on the album as well. Here's a quote from him. He explains that the character of Joe, who apparently was the protagonist of this album, This is another instance where I didn't know it was a concept record, but apparently it was, or he is now refashioned it as a concept record. But he said it's an homage to Daniel Johnston, the late great singer-songwriter, beset by mental health issues. I started thinking, who is Joe?

And how do the songs and the way there's sequence on the album reflect what he's going through? As I started finding the foundations of an ancient city, it started becoming like founding the foundations of an ancient city while digging in my backyard as I kept digging certain songs from the original album fell by the wayside as they seem misplaced in the new context often asked for new lyrics to fully give birth to the story contained in the music. He says later that he asks that you hear this album like a kid hearing the album for the first time. Of course, if you want the original album,

you can hear that on streaming services. I feel like we have to talk about two different things here. One is the original album, looking back on it 10 years later, where it stands in the canon, as I said, of indie classics. And then this re-recorded version, which is another instance of Will Toledo re-recording an old Carsey Headrest album.

He did this many years ago. with Twin Fantasy. I feel like Carsey Headrest has been in a weird place for a while now as a band. Teens of Denial was this record that really established them. Certainly in my mind is like one of the great potential indie rock bands of the next 10 years. And now we have, here we are 10 years later and they're definitely not one of the great indie rock bands, I would say right now. They've done a lot of, they put on a couple albums that were very flawed, had some good moments on them, but we're very conceptually and structurally messy and even incoherent at times.

And it does feel like there is a bit of a sense of confusion from Will Toledo. That's what I get from him as an artist, just kind of making things more convoluted than they need to be, including this record, which is already a classic. So anyway, I've thrown a lot out here. do we want to start with just the album itself? I mean, I think it's still a great album in its original form. Oh, absolutely. I mean, I would hope that, you know, we'd be talking about this album, even if there

wasn't a reissue, just because I think for people of our tastes, this is like five-tool classic, right? It's got the, you know, it's got the hooks. It's got that kind of indie rock rawness, but it's also got the lyrics that are just endlessly quotable and just very highly annotated on genius. I think it's kind of follow-up, but in the same vein as like the monitor or lifted by bright eyes. But almost more accessible than those albums, I feel like. Yes, totally, totally. Like the songs, there's some long songs, but there's also a lot of punchy earworms. And it has the dense thing and also

the light and catchy thing somehow simultaneously. Yeah, that's, I mean, I remember the first time I heard that record. I got the, you know, just driving in my car and listening to the promo. And this is the original one with not what I needed with the car's interpolation. Which is kind of my favorite version still. I love that they did that, but they had to take it off the record. Yeah. It was an expensive mistake, as he says.

Yeah, there were just so many times during that where I didn't have to necessarily pull over, but it was just like a spit take of like, oh my God, that lyric is so great. And when I heard that he was taking out the drug and drug references and profanity, I mean, the first, the first lyric that comes to mind is, you know, last Friday night took ashes of mushrooms. I did not transcend. I felt like a walking piece of shit in a stupid looking jacket. One of the best lyrics of the decade. And apparently, I imagine that one did not make the cut similarly because not what I needed is not on the record, the best lyric of the past decade, which is I feel so empty trying to explain. explain this. His name is William O'Neabor. He's from the 70s. That whole song is gone. So,

um, really gutted, you know, it's, this is no longer teens of denial. No matter how much, uh, we draw out the story of Joe. This feels like Star Wars prequel type stuff. I don't, I'm not really attached to Joe, but also I'm not like an 18 year old furry who are, you know, who I've been to car seat, had the rest shows and those are the real shooters. So maybe they feel a certain type of way about it. Yeah, I mean, they definitely haven't fallen completely off the map. There's definitely still an audience out there that is deep into this band that will talk about them online. But I do think that when Teens of Denial came out and it was preceded by Teens of Style, which was a compilation of, I think they were re-recorded songs from the records he had done

on Band Camp, which was a very prescient move, it turns out, him reworking these out. albums that he had done on Bandcamp, which if you don't know about Carseat Headrest, there's this big backlog of music that Toledo had recorded on his own before he had a record deal with Manador that amounts to like a career's worth of music. I think there's something like a dozen albums that he made on his own. Many of them really quite great. I mentioned Twin Fantasy earlier. I would say that among fans of Carseat Headrest, that might be considered the best, certainly among the best. Teens of Denial, I think, is more of the casual listeners album that they associate with Car Seed Headrest. Totally. I think that's the interesting part about Twin or Twin Fantasy

versus Teens of Denial, which is that Teens of Denial is like his 10th album. Right. Exactly. Yeah. And so for, you know, maybe the more casual listener, I mean, I first got on with How to Leave Town, which I think that might have been 2015. That was, that preceded Teens of Style by a couple of months. I think it's earlier than that. I think it's like more, maybe a year or two, but I could be wrong. Yeah.

I mean, that was back when I, I discovered car seat headrest because this was 2015 and I would get these promos where it said, recommend it feel like car seat headrest. I'm like, I've never heard of this guy. Like,

how can I, how can you recommend? And that's when I found how to leave town. It's like, oh, wait, this is pretty sick. Yeah. And,

and, you know, when teens of the Nile came out, it just felt like, oh, he's the next one. Yeah, he's the new autur. And in retrospect, it looks like it was more of an ending to his career, that he had already amassed all these great songs and was so prolific.

And because since then, his output has slowed considerably. You had Making a Doorless Open came out in 2020, which, if you don't remember, that was released in three different versions. Yes. That there was like an LP version, I think a CD version and the digital version, that were slightly different from one another, but they were different enough that if you were a fan, you wanted to hear every version,

but then when you heard every version, it was like, well, these aren't all that different. So it was like... Massive pain in the ass to review, by the way. Exactly. It was like different enough to be interesting, but not different enough to, you know, be worth your time. And then the scholars, this rock out opera,

comes out last year, some really good moments on that album, some really, I think, good songs. I mean, Will Toledo again? Very talented songwriter. But then you also have these like 18 minute songs, which, look, I'm a fan of long songs. I'm a jam band guy.

So I'm open to that. But if you're going to do something like that, it has to feel, I think, like a sweet, almost like a series of little songs tucked into one big song where it feels interesting over the course of the runtime of the song rather than a song that's just sort of stretched out with instrumental passages that don't always get somewhere interesting.

It just feels like his career has been a lot of diddling around wasting time in the last 10 years. And this re-recording of a very classic record, it feels like the peak of that. And like you said, it's like he doesn't know what's good about this album. Like he's taking a lot of what was great about the original album and presenting it, And, you know, some of the songs that he put on this record, there's one song called Optimistic Son. There's another one, trying to remember what that's called. There's another song with Joe in the title.

Yeah. It's called Joe Drives Again. They're fine songs, but they're not essential. They don't need to be there. And I think it just speaks to a sort of weird, convolution that's happening constantly with his own music, it's really taken me out of the band. It's hard for me to think of a more disappointing band in the last 10 years.

When you factor in the potential and the hopes maybe that people like you and I had, I just feel like no one has been a bigger letdown than Carseat Hadrest, really. Yeah, I mean, I know that you were on the record saying that like, hey, man, this might be the future. And I don't think people would hold it against you because... I wasn't the only one, though. I think a lot of people were... At least for this kind of music. I'm not talking about music on the whole,

but for this kind of indie rock, they were the most exciting thing going. And because of his age and all the ideas that he had, it just seemed like the potential there was so great. But again, weren't factoring in that he had all these other albums. And maybe it was just like, he's written a lot of songs already. How many songs does he have left in him? And the answer seems to be not that many, at least not in the last 10 years.

Yeah, I mean, maybe it's sort of like celebration rock or like the monitor in the sense that, you know, they've put out good work afterwards. But sometimes you're just put on Earth to make a certain kind of record. And when you do that, it's really hard to keep trying to top it by doing more of the same. So, I mean, it seems like Will Toledo is kind of going through a, I guess, a more cosmic change. their life. And I'm not mad at him doing what he's doing. I would love another. I think the bit my problem isn't necessarily that Car Seat Headrest isn't making albums on the level of teens and denial. That really nobody is. I need that like 70-minute, audacious, sprawling kind of rock opera, indie rock thing, like I had mentioned before. And I don't think in the past 10 years anyone's even really come

close or even attempted to make something like this. Well, Carsey had rested last year. I mean, the Scholars is what you've just described. It's just not as good as teens in denial. So I read somewhere that they're working on a new record. So I'm going to listen to it. Again, I don't want to rip their last two albums too much because I think there's moments on both that are really good. And I would never question his talent.

He's a very talented guy. I just think, I feel like there's a level of indecision going on in a need to complicate things that don't need to be complicated. And he's not the first person to fall victim to that. I just think it's unfortunate. And maybe he needs a producer. We got to bring in Rick Rubin here on a zip line, you know, get him into the studio and just someone who can be a sound,

board and get them to just focus on specific ideas moving forward. I don't know. We'll see, though. Maybe the next record will be great. I hope it is. Yeah, get this out of the system. You know, just we're done rehashing the past and maybe he'll do it again. Because like there are so many moments on making a door less open and the scholars where it's like, oh yeah, this dude's back. He's in his bag. And then the song goes on for like 15 more minutes. Yeah. All right, well, let's get to the upcoming, or I guess new releases that are out today. It's upcoming as we're talking right now.

We're recording this on Thursday, but they will be out on Friday, May 22nd. Not a big release weekend. It's the holiday weekend, got Memorial Day, so it's a little bit slower. There's a new Bleacher's album out Ian called Everyone for 10 minutes, all lowercase. No capitalization for Jack Antonoff. I haven't heard this record. I haven't loved Bleacher's material in the past. He's going after me with this band, I feel like.

He's going for that New Jersey, Bruce Springsteen. I guess the idea would be to focus on Bruce in the born-in-the-US-A era, popier stuff, big-sounding. He has this persona on stage when he's with bleachers where he's got the white shirt with like the sleeves rolled up and he's like smiling. and it turns my stomach a little bit. It just feels like Bruce Cosplay to me.

I'm a, I'm a sucker for that kind of pandering, you know, that kind of Heartland Rock pandering. But when you don't hit the mark, it's kind of how I feel about the Kevin Morby record that came out this month where he is playing the notes that I like, the Heartland Rock notes that I like. And I just feel like it's not landing for me. And there's a point where it starts to feel like pandering and I get turned off.

I feel like that way with bleachers historically. Again, I have not heard this record, so maybe this album is great. But that's how I feel about bleachers generally. I mean, for me, most of my experience with bleachers is the video for Modern Girl. It would play almost every single day at the gym I would go to. And man, that is one of the most punchable-looking bands and punchable-looking videos that you'll ever hope to see. Yeah.

But we got to give a shout to the fact of their upcoming tour. Their opening acts include Howdy Wednesday American Football, and this is Lorelei. Oh, that's great. Yeah, you can't hate that. And as a matter of fact, I think they had an opener last night that you're going to talk about later for their New Orleans show. Oh. Ben Stellar and Thomas Dahlbaum. So, yeah.

But so Bleacher's... I mean, Attenoff, if he came on our show, if he was a guest, we would love Jack Antonoff. I bet as a guy, he's incredible. And look, he works with all these people, all these female pop stars that's become his brand as a producer. And people complain about, like, why are they working with Jack Antonoff? He's got to be an incredible hang, along with being a very talented musician. I mean, he's created so many hits for people or collaborated on hits for people. So he clearly knows what he's doing.

doing as a hitmaker, but it seems like as a person, it seems like he's a great hang. And I'm sure if he was on our show, we'd be broying down, talking about all those acts you just talked about. I'm sure he's funny and engaged. So he's a great dude, I'm sure. Just in bleachers, there's something about it. It turns me off musically. I guess like my ceiling for bleachers is if I hear it and I confuse it with one of the more recent killer songs where they're trying to rip off war on drugs. That's what I think that's, I think that's the most I can hope for for bleachers on this record. Yeah. Yeah, I'm with you on that one.

Ed O'Brien of Radiohead has a new record out this week called Blue Morpho. On my substack, I did a big column this week where I reviewed a bunch of albums, 18 in all. Ed O'Brien was one of the albums I reviewed. Did not give it a positive review. I don't know if you've listened to this album, Ian. but it is fascinating with Ed O'Brien because again, of all the guys in Radiohead, he is easily the one I'd want to hang out with the most. He seems like an awesome guy, very approachable. I've interviewed him once. He was super nice, super normal. His music taste is probably

more like mine than anyone in Radiohead. Just a cool dude. But his records are easily the least interesting. I mean, him and Selway probably go neck and neck in terms of solo records that are nice. I mean, it's always the same. It's very well produced. Excellent musicianship. They sound great.

And there's not a single memorable song. It's kind of like Pink Floyd solo records. I mean, it reminds me of like, this album has kind of made me think of the Division Bell, that record, except the Division Bell has like these great David Gilmore guitar solos all over it.

So I love it for that reason, but this album doesn't even really have that. It's just, again, exquisitely produced. If you put it on headphones, like, if you wanted to, if you were selling stereos and you wanted to prove, like, how good your stereo sounded, put on Blue Morpho. Like, it'll blow people away. You'll be selling stereos left and right. But people are going to be like, what album did he play again? I don't remember the name of that. Like, who was that?

It sounded good. I don't remember what it was. Have you heard Blue Morpho, Ian? I'll be honest. I've never heard a Phil Selway nor a Ed O'Brien solo record. Oh, you're missing out, my friend. Yeah, I mean, after that, you're missing out. You just gave. It's crazy because, like, you think about, like, a guy like Ed O'Brien and the way you're describing a solo record, and I'm sure it hits him many times where he just, like, kind of stops and looks at it's like, damn, dude, I'm in radio head. And it goes to show

the value of having bands because there's a possible, there is a possible, there is a possible that Ed O'Brien doesn't meet those guys. And, you know, he's a musician, he's inspired, he creates just albums exactly like the one you've described, but never gets to contribute to OK Computer. I mean, never gets to contribute to Kid A. And I think that I do wonder if we are getting a lot of solo mid at the expense of, oh, this guy could be, you know, the great fourth option in a band, you know, like the guy, the 3 and D guy on the NBA team.

But instead we're getting people, like, the high school guy who gets, like, recruited, plays on Duke and is like the 10th guy off the bench. It's a very convoluted basketball metaphor, but it made sense to me. Well, I mean, I think with the solo records in Radiohead, it does, it's like the solo records in any band. You get to see how the band works

when you separate all the components. And in Radiohead, it has unfolded as, I think most people would have predicted, which is that Tom and, Johnny largely dictate what the album sound like, and they can take that sound with them if they make their own albums. Although, you know, the smile is different enough from Radiohead where, because I like the smile albums quite a bit, but, you know, they don't have that magical kind of intangible thing that makes them feel as important, even as like a moon-shaped pool.

Speaking of albums that turn 10 this year, that album has a gravitas. that no album even by Tom and Johnny have. And it's because it's Radiohead. It's all them together. And Ed is a part of that, even though it feels like the later Radiohead albums are even more dominated by Tom and Johnny. I mean, at times it doesn't sound as much like a band

as some of the earlier records do. But, I mean, God bless Ed O'Brien. Yeah. I feel bad because he is a great guy. And I don't want him to listen to this, because if any time I get a chance to hang out with it, O'Brien, I would love to do that. I just won't talk about his solo records.

Or maybe I got to be the friend that's honest with him, that gives him the hard truths. But maybe he knows that, and he doesn't care. Maybe part of the fun of this album for him is that I'm just making music in the studio. I don't, doesn't need to be great, you know. I've made a lot of great music in my life. I just want to do something and create it and who cares how good it is or not. You already have Kid A. You already have OK computer.

Let me have blue morpho. You owe me this one, radio head fans. This implies the existence of other colored morphos. That's true. Well, maybe we'll get more morphos after this. It's green morpho. It's like the Weezer approach. The other bigish release out today is future islands from a hole in the floor to a fountain of youth.

Do you go deep on future islands at all, Ian? I mean, I actually do. Go back deep enough where I have memories of seeing like future island shows on like on the night where like my, you know, the girl I was dating for like two months broke up with me and I'm going to the future island show all heartbroken. It's my main memory of them, however, is interviewing the band before they put out singles their big breakthrough record in 2014. This was before they had gotten on. Was it Letterman where they did? seasons that big viral one. Yeah, the guy did the dance.

Yeah. And they were super honest. Like, yeah, we're going for it with this one. Like, we called it singles because we think it's going, it's like just all, all killer. And you know what? It's true. And I mean, I think about them, like, I haven't really kept up with much of their stuff after the fact. But man, what, that is a band where you can't, like, the one song, the impact of one song on their career. If that song never happened and it was just like kind of a step up from the previous one, you know, maybe they're playing, you know, the 500 to a thousand cap rooms, which is, you know, enviable career.

But now they are, they're, they just remind me of all those festivals in the mid-2010s where it was like headline probably by a totally phoned in strokes, chants the rapper and like Mac DeMarco. Like Future Islands was your like second line band. Oh, yeah. They are like, again, I'm bringing it back to the NBA Twitter, where you'll see people like, yo, Kendall Gill was a bucket in the 90s. It's like this guy who was like an all-star but not an MVP candidate. That's who I kind of think of Future Islands as. Yeah, I mean, you said the impact of one song.

I would say the impact of one late night appearance. I mean, because without that letterman appearance going viral, I think that song doesn't take off. And it's a good song, but it's him doing that crazy dance on the show. show that everyone remembers. And it is worth thinking about that this week because, you know, Stephen Colbert is being taken off the air, the late show with Stephen Colbert, the franchise that originated with David Letterman and how that feels like a bellwether

for the country, I guess, if you believe that he was canceled because of Donald Trump, which I think is a fairly good assumption. But also larger in terms of television, just late-night TV being, in an obvious protracted decline and how that's impacted music and particularly indie bands and that, you know, that was like the one way

that you could reach something of a monocultural audience back in the day. You know, you go on one of these late-night shows and if you do well, you know, you would get some play from that. And Future Islands, are they the last band to get that bump from a TV show?

I mean, it's hard for, I can't think of another example. There might be one. But certainly from the indie world. Yeah. The indie rock world. I feel like they're the last band or one of the last bands. I mean, that is going away. Because even the shows that exist now, I feel like do less music than they used to.

I feel like every night, you know, 20 years ago there would be a musical guest. Now, like, I think Kimmel occasionally does guests. Yeah. They had that knocked loose performance, which was. It was so awesome. But I don't know if it, like, put them at a different level. Yeah. That's different than the Future Islands thing, I would say.

That was like a whole other. And it was also a different era of social media, too. I mean, it was the social media strength of the mid-2010s. It was the engine to propel stuff like that forward. Because even then, people weren't actually watching late night. They were consuming these clips the next day. but then once you didn't have this stuff put into your feed anymore because like on Twitter I'd never see late night clips anymore

except for geese but I don't know if we want to like delve back into that discussion again no I mean I feel like I'm always just seeing you know sex and drugs type stuff inserted in my feed now on Twitter anyway I mean that's like a cesspool of viral videos but yeah I don't know anyway future islands they're new record. Go check that out, I guess, if you want to relive your mid-2010s social media watching. Yeah, Seasons was the number, I remember this. I thought I remembered it and I checked it out. Yes, this was Pitchfork's number one song of 2014. Wow. So it went the distance. I wonder if they would still say that now. Probably not. Probably not. Let's talk about Rolling Stones' 100 greatest punk albums of all

time list. A lot of lists these days. We're getting a lot of mileage out of lists from legacy organizations that was the New York Times, leaving songwriters list. Rolling Stone did a guitar solos list. Did we talk about that? I wrote about that on my substack. I don't know if we talked about it on the show. I think it infiltrated our conversations without us having to block it out. It just comes up enough. I mean, you brought this up to me and I was like, ah, do we really want to talk about this? And then I got sucked in and I was looking at the list. Do you have any like big picture thoughts on it? I thought it was interesting how they tried to integrate albums from the last 20 years into the list.

So you ended up, say, like with the first Ice Age record. Was that like number 59, which was higher than like the first stiff little fingers record or the first suicide album? Okay, whatever, I guess. I like that. I did like that album, you know, like I remember being. like one of the first people to go hard for Ice Age because they reminded me of these new Puritans at least early these new Puritans.

But is it a punk record though? Yeah, I think it is. I think it is. Okay, because this is something I kept asking looking at the list. And I'm going to be a little maybe devil's advocate here, but okay, let's look at the top 10. We're not going to go through the whole list here.

But, okay, so number 10, The Clash, London Calling. This is Rolling Stone we're talking? Like, what Rolling Stone list could London Call? probably possibly be number 10, but here we are. Well, okay, so I'll say right here, is this a punk record? Because I saw a tweet this week that I thought was actually pretty interesting. It looked like they were trying to troll, but I actually think they make an interesting

point where they said that a lot of punk bands, especially like a lot of the foundational famous punk bands, didn't actually make that many, like, died in the wool punk records. Yeah. Because they got sick of it after an album or two. And the clash are the classic example of that, because, you know, they make that. their self-titled album, you know, famous punk record. But then like by the third album, they're like, let's play some reggae. Give me some reggae. You know, let's play some 50-style rockabilly. You know, they got sick of it. And, you know, there's something on this list,

and this is true in general, I think, with punk rock writing, you know, writing about punk as an idea versus punk as a genre. And as a critic, I lean toward the punk as an idea thing because I think I always like to be broader than more restrictive, but I do wonder on a list like this if you need to be a little more restrictive because there's a lot of punk-as-in-ide-albums here. Yeah, I think it's a question of whether we're ranking punk albums or albums made by bands that were punk at one point

because it opens things up to, like, for example, the Paramore album they chose, brand-new eyes. I think that is in no way, shape, or form of punk-sounding album. At least put Riot on. there because that's kind of pop punk, you know? Right. Yeah, exactly. It's like, are you picking the best Paramore album or their best punk album? Right.

I'll renew my question here at number nine. Nevermind by Nirvana. Now, I'm going to say flat out, this is not a punk record. This is a record that Gen X music writers said was a punk record because they wanted to believe that punk took over the world when this album went to number one, conveniently ignoring the many 70s arena rock aspects of this record, including Kurt Cobain himself saying that the riff of Smells Like Teen Spirit was ripped off from Boston's more than a feeling.

And I would actually argue that those are the aspects that enabled that album to become as successful as it was. I mean, if we're going to say this is a punk record, then we should say Bad Motorfinger by Soundgarden is a punk record. Because Soundgarden was actually on SST, you know? So, and by the way, I don't think it's a punk record either. I don't think bad, but I'm not making that case. I'm just saying, never mind shouldn't be on this list.

Am I wrong? Yeah, also, you know, we have to acknowledge the bad finger of influence on Soundgarden. But, yeah, like people tend to do, I think of never mind along the lines of MGMT's miraculous, spectacular, and that when I was making the best blog rock album list, it was a question of, you know, I don't know if this album belongs, but if it does, you got to put it at number one. You know, it's sort of like with London calling, I can't think of any list in which you're including Nevermind and it's number nine.

Between that and like where it landed on the pitchfork 90s list, so you can make the very trolley argument. This album's actually kind of underrated now. Well, it is by critics, I think. Yeah. I mean, one thing looking at the list, I was thinking, I was trying to think of who's not on this list at all. And I was thinking about like a lot of the sort of.

gutter 90 skate punk bands that like my friends liked when I was a teenager like pennywise for Oh yeah bro it bro him or whatever or uh or lag wagon bands like that where's mxpx where's our where's our tooth and nail representation here and I look like bad religion is on the list but they're in the middle of the list and like these are like dyed in the wool punk bands that punk fans loved and in many ways they're like the punk 101 type bands and i feel like they get a little diminished when you're when you're putting never mind on the list like never mind doesn't need to be on this list but what about penny one i don't even like penny wise but i'm saying throw them throw them in the 80s or 90s i mean because they're not going to get on any other list this is the only list they've got

a shot at so if i was penny wise's manager i'd be calling up rolling stone i'd be like can you give us like number 91 just put just put any old penny wise album at nine That Mike's got some words. Like get this Idol's album out of here and put Pennywise or No Effects, you know? Well, No Effects made the list, but they're in the 80s. Punk and Drubbuk made the list. Not Heavy Petting Zoo? Damn. Well, yeah, you could put Heavy Petting Zoo on there too.

Punk and Drublich, put that up higher. Again, these albums aren't going to make any other list. Nevermind's going to make every other list that anyone ever makes. So get Nevermind off here. Funhouse by the Stooges at number eight, of course. Seven, the sex pistols, never mind the bullocks. Probably too low, but I don't know. It's in the top ten.

I will say that if never mind is a punk album, then appetite for destruction should be a punk album, because that album sounds more like the sex pistols than Nirvana ever did. Again, I don't think G&R's not a punk band, but you can put them there. Six, wire, pink flag, of course. Slater Kinney,

dig me out at number five. I'm fine with that. They're a long-running band. I mean, they turned into more of like a rock band later on, but dig me out.

Makes sense to me. Okay, so at number four, we have another Clash album. This is the self-titled album. So there's two albums by the Clash in the top ten. Because, like,

when I saw Lyndon calling, I guess I assume that they were not going to double up on bands that you would only have like one band per spot. So, I'm angry that the replacements are not in the top 10.

If you're going to put Nevermind here, like Let It Be by the Replacements, which is not on the list at all. There's only one Replacements album, but the first one, which is the punkiest album. But if we're going to expand the definition, because Let It Be is not a very punky album, but it's more punky than Nevermind is. Yeah. So Let It Be should be in the top. But we've got two Clash albums in the top 10.

Are you okay with that? Sure. I get pretty weary of discussing the parameters of punk anyway, but yeah, like the clash got to be on there. Like twice, though, in the top 10? Sure, why not? It's sort of like if you're making like a shoegaze list. Yeah, you got to put my bloody Valentine twice. I mean, that's like the working definition for it.

Yeah, by all means put it in there. Yeah. I mean, I think the first album is their punk album. Yeah, that's like definitive. Yeah. You like are my, that is an album that to this day is setting the definition for punk. Like that is that is just like base materials. Yeah, I mean, exactly.

I think I was getting at this before. I mean, as a critic, I generally believe in like wider definitions of things. But if you're going to make a genre list, like what are the albums that sound punk, you know, that you hear it or you think about what, what is punk? the albums that come to mind. Like Marquis Moon is on this list by television, which I love that album. Is that really a punk album? In theory, I guess,

because, you know, CBGB. That's it. It's only the CBGB's thing. It's like, it's talking heads. Are they really a punk band? I mean, if you think of punk as an idea, again, of like expanding the parameters

of what music is or rebelling against dinosaur rock or whatever they are, but I think as, we define it now? I don't know. It just feels like they just happen to be in the same. They're great bands, but I don't know if they're punk, but I don't know if I'd put them on this list anyway as a punk band.

Because again, where's Lagwagon? Let's get Lagwagon in here. I just want, you said MXPX. I wonder if they're on this list. I don't have it up. We'll assume they are. There's a serious fat recreation right here. We need some more Christian punk on here too.

The Minuteman double nickels on the dime at number three, sure. Haven't we learned anything from mild end kicks? I mean, come on. Like Rolling Stone putting that at number three. I'm surprised who Scrodoos thought at 3.5, you know? Well. Okay, so at number two, we have X-ray specs, germ-free adolescence. I mean, X-ray specs, great band, should definitely be on the list.

Is that like a more important punk record than wire sex pistols, the clash, the it men, even Slater Kinney. I think my bigger problem with the list is not how they maybe reframe the past, but maybe it's like the past 10 years that I'm a little more shook over. I mean, the modern stuff is just like scraping pitchfork lists. I mean, priests, that's like, every, like, I'm not feeling that. Ice Age, fine, I guess. Idols, like, doesn't make sense to me.

Makes me also realize, though, they put Soul Glow on there. We need a new Soul Glow album. Yeah, I mean, would you put anything? from the last 20 years in the top 10? Not the top 10. I mean, the only argument you could potentially make is say for glow on. Right. I think that was in the 30s because that really did change things in a way that a lot of the albums in the top 10 did.

Top 10, I mean, that just feels a little too rich for me. But like if you're really going to go out there and try to, you know, start conversations and, show that like punk is as important of a concept as it was in the 70s or 80s you got to find something to put in the top 10 or maybe even like at the edge of the top 10 but um i don't know what that would be i at least appreciate the fact they didn't do any kind of stunts like when spin put scrylx as one of the top 100 guitars of all time um you know they didn't try to put like playboy cardy in there or yeezes which you could if you want to get spicy with it but Yeah, it's like most of the Rolling Stone lists I've seen of late where it's like, yeah, I don't have too much of a problem with this.

Yeah, I mean, I would say, because I think the youngest album is the Slater Kinney album, which I think was 1997. Dig Me Out, K-Me Out. It came out. I mean, I, again, I'm not the biggest Green Day fan in the world, but I do think, like, Dookie could have been, like, in the top 10 or the top. Oh, sure. I think it was at number 20. I actually think you could bump that up more in terms of importance. I mean, it's like, is that the best.

biggest selling punk album of all time. I mean, album. Yeah, I mean, so, and obviously just a hugely influential record, not just on punk, but on all sorts of music. On the music industry. I mean, it's not maybe at the level of Nevermind, but for, for, especially after Nevermind, that was like really carrying water for major labels as far as like what sort of bands they were signing.

This is all coming back to stuff I'm working on with my book about the, the proliferation of like punk and, punk bands getting signed. And also, I'm getting really deep into the tooth and nail catalogs. I'm doing the Pedro of the Lion chapter. So if you want to talk about MXPX, this is as good of a time as you're ever going to get. Well, I would love to, but we should get to recommendation corner here in a minute. But we haven't even said what the number one album is on the Rolling Stone list, which is the Ramones by the Ramones. Or I should say, Ramones by Ramones. No the, 1976, which you have to say. I mean, definitely the most important punk record of all time.

Although not the best Ramon's record. I think Rocket to Russia is the best Ramon's record, which is on the list. I think it was number 26. But it is the best punk album, if that makes sense. It's not the best Ramon's album, but it is the best punk album, or it's the album that I think you should put at the top of the list.

Not the album I would necessarily, but a place like Rolling Stone, they should do it. So good on them. I think that's why they did the list, too, because that album just turned 50. There you go. Yeah. I mean, as far as I know, unless maybe Carrie Brownstein did this, but Ramon's the only people on the top ten who were on the Simpsons. So, sure, I'm okay with them being number one.

We've now reached part of our episode that we call Recommendation Corner, where Ian and I talk about something that we're into this week. Ian, why don't you go first? So one of the reasons I can't be too mad at Will Toledo re-recording his own songs is that I totally do that on Twitter. There's some tweets that I like rehash probably once a year amongst them for my recommendation here. You know, you must be a micro house fan the way you got me playing the field. Here we go, Sublime with Rome. The field is a, I believe, Swedish guy.

It's a techno act who put out some pretty influential and canonical albums in 2000, in the late 2000s. Yeah, here we go with Sublime, came out in 2007, the one after that. in 2009. All of his albums are really good and all of them are pretty much the same. I was thinking about doing a field album ranking list just to do the degree of difficulty, but they haven't put out a lot of music in the past decade. The last album came out in 2018 and they put out an EP last week called Now You Exist. And it's an EP in that it's only 43 minutes as compared to an hour. It's also not on compact. It's on a completely different label. The covers are different. All of his covers are pretty much the same, but this is substantial as anything he's made.

And it's one of my favorite albums of the year. It's the sort of thing that could feasibly be on the best dream pop or shoegaze, Ambient, or IDM lists of 2026. If you've never heard the field before, from here we go with Sublime is up there with like, untrue as foundational genre records. All of his records are good. The 2009 one, I think, has John Stenier from Battles on. That was so sick.

But this new one, absolutely essential as well. And it's only 43 minutes, so you don't have to give as much of your day until listening to it. So that's my recommendation, the field, now you exist. And I want to talk about one of my favorite albums of 2026 so far, which is called Birds of Paradise. And it's by a guy from New Orleans called Thomas Dolbom. Thomas actually is originally from Florida, Tampa area. and he writes a lot about Florida on this record, sets his songs in the seedier parts of Florida,

writing songs about like pill mills and trailer parks and people just trying to make their way in the world or trying to find a warm bed for the night. If that sounds like something that you would be into, I should also mention that he is in this lane of MJ Lenderman. MJ Lenderman actually plays on this record, plays drums. You can also hear him do harmony, vocals on a couple songs, including the single Coyote, which is one of my favorite songs of the

year. And in that song, he's sort of like the Adam Duritz to Thomas Dolbom's Jacob Dylan and Sixth Avenue Heartache, just the way his voice comes in. There's also like a pretty strong, I think, Jason Isville flavor to a lot of what he's doing, again, because of the storytelling, the way that he can create these worlds with characters and sing them in a conversational style that makes you feel like they're people that you know when you're listening to the song, but also feels like something taking place in the movie of the mind. Doebaum has been around for a little while. He put out a record in 2022 called Welleswood that got some attention.

Then he made this record in 2023, and it basically sat on the shelf for three years as he was trying to figure out his record label situation. So yeah, he did work with Lenderman, but it was before Lenderman really became indie famous in case you're wondering about him being an imitator or a carpetbagger. But yeah, if you are into that sort of alt-country Americana scene from the indie world, Dolbom to me really feels like the next one in line, someone who really feels like a potential star in the making. And I think that this record is going to be a real calling card for him.

If you liked Manning Fireworks, if you like those Isabel records, this is an album that you are definitely going to get into. Again, it's called Birds of Paradise. The artist is called Thomas Dolbom. And yeah, check it out. Jack Antonoff agrees apparently Adam open up for bleachers in New Orleans this week, so good for him.

Thank you all for listening to this episode of Indycast. We'll be back with more news reviews and hashing out trends next week.