Indiecast - SXSW Controversy, The New Pitchfork Festival Lineup, And Our Favorite Albums Since 2014

Episode Date: March 15, 2024

Steven and Ian open this week's episode by rehashing a surprising trend from last week — Indiecast angered some people online! The (minor) mishap prompts a discussion about previous Indiecast-related controversies. After that they proceed to a quick Sportscast about the latest insanity over Aaron Rodgers, and Steven's inability to simply enjoy the biggest Wisconsin sports stars (9:34).Next, they talk about the recent controversies related to South By Southwest, which has seen dozens of bands bail out over the festival's ties to the military (14:35). Is it now better PR to quit SXSW than to participate? The guys also discuss the lineup for the Pitchfork Music Festival (24:14)and a viral tweet related to Pavement's tour rider in 1999 (36:55) before ending up with the 10th anniversary of The War On Drugs' Lost In The Dream (44:58) and sharing their favorite albums released since 2014.In Recommendation Corner, Ian talks about a classic 2001 album by Texas band Lift To Experience while Steven recommends recent LPs by Kim Gordon and Hannah Frances (56:01).New episodes of Indiecast drop every Friday. Listen to Episode 180 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 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 South by Southwest, the new Pitchfork Festival lineup, and the 10th anniversary of Lost in the Dream. My name is Stephen Hayden, and I'm joined by my friend and co-host.

It's his fault and not mine that people got mad at us last week. Ian Cohen. Ian, how are you? I really appreciate it. the reality check because here it was me thinking that, oh, it's definitely the fact that Steve's written like five or six popular books and the tens of thousands of followers and the celebrity endorsements that make us a target. But truly it's the fact that I haven't been properly respectful to Sun Ra and Farrow's discography. Well, look, I was being facetious with that intro because

I actually think it's mostly my fault because I think I did. most of the talking in the segment that got people mad last week. Look, I don't know if you've had this experience, Ian, but from the beginning of my career, back to my days as a small town newspaper reporter, a humble country lawyer, if you will, of journalism. You write these pieces sometimes where you know this is probably going to piss somebody off. You know, just to pick an obvious example from, modern times, if you're going to review a Taylor Swift record and you know you're going to be

critical of the record, you're expecting to get some blowback from that and you steal yourself for that. And it's still hard sometimes when people come after you online, but you're at least are, you've braced for it, you're expecting people to be mad. And then there's like a different kind of story, or in this case podcast, where you're talking about something innocuous and it's fun, but it's not that important, you know, and you just feel like, well, I'm going to have fun with this, and no one could possibly get upset about this. And that's the thing that kills you.

Like, that ends up being the thing that people get mad about. This has happened to me so many times at my career, and I'm not even going to, like, mention the other times because I don't even, like, want to gin up any, you know, anger. I mean, I once wrote a column about how parents shouldn't bring kids to kind of concerts, which was a mostly kind of joking column, but that was like maybe the most controversial thing I ever wrote. But have you had this experience?

Is this true for you, too? Like, the things you don't expect to be controversial, those are the things that get people mad. Yeah, I mean, don't get me wrong. There's, like, a lot of stuff I wrote early on where I'm like, this might get people mad and, like, that absolutely happened. But that was, like, before Twitter. Yeah, I would say especially for us, like, from the moment.

this podcast was in its planning phase. I remember back in the summer of 2020 when we were starting this out. Like, this was back when people on Twitter were calling for, like, Phoebe Bridgers to not release Punisher on Juneteenth, because that was the year that American, like, white Americans realize racism exists. And I was thinking, I don't remember that story. Oh, yeah, that's incredible. Mike Kinsella was dropping the Owen album.

And they're like, hey, man, like, you need to respect this, like, holiday. we just discovered in 2020. Strange times, but, you know, obviously I'm thinking, yeah, what about, I remember this conversation we asked. Like, what about the optics, like two white guys launching a podcast? And, you know, what I've learned in the four years of doing this podcast specifically is that it's never the stuff that I spend the previous night fretting over. It's like, uh, are the Mitzky Stan's going to get at us for saying that Laurel Hell is kind

of mid? Absolutely not. I think that actually now at this point we can predict what's going to make us, if not like the main character on music Twitter, like a guest star where you send me a screenshot and I feel this like sinking feeling in my stomach. It's all like I think we can anticipate our Twitter beefs with tremendous clarity because it's always going to be a guy our age or older. It's like another music writer. And basically what starts beefs are our take that, you know, music does not need. to be more academic or EMP or like more gonzo that. Yeah, but like, okay, but that's not really what happened this time.

Look, I don't want to get into it. Okay. Because I don't want to kick the hornets nest again. And look, it's not a big hornet's nest. It's only about like three or four hornets in this nest. But you don't even want like one hornet mad at you. Like if you got three or four mad at you, it can be hard. But like if you want to know what I'm talking about,

Go on Twitter, look for Indycast and search for Indycast with the word obnoxious. Or if you're feeling very saucy, look for Indycast, obnoxious pricks. It just got me thinking about other controversies that we've been involved in. And there haven't been that many, really. As you said, I think because the people who listen to the show like our show, they like us or they at least appreciate us. sometimes you have hate listeners. I mean, we had a lot of hate listeners last week, apparently. But, you know, the hate listeners,

they're the ones who are maybe most likely to take something and paraphrase it in a social media context, and then that gets paraphrased again, and it gets paraphrased again, and by the end of it, you're, like, supposedly voicing the worst opinions of all time, you know, according to social media, even though, like, you haven't actually said that.

I think that the worst, controversy we've had, though, over the four years of the show was Bo Burnham. Remember the Bo Burnham controversy? Like we were talking about his pandemic era special inside. We both kind of made fun of it a little bit. Yes. We got emails about that for weeks. That was like maybe the most controversial thing we've had. That's number one, for sure. And the other ones aren't that big of a deal. And even this latest one, it's not a big deal. Whatever. I'm having some fun with it because, again, when you get called the obnoxious prick, social media. You have to laugh at that. But yeah,

the Bo Burnham thing. And I have to say I watch both it had some likes. I saw some videos from that recently that came up on my YouTube feed. And I got to say, like I liked it more than I did whenever that came out, 2021, I think. Maybe 2020. I just wasn't ready to like

experience musical comedy about anxiety during the pandemic. Like I wasn't in the mood for that during the pandemic. But now, there's some space, and I could appreciate what he was doing a little bit better. But, uh, so if there's still people mad at us about Bo Burnham discourse on this show, just know I'm doing somewhat of a 180 right now on that. Yeah, we're doing the work. We're going to have like a five-year anniversary episode about our Bo Burnham controversy. We're, we're gearing up for that. You know, like in 2026 or whatever,

when if and when South by Southwest still exists and like the release schedule gets like pretty, pretty I think that's going to be one of our, like, let's just see if we can get 60 minutes out of this. Yeah, I think we could. I definitely think we could. You know, the thing is about these controversies, it just shows how much we need sportscast. We need that as an anchor, because if we don't have sportscast to open the show, who knows what we're going to say, that's how you end up with the, you know, social media controversies. So let's just do a quick sports cast here. I just want to talk to you about Aaron Rogers for a second.

There was news this week that he's being considered as a vice presidential candidate for Robert Kennedy Jr., which is an incredible sentence to say. And then immediately after that, it was reported on CNN that, I guess, like 11 years ago. I don't know why this is being reported now, but 11 years ago at a party or something, Aaron Rogers said to a CNN reporter, that he basically endorses Sandy Hook conspiracy theories, you know, that it was like an inside job from the government. Like Alex Jones, horrible crack concept. Oh, like a false flag type thing. Yeah, did you see that story?

Like, that came out this week. And I'm like, okay, I believe it, but I'm also like, why didn't the reporter, like, why did they sit on this for 11 years? I feel like that was maybe news in 2013. I don't know. See, that's a little weird to me. but I don't know. My life right now as a sports fan is constantly negotiating who is worse.

Like which of my childhood heroes is worse, Brett Favre or Aaron Rogers. Like the two biggest sports stars of like my life in the last 25 years, it's this constant one-upsmanship on who's worse. Like when Brett Favreve went to the Jets, he sent Dick's, he sent Dick Picks to like a trainer, which was bad. But then now you have Aaron Rogers endorsing Sandy Hooker. conspiracy theories, which seems worse. But then Brett Favre was like siphoning money from the state to fund a volleyball court for his daughter. Yeah, like wealth, that's pretty bad.

Like, welfare in Mississippi, like, you know, the neediest people in America. So I don't know what Aaron Rogers is going to do the top of that. Is he going to, uh, I don't know. I don't even want to say a joke scenario because it could actually come true with Aaron Rogers. Yeah, I think with this story, what I love is that Aaron Rogers was picked as a vice presidential candidate with like Jesse the Body Ventura as like a possible like backup plan. But I love how, you know, this is just the ultimate indictment of the New York Jess is the franchise. Because like if you're Aaron Rogers, you can be a starting quarterback, the thing that you've done for the past like 10, 15 some odd years.

or be a vice president for a completely hopeless and wildly unpopular third party candidate. And like I haven't heard him turn it down yet. Like that's the wild part. He hasn't unequivocally said, yeah, this is dumb. I'm getting ready for training camp, which is like what all quarterbacks always say whenever you talk about anything. And I mean, I don't know, man. I think, like, does he think that like being vice president is cool?

Like I think that the Joe, like Joe Biden, like ice cream. Joe Biden from the Obama era like kind of really changed things up because before that like vice presidents were Al Gore Dick Cheney you know people like that or like Mike Pence

it's not a cool job I don't know if anyone's seen Veep but he is going to hate that jobs even in the circumstance he's not going to get elected he's not going to do the job ever come on like what why are we even talking about here it's like this is the levels of delusion with

this guy, you know, and the thing with Rogers is he's been indulged for way too long by even his critics saying, well, he's a smart guy, but he's a smart guy for a quarterback. Yeah. He's a smart guy for a quarterback. That is the qualification, which means he's not really that smart, okay? I'm sorry, in terms of like the greater world, he's smart about football, but in terms of, you know, anything else outside of that, he's an idiot. And just the levels of delusion here, of course he would consider this because in his own mind, he thinks he's qualified to do this. He thinks he has the truth.

He's been on Reddit, just injecting Reddit into his veins now because he's not even playing football for the past year. So he's just on the internet constantly while he's doing his recovery from the ACL, you know, just mainlining, you know,

just propaganda all the time. I don't know, man. Well, you watch that Patriots documentary. Do you think this is like a sciop coming from the Patriots? to undermine one of their rivals in the AFC East? Well, I mean, that documentary, this is the documentary on Apple TV Plus called Dynasty, which I thought started off well, but it's just gotten worse with every episode.

And I'm still watching because I'm addicted to it. But one of the more recent episodes, like the day this podcast posts, the last two episodes, I think, are going up, but like last week's episode, it literally opens with Rupert Murdoch talking about what a great guy Robert Kraft is. And like there's no irony here. There's no irony here. There's no like, oh, we're making, like, they're actually

presenting this as a straightforward endorsement of Robert Kraft. And because they're telling the story, I don't know if you remember this, like when Robert Kraft and Rupert Murdoch went to go meet Vladimir Putin in the mid-2010s.

And like Putin stole Robert Kraft's Super Bowl ring. I mean, this is just like a 30 rock. Yeah, that rules. Storyline. I mean, the Aaron Rogers running for vice president is another

30 rock storyline. But they're just presenting this as like straightforward awesomeness and not as an indictment of Robert Kraft, who has totally hijacked this documentary to like make himself look amazing and to

make Bill Belichick look terrible, which it takes a lot to make me feel sympathetic to Bill Belichick, but this documentary is so obviously slanted against Belichick in Kraft's favor that I feel sympathy

for Belichick. It's unbelievable. But anyway. Yeah, I think that like you would ask yourself, like every time like someone like a billionaire is posting on Twitter or you see like, you know, Robert Kraft making a documentary like this, people are like, if I had billions of dollars, I would just like,

kind of chill and sit with my money. I'm like, absolutely not. If I had all the money in the world, I would just be posting nonstop. Yeah. Well, I mean, this documentary is basically just like one long post for Robert Kraft. Well, enough sports cast here. We have a lot of indie news here to get into to hash out. And we're going to start with South by Southwest. If you haven't been paying attention, this is a very controversial year for South by Southwest. And it started probably, like a week or two ago, when you started seeing artists announcing that they weren't going to perform at official South by Southwest events this year because of the music festivals, well, I guess it's not just the music festival, it's the entire event, but like their connection

to the military industrial complex. And I'm not joking. I feel like we're talking about a lot of ridiculous things in this episode. But apparently, in part of the South by Southwest Conference, and I guess it's like more of the tech side of what they do, that the U.S. military is involved. I don't know if they're involved as a sponsor or if they're just there as guests speaking. I'm unclear on that, but people on the music side have caught wind of this, and there's been bands dropping out left and right. I believe there's about 60 at this point, and I'm sure that number is growing.

And there was a thing this week where the Republican governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, he tweeted about this situation. And he basically did the Republican troll routine where he's like, you know, good riddance to these bands. Like, we don't want them here. And then South by Southwest, they jump in on Twitter to say, we disagree with Governor Abbott. And then they just proceed to make a totally,

worst for themselves. And I'm not going to read this whole Twitter thread, but, you know, one of the more pertinent tweets is the defense industry has historically been a proving ground for many of the systems we rely on today. These institutions are often leaders in emerging technologies, and we believe it's better to understand how their approach will impact our lives. And then it says the Army sponsorship, so the Army, I guess, is a sponsor of South and Southwest, which is, again, an incredible statement. The Army sponsorship is part of our commitment to bring forward ideas that shape our world. And they participated this year as a sponsor for two South by Southwest pitch categories, giving entrepreneurs visibility and funding for potentially game-changing work.

So, South by Southwest, I guess you would say this is doubling down. I don't know if that's the right term. They're certainly not hiding the fact that the military. is involved in the festival. This is wild. I mean, I think about like 10 years ago, when people complained about Southwest, it was because, oh, you know, the inflatable house offering an after-dark experience

sponsored by Doritos, you know, that's kind of crass, you know, and now we have like, you know, we're bringing in the army to encourage, you know, disrupting behavior. You know, like, we want them to, help the tech industry bring forward ideas to help our world. Is this like the death now of South by Southwest? Are people overreacting to this?

It certainly feels like in terms of a music festival, it was already waning in terms of its influence, and we've talked about this before, but as a media event, this has fallen off a cliff. I mean, no one really talks about this anymore. That's also partly due to music media being greatly diminished compared to 10 years ago, but at the same time,

the idea of a band going to South by Southwest and being discovered seems very sort of antiquated at this point. And then you have this army thing coming into play. I don't know. I just feel like, are we going to put a fork in South by Southwest now?

Is this it for them as a music festival? Well, you mentioned that the music journalist industrial complex more or less doesn't exist anymore, but I'm going to go to South by Southwest. Southwest to just see what's happening at the intersection of like space force and postpunk. I mean, I think this is where the real developments are happening. Yeah, it's so I mean, I remember like 10 years ago interviewing Cole from Zaka from Dive.

And he was talking about like how South by Southwest was, you know, it makes no sense for us economically. Like we lose money. We get to play like 20 minutes sets to people who are just like there for like free. Tito's vodka. And that was like a pretty controversial statement back then. It's like, what are you talking about, man? Like, you're privileged. You know, we got to do this. Bootstrap it. And, you know, now it's just like you have to ask yourself, I mean, the same way I asked myself like anything that we did back in 2013, why we're doing it in 2024. I remember like, I think maybe the beginning of the end was when South by Southwest book James

Comey as a speaker, like after he was kind of dealing with the fallout of possibly influencing the 2016 election. And yeah, I love how, I love that South by Southwest is, if not doubling down, kind of rationalizing, well, yeah, like, yes, the Army does make a lot of stuff that we use because it's like one of the few places that, you know, gets an unlimited amount of money. But, you know, you brought up a good point about whether it. it's better now in 2024 for a band to say they're not playing South by Southwest than it is to say that we're playing.

Well, I said that in the outline. I haven't said that yet in the show. But yeah, I was saying in the outline that it feels like this year, the good PR move is to say you're not playing South by Southwest. And maybe not at this point because so many bands have already said that they're doing it. And I'm not saying that they're doing it only as a PR move. I think that bands are genuinely. upset about being associated with this. They don't want to be a part of it. Maybe on top of everything

else about South by Southwest that isn't all that great because again, like economically, it doesn't make a lot of sense for bands to be playing this. They don't really make a lot of money doing it. In fact, they end up losing money. And when you don't have the media attention that playing this festival used to get, I think it just makes going through those struggles like more inexplicable. It is interesting to think about South by Southwest at this point as being more of a tech festival probably than a music festival. And you could maybe say that that's a metaphor for the music industry in general, maybe just entertainment overall, that tech is swallowing everything. And there is no sort of like morality to tech. It doesn't seem like, you know,

that it is more of just like this pure capitalistic idea of like, oh yeah, why would we? wouldn't we bring the army in? They have a ton of money. We have all these federal dollars. We can use this apparatus to fund our projects. Of course that makes sense. Like there's no moral dimension to that at all. We don't have to think about that. As opposed to, I think, the image of South by Southwest, which for a long time was, oh, we're going to Austin. It's this weird little artistic community. And we're going to have all these bands playing in bars and in the street. And it's going to be a great happening and it's going to be an incredible vibe. I mean, that, that seems like dead and like pretty much long dead at this point. I have to say, too, you know, whenever we've

talked about this in the past, you know, we have heard from listeners who talk about how, well, I go to South by Southwest every year because it's a great value. I go to these bars. I can see all these bands I love and I don't have to pay anything and isn't that wonderful? It's a great deal. And, you know, I think it's worth asking yourself, like, why is this free? Why is this such a good deal? Just like you need to ask yourself sometimes, why do I get to stream literally a billion songs for, you know, what, like $10 a month or less than that if you're, you know, going on the ad-supported platform? Like, doesn't this seem like an insane value for what I'm spending.

And yeah, it is an insane value. And the reason why is that the artists themselves are not benefiting from this at all. So, yeah, I don't know. It just seems like if you factor in how difficult it is to play here for artists, and then you have this sort of icky military connection going on, I don't know. I just feel like as a music festival, it seems pretty much dead, and it's just moved on to being something else. You know, again, maybe more of a tech conference.

I know they have the film festival. So, like, you know, if you want to be an influencer in the tech community, you're going to care about South by Southwest. But maybe if you're a band, those days are over. Yeah, Salem at the Fader Fort was a military sciop. Oh, man. That was maybe the last great moment, the last great slash terrible moment at South by Southwest. Yeah, we're going to find out that's like MK, that's like MK Ultra, you know, like how

LSD was initially like used to, I don't know, like get like communist sympathizers to turn, Salem at the fader for it. We're going to be discussing that like in 50 years. Yeah. Oh man. Love it. Love that. So speaking of music festivals that are in the process of changing, let's talk about the pitchfork music festival, which announced their lineup this week. And I guess there was maybe some confusion about whether there would be a music festival this year, given all of the changes at Pitchfork. Of course, if you listen to this show, you know that, I guess that was in January, I think, GQ announced, or Kande Nast announced that Pitchfork was being folded into GQ, that

pitchfork is essentially going to be the music vertical for GQ. And in the process, Pitchfork lost about half of their staff. And of course, Pitchfork continues to publish and they're still going. But people, I think, there wasn't a ton of clarity in whether there would be a festival. But there is a festival. The lineup was announced this week. And I'm going to say, you know, before we get to the part that everyone's making fun of on this lineup, I got to say, I think this is a good lineup.

You know, I'm looking at, especially if you look at the undercard of the lineups, I'm seeing Jeff Rosenstock. I'm seeing Amen Dunes. seeing Rosalie, who I wrote about this week, great singer-songwriter. I'm seeing Feeble Little Horse, Hotline T&T, Kara Jackson, you know, Who Outmanican Pussy, Jessica Pratt? I mean, there's like a lot of great artists on here. Even on the headliners, you know, you got 100 gecks in here.

So a lot of good stuff. Wednesday, I didn't mention them. They're playing the festival. So like a lot of great artists that I think you would expect to see in a normal year from Pitchfork. But I guess we have to talk about like the weirdest headliner this year, which is Black Pumas are headlining on, I guess, Friday this year. And, you know, are we just assuming that this is like a GQ thing?

Because, you know, I'm guessing that most of this lineup was already booked before these changes happened at Pitchfork. But the Black Pumas thing, Black Pumas, of course, being the, you know, the, you know, revivalist R&B act that has won like a billion Grammys already somehow, even though they've only been around for like five years. And not really an act that you would associate with pitchfork. I think I actually looked it up. They reviewed the first Black Puma's record, which came out in 2019, gave it a 7.0. They actually, as far as I could see, didn't review the most recent Black Puma's record, which came out last year.

So it's certainly not like a darling of the same. site. What are your feelings on this, Ian? I know you have opinions about Black Puma's at Pitchfork. Yeah, this is amazing. Also, like, people have to realize that, like, pitchfork has been at Condé Nass since 2015. So, um, and also, it takes a long time to book a festival. Uh, so this stuff was probably in the works for God knows how long. But, I mean, I always thought, like, what would be the funniest possible Pitchfork Fest headliner would have to be like one of those Patreon-only episodes that we discuss where we like don't want to ruffle any feathers. And but you know, here we are discussing it in real time.

And you know, as far as like what would be the funniest, like this one is just Pat Mahomes passing through a six-inch window to complete a third and ten. It's unbelievable how much this kind of just hits the target because you're like, it is so hard to think of, you know, bands or, you know, genres that don't fall into pitchforks purview in the modern day. I mean, Alanis Morissette was the subject of a April Fool's review back in, like, 2001, and now she's, like, headlining it on Sunday. It's Alanis Morset, Brittany Howard, and Muna are like the headliners on Sunday. And again, Friday, Black Pumas, J. Paul, 100 Gex. And on Saturday,

it's Jamie XX, Carly Ray Jepson, speaking of 2014. We're really going back to like, you know, mid 2010's, we're going to be revisiting that again in a later segment. And Jesse Ware is the last headliner on Saturday. And, you know, those were like, yeah, that makes sense. But, like, Black Puma's are, like, one of the few bands that you could say, yeah, this has nothing at all to do with their editorial stance, like, ever. Because you look at their, I think it's even better to look at their Spotify, fans also like page.

And you get people like, you know, Leon Bridges. and Gary Clark Jr. and Sharon Jones, who I can see, like, I can see the vision there. But you also get, like, Nathaniel Ratliff and the Night Sweats, St. Paul and the Broken Bones. Like, you know what these bands look like. It's like eight white guys. They all got fedoras on. And it makes me think of, like, I don't know, dating apps in L.A. Circa, 2012, where it's like, I love going to concerts, along with, like, fluent and sarcasm, and looking for a partner in crime on their dating profile.

Like, it just makes you think of, like, when people clown Wilco as Dad Rock, like, these guys are, like, early Sonic youth compared to these type of bands. So, but I don't, I think the bigger question is, like, I don't even know if they're popular enough to justify not being, you know, seen as, like, a pitchfork band, you know, Kronbun, I think they're in that kind of vein. Like, they have, like, twice as many followers. That seems to me like what a GQ inside job would be because I mean we're not that far removed from GQ saying hey, why don't you think about reuniting Oasis or the white stripes? You know?

Yeah, I just wonder. I wonder if like someone dropped out or something. I mean, look, I don't want to pile on black pumas, but, you know, following up on your point, there are a band that I'm just unsure of like what their real world popularity is. If you go on Spotify, they have about 3 million monthly listeners, which is fine. But, like, that doesn't seem like a festival headliner to me. And they're just a band that has, like, historic levels of, like, music industry support. Like, the music industry loves Black Puma's. Again, they want to give them Grammys.

They want to put them in this position. I don't know. I mean, I have a hard time believing that pitchfork on their own, like, the powers that be at pitchfork. We're pushing for black pumas. I do feel like that's more of like a Condi-Nast GQ thing. Maybe I'm wrong, but I just feel like the 100 gex crowd, are they going to stick around for black pumas? I don't know.

I'm skeptical of that. I actually feel like 100 gex should be built above them. For a pitchfork festival, I think that they would be more appropriate for that, and I think they would actually draw a bigger crowd at this kind of festival. You know, there's other kinds of festivals, I think, where Black Pumas would kill. But I don't know. South by Southwest. Yeah, or like Austin City Limits.

But, you know, I'm looking, I mean, you know, Black Pumas have twice as many monthly listeners as 100 gecks. So maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the Black Puma's crowd is going to come out in droves in Chicago. That'll be amazing. I mean, I could see, like, Black Pumas fans showing up for Black Pumas. And unlike everyone else leaving and going to after parties. You know, that might be a scenario at Pitchfork. Are you going to Pitchfork this year?

I actually can't go this year. We got too many trips going on. But I just want to say, like, you know, I just wonder how much better this would be received if the only thing you change was Black Pumas. Because, you know, this is like how we used to book the festival. Like the undercard is basically every band from the previous year that got between like an 8. and an 8.5 best new music. You know, Carly Ray Jepson, like, is at the national big thief level of, like, yeah, we're going to get her to play every two years territory.

It's still pretty down the middle. But, yeah, Black Pruva's, man, this is great. I think, I mean, I said this at the top. I actually think it's a strong lineup. I mean, you know, water from your eyes. I didn't mention them, model actress, Joanna Sternberg. There's, like, a lot of great artists playing. this festival. So I actually, I don't think it's like that far afield from what pitchfork normally

does. Again, just some of the headliners are a little strange, but, you know, festivals are in a weird place. You know, like I wonder if they try to get Vampire Weekend to play this, you know, because they have a new album coming out. Like maybe they tried to get them. They tried to get MGMT. You know, like a lot of these sort of like classic rock indie bands have like come back this year. they would have been available, presumably, to play this. So I don't know, maybe pitchwork wasn't interested in those groups. To me, that would have maybe been a better fit. Even throw LCD sound system in there.

I heard they're available. Well, they're touring. They're playing festivals this summer. So that would have made sense. Someone shared a poster from a block party in Utah. There's like a big music festival happening there in May. And the headlanders were, LCD sound system, the Postal Service, and Vampire Weekend.

And then just like all the way down the poster, it was like a pretty incredible lineup. Like, do you know what I'm talking about? It's like Kilby Block, I believe, something like that. Yeah. Something would kill me in the title. Someone was like, oh, this is the real pitchfork festival. And I was like, this is kind of a better, I mean, it's like a great lineup. Like if you are into, like down the line, indie rock.

Yeah, so. Yeah, it's Vampire Weekend, Postal Service, LCD Sound System. You also have Jay Paul, Joanna Newsom is playing here. You got Wu-Tang Clan, Death Cat for Cutie, Interpol, 100 Gex, GBV is playing there, Balin Sebastian, Dinosaur Jr., always, Courtney Barnett, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Peach Pit for Ian Cohen, Ty Segal, Andy Schopp, I mean, like, this is a great lineup. Kind of want to go to Utah to this festival, the 2nd May, the Kilby Black Party.

Are you confusing Peach Pit with Passion Pit? Oh, I must be. Who's Peach Pit? Peach Pit is like one of these bands where We're getting a little. Peach Pit is like one of these bands. I keep on seeing like in my, you know, inbox where it's always, it's like either Peach Pit or their name is like Slow Hollows or like Hollow Crystal

or just like some permutation of like slow fade hollow. It's like all these bands. that are just like probably doing massive numbers on Spotify that we never ever talk about. But like we should really get into. You know, Peach Pit, that's like way too similar to Passion Pit. I'm sorry.

I'm, you know, if you're looking at this quickly, it's sort of like having a band, like a new band called like MGMS. It's like, okay, come on.

You got to go a little bit different here. There's like a band from like 15 years ago that has a very similar name. But who am I to say? Because I guess Peach Pit is big. I've never heard of them. Yeah, they're huge. It's like one of these bands where it's like if you ask, I don't know, a 26 year old, what they're into when they say indie rock, that's probably what they're talking about. You know, or I'm thinking about like still woozy, Del Water Gap. Like there is such that, I swear to God, like that is my last pivot as a music writer.

Like, you know, emo, that's come and gone. I got to get off that. I got to get into the future. remember some guys of like you know Spotify indie stuff um that that that's my new move well killby block party hit up uprocks bring bring indycast into there get us a sponsorship uh because where's that it's like is that in salt lake city um uh it's like i think it's somewhere in utah yeah it's i mean if it's not there it's like uh where like sundance uh i would i would say like salt lake city yeah that's where it is yep it's in salt lake city yeah it's in south City. And I was in Salt Lakes. I was there a few years ago. Very cool town. Yeah, that was the Barty's strange story, right?

Yes, yes. Yeah. So, Kilby Black Party, hit us up, bring us out there. Wine and Dinus. We'll do some live shows from the festival. Great lineup there. All right, let's move on to, this is, I guess, live music related to, but this is going back to 1999. There was a thing being passed around this week. it was a tour writer for pavement for the Terror Twilight Tour in 1999. Their last tour before they reunited very successfully

10 some years later and then again 10 years after that. And it's funny, okay, not to make fun of a tweet again. Again, I want to be respectful to the Twitter prompt community as well as the tour writer Twitter community.

It's funny because this thing gets passed around. It's a screenshot of their tour writer. And again, for those who don't know, a tour writer is a list of items that a band requests ahead of time that the venue provide. So usually it's drinks, it's food, things of that nature. And I believe the band pays for that stuff, if I'm not mistaken. All that stuff is billed to the band. So it's not like they're asking the venue to spend all this money on them.

but it's so funny to me when you see stuff like this gets circulated because it's always someone who says I can't stop thinking about this and it's pavement's 1999 tour writer like really like you're just thinking about pavements 1999 tour writer

this is an obsession for you I guess this is what happens when you don't have kids maybe maybe I did this before I had kids but anyway I think the idea was that this tour writer is very extravagant and you read it and okay so they're asking for let's see

48 cold bottles of premium domestic beer and premium domestic beer is in parentheses Rolling Rock and Budweiser welcome to 1999 yeah exactly man hey look it's not like today where there's like 50,000 beers when you go to the liquor store like back then there were like five beers and like Rolling Rock was like you know the parier of beers back then

Blue moon, blue moon in that first drop, like, you would think that that was, like, the most pop-notch snob IPA or whatever it is. Like,

heffavisen, like that was just, like, mind-blowing shit. So they're also requesting 24 cold bottles of premium imported beer or a good local microbrew.

So again, pavement ahead of the curve. Thinking about microbrews in 1999. And look, again, they're just going on the list. they want one case of Coca-Cola classic, one case of some other soft drink, honey, wait, no,

bakery fresh bread, that's something I guess that would be considered extravagant. Anyway, there's, I guess, what, like 20-some items on here that they're asking about, and this is being passed around as an extravagant thing. I mean, I'm not an expert on tour writers. I feel like nowadays, when I've been in people's green rooms, you got the hummus there, usually. You have some sort of like tortilla chip going on. There's probably some beer in the refrigerator. You know, maybe you got like a high life in there.

And then maybe some other like nicer beer in there. Like Paypin, I guess, asked for a bottle of bourbon. As opposed to like in a fucking plastic. bag like what's wrong with that? Yeah they wanted they wanted a 750 milliliter of makers mark so you know I mean they're not extravagant here

is this just is this like a sign that something like this becomes a big deal online that we have just had our standards lowered over the last 25 years that like what used to be considered normal for a band again pavement pretty big band in 1990s

1999. Like, we now look at this as like, wow, they're like rich, but like, this just used to be normal back then. Yeah, it's like that Simpson's episode where they're like, okay, principal Skinner's 40 years old and he makes $25,000 a year. He's a millionaire. Yeah, I'm thinking of like, you know, my own job, you know, just not to get into politics cast again, but, you know, I'm a union guy and we're fighting for a new contract.

And so much of the union fights nowadays are just trying to get back. stuff that was normal 30 years ago. And I don't know if like people thought like pavement showed up to the gig with like a bindle like a bunch of like box car hobos. But A, I don't think they get the, I think you don't always get the stuff you want on the rider. But like, you know, splitting a fifth between like five or six members of the band. Like, you know, why wouldn't we want them to be comfortable? I mean, let's also, you know, acknowledge the fact that this is terror twilight era pavement where like, I don't think they were really speaking to each other all that much. So maybe they do need to get a little more drunk.

In that case, I'm going to let it ride. But yeah, this is like, if not the most popular band in indie rock in 1999, like real indie rock. You know, at least the most popular band on Matador. This doesn't seem that extravagant. Yeah, they ask for 20 pounds of clean ice cubes. I like that it was clean ice cubes. You know, you have to make sure it's not being recycled from the bar.

They ask for one New York Times newspaper and one local newspaper. Wait a minute. What if one person does the crossword? You got to ask for like five. Well, to me, again, this is 1999. It's pre-internet. So, like, if you want to know what's going on in the world, you need a newspaper. This just got me thinking, like, okay, let's say Kilby Block Party, they step up.

And they're like, yeah, Stephen Ian, we want you guys to come out. We want you guys to do some apps from the grounds here. interview some bands, what would be on our tour writer, you think? I know what you would request, because you're an ice cream guy. So I think there'd be like a couple different varieties of ice cream, a couple pints. I don't know what flavors you'd want. Maybe you'd be like, I need a, I need a chunky monkey. Nah, I'm like local.

I'm local. I want the micro version, whatever Utah's got. Oh, wow. I don't know. If we're recording apps. You want local? Like a local chocolate or a local, or are you going to like, like, like, like, surprise me, like whatever is the best

from the local ice cream. Ice cream might make me kind of flemy while we're recording. So, you know, I don't even know if I would go with that. Like, I'd probably do it on my own. Yeah, I think that all I need is just get me my diet Mountain Dew and I'm ready to go. Like, I'd rather just like do it

guided by voices style and like just pocket the money and spend like whatever part of the advance on like Mountain Dew or whatever. Well, I definitely want the clean ice cubes. Yes. So give that to me. Non-negotiable.

I need some bourbon. I think Maker's Mark will go with that. Like some Red Solo cups. That'd be good. Some salty snacks. I like a salty snack. Maybe like a nice little pretzel. I like that to munch on.

Some sort of like sandwich from a local sandwich place. I think that would be good. You know? Because again, it would satisfy my hunger, but it wouldn't make me too full when I'm recording. See, I'm way more demanding than you, apparently. You're very, I just give me Diet Mountain Dew. Like, I've got, like, a list here.

That's probably it. Just the bourbon and the sandwich and the clean ice cubes. Like, those are the big things for me. Yeah. So, Kilby Block Party, if you're taking notes, write that down for Indycast when we come to your festival. Yeah. But I will throw a tantrum if you get me, like, Mountain Dew Zero Sugar, as opposed to Mountain Diet Mountain Dew. Like us real sippers can tell the difference.

So our last segment here before we get to the recommendation corner is I want to talk for a little bit about one of my favorite albums of all time Lost in the Dream by the War on Drugs. 10th anniversary is coming up on March 18th and I want to talk about this record a little bit and I also just like want to talk about like favorite albums

since 2014. I'm curious, you know, that's a 10-year span I know I have five records that I would add to Lassen the Dream as being really big for me But it's funny with this record I mean it's one of those albums that I remember I remember I can remember hearing for the first time You know like I got the promo I remember hearing an ocean between the waves and just being like I want to hear this song Immediately again like I just love this song and I remember I interviewed Adam not long after that I think we talked in like January of 2014 and

That was among the first interviews that he did for that record, if not the first. And it was just great to hear him talk about it. He was coming out of a dark period making that record. And I was just talking about how much I loved the album. And I thought it was going to be really big. And then it ended up really blowing up for them, which was great. It is interesting with this album because as a War on Drugs fan, and this is my favorite band of the last 10, 15 years,

as anyone who listens to the show already knows. there are times where I believe that it's not the best War on Drugs album. And that's usually when I'm listening to Slave Ambient, which is the record that comes before it, came out in 2011. When I listen to that record, I'm like, no, this is the best war on drugs album. And sometimes I feel that way too when I listen to a deeper understanding, which is the record after Lost in the Dream. But then I return to Lost in the Dream and immediately I hear under the pressure,

I hear red eyes. I hear an ocean between the waves. I hear eyes to the wind. All the great songs. And I'm like, no, this is the best. This is the best War on Drugs record. And it's also my favorite record of the last 10 years. What's your relationship with this record?

I know you're a fan. I mean, do you revisit this album? Like, what are your feelings about it? Yeah, I mean, I know this might, like, kind of rub you the wrong way. Because, like, when I think about, like, how this band, like this band's like discography as a whole. It's like extremely consistent and, you know, they have a very specific thing kind of like Beach House where like I'll like their

favorite album is typically my favorite album or the best one in my view is usually the one that I'm listening to at that current time. And then there's one where I'm like, oh yeah, this is clearly like the one for them. And so for Beach House, that's Teen Dream. It's lost in the dream here. You know, I love Slave Ambient. the ones that came out after Lost in the Dream are

you know I like them a lot but nothing nothing has the relationship to me that I have like Lost in the Dream also we gotta give a shout to Burning that's my favorite deep cut from the record Oh my God that core that one part he's like woo like that

that one he throws in during the second verse but you know with this album you know I love it I think that it's tough to go wrong with anything the war on drugs does but this one specifically, I don't know if you can come up with a more like sonically influential rock album over the past 10 years than this one. I mean, no, like mind you, you could say like,

well, more music these days sounds like either Phoebe Bridgers or Alex G or even like Macdem Marco for that matter, but I think this is like a real before and after. Like there was, you know, they were developing a sound and after this album, you would just have like, yeah, this is a they're going for a war on drugs thing right here. Like, you could be a war on drugs rip-off band and like kind of get by. Do you were, if you want to remember some guys, do you remember Caveman? Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah, they had a 2016 album that I reviewed.

And I mean, this makes like the, like, not even the killers like ripped off war on drugs that that hard. It was, it's a real incredible, remember some CMJ South by Southwest Buzz Band. situation. But yeah, I love this record. I mean, is there a more, like, when you think about, like, the past decade, is there a more influential, like, guitar album than this one? I mean, it's definitely up there. I think in terms of, yeah, some of the, like, guitar tones and, like, the synth tones and, like, the combination of, like, drum machines and real drums and just the idea of, like, creating a band in the studio that sounds like a real band, but isn't actually a real band?

Like the War on Drugs on stage, obviously, they've really become a great live band over the years, but on their records, in a particular loss in the dream, it's like really like Adam Granducille assembling the records and doing overdubs and like bringing in musicians

and really kind of creating a sonic experience that specific to the record that like, again, it feels like a band, but it's not really a band. And I think that kind of aesthetic has been very influential. I do wonder to what degree the influence of loss in the dream was laundered through a deeper understanding. Just because that was their major label record.

And it's the one that I think a lot of people outside of indie rock heard. That was their introduction to the war on drugs. And that's when they start winning Grammys and getting at least a little bit more radio airplay. So like, you know, I just think that maybe that record, like a deeper understanding also kind of cleans up Lost in the Dream a little bit. The reason why Lost in the Dream is the record for me is because it feels like the perfect midpoint between like the noisier era of the band, which is slave ambient, like where you have a lot of these interstitial tracks that are just very abstract and beautiful and like I

love that side of the band. But that's really been excised from what they do on these major label records that they've done. A deeper understanding is basically just a mainstream. Rock record. But Lost in the Dream, it like is pointing to that, but it still has some of the noise and like sort of ambient sound of the early record. So that's why it's the one for me. It's my favorite. And I'm wondering, like for you, thinking back, if I were going to ask you, like, what are your five favorite records that have come out since 2014? Like, do you have like five

in the chamber ready to go? I mean, I feel like I could guess some of those records from you. Yeah, totally. I I mean, I got to, you know, I just got to go with, like, the big three, you know, from, like, it's so funny, like, my favorite records from, like, if you want to call it, fourth wave, emo revival are the ones that come after. They're like the, they're like a deep, the deeper understanding to their previous ones, lost in the dream, but like, you know, harmlessness, goodness, near my God. I'd have to include those three. Other two, like off the dome, I'm going to go with. And who are those bands? Wait, hold on. You got to say,

not everyone's going to know exactly, like, what goodness is. Hotel year is goodness. And then, like, foxing near my God. And then what was the other one? The world is a beautiful place and I'm no longer afraid to die harmlessness. Yeah, that's a good point. Right. Okay.

I think we definitely got more war on drugs fans than Fourth Way Vemo fans in here. But I'm also going to include the 1975 album from 2016 with the absurdly long title. I'm going to put that in there. And you are so beautiful even though you don't I love it when you sleep or you are so beautiful and yet so I'm aware of it. Damn, I think that was like the first time I ever nailed that off the dome. And since like I, you know, don't want to totally front like music peak with 2016

even though I sort of believe that, I guess the past five years, if I had to, or the past like three post-pandemic, let's call it. I'm going to go on a limb and say ants from up there. Black Country New Road. I feel like that's the album of the past couple of years where I feel like, that's, you know, put me in an emotional space kind of similar to, you know, not just the ones that I had mentioned from like 2014 to 16, but also like, you know, 2005-ish, like when I was listening to, you know, like Wolf Parade or like Sufyan or something like that. There were a couple

of candidates, but I think ants from up there is definitely going to be something that is on a short list for my best of the 2020s. So for me, I would say, and this is my top five, other than Lost in the Dream. And I'll go chronological here. I love you, Honey Bear, Father John Misty. That would be the closest rival, I think, to Lost in the Dream. If I exclude, like, other War on Drugs records. Non-War on Drugs Division.

I say definitely, I love you, Honey Bear, Father John Misty. I'm going to go with Currants by Tame and Paula, too. And if we're talking about influential records, just in general, you've got to put currents either near or at the top of the list. for like indie rock records if we want to call Tame and Paula indie rock even just records in general I think currents obviously very influential um go farther in lightness by our boys gangs of youth uh incredible record gangs of youths gang of youths Dave if you're listening I'm sorry gangs of youth I think that's actually probably more grammatically correct

if I were to correct the band there I think gangs of youth as opposed to gang of youths Maybe they're both right. Anyway, great record. Purple Mountains, that record from 2019, just an unbelievable album. And then if I'm going like in the 2020s, I gotta say the MJ Lenderman live record has just catapulted.

I love both songs by MJ, but the live record that's just already iconic in my house. So that would be the top five. And like for me, these records, along with Lost in the Dream, not only are they great records, but they're records that I feel like

influenced my taste at the time. Like, I wanted to hear other albums like those albums when they came out. Like, they kind of took over my life once they entered my life. And I think that's a different kind of record versus something that you just love. You know, like something where you're just like,

this is what I, this is like my taste, this album. And I just want more stuff like that. So that's definitely true of those five plus, lost in the dream. So all great records. Love them all. All right.

We've now reached the part of our episode that we call Recommendation Corner where Ian and I talk about something that we're into this week. Ian went to go first. Yeah, so we're taking back in the archive for this one. We rarely, I do want to give shouts like older records sometimes. And this one's a real doozy. So our pal, Riley Walker, every now and again on Twitter, they'll post like an actual CD of this, you know,

either late 90s or early 2000s obscurity. And this week they posted this band called Lift to Experience. The album's called the Texas Jerusalem Crossroads. This is an album from 2001, which it's apparently the fifth highest rated

Shugay's album on Rate Your Music ever. And I would describe its basic premise as like Southern Post Rock Opera. Like the parallels with this and drive-by truckers are really fascinating. They both came out in 2001. It's a concept album about like three Texas boys, not Alabama icons. They both have kind of a cringe hip hop element to it. You know, like drive by truckers have said they kind of regret the name.

The album cover for this one looks like Penn and Pixel taking on creed. There's like spoken word parts and singing. It's about 90 minutes long. And it's a concept record about like the intersection of religion and southern culture and like salivational properties of rock music. Except instead of like Leonard Skinner or Neil Young, this record's influence is like Texas indie rock, circa 2000. So I guess it sounds a lot like you know explosions in the sky

and trail a dead. It's, yeah, a real cult classic. There is, I don't think I've heard. I mean, it sounds like a lot of bands that we like, but it's a truly singular work. It's not the best thing to Riley Walker did on Twitter this week.

Indie cast fans probably know what I'm talking about and we won't rehash it here. But yeah, this record, I could see this getting like even more of a bump once people find out about it because you just can't really believe that a, I guess like, if not a major label, like, you know, Bella Union, which is a big indie, finance this. Like this is just such like a where has this been all my life type record. And I'm curious if you've heard it. No, I haven't listened to this yet. I saw Riley's tweet and I saw you talking about it and I'm definitely intrigued by this record. So it's in the queue. I'm excited to

dive in. It sounds like something I'm really going to love. I was busy, though, listening to two other records this week that I'm going to talk about in my recommendation corner. The first is the latest from Kim Gordon. It's called The Collective. And I've been listening to this record a lot this week. It's been very well reviewed. I mean, we've talked about it a little in our fantasy draft segment. Neither one of us pick this record and probably one of us should have because it has been getting really great notices. But the more I listen to it, the more I feel like this could potentially be like one of the great sort of late career records from an iconic artist, particularly in terms of like how it reimagines what Kim Gordon does. I mean, we know Kim Gordon, of course, from Sonic Youth, one of the great indie rock bands of all time. and this record has some of the elements that you would expect from Sonic Youth record,

but it's not looking back at all. It is very much of the moment. It's this sort of sound collage type record. There's elements of electronic music. There's like some ambient sounds on it. It's a very unique sounding record, and it's definitely unique coming from Kim Gordon. And I love it.

I think she hit it out of the park with this album. And when you see an artist like this, who's been around for a long time, and then they're able to reinvent themselves. It's always amazing. And we saw that recently with Lowe, the last two Lowe records, how they were really able to take what they did and go in a completely different direction. I get some of the same vibes from like this Kim Gordon record. Really good record.

The collective, definitely check that out. And I also want to talk about a record called Keeper of the Shepard. This is by a really good singer-strongwriter named Hannah Francis. And this record, you know, it's been compared to Joni Mitchell because Francis, as a guitar player, she's dealing with like a lot of alternate tunings, just like Joni does. And it definitely gives sort of a Joni vibe in the guitar playing at times. But to me, like, it really kind of brings me back to like the mid-2000s, like that freakfolk scene that was really thriving at the time where, you know, you've got,

Devanger Banhart, Joanna Newsom, Artist of That Oak, and then Fleet Fox is being on the more sort of accessible end of that. And I definitely feel like you get some of that from this record. And there's just like a lot of great like guitar playing on it, a lot of great, you know, kind of just cool sonic textures to it. And, you know, there's been this trend lately of like singer-songwriter records that are really leaning into like the music side of the equation. You know, we really equate singer-songwriter records like with

with lyricism and like someone pouring their heart out and writing about their angst and this like kind of confessional manner and there's been a really cool wave of singer-star writers who are a little bit more abstract and it's more about the music and I think this is a good example of that

there's a record coming out next week by an artist I love named Rosalie the records bite down I'll sure I'll talk about that and recommendation corner next week that's another example just a really cool record I like it a lot

So both of these albums, Kim Gordon, Hannah Frances, put them in your queue. Really good stuff. Yeah, we're talking, you know, freak folk, remember some guys in the mid-2000s. Let's, you know, Vettiver, Esper's. Like, let's get into it. Oh, yeah. Vettiverr is great. Yeah, love Vettiver.

Totally, yeah. Define Me Gone. Yep. That could be a Indicass Hall of Fame record. Thank you all for listening to this episode of Indicass. We'll be back with more news and reviews and hashing out trends next week. And if you're looking for more music recommendations, sign up for the Indie Mix Tape newsletter. 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.