Indiecast - New Albums by Geese and Cate Le Bon, Plus: Will Frank Ocean Ever Put Out A New Record?

Episode Date: September 26, 2025

Steven and Ian begin with a quick Cinema-cast about the new Paul Thomas Anderson film, One Battle After Another, and how PTA is more like a great band than a great director (1:05). From there, they talk about the new Cate Le Bon record, Michaelangelo Dying, which is doing big numbers for Ian's fantasy team (12:08). Then they pay tribute to Foxing, the great indie-emo band who announced their hiatus this week (20:32).After that, they discuss Getting Killed, the brilliant new LP from Geese (30:49). Then they do a "yay or nay" segment on whether Frank Ocean will ever put out another album (45:14). In the mailbag, they discuss the protest singer Jesse Welles (49:08).In Recommendation Corner, Ian talks about the shoegaze band Total Wine and Steven talks about the British singer-songwriter Joanne Robertson (57:20).New episodes of Indiecast drop every Friday. Listen to Episode 258 here and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can submit questions for Steve and Ian at [e-mail], and make sure to follow us on Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) for all the latest news. We also recently launched a visualizer for our favorite Indiecast moments. Check those out here.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 Uprox's Indy Mix tape. Hello everyone and welcome to Indycast. On this show, we talk about the biggest indie news of the week, we review albums, and we hash out trends. In this episode, we talk about new albums by Geese and Kate Laban and the end of boxing. My name is Stephen Hayden, and I'm joined by my friend and co-host. He's fighting one battle after another after another.

Ian Cohen. Ian, how are you? Ian, I'm talking about like the Ian who edits our show. show. Like, we never do a soundboard thing, but can we, like, pipe in Ralph Wiggum saying, what's a battle? I think that would really make this episode pop. What's a battle? Do you think so? Yeah. Or just, like, the fix. That, like, you know, one thing after another, is that the song

where we just kind of, like, you know, splice in the word battle? I think it's time for the fix renaissance, you know? Yeah, we'll see what happens. There is a new movie coming out today. We're going to do a quick cinema cast here at the top of the episode. The new Paul Thomas Anderson movie, one battle after another, opens Friday, September 26th. A very momentous day for me personally on the pop culture calendar, because we have this new PTA movie, we have the Geese album that's out today, which we're going to be talking about here in a minute. But I was just thinking about Paul Thomas Anderson and how, in a way, I think about him

more like a band than I do as a film director, just in the sense that. I've grown up with Paul Thomas Anderson. I feel like I have been seeing his films since college. I remember seeing Heart 8 in college, I think even before Boogie Nights. I think it played at the campus theater. And this was back when PTA was looked at as like a post-Tarantino director, like one of these guys that was following in the footsteps of Tarantino making a crime film. Sam Jackson is in that movie.

So at the time it was just like we're college guys who like Tarantino and this is the newest guy doing Tarantino. And then Boogie Nights comes out. I see that in the theater. That's still one of the greatest moviegoing experiences of my life. Just incredible. Magnolia. See that three times in the theater. I feel a different way each time I see it.

Sometimes I love it. Sometimes I don't love it. But I just kept going. Punch drunk love, seeing that, being confounded by it. but then loving it the second time. There will be blood, another of the great movie-going experiences of my life, just overpowering. Saw it at the Oriental Theater in Milwaukee.

I think it was opening night. Pack Theater, just incredible. The master saw that. First thing I did after my son was born, I think that movie came out maybe a week or two after. So I was sleep deprived, but I was like, I got to go out of the house and see the new PTA. inherent vice. I have an inherent vice poster in my office. Love that film. You know,

Phantom Thread, incredible movie, licorice pizza, great movie, kind of a weird ending. Still not sure about the ending, but I like that movie a lot. And now you have this movie, and it's weird because I don't know how you feel or how closely you've been following this, but up until like a week or two ago, I was convinced that this movie was going to be bad because I just didn't like the trailers didn't really seem like, is this going to work? He, you know, has a budget of like $140 million. Is he being set up to fail here, making a big bomb? And now all these reviews have come out and they are uniformly ecstatic. It's calling it the film of the year. I saw one person call it the best studio film since 2010. I don't know why 2010 is the mark of demarcation,

but I'm extremely psyched. I have my ticket. I'm going to go with my wife during the day on Friday. We're going to play hooky. We're going to go see the new PTA while the kids are at school. So I'm psyched. I'm really hoping this movie delivers. I have high expectations,

but I don't know. Do you have a relationship with PTA? Do you have a similar thing? I mean, we're around the same age. Yeah, I mean, I'm not as much of like a movie guy as you are. I mean, I, like, you know, seeing Boogie Knights, obviously was a formative experience. And shout to our.

mutual pal Jamil of Indycast listener, just played the Magnolia and Bachelor number two soundtrack to death when those came out. My only like real kind of in the mix of PTA stories when I went and saw Phantom Threat Act, I had to drive to L.A. to see that. And while I was there, like I overheard the ushers talking about how Maynard was in the theater,

but he was seeing downsizing that day, if you can remember that movie. Maynard James Keenan from Tool? Yes. Wow. Yeah, it's like there are two ushers like, you're like, Maynard's here. And like one of the guys didn't know who Maynard was.

And so he'd be like, yeah, the guy from Tool. But anyway, yeah, I actually watched The Master this weekend. Not because like I was, oh, PTA season. It's like both Joaquin Phoenix and Philip Seymour Hoffman were in that ringer list for best movie performances of the 21st century, I believe. And yeah, Joaquin Phoenix, just all-time perver in that movie. Kind of similar like with Philip Seymour Hopin and Boogie Nights. Stoke for this one. I would have seen this movie.

Tonight the day that this episode airs, but I'm actually going to see Conor O'Malley live. So it's a very dudes rock kind of weekend for my wife and I. I'm pretty stoked about it. Yeah. It's weird because there's all this, you know, hype going into the movie. And again, I feel like there was, maybe it's just me projecting. I feel like there were bad vibes attached to this movie up until like a week or two ago. Oh, I agree.

Yeah. You know, and then, you know, people got a chance. to see it and the reviewers have been, you know, over the moon about it. I'm a little worried now, almost in the opposite direction. Like, am I being overprimed here to expect something great? I don't know. I mean, I think part of the problem is that, like, every time there's, like, a Paul Thomas Anderson conversation nowadays on Twitter, they just bring up the story where him and

Quentin Tarantino are doing Coke and, like, Fiona Apples there just, like, wishing she could die. That's pretty much the go-to, uh, PTA story. nowadays on Twitter? Well, for a certain kind of person. Yeah. I mean, someone who wants to take the piss is going to maybe bring that up. To me, I feel like it's been pretty worshipful for Paul Thomas Sanders.

You get like some of the occasional people that want to take a shot. And I get it. Again, he is like the band. He is like Radiohead of cinema, I think, and that he gets that same kind of just worshipful adoration. And it's kind of the same kind of. person who loves Radiohead and Paul Thomas Anderson and I am that person. So if you want to call me like a film bro or like a music, guilty is charged, but I am what I am. I can't deny it. And

I'm not going to pretend that I'm not super psyched for this film. So we'll see. You know, people always want to rank Paul Thomas Anderson films. Again, I don't know how deep you go with him. Was that the first time you saw The Master by the way last weekend or had you seen it before? I think I'd seen it in like 2012 being kind of distracted. But I mean, I've like seen all of Paul Thomas Anderson's movies. But I wanted to pay attention this time around just kind of knowing that, oh, by the way, this is two of the best film performances of all time. Right. And they really are.

It's like, yeah. It's crazy. Yeah, it's insane. Because like for the most part, when I go to the movies, even when I see a good movie, the previews are either like repackaged IP or horror films and you sort of do forget and I know how like film bro this sounds even though like I do not I like a lot of films that film bro is like but I don't identify as one um it's really wild see that oh this is like this is like movie movie you know this is like real cinema and I know that how I feel is to say that but when you see real like acting acting

from people who are masters at their craft, it's like, yeah, maybe I don't need to see new movies. May I just need to do a rerun through Paul Thomas Anderson? Maybe except Boogie Nights. That's like the only one I've seen like multiple times. That was always on in college when we were hanging out. And it's a weirdly underrated movie now. I mean, it's weird to say that I think among the populace, it's not underrated.

I feel like among the intelligentsia who want to rank Paul Thomas Anderson movies. I see Boogie Nights now in the middle of the past. Yeah. And, you know, I understand if you're going to compare it to like there will be blood or even the master or punch drunk love, those are much more formerly inventive movies and boogie nights. The knock on it would probably be that it's derivative of a lot of the great masters of the 70s, in particular Altman and Scorsese. But it is so fun to watch. It's so rewatchable, yeah. It's so audacious and entertaining.

I mean, you want to talk about great performances. that that's like a Simpsons episode in terms of like the depth of memorable characters and perform it you know just like secondary or third tier or fourth tier characters in that movie are in your mind you could name like 20 characters from that movie that are phenomenal so that's still up there for me and you know there will be blood again one of the most powerful just being in a movie theater like you felt like you were watching you know 2001 or something like a movie like that or like a great like The only Kubrick movie I saw when it was new in a theater was eyes wide shut, which is a movie at the time. I'm not going to pretend like I got that movie as a 21-year-old in 1999 because I didn't. It went way over my head. Now I think it's a masterpiece, but I did not get it in 99. But yeah, for me, it's either Boogie Nights, there will be blood.

An inherent vice for me is the dark horse out of those. I just have such affection for that film. And Phantom Thread is great too. I feel like a lot of people don't give that movie a chance because it's like in the fashion industry of the 50s. And I even avoided it for a little bit because I thought the milieu here isn't interesting to me at all. Daniel Day Lewis is amazing. It's like really funny. Yeah.

Brilliant film. I love that movie. Yeah. We are pro. If we have to do like an accessory, yay or nay, I think we're both yay on Paul Thomas Anderson. I think so. I think so. And we'll get off a cinema cast here in a second.

I just want to mention too that I find it fascinating that, you know, Paul Thomas Anderson typically makes period pieces. You know, I think the last time he made a movie that was set in the present is Punch Drunk Love, which is, you know, like 22 years ago. And, you know, the reality of that movie is not really like a tangible reality that there is a bit of like a fable or fairy tale aspect to that film. So for him, at this moment in time, in this insane year to make his most topical or timely film. I mean, I don't know if Fox News knows about this movie yet. I'm a little surprised that there's not more controversy about this film about, like,

left-wing revolutionaries battling the government. I mean, I feel like this, if this movie does well, yeah, we'll get there. Like a Leo DiCaprio movie about that. I'm surprised there hasn't been more blowback. I assume we'll get there. It's like you want the movie to do well at the box up. so it hangs around, but I think if it does hang around, it's going to become this culture war football that people toss back and forth.

So that'll be fun to see. That's the end of cinema cast. Let's get to our fantasy album draft update. Ian, your last album on your team is out today. It's called Michelangelo Dying. It's by Kate LeBahn. And I think it's a rap in our draft. What do you have?

You have like an insane score for this so far. Yeah, Caleb-on's coming in hot at a 92 right now. We're like, to get it back into a tiny bit of sports cast, this is like Oregon pouring it on against Oklahoma State, like just really spiking the football. Or the lions against the bears, you know, Dan Campbell, just putting Ben Johnson's head in the toilet and flushing it several times. Like going on and forth down in the fourth quarter.

And I'm Ben Johnson. I'm Ben Johnson in the scenario, which is awful. Yeah. I mean, she's so coming in hot in a 92, I don't know if that'll hold. Maybe like the skinny or one of those places just has this deep-seated grudge against Kate Lebonne this time to strike. But yeah, Wednesday's still sitting in 89. You know, nourished by time still up there.

It was a good battle, but ultimately the stars came out to shine for me. And this was like an old school. This is an old school performance for me. Have you heard this album? I've not. I have not either. Stereo gum tells me it's her most transparent album yet, which has gotten my interest. What does that mean?

I have known. Maybe it's like you can understand the lyrics, maybe. I don't know. I mean, I feel like most music you can see through. You know, like, as it's entering your ears, like, you don't see it entering your ears. So I assume all music is transparent on some level. So I don't really know what that means. I mean, I think what it probably means is that it is the most maybe emotionally direct record.

Yeah. That's what I have to assume. And, you know, Kate Labon, I like her work generally, and it's been cool to see her not only be this critically acclaimed musician, but she's become a record producer. She's really become like a jack of all trades type indie performer. So I have no doubt that this record's really good. I haven't heard it yet. I don't think I got to advance of this. So I'll listen to it like the rest of the people and just cue it up on my streaming platform of choice.

Yeah, I'm just looking at the Metacritic scores here. And I see, yeah, they're mostly European, but Rolling Stone gave this album four and a half stars. Do you remember like when Rolling Stone suspended the star system for a bit? I didn't know it came back. Oh, it's back, baby. Oh, yeah. Kate LeBond got a four and a half star out of five here. That's why she's at 90 right now in Metacritic from Rolling Stone.

Yeah, like Rolling Stone, they had this like wacky editor who came from the deal. Bailey Beast and had a tabloid, I think, kind of sensibility that he brought there. Like, I remember he did an interview, and maybe you wrote something where he was like, we're going to get Eric Clapton's ass and all the other classic rockers. You know, we're going to take him the task. And they were doing a lot of sort of, again, like kind of tabloid-y type things. And then another thing he initiated was we're not going to do star ratings anymore because we're not going to rate art.

You know, we're just going to review art. We're going to tell you whether you should listen to it or not, but we're not going to put a star on it, man. You don't do that to art, man. You know, like that argument, which is so annoying to me. Look, a number or a star, I mean, as a writer, I don't like scores on reviews because it just makes people ignore the writing. They'll just look at the score.

But readers like scores. They like stars. Even the people who complain about it, they like it because they obsess over it. And it's the only thing they look at. So they got the wacky guy out of there, restored some sanity at Rolling Stone, and they brought the stars back because that's what people wanted. People love the star ratings. They like the score at pitchfork.

This thing that we pretend that readers hate this thing is so bizarre to me. Because, again, it's only writers who don't like it. I mean, maybe you don't have an opinion about it. You've done way more pitchfork writing than I have. But, you know, when you have a score next to your review, people will just view your review through the lens of that score. And that's almost like you're writing to justify the score, even if you aren't the person who's only giving the score, which no writer is. It's always editors who at least have some say. They usually have most of the say of what the score or the star rating is going to be.

I'm getting on a tangent here. But I just find that conversation really funny. And it's funny to me that Rolling Stone briefly did not have star ratings and now they have them back. Yeah, because I'm looking at them now. And Rolling Stone is paywall to just paywalls all the way down. But, you know, most of it's like three stars, four stars, four and a half stars to the new Cardi B, which puts it on the level of new Kate Laban. I'm just hoping they bring back like the two and the one and a half stars. I'm already like sneaking ahead and seeing a classic one and a half star rolling star.

Review album name-checked in a future conversation that we're about to do. So, yeah, Sanity's returned. You know what they also should bring back, and this is for the old school, Rolling Stone readers, is that back in the day, when you would actually look at it in a magazine and you would get to the review part, they would always have this, like, garish drawing. I love that. I love it so much. That would go with the lead review, so it would be some weird caricature of, like, Bono or Michael

Stipe or Kurt Cobain, like whatever they were reviewing. They got to bring back some caricatures here. Like, can we bring, like, that caricature artist, what are they doing right now? They're probably wasting away. They haven't had a good freelance assignment in a while. So let's get that person out of retirement. Let's do some Cameron Winter caricatures, some Carly Hartsman caricatures. I mean, you know, I think this would be a good thing.

I think this would bring people back into the music journalism tent. I mean, I'd read it. I have like imprinted on my memory, like the character they did when they decided to like make Master P or insane clown posse the lead review. Oh, that's right. Yeah. Oh, my God. It's funny because there is, in the book I'm writing, there is one that's stuck in my mind when I'm talking about Texas is the reason. I'm talking about like New York hardcore bands like Helmet. I look this up.

It exists. It was one where they reviewed Helmet and Rollins Band. together. And that's stuck in my mind because it's just like, yeah, here's a bunch of rock music that's like absolutely no fun. That would have been like 92, I'm guessing. It was 97. It was for after-play. Yeah, it was like for a, it was like for a Rollins band album that didn't have liar on it. Yeah, I was going to say, I feel like Rawlins, because Helmut, I think their first record was 92, wasn't it? Or was it 93? Well, actually, strap it on came out in 92. But yeah, the one you know like meantime with the unsung on it. That was 92. Okay. And then. Betty

in 94 or 95. Well, and then that Rollins band cover, like with the sun on the cover? I think that was 92. Isn't that liar is on that right? No, no, that's the one with low self-opinion on it. So Liar would have been like 94 or so? Yeah, that's 93 or 94. That's weight.

That music is so shitty. I'm sorry. Rollins band? Come on. Henry Rollins? I don't know. Lyer is such a funny song. It's so dumb.

Yeah, it's so dumb. Their cover of Suicides Ghost Rider for the pro soundtrack. I bring that up every other month on Twitter. You've got to hear it. It's so awesome. I mean, he was in Black Flag, although he wasn't the original singer in Black Flag. But I mean, that's where his credibility comes from.

But then he's just doing this like shirtless alt metal thing in the 90s. And I don't know. It has not held up. Has not held up very well. I don't know. Maybe get some Rollins band fans that can write in and disagree with that. Yeah. Our Melvin Gibbs heads are going to go at us

for sure. Is Lyer the one where he's dressed like a cop? Yes. And he's all in red. And he plays several roles. Yeah. Shout to Henry Rollins. Just watching that in high school.

Just Henry Rollins painted in red shouting. That's what high school was back then. And we liked it. Yeah. All right. Let's get to some sad news this week, Foxing. Yeah. The great band from St. Louis, emo, punk, art rock band.

They announced that they are going on hiatus. they released this statement, which I will now read. After 14 years as a band and 12 years of consistent touring, we've decided to take a hiatus from playing shows, writing or doing anything as foxing. It feels really scary to say that. This band has been completely inseparable from us as people, for our entire adult lives up to this point.

It's so much a part of our identity and our sense of self-worth in the world, but has become clear to us that in our pursuit of our dreams and making the most honest and genuine art we can, our relationship with music, each other, and our sense of self, without the band has eroded. We have decided to prioritize these things and need to step away from the band to do so. And then it says that they're playing some shows

in Chicago and St. Louis. Later this year, this will be the final shows. And, you know, this is the language now that bands use when they are breaking up. They don't say we're breaking up. They say we're going on hiatus or an indefinite hiatus.

Although, you know, when they took Kimmel off the air, they called that an indefinite hiatus. And then he was back like six days. later. So TV, it doesn't matter as much. But in indie rock, if you say hiatus, that means you're breaking up. I do feel like it opens the door for the reunion shows in five to ten years, which will hopefully be a good payday. I mean, I imagine that will come at some point for these guys. But really good band, you know, in reading between the lines of this statement, it just sounds like, you know, being in a band's really hard, and they just weren't feeling it, I guess,

or they were not feeling like this was enjoyable anymore. That's the sense I get from this statement, which is sad to say, I mean, this band's had like a tumultuous history. You can speak to this more than me. I would say you're a bigger fan than I am, although I really admire this band. I thought they were a great live band. They made really cool records. They got classified as email, but I think if it were 20 years ago, they just would have been called. called an indie rock band. I mean, they have a lot more in common with what was going on in indie rock, I think, in the 2000s and maybe what was going on now, just the combination of punk and, like, artier rock influences and just trying to make sonically adventurous albums

every time out on the, I'm just trying to think of the right word, out on the bank, out in the world or whatever. Every time they put out a record, they tried to do something different, which is really admirable. I think sometimes more successfully than others, but really cool band, interesting band, and sad to hear this, but hopefully this will be good for them in their private lives. Yeah, I mean, despite the, you know,

despite the someone check on Ian Cohen comments at Stato Gump and, like, you know, my Twitter feed, anyone who's been following Foxing pretty much from the beginning knows that they've always been on the verge of calling it quits. I think on their band camp bio it says, we're a band, someday we won't. And every single interview I've done with them and pretty much every interview anyone else is done with them has centered around like, yeah, making this record almost killed us. Touring is such a slog.

I don't know if we can keep doing this. And they always just got over the finish line where they can just do it again, which is a weird kind of form of success. Like if you're a band, like if there's like just nothing happening, you can say, yeah, whatever, we can call it quits. Like there's, and if you're super successful, you know, you can book like a bunch of festivals and just put out music intermittently. It's interesting because their first, like one of their first splits was one with Japanese breakfast. Like really when Michelle was getting out a little big league. So that's kind of the world in which they're from. It's very interesting to think about like what boxing would have happened to them if they had kind of gone that, you know, dead oceans route instead of signing a triple crap.

But they were an emo ban in the beginning. That was their milieu. They made kind of a more artsy version of it, but it was definitely emo. And yeah, I mean, it's the interesting thing about this is that the subtext of like most of their best songs and especially the last album is that it's almost always about the emotional, physical and financial toll of being in a band. And I think this music resonates because it's not just like about like being on it's not like turn the page. it's music that you can kind of relate to if like you're feeling like underappreciated if you're feeling like kind of looked like passed over if you feel like you're just working your ass off and just not getting feeling secure which you know is I felt that kind of way sometimes writing about emo let alone making it but yeah I do wonder how things would have progressed if it wasn't for the pitchfork review of draw down the moon in 2021 you know that had like just such a weirdly profound impact for a review in 2021, but I think that did change the vibe. That album was kind of, you know, weirdly received by the fan base anyway. But the new album, I don't know if it like created a new

fan base for them, but people were really excited about that album. It wasn't just like one of the shows where you're going to wait around and hope they play Rory or The Medic at the end, like two of my least favorite songs by them. And the other thing I'm kind of struggling with here is that, so much of the conversation around Foxing and like I'm guilty of this is this perception they didn't get as big as they should be. And I and yeah, like you make a record like near my God, you should be at the level of Manchester Orchestra instead of opening for them like three or four times in your career. But that being said, like Foxing were a successful band. 99% of bands would kill for their career. You know, one of the last things they posted was

them performing at Red Rocks opening for Cohe and Cambria and taking back Sunday. They went out on a high note. You know, like, I think they've accomplished a lot. Like, as far as their discography and, you know, their present and, like, especially as a live band, I think that they were the greatest band produced by the Emo Revival. Like, the hotel year was more legendary, but smaller catalog and, you know, more erratic as a live band. The world is, I mean, their new album to me is kind of like Emmett Smith in an Arizona Cardinals jersey. Like, Foxing, great run. Set. A. S out. like happy for them as people. And hopefully they get another bite at the Apple five or ten years down the road when,

you know, Fest, you know, brings them back to perform as a reunion. Yeah, I want to follow up on something you said before about the narrative around this band being, why aren't they more successful? Like,

why haven't more people caught on with them? And I think that's something you see recur with bands of different generations. When you were talking about that, it just made me think of the replacements in the 80s and, like, narrative of that band. People that love that band were like, they should be the biggest band in the world. And it never really happens. They kind of always stay at the same level, even as they go to like a major label or they get a big time producer. It never seems to grow their audience. And I do think

that there is something ultimately toxic about that becoming the narrative of your band. And I try to be conscious of this as someone who talks about music to not be so heavy handed with that, because I think it's a pretty bad sales pitch a lot of the time if there's a band that you love and you want people to check them out and you say they should be bigger than they are because even though there's good intentions with that I think there's something about what that communicates to a person who hasn't heard the band where it almost makes it sound like oh so they're kind of like a loser band they can't get it together you know and it's not a really attractive quality to affix to a band. You mentioned that pitchfork review of Draw Down the Moon. I think the reaction to the review

is more telling than the review itself. 100%. The idea that, like, we have to protect this band. They have to, you know, this review is going to prevent them from being as popular as we think they should be. It's just not the way it should be. Because like you were saying, they were a successful band compared to like 99% of bands. They have a legacy. They have passionate fan base. They have records that people are going to talk about in four, five, six, seven, eight, ten years. You know, most bands, they come and go. They don't get remembered. So I think for where they came from, they should be really proud.

They did a lot. They accomplished a lot. And I don't think it's going to be the end of them. I think they're going to step away from this, live their lives. And at some point, someone's going to slap down a nice offer that will compel them to come back and play on the road. and then everyone will remember how much they love this band. And it'll be a good fresh start for them after they can kind of live other parts of their lives.

Yeah, because I think back to when I saw them in the hotel year do a tour together, I think it was maybe the end of 2024. And like the hotel year was doing a 10-year anniversary. It was like a reunion show for them. And they were doing, I think, a full-on play of Home Like No Place. And Foxing were doing one for, the Albatross, which is their first album and their most popular one. And you could see it was very, very distinct in that, like, people were so stoked to see the hotel year again. They looked refreshed.

Whereas, like, Foxing, you know, had, like, a new album. They had, like, four albums after that. And, you know, it's just music they don't relate to as much. And, yeah, I mean, you know, when I've talked to Foxing, they've said, like, yeah, I mean, we got gassed up so much early. It's like, oh, you guys are going to be playing arenas. And, you know, like, I'm guilty of that and it kind of allowed it kind of prevented them from truly appreciating what they did as a band so um yeah we i think both of us because we we definitely have bands that are in our kind of realm that we wish were bigger uh and i think that's something i've definitely tried to uh retract upon as i grow older all right so we have both pledged that we're not going to say that bands we like

should be bigger so as we are pledging that let's pivot to a band that I think will be really big after this album comes out. The band is called Geese, and their new record is called Getting Killed. It's out today. And this is my album of the year. I'll just throw my cards on the table right now. I wrote about this album for Up Rocks, wrote a pretty long review about it. I just think that this is the most talented and exciting young indie rock band going right now.

And this album has really capitalized on really like the first. flush of capital this band has gotten in the past, not even year, like about nine months. And if you know anything about this band, you are aware of the solo album made by the lead singer, Cameron Winter. It was called Heavy Metal. Came out at the end of 2024, right in the middle of year-end list season, which is the absolute worst time to put out a record if you want people to care about your music. And from reading a little bit about this album, getting killed, It seems like this was almost like a deliberate choice by the record label because Cameron Winter, he made this weird record on his own. They didn't really have a lot of faith that it was going to do anything critically or commercially, so they essentially buried it during a season when most music critics are either working on their year-end list or they're getting ready to go on holiday break.

But lo and behold, people discover this record, they latch onto this record, and it becomes a big cult favorite. it's one of those albums that people are going to be sneaking on to their 2025 year endless. I would not be surprised that people say this is the best album of 2025, even though it technically came out last year. I'm not going to do that. I think I will, though, call Getting Killed My Favorite Album of the Year. And it really does pick up on the thread of heavy metal and the real kind of risk-taking that Cameron Winter takes as a songwriter.

And as a singer. I think when you listen to a lot of indie bands now, it feels like the singers are doing their best to not be noticed. They want to blend in with the pack. They're not going to do anything too crazy vocally. They're not going to do anything too crazy as far as like a performance or demonstrative thing in front of a band. And Cameron Winter goes against that trend.

He is going for broke at all times on his own record and with geese. And look, there's going to be people who I know. don't like heavy metal, they're going to hate this record because of the sound of Cameron Winter's voice. It sounds like he's trying to channel, you know, Nina Simone, Captain Beefheart, Julian Casablancus, and Leonard Cohen at the same time. It's like a pretty crazy, erratic type vocal style. I love it. I think it expresses something really powerful in this music that, you know, I did this in my review. I made fun of myself for doing it. that whenever critics say this album sounds like living in America right now, I always make fun

of that. And then I proceeded to say that this album feels like living in America right now. Because it is chaotic. It's wild. It's really dark. And it's also got an undercurrent of very kind of pitch black comedy to it. In a way, I mean, I haven't seen one battle after another yet, but it feels very carmic that these two works of art are coming out on the same. day. In my mind, I've already kind of married them together. And again, one battle after another, maybe I won't like it, but it feels like they're both doing something, channeling an energy or feeling that feels really potent right now. But beyond all that, I mean, this is just like a great rock band. You know, I don't know how much you've listened to like their pre, sort of, because they put

out their record projector. That was their official day. in 2021, but they also made a bunch of music in high school, because these guys are only in their early 20s. They made a record in 2018 called A Beautiful Memory, which I think is kind of remarkable. I mean, I give an extra credit because these guys made it when they were 16. But it's like the best music I've ever heard made by high school sophomores. I mean, it, and you hear them, they are just straight up channeling like Pink Floyd and the doors. and Zeppelin and like all of the sort of teenage blacklight poster favorites. You hear them doing it on that record, and I'm sure that's why they buried it,

because it sounds like a pretty derivative album. But they do it brilliantly. And on getting killed, you can see them coming full circle with that music scholarship. They've internalized that rock syllabus, and they're able to go beyond it. And so you get a song like the title track, Getting Killed, kind of has like a Zeppelin-type feel to it. But because of Cameron Winter's vocals, it just takes it out of that sort of Greta van Fleet zone.

Like it just feels way more idiosyncratic and progressive while also having the sort of the roots of great rock music at the same time. I just think it's such an exhilarating record. Again, it's really dark. I think it has some real cultural relevance to it, but it doesn't do it in a heavy-handed way. they're like a really fun band, even when they're writing about really dark stuff.

And, you know, there's that sort of looseness to them as a band that I just love. A lot of people, they, you know, they've sort of glommed on to Cameron Winter as a solo artist. I think it's important, and I tried to do this in my review, to emphasize that this is a real band. And they've been together for a long time. And I think the chemistry that they have is a band, and the places that they're willing to go with Cameron Winter's, leading them. I just think they're really exciting. I'm excited to see where they go next. I think they have

a ton of potential. They're really, really talented. I mean, the ideas, the musicianship, I don't know. I think it's a really special record. I might even like their last record more, 3D country. If you haven't caught up with that album, that is such a fun record. One of my favorite albums of the decade for sure. But I'm all in on this bandie, and I'm I am on the hype train. I am trying to drive the hype train here. I don't know if you're on board too. What do you think?

Yeah, so heavy metal is the album that I admire. The voice is really tough for me to get past sometimes. But within the context of geese, I'm all in on it. And I think you mentioned something that's really, really important in my enjoyment of this. You talked about how there are some alienating parts of it, you know, most notably the person. who's singing. And I thought about this as I was writing a 20th anniversary piece on Wolf Parades, apologies to the Queen Mary, and thinking about 2005 mid-aughts. And a lot of my favorite bands and a lot of like the big indie rock bands from that time were, and I say this as a high compliment,

like 10% annoying at all times. Like there's just something going on that you could imagine actively aggravating people. And I think that's true about Sufyan. I think that was true about Animal Collective. I think to a certain extent, it's true with Deer Hunter as well. And I think this band is sort of, they're not like Deer Hunter at all, but like I think they do have that compelling frontman, but also a really good band behind it. I like this album a lot. The production is just so interesting. I think they had Kenny Beats doing this.

Not to be confused with Kenny Siegel, who produced a very similar album in terms of, you know, the sounds that throws together like Benjamin Booker. one of my favorite albums of the year, maybe my favorite. And I think this is just exciting because it feels like it's been a very long time since there's been a rock band at the center of the indie discussion that has the ability to grate on people, like sonically. You know, with all due respect to Wednesday or always a band who had similar heat in years past, people, they're very likable bands, whereas geese, whether it's due to the hype whether it's due to Cameron Winter saying some bonkers stuff or whether it's the fact that this

album sounds a lot like 1996 Black Crows or Halfcan Wigs, which is like, it is so wild. Because like I reviewed Projector in 2021 and it just sounded so strange to me that this was like a Aughts Brooklyn buzz band trying to exist in that time period. And now they kind of are a classic mid-aughts buzz band doing a sound that no, like even two years. ago you wouldn't have predicted that they would have a 12,000 word profile in GQ but GQ is kind of like, hey, we're fashion guys, but we like jam bands now. Yeah, can I just say, yeah, go for it, man. I know you got something to say. Well, at the risk is sounding big headed. I just want to say, I've never written for GQ, but I feel like they are taking their cues from me. Like, when you're doing like a

12,000, 12,000 word profile of like Adam Duritz and you're doing big fish stories and big goose stories and now you're doing geese and big empty. Not that I'm the only person that likes this stuff, but I'm just saying it's very me-coded a lot of their coverage. And I'm loving it. It's great. Because I'm not used to people caring about jam bands or jam-adjacent stuff. So I'm all on board with it, but I just, you know,

I need a shout-up from GQ here. Because I feel like I'm helping dictate editorial policy over there. Again, not to be big-headed, but I don't know. It seems obvious to me. No, I thought a million times. I'm like, I wonder what Steve thinks about this. because, you know, like they did that big dad, like, you know, dad rock piece. Right.

Like, it's all stuff that you've talked about in the past. Absolutely. It's super interesting how we have, like, the two main tracks of music writing in 2025 is like the brain rot route and like the jam band. And I think peace exists at the intersection of these two things. But the title track, I know I mentioned Amorica. It reminds me more of Black Moon Creepin from Southern Harmony and musical companion. I can talk, I could, I could, I can hang in the Black Crow's talk. Yeah, I mean, I say that.

This might be my chance to do the Sunday review on Amorica, you know, Jeremy Larson call me, or actually the one I would want to do even more because I've already written a lot about Black Crows, because the title track is very Black Crow's coded. And I think it's very Amorica, more than Black Moon Creep. And just because Amorca is more of their psychedelic record. And I think it's more common with this. but I would also shout out another major touchstone of 90s hippie rock, which is soup by Blind Melon.

I think that has a similar flavor to a lot of these songs. And that's a record that needs to be rediscovered. I almost mentioned the Black Crows actually in my review, and I didn't just because I sort of doubt that geese listens to the Black Crows. My feeling is that they were listening to the same things that Black Crows were listening to, which is a lot of that classic rock stuff, and they put it together in a similar kind of way.

So you're going back to the same sources, and that's how you ended up sounding like Black Crow's. I made a similar argument recently about Sunbolt Trace, because I feel like so many records now, like from that countryish rock indie space, remind me of Sunbolt. Even though no one talks about Sunbolt, it's all David Berman and Jason Molina.

Because Jay Farrar, I don't think, is as fashionable as a reference point as those other guys. And also, he doesn't have a sense of humor. Like, I mean, Molina's not that funny either, but like, he's not as dourer. No one's as dour as J. Ferrar. But I think there's a similar thing with the Black Crows. So, like, when I saw you mention that on social media, I was like, okay, so I'm not alone.

I thought I was maybe going too far. So I was like, I can't talk about the one. Because am I stretching here. But, yeah, it's very amorica coded at times, I think. Yeah. And soup by Blind Melon is the A4 mentioned one and a half. F-star review in Rolling Stone. Like career ender.

I know things got dark for Shannon Hoon, but like... I mean, Shannon Hoon died like right after that record came out. So, you know... So him dying was the career ender. But yeah, that didn't help. Yeah, but I'm thinking of like... Because I recently like revisited the video for Remedy because the first CD I bought with my own money

was Southern Harmony and Musical Companion. I got that same day as DOS FX. Whatever. I'm looking at it now. It's like Chris Robinson was doing like very much like a gender bending sort of thing in that video that if you were to watch it now, like it's very 20, 25 in the way he looks. It's like with the long floppy earrings. And right. Yeah. It's it's good. I got I do want to. I mean, yeah, Black Rose is a band like the only song you're going to hear on the radio nowadays is like she talks to angels or like hard to handle. But. But, you know, I was, like, fucking with them up until, you know, three snakes and one charm. I remember listening to that. I was listening to that at Jewish summer camp. That's a good one.

Not many people were into that, yeah. That's a good one. Yeah, I mean, I think, and when they got back together with Mark Ford in the mid-2000s, that's also a good period for them. I mean, Mark, like, the live stuff from that time. They're, like, a phenomenal live band. Anyway, I could talk about Black Crows. Or Afghan wigs with the Wawa and the bongos and the big bells.

Like that, because I think about this sort of music when you were talking about Tarantino before. Like that is kind of Tarantino adjacent where like, you know, white boy rock bands were like doing that kind of funk sort of thing with jive turkey talk. I mean, in some ways it's kind of regrettable. Maybe this is going to lead to a rediscovery of urge overkill. That's what the people need. Oh, that'd be phenomenal. So we're both on board with geese.

Great band. Great record. Go check it out. Let's get to our yay or nay segment here, Ian. is for the Instagram and the TikTok kids. We do this every week. We take a topic and we yay or nay it. We're going to go in a slightly different direction.

We've been talking about a lot of bands lately. Let's, what's, yay or nay, a question that has been pondered now for years and years, and that is, will Frank Ocean make a third record? This is in the news this week because people were talking again about how back in 2019 Frank Ocean was teasing his third studio. album, which was to be called Look at Us, We're in Love. He even released several singles from it, including D.HL, in my room, Dear April, and Kayendo. But then COVID happens, and it took all the momentum out of the record, and apparently the album was shelved and is unfinished. Now, I don't

know if Frank Ocean has actually confirmed any of this. I think this is what people are speculating. But again, here we are. It's nine years since the last Frank Ocean record, Blonde, came out in 2016. So let's attempt to answer the question, Ian. Yeah, or nay, will Frank Ocean make a third album? Yeah, I mean, the article itself talking about his, like him coming forth on that stuff, that felt like a big nothing burger. But yeah, I think with Frank Ocean, the most suitable comparison for him is DeAngelo.

And Black Messiah took 14, 15 years to come out. So Frank Ocean, 2030? I'm going nay on this decade, but yay in general. But the thing about Frank Ocean is that unlike DeAngelo, he's not a guy you can book for the Roots picnic or whatever, because Frank's not really a performer like that. I do think he'd prefer to just like put out singles, mixtapes or whatever. But the irony is that he is such, he is an artist that is so much better understood in the album format. And I think he kind of is tired of that. So I imagine that he will continue to do teasers in the same way that he had been doing in 2019.

And we will get an album. And it won't be in, it'll be like, oh, by the way, this is coming out on Tuesday in 2031, like two weeks before. So I'm going on yay, but not by the end of the decade. So for me, this is a very hard question to answer. It's impossible to answer because we're dealing with one of the most peculiar artists of modern musical times. Frank Ocean is someone who could put out an album 10 years from now. He might never put out an album. He might put out a record tomorrow.

We really have no idea. We don't know what he's got cooking in the lab. Maybe he's still working on this album that he was teasing in 2019. Maybe he put it in the vault and he's working on something else. The thing with Frank Ocean is that it doesn't seem like he needs to put out a new album. His legacy already seems like weirdly secure despite how small his body of work is. I mean, if you look at the releases that he put out in the 2010s, I mean, those are definitional for that decade. And they're so influential.

And no matter what he does now, he's always going to be remembered as a touchstone artist of his era. So in a strange way, him putting out new music might even hurt his legacy because I have a hard time believing that anything he could do now would meet the public's expectations. You know, he had that weird thing at Coachella a few years ago where his performance. It was kind of a train wreck disaster, and I don't think anyone really remembers that, but it does show how when you're in the situation where people adore your work so much, sometimes the worst you can do is try to top yourself. But at the same time, he is relatively young, and it's just hard for me to conclude that he'll never put out a third record. It just seems inconceivable to me. So I'm going to say yay. I think he will put out a new album, though it might be later rather than sooner.

All right, well, now we've answered that. We could post it on the IG, on the TikTok for the kids. Let's get to our mailbag segment. We haven't done the mailbag in a while. Thanks to everyone who has written in to us. It's always great to hear from our listeners. You can hit us up at Indycast, Mailbag at gmail.com. We got a good letter this week.

You want to read this one, Ian? Yeah, this comes to us, Lewis, a longtime listener from Salt Lake City. And Lewis was wondering if you guys have ever heard of this guy named Jesse Well. He's a singer-songwriter who's become a huge TikTok phenomenon singing times they are a changing-esque acoustic folk songs about current events. He's got over 800,000 monthly listeners on Spotify, and his biggest song, War Isn't Murder, has over 6.5 million streams. Personally, there is something about his voice and presentation that is a little grading to me, but clearly it's working quite well for him. What I want to know is that is if we are in a protest folk revival of sorts, could this become a larger phenomenon? I think it's fair to say at the times we live and feel necessarily reminiscent of the 60s

and that there is a lot of political unrest and disillusionment. On the other hand, it is a bit hard to imagine popular contemporary folk music today. That doesn't feel overly hallmarked core a la the stomped clappers. Curious to hear your thoughts, Lewis. Okay, so I wrote about Jesse Wells, actually, on my substack, which is called Evil Speakers. I encourage you to check it out. And basically, I wrote about how I can't stand this guy. And I was triggered because he recently put out,

because he does these topical songs that he puts on YouTube and TikTok. He also puts out albums that are not topical. He kind of like a typical Americana singer-songwriter. He put out a record last month, I believe it's called Devil's Den. It was like his third album of 2025. So this guy's a grinder, just pumping out songs all the time. But the thing that made me finally want to opine on him is that he put out this song called Charlie.

Now, take a guess who Charlie is about. The song... He's finally getting around to Brat Summer or something. Yeah, exactly. Charlie X-TX. No, he wrote about the Charlie Kirk assassination. And he posted it like less than a day after the guy was murdered. Which to me is not songwriting.

That's content creation. Like, you're just rushing to capitalize on interest in a current event story. But the crux of the song is basically shaming people online for doing mean tweets about Charlie Kirk, which, you know, look, mean tweets, I'm not a fan of, but, you know, we are in a moment, like, if he had waited, like, four or five days, he might have noticed that, like, the U.S. Attorney General was threatening to prosecute people for, like, vaguely defined hate speech, and the FCC chair was, like, bragging about pressuring a TV network to take a talk show host off the air that the president doesn't like.

Like, we have actual things that you could protest that are being perpetrated by people with actual power and not just like random miserable people online saying inappropriate things about a you know an assassination so to me that really speaks to what his project is which is again not really formulating any kind of coherent message that would actually be a threat to people in power it's just creating content for Facebook boomers who say they want a new bob Dylan but they're really just looking for like a folk music version of a Bill Maher new rules monologue. You know, because that's what his topical songs are, really, for the most part. And there's also the fact that he's just not a good singer and he's not a good songwriter.

Like, if you look at the greatest protest songs, they all have great choruses. They're all anthems. They're all songs that you can sing along with because they're meant to be sung at a protest by large groups of people. You listen to this Jesse Wells guy. It's just a pile up of words. and like a third rate Woody Guthrie

derived melody that we've all heard a million times. It's boring, boring songwriting and just the sort of hype around this guy

because he's been profiled by the New York Times and the New York Magazine and Rolling Stone and it's always about can he bring the protest song back? What I would say is instead of trying to revive

something from the 60s, maybe we could look at music now and how this has evolved. To go back to Geese, The first song on that record is called Trinidad. It's not a protest song, but it is a song that I think conveys the madness of modern times, the chaos of modern times. And it does it in a way that is not just the guy with an acoustic guitar,

because I feel like we've evolved past that. People want to squint in this guy's direction and pretend that he's something that he's not. Because, again, there's like this Facebook boomer nostalgia for a protest. singer, but there are other kinds of protest music that we could draw to, and maybe we should focus on that, rather than this guy who's like the Greta Van Fleet of folk music, essentially. So, anyway, that's my rant. I don't know if you have as, I have a feeling you don't care as much about this by a fraction as I do.

Yeah, I hadn't heard about this guy at all until I saw a Rolling Stone article that said protest singer Jesse Wells laments the death of Charlie Kirk and New Song Charlie. And I see the picture and he kind of looks like stomp clap, not just a lot of. Tufnal. It's like very hard to take him seriously. But the way you're describing it, it's like, this guy isn't like Bob Dylan. He sounds more like RXK Nephew, except like RXK Netany. Like this guy's protest songs will have like a fraction of the impact of American terrorists, which actually is one of the best protest songs of the 2020s. Yeah, it just reminds me about like RFCK Nephew will like constantly put out these songs. And then you'll hear his albums and like there's five songs about like

his girlfriend or something like that. Yeah. This just feels like, kind of more of a progression of Oliver Anthony or... Oh, totally is. He admits in that Rolling Stone story that he saw Oliver Anthony and that inspired him because he used to make like nondescript grunge music. That's what he did for like 10 years. And it's funny. Like when you read about him, people will describe him as like a kid, but he's like 32 years old.

Like he's a music industry veteran. And good for him. He found a schick that people glommed onto and it's helped him have a career. But I don't know. If you're going to protest something, don't you need to say something? Like, a lot of the songs don't say anything. It's like it's claptor. It's the musical equivalent of claptor.

Like in comedy, when a comedian says something that the audience agrees with, like they clap along, even though they're not really laughing. There's no joke there. Like, that to me is what this is in a musical sense. It's like we're sort of telling people, we're telling this Facebook boomer audience what they want to hear and they can clap along. they can feel like, oh, this is a right on message.

But then it's like one year out the other. Like this music does not stick really in any possible way. I defy anyone to listen to a Jesse Well's song and hum the melody right after you hear it. You can't do it. There's nothing memorable about these songs as songs. Whatever just makes me think of is how you hear people say the left needs Joe Rogan. And this is kind of sort of like filling that void in the same way. hey, we need a new Bob Dylan.

Like, no, it's like, rather than letting something evolve, like, organically, it's just like, this thing reminds us of this thing that was popular. And I think one of the, one of the low-key benefits of the news cycle being what it is, that I have my doubts that we're going to be, like, thinking about this guy like a month from now. Like, I really feel like this, you know, Charlie is, like, the peak of this person's visibility. maybe it'll happen, but if we're talking about this by the end of the year, I'll be surprised.

You can only reach the fire for episode that we call Recommendation Corner, where Ian and I talk about something we're into this week. Ian, why don't you go first? All right, so this is a duo, I believe, from Nashville called Total Wife. Their new album's called Come Back Down, came out last Friday.

As much as I mocked shoegays for clogging my feed nowadays with some of the most mid-music imaginable, it's kind of replaced emo as my go-to recommendation corner i need to put something here it's not really groundbreaking but it's an enjoyable listen choice so um that is exactly what this does they are not really doing the wisp or the heavy shoegaze sort of thing more so the uh they are gutting a body of water my bloody valentine but with some break beats in there um and yeah it's not groundbreaking it's enjoyable if you're going to do one My Bloody Valentine song over and over again,

it better be the song soon. That's like a song you can make an entire genre off of. So yeah, this album, I imagine I'll probably listen to this more than a really good album you're going to talk about. And at the same time, I need my 7.5s. So total wife, come back down, fit that mold. So I'm going to talk about a record that is also getting just ecstatic reviews right now. It feels like this year as a music year is really coming on in the fall.

We've had some really big records. It felt like I felt like I got a little bit off to a slow start compared to 2024, but we've had a lot of killers like in the last couple months. This is another one. It's by a British singer-songwriter named Joanne Robertson, and the record is called Blur. That's Blur with two R's. And that title is also a good description of what this record sounds like. I was trying to find like a pithy way to convey the sonic quality of this album. And it sounds like Robertson is like at the bottom of a well that is like maybe 12 feet deep. And she's being recorded. And it makes her voice sound echoy and distant, but also extremely beautiful. And I don't know if it's like the best way to describe it, but it does it for me.

because you have the singer-songwriter aspects of this record, but sonically it is more like a dream pop record. And it has like a really kind of otherworldly quality to it where the vocals are very hushed. The guitar tones are, again, blurry, but also very distinct and very lovely. And it's just such a vibe. It is such a vibe, again, I must say beautiful like 15 times in this segment,

but there's really no other word for it. It really is also outstanding fall music. It totally makes sense that this would come out right after the autumn, the beginning of autumn, because I think it's an album that I look forward to listening to on headphones as I take walks among like falling leaves and while I'm wearing a sweater and things are getting chilly outside. It just has that vibe to it.

Just a very singular experience, you know, unlike a lot of singer-songwriter records, It does have a real sense of atmosphere to it. And it is a true kind of sonic experience that I think transports the listener as you're taking it in. So I highly recommend this album. Really like it a lot. Again, it's called Blur by Joanne Robertson. Have you listened to this album?

Yeah, I've listened to it. And I mean, I got to ask the way you're describing it. Have you ever heard, have you ever listened to Grupper? Oh, yeah. Okay, yeah. That's like really, that's really what this comes into for me. And I would say, like, yeah, I hope it's a fall album. It's been, like, kind of in the 80s.

Like, San Diego's summer is, like, on a two-month away. In October, that's when it really gets hot. But, yeah, I've enjoyed it. Want to spend more time with it. That being said, you know, I spend most of my time in the car, in the gym. The two places where you are not going to listen to this record. Probably not. Maybe afterward.

Maybe if you're, like, you know, in a sauna or something. But in a ice bath. Yeah, in two months, I'm going to be like, Oh man, have you checked out this Joanne Robertson record? Like when it dipped into the 50s here. So, yeah, I like what I'm hearing from this. Love it. And Total Wine, too. I've listened to that record.

I enjoy that as well. This is a good shot chaser combination, I think. Listen to Total Wine, then cool off, listen to some Joanne Robertson. I think that'd be a good way to spend the weekend. Thank you all for listening to this episode of Indycast. We'll be back with more news reviews and hashing out trends next week. And if you're looking for more music recommendations,

sign up for the Indie Mix Taped News You can go to uprocks.com backslash indie, and I recommend five albums per week, and we'll send it directly to your email box.