Indiecast - The Indie Stars Of Our Next Decade

Episode Date: October 23, 2020

After quarantine set in, it wasn’t long before Adrianne Lenker got to work on some more music, opting for a solo project since she was unable to see her bandmates. While Big Thief apparently were able to reconvene and record a new album over the summer, Lenker has shared the result of her musical exploration at the beginning of quarantine, two new solo LPs titled 'songs' and 'instrumentals.' In this episode, Steven and Ian dig into the lore surrounding Lenker and her band Big Thief, as well as their prolific and acclaimed output over the last few years. The conversation centers around one central question: is Big Thief really a band or is it just a front for Lenker?The episode’s second half is focused on Fake It Flowers, the debut album from 20-year-old rocker Beabadoobee. With catchy songs and big choruses, Hyden argues that Beabadoobee’s debut album solidifies her role in the modern indie rock canon as Stone Temple Pilots, where Soccer Mommy is Nirvana and Clairo is Pearl Jam.In this week’s Recommendation Corner, Cohen is looking to the ’90s and plugging Ida’s 1996 album 'I Know About You,' while Hyden is digging 'Optimisme,' the new album from Songhoy Blues.Sign up for the Indie Mixtape newsletter at uproxx.com/indieSee 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 talked about the biggest indie news of the week. We review albums, we hash out trends. In this episode, we'll be talking about new albums by Adrienne Linker of Big Thief and Biba Doobie. My name is Stephen Hayden, and I'm joined by my friend and co-host, Ian Cohen. Ian, how are you? So, you know the phrase Pride goes before a fall?

I think it's in the Bible or maybe I heard it on a Pedro the Lion album, you know, either way. But, you know, almost immediately after last week's podcast, I felt like we, you know, knocked that one out of the park. We got to, you know, hang with our readers and answer their questions. I go running immediately after that, you know, it's my morning run. I have a, I have a mix of kind of artsy leaning new metal on, you know, perfect circles, Meridenoms, White Pony. You could not be more Ian Cohen than this story. This is the most Ian Cohen story ever.

And I dodge this kindly old, you know, group of individuals who are standing outside their home. And then I land wrong on my left foot. I have a faux Jones fracture in my left foot. Now, why am I telling you guys this? A, because we care about you. I assume you care about us. But my immediate thought is now that I'm on the shelf, can't go running for at least six weeks, I thought about, like, how much am I going to miss out

on, like, the really aggressive emo, screamo, metal, punk stuff that really is crucial in establishing the dynamic between myself and Steve, you know? That's true. I'm laid up for six weeks. Like, what if I'm also listening to kind of chilled out, like William Tyler-esque, like, ambient chugel? And then we're both the same guy And then all of a sudden

IndyCast just completely loses its tension So these next six weeks Will be very interesting people It'll be fun It'll be fun It'll be like Oh wow Ian all of a sudden likes Jason Isbell Even more than I do

Like what happened Yeah I've been thinking a lot about fatherhood And like And as the way And it's like right now We're experiencing like maybe The one week of fall like

conditions in San Diego. Well, I mean, I'm in Minnesota, and it snowed. There's like five inches of snow on the ground right now, which is early even from Minnesota. So I'm going to be even more beardy and flannely in the weeks ahead. So maybe, talking about the Horde tour last week was a real monkey's paw situation. Well, I was, you know, there's, I actually have Horde tour in this episode's outline as well. So I found a way to shoehorn hoard into our conversation. So hopefully we'll get to that.

Hell yeah. That's just a little sneak preview for you all to be looking for the Horde reference in this episode of Indycast. I want this to be like a bit that we have where we just bring up Horde randomly no matter what it is we're talking about. But you mentioned last week we did our first mailbag episode. And we decided that we got so many questions and they were all like for the most part. like really good that, oh, we should start just doing like a regular mailbag segment in every episode. So we're going to do that now quick before we get into the meat of the episode. And this is an email that we got from a listener named Sam.

Sam, thank you for writing in. This is what Sam writes. He says, big fan of the pod. Thanks for taking an episode to talk about Healthy on Digest a few weeks back, which quick sidebar. I've gotten a lot of comments about the Helcyon Digest episode. I feel like that's when a lot of people climbed aboard the Indycast train. I don't know. A lot of people seem to like that episode.

Anyway, my question is somewhat related to that episode. Ian, what is your beef with Centipede HZ slash Animal Collective's output in the 2010s? I followed you on Twitter since 2013, and I feel like I've seen you bash that record more than once. It really isn't that bad. Please explain your reasoning, Stephen, interested to hear your thoughts as well. So that comes from Sam. Yeah, Ian, what's the deal? Why don't you like that record?

What is the deal with me and centipede? I think it's called centipede hurts. I think it's just stylized that way. Is it? Oh, okay. Look, I don't necessarily, like, Animal Collective going from here comes the Indian to Merry Weather Post Pavilion and even if you want to include like tomboy as well. some of my like one of my favorite runs for any band like period um it's really hard to

overstate just how much that defined indie rocking like kind of change people's perspectives on like what that actually entailed going from the more college rock pavementy sort of thing in the 90s to more of like a post rock sort of feel in the 2000s but it's not that i think it's a bad album. I mean, like, it's relatively speaking, it's like a major step down. But we talk a lot in this show about these real iconic noble failures, like your be here now's, your reflectors, like the albums where that, it just signifies a real shift in time. And for, I don't think you can, like, if you weren't there in 2012, like the deflation surrounding Animal Collective with Santa Pete Hertz, I just I remember so vividly like when you know the first singles came out it's like okay this is

interesting it's a little bit busy it's a bit overcrowded but you know it's an animal collective they'll pull this out and just seeing that brief period of people tried to talk themselves into centipede hurts and then that outward breath of like yeah okay I think I think that they kind of blew it on this one and also Stuart Berman's review where he compared it to like a burrito splashing on to a car windshield. It to me is not, it's not so much that it's a bad album, just like a historical signifier when you look at the entire trajectory of the 2010s. We talk about how in 2013 things went more in a pop direction, less beholden to like artful indie. And like that is to me the, that was the signal right there. Like that is when the tide

really started to turn. Also, I do like Panda Bear solo output. Avetera's got some good songs as well. Flora Dada, the one song from Painting With, I liked that song the day after I hurt. Like, I went on like one of the best first dates of my life and then heard Flora Dada like the next day. I'm like, this song rules, man. So I was like in a really good mood. So I don't think it's impossible for them to like regain, like to, you know, to make a great album again. Maybe they're in like a flaming lips holding pattern before they made embryonic or the terror.

but yeah centipede hertz is like one for the history books in a way that a lot of other disappointing or even bad albums aren't in that time it's just such a historical artifact yeah i was going to say that i think that the reason why it gets brought up isn't that it's like this terrible record i think it is like a pretty good album it's just as you said i think you can look at it as an easy signpost of the decline of that aughts era indie that was was so prominent. Especially, you know, like we talk about 2009 being the year that those bands seem to have peaked in popularity and esteem.

You had, you know, Mary Weather Post Pavilion. You had the Grizzly Bear record, Beckettomist. You had dirty projectors. That record bit the Orca. And I was just thinking like how dirty projectors put out their 20, their 2012 record right around the same time. Swinglow Magellan. Yeah.

Swinglow Magellan, which I think it's actually like that one. It's a quite good record, but also no one talks about it. anymore. I mean, so in a way, Centipede Hertz has more significance because I think people just look at it as that sort of signpost record of like, you know, oh, these bands aren't going to take over the world.

You know, like, I think there was this idea in 2009 that like, oh, Animal Collective, they made this sort of relatively poppy record and now they're going to move into this other arena and we're going to have this indie rock revolution, just like we had the alternative rock revolution or the sort of garage rock revolution

of the early aughts. And it was like, no, that's not going to happen. These bands peaked as like semi-popular, fairly popular bands, and now they're going to sort of go on the decline, and now we're going to have a new generation of bands come in. So, yeah, that would be my feeling on Animal Collective. You know, it'd be fun at some point on this show. I feel like I need an excuse to do like a revisit of the Animal Collective discography, because I'd like to do a deep dive, because I've not listened to those records in a long time, and they really were in their era super significant. Like if you were into indie rock,

you had to pay attention to Animal Collective. Whether you love them or hated them, they were a significant band. Now it's like they've fallen off the face of the earth. Like you never hear anyone talking about them. It's like if you talk about Otts-era indie music, it's like the early aughts, and then maybe like Fleet Foxes and Bonnie Vair,

and like those Brooklyn bands have just been, sort of memory hold out of existence. I'll tell you what, man, but like before, like, I'll leave it at this. I went to see Animal Collective. I think it was 2017. And for those of you all who attend shows in Southern California, if you've ever been to the Observatory in Orange County, like those shows are much, much, much, much liver than the ones in Los Angeles or San Diego.

Like, people get hype in Orange County for these shows. And I'll tell you what, like I saw Animal Collective in 2017. it was not like, you know, an outdoor amphitheater, but like people were going nuts for them, man. Yeah, but like... They will have a cult audience. Okay, but like, I'm just going to say that, like, that is not the real barometer, though,

because I think any band, any band that has, like, a real audience can do well in Southern California. There's so many people. There's so many different kinds of people. Like, if you can't do well in that area in New York, then you're totally screwed. Fair enough. I live in the real,

America, Ian. In the middle of the country, I think, is where the... I say that facetiously, but I do think there's some truth to that. There is. Because you're in a huge market, I think, yeah, they ought to be able to do pretty well there. But, like, I'm just talking about the rest of the country. I just wonder how well they would do. I don't know.

I could be wrong, but I just... But certainly in terms of the conversation anyway, like when people talk about Otse-era music, I feel like those bands get overlooked. looked and I don't think they should. I guess maybe we need to lead the charge on, we need to do like a series on like the late aughts or something.

Just for my own, I kind of just want to go back and see how I feel about those records because I have not, like you know, like I put on sung tongs a couple months ago and I really enjoyed it. Which kind of made me want to go like, oh, what

does feel sound like or strawberry jam? Like those records I've not played in several years. Well, we might have an episode where we bring Animal Collective back to the real America. Well, until then, we should probably talk about Adrian Linker. From the real America, Minnesota. She is from the real America. That's right.

Well, originally she's from Indianapolis. She was born there. That's where she was in the religious sect or cult, however you want to college. I think she lived there until she was about six. And then she moved to Minnesota. actually lived not too far from where I live right now. I think she lived in a suburb called Plymouth, which is pretty close to where I live right now. She had this sort of pre-famed career as like a child prodigy type musician. She put out a record when she was 13 called Sages of the Sun,

which I've not heard that record. I assume that's probably on YouTube somewhere. And then she put out another record in her early 20s called Hours Were the Birds that came out in 2014. But of course, her career begins in earnest with the first big thief record, which comes out in 2016, called Masterpiece. I really love that record when it came out. I put it in my top 10 list that year. It was followed up by capacity in 2017. I love that record even more. I would say that that is still my favorite record that she has made in any incarnation. And of course, she's been one of the most prolific artists of indie rock in the last several years. She put out her first solo record, or I guess her, I guess I don't know where it would fall in the lineage of like her childhood records,

but like her, I guess, first post-Big Thief solo record, Abby Kiss in 2018. And then she really achieves this sort of critical breakthrough in 2019 when Big Thief puts out two records, UF-O-F and two hands. And that really makes them this like critical darling officially with those two albums. Although we'll get into this in our episode, I still prefer those first two records. and I'm curious about the sort of arc that she's been on in the past few years. But anyway, today there's two new solo records from Adrian Linker, both recorded during quarantine. One is called Songs, more of a conventional solo record.

The other is called Instrumentals. Essentially, it's just two long guitar tracks that she's playing. So that kind of feels more of like an ancillary record, but again, we'll talk about that. Anyway, I have a lot to say about these albums, but I'm curious, Ian, my sense from you is that you are not as much of a big thief fan maybe as I am. I'm just curious what you think of her, the band, and these albums. Well, I do like the possibility that this is like Adrian Lanker's version of Sweat Suit or something like that. Like I wish that she did a little bit more to play up, like the dichotomy in that. But yeah, we had a.

question in our mailbag last week asking about artists we'd like to hear solo albums from and for me that was that was a surprisingly tough one to answer because I I like bands and so many of the artists I like otherwise are already solo artists and you could think well you know Ezra from vampire weekend love to hear his solo album because he has such a strong artistic personality but I think father of the bride sort of kind of is like a solo record. I think most really strong artistic personalities end up making of de facto solo record within their own band. And, you know, for, it's been a big week for NPR solo, like bands going solo, like Jeff Tweedy, Matt Berninger. And, you know, those didn't interest me as much because to me they became kind of like less of the focal point for me

in the album. Like, I like their backing musicians. And I, I'm not really thrilled. when artists of that ill kind of do what they were doing in the band except quieter. So the first Adrian Lanker out, like Solalma Biscis, didn't really leave much of an impact on me. But, and I really appreciate Big Thief as a band because, like, they really put forth, like, they're a band. You see all of them on the cover. The instrumental interplay is really important in the shows. I think they play like kind of four in a row, like Grizzly Bear used to. And, you know, parts of UFOF sounded like a.

American football to me with like the alter tunings and the odd time signatures. But, you know, when I, when I listen to this record, I did it. You know, it's like, okay, I'm sitting down in quarantine. She's in quarantine. Let's get in the mood. And I was just shocked about like how directly this album hit for me. You know, her lyrics don't always hit particularly directly. I think they're a little bit more opaque.

But I love the fact that it was so like raw and pretty. and like in a way that big thief albums are but it gives me an ability to like focus on the person making it which makes me connect to it more emotionally like it's an album like I want to return to to lean into the lyrics and the production also is really really interesting like I think there's like rain you can hear the rain in one of the songs like they're very big on room sounds so

and also sounds it sounds very well suited for fall when we got a little bit into all bottom album. So, you know, Big Thief, like UFOF, I could appreciate that as just like a pretty album and event record. But this one makes me want to kind of know more of what's actually going on in Adrian Lanker's head, which is a different experience than I usually have with, you know, Big Thief. I mean, they're a band I liked. I think the, I liked masterpiece. I thought the, the title track sounded like heartless bastards or something like that. And I thought they were just, like kind of this Midwest band on Saddle Creek and then I find out there, you know, actually based

out of Brooklyn. I like the capacity as well. Like they were a band that was perched on that. I'm going to put them at like 25 to number 30 on my year end list. Like I, I appreciate that it's an event for other people. It doesn't blow me. Like I'm not emotionally invested in it, but I feel like I have a possibility of being like emotionally invested in this one in a way that I hadn't been with previous Big Thief records and also instrumentals, I probably won't, like no offense to it, but I'm probably not going to listen to

that again. Yeah, that definitely feels more of like the follow up in a way that I know there's a lot of people that love two hands and even make the argument that that's better than UFOF. I don't share that. I think other than that song, not and a couple other tracks on that record.

That record definitely, to me, feels like demos that didn't really get put into the kind of shape that maybe would have really made those songs shine. Or maybe you could have just folded some of those songs into UFOF. Yeah, it's kind of like the, what's it, weird era continued. Like, if we're thinking of like the deer hunter trajectory, like UFOF was, I don't know, the microcastle.

And that was like, I mean, we can get into this idea of like, you know, what big thief's future holds. Like, where are they situated? But yeah, you, two hands. I think that was a lot of that was like just kind of momentum from UFOF. Right, right. And, you know, it's in regard to songs and instrumentals, by the way, I agree with you with instrumentals. I, yeah, again, it feels like more of like an afterthought in a way. Although, you know, if you're looking for chill out music at the end of the night, it seems like that could be good

to put on. But songs definitely seems like the main attraction. And I had a similar reaction to you where I responded more immediately to songs than I did. did to even like UFOF. And I think like to me the songs just seem a little like better crafted, a little bit more direct. I like Adrian Linker working in this lane where it's like an early Elliot Smith, Sun Kill Moon type vibe where it's just like one person with a guitar. I believe she went through a breakup before writing these songs. So the songs definitely seem informed by, you know, both the isolation of quarantine and whatever, you know, angst or loneliness that she was feeling in her personal life at the time. So it definitely has a very strong vibe to it. You know, I want to go

back to what you were saying about, you know, solo artists who go away from their bands to make records. And I have to say that, like, when I first got into Big Thief, the thing that I responded to was that they sounded like a band playing in a room together. And we talked about this in other episodes that in indie rock especially it seems like lately you don't get a lot of that in bands it seems like it's one auteur who is working in the studio sometimes playing most of the instruments themselves or if they aren't doing that they're you know having people sort of record their parts remotely and then they sort of fit it all together like a mad scientist and that's how they're putting the record together whereas big thief they had this very sort of like natural

aesthetic to them where you felt like oh that these people are actually actually, like, you know, playing together all the time. They're probably, like, living in the same house. You know, there's a real great vibe to what they're doing. And, you know, when that first record came out, masterpiece, like, I wasn't surprised that that didn't take off critically because, you know, you likened the title track to Heartless Bastards, which I think is apt.

I mean, they sounded like an all-country band, essentially, which is not something that, you know, now is going to set the world on fire critically. And they've moved away from that more sort of direct, primal, you know, gut bucket sound. And it's gotten more sort of meandering and ethereal. And I think on capacity, they struck a really good balance between still having that band sound, but also having more of a distinct personality where it wasn't so easy to compare them to other bands. And I think that comes from Linker, like her songwriting. I think for me, like, where, I'm not even saying it's a bad thing necessarily, but I feel like

their personality as a band on those next two records, it bleeds more into who Linker is as a solo artist more. And for me, they seem like less of a band in a way. Like recently, and they see more of like a backing band for Linker. And I just feel like the gap between what you. does on her own and what she does in the band has shrunk and for me that has detracted a little bit I think from what they do I don't know if that makes sense at all it does it's interesting because like both Buck meek and the drummer have put out like Buck's solo album comes out to believe in January

and the drummer had put out like kind of an album of like it's like ambient or like noise earlier this year so I mean I think but in a way they do remind me of like Deer Hunter a bit in that that like you get like maybe bucks the locket punt like the the lotus plaza of it all. Yeah, you've been like really comparing them to a deer hunter a lot lately. But I think that's kind of accurate when you think of like, you know, a band that's like really got the juice critically and very very prolific and just, you know, every time they drop something like it's an actual event. And I think, you know, big thief's in that spot right now because, you know, you. When we think like big picture, you know, particularly compared to, you know, Jeff Tweedy and Matt Berninger, it's like our big thief, are like, are we going to be doing like a 10 year anniversary, you know, in 2029 about UFOF thinking about like Halcyon Digest and what happened to all the big thief fans or are they going to be like a national or Wilco type band that just keeps kind of pushing on and reaches this new level of popularity, you know, like I. You know, you brought this up, like we were talking about this before we started recording.

And it's a really interesting question to me because I think the similarity between Big Thief and Deer Hunter isn't just that they had these big event records, is that they were putting out a lot of records at the same time. And Bradford Cox was putting out solo records. And I wonder, you know, look, I'm a guy to my voices fan, so I'm never going to like, you know, criticize someone for putting a lot of music, especially if you feel inspired. And by the way, I should say that it sounds like Big Thief has already recorded their next album. It sounds like they did that this summer. So it sounds like there could be a Big Thief album at the end of the year or maybe early 2021.

I think when you look at Wilco and the national bands like that, when you think of their classic periods, it's like each album feels like its own world and its own sort of sonic personality, especially with Wilco. like if you think from like AM to like sky blue sky. You know, each record has its own personality. And I wonder if Big Thief is falling into that deer hunter trap where like you're putting on a lot of records and they're all good, but like they're not terribly different from one another. And they don't necessarily chart a progression. Like I wonder like I can chart a progression from masterpiece to capacity.

I feel like the gap. between capacity and like UFOF isn't as dramatic. And then two hard, like two hands is definitely of that same world of UFOF. And then the Adrian Linker records, it's like, I like them all, but like they all seem similar. I just wonder like, are they going to take the next step in a different direction or is it going to be all these sort of crunchy, hippie folk records? Yeah, when you, when you read like the interviews, like they are real, like they are very earnest about. like, I'm just a vessel for the music to flow through me. There's, and I don't know, maybe like people who are like 10 years younger than us might

start reading that stuff and think of them like Animal Collective, like, who are these hippies? And also, we, I can't believe we haven't brought up Buck Meek's hats yet. Like, this guy, man, he, he, he's just pulling the ultimate heat check every time he steps out the door. Like his hats, like, we're reaching like Farrell type territory, right? here or Dudley do right he is I mean I got to admire it man like yeah you know I'm I'm pro indie rock hats by the way yeah you know please wear colorful hats uh you know he should start doing like the Jeff Ahmet hats you know like those those puffy hats that he would wear in the

early 90s like with the tank tops and stuff and like the basketball shorts I think that would be a good look for him to rock or someone else to rock out there um yeah that's That, see, everyone's trying to, like, you know, do this whole 90s thing. And we'll talk about this later in the episode, obviously, with Biba Dooby. But, like, I really do think that kind of quasi-hipy grunge thing, like, whether you're talking about, like, Jeff Amit or, like, even Blind Melon, that is just so right for the picking, man. Like, that, please, like, please, someone tried to be, like, the, I don't know, 2020. I can't, I can't remember the other guys in Pearl Jam. Mike McCready.

That's it. Right. Well, yeah, McCready had like the Stevie Ray Vaughn look. Yeah. Early on a Pearl Jam, like around 10 era, lots of scarves and bandanas and stuff. Leather vests and whatnot. Leather vests and stuff. You know, well, speaking of 90s and this is where I'm going to bring in the Horde tour, I do think that Big Thief does have that horde type vibe to them.

And I feel like when they started getting a little bit more famous, and when you get more famous, of course, you start getting more detractors. Like, that's the thing that people would jump on. Bonaba, Big Thief, as being like, you know, because they do have this sort of nature kid aesthetic to them, like in the way that they present themselves. And look, I'm receptive to that. And I'll say, too, that, you know, for all of the, like you read their interviews and there is something, like you said, very earnest about it. But I do like how that translates to them in terms of how they carry themselves as a band. Like, if you go see them, they're a great

live band. Yeah. And that's another thing why, you know, when some of the records start to get a little bit more spare and more sort of just focused on on Linker's voice, although I love her voice. I miss the muscularity of some of those early records that I think has been lost a little bit. I think that's why people love that song not so much because that was like such a powerful song.

But that song's somewhat of an anomaly on those two albums. I think that song's like a much, it's much louder than most of what's on the rest of the song. those records, but they're also like louder live. So I don't know, part of me like kind of wants them to to lean on that a little bit more. I just wonder to, you know, again, I love artists who are prolific, but I do think maybe it would be great if they just sort of buckled down and channeled all the songs that they were writing into like one great album. Yeah, but also, I mean, that kind of is what happened with like Deer Hunter and Animal Collective. They took a couple

years off and then all of a sudden, like, people, you know, weren't as interested in them anymore. Right. Who's to say? But, like, the thing is, we're also talking about, you know, a time when live music isn't happening. So, like, Big Thief, you know, isn't going to stop making a record because they have to do this, like, big tour where they're playing every single festival on the face of the earth. So I think maybe something like their, like, their output may become, like, the, you know,

norm for band. Or conversely, like they might make like a more muscular album because they can't say, well, we're just going to build these songs out when we play them live. Like, who knows? Yeah, well, I'm curious to hear this new album that they've been working on. If it moves more and this sort of more sort of, I guess, strip back thing or if they're going to, you know, maybe get that masterpiece, you know, oomph back into their music. I'll be curious to hear it. But for now, I think we both are on the same page with songs. songs, both like songs, I guess her main solo record that she's putting out today. So definitely go check that out.

Let's move over to Biba Dubei. Yes. One of the buzzy indie artist of 2020. You know, we've talked a lot about Bartiz Strange on this show. He's one of the big ones. I feel like Biba Dubei is probably even bigger than him just because she's like on a bigger record label. Yeah, like it's not, with all due respect to Bartiz, like Biba Dubey has eight. 18 million, 18 million monthly Spotify listeners.

That's more than like the 1975. That's like more than like metallic. It's crazy. It's crazy. I mean, and she does seem like this indie pop star that has arrived fully formed. Although, of course, she has been kicking around for a couple years now. Her name, of course, is Beatrice Laos.

She was born in 2000. She's a Filipino-born British singer-songwriter. She's been putting out EP since 2018 on the record label Dirty Hit, which is the same record label that, 1975 are on. She actually toured with the 1975 on the music for Cars tour. She's also toured with Claro. And I feel like aesthetically, you could probably put her in the same campus Clero as as well as soccer mommy who soccer mommy is so young, but can we call her the godmother of this sort of like 90s retro indie pop sound? You know, for Zoomers? Yeah, clean like her 2018 record,

which, you know, I think it's a fantastic record. I like it more than color theory which came out this year, which is also pretty strong. But the more and more distance we get from it, I start to think that clean is maybe the most. I don't want to, I don't know if influential is the right word because I think when we see trends pop up, it's just there's more focus on a lot of people doing the same thing rather than, I'm going to try to sound like soccer mommy or like, you know, with the strokes. Like it was people were more looking for bands who sound like that. But in the more distance we get from Clean, the more I see it is like maybe the most impactful indie, like one of the most impactful indie rock albums of the past several years. Like this set the stage for this melding of, you know, not this 90s alternative mode of music, which was always sort of popular, but melding it with like Michelle Branch or Averellivore Levine or, you know, the minivan era Cheryl Crow. Like this really said it like this is like this is the sound of indie rock now and you appreciate it a lot more when you hear just how many bands sound like soccer mommy but are nowhere near as good.

Well, and I would also, you know, almost put like Stranger in the Alps in that same category as well. Oh yeah. It's the first TV Bridgers record. It definitely had it's, I don't think it's as much in that 90s zone, but there's definitely some of that like coffee shop like 90s like alternative rock type. sound to that record that really does it well. And Tony Burke produced that, and he actually had a hand in a lot of those original records that came out in the 90s, so that's another connection there. But anyway, the Biba Doobie, her full-length solo debut came out last week.

It's called Faked Flowers. And I was thinking about this. Look, we always, we're two music critics, you know, hovering around 40, so we're apt to make 90s comparisons to everything. but is it fair to say that like if soccer Mommy is the Nirvana and Clara is the Pearl Jam that like Biba Doobie is like the Stone Temple Pilots

of this because, and I don't mean that as a rip because I like Stone Temple Pilots. To me, where that analogy fits is that I think what Biba Doobie is doing is similar to those artists but her songs just seem much popier and more obvious to me and also consequently they seem more poised to like actually be hits and be played on the radio.

Like this record, I've read reviews of this album. You know, critics seem like a little bit. I mean, I read really good reviews. I think the pitchfork review was like kind of like okay. It was like a 6.4. I think they gave the record. And it reminded me a bit of our 2013 conversation

where we were talking about how that was the year where this generation of indie rockers were coming along that were sort of foregrounding the poppiest music of like the 80s and 90s into their music and really kind of setting aside the more. conventional punk and indie influences that we associate with the genre. And I was listening to Faked Flowers and I'm like, well, this is like the next progression from that.

It's like, because it's like even like popier. And it's like the reference points are even like less sort of critically reputable or at least formally reputable. It's like, you know, this is, she's talked about like Nora Ephron, romantic comedies being a reference point for her lyrically. You know, she's taught, you know, she has a song about Stephen Malcolmess, but like, There's nothing remotely pavement-ish about her records. You know, it does sound like the kind of music that, like, you would hear, like, in a C.W.

You know, soap opera or, like, in a friend's episode. You know, like, music that, like, 34-year-olds were listening to in 1998. And, like, now that's the music that Zumers love, which I think is, like, that's one of the hilarious things about music history, how these things happen. Because, I mean, yeah, this record, it's basically just, like, like if the cranberries made a pop punk record. I mean, that's what I was thinking a lot. It does not sound like salvation. Like, that's the one time where cranberries act,

like they kind of made like a pop punk ska song about not doing drugs, which makes it even more of a ska song. It doesn't sound quite like that. No, but like that song, Care, for instance, which is the first track on the record. It has like a cranberries sounding guitar hook, and her vocal sounds a little bit like Dolores or Reardon from that band. And she kind of runs through like different styles on the record.

There's like more sort of coffee shop folk songs on the record. There's emoish songs on the record. There's a song called emo song. Right, exactly. So it's pretty on the nose. I think you could accuse this record of being a little superficial. You know, I don't know if there's a ton of depth on there. On the other hand, she's only 20 years old, which leads me to believe that she's going to

improve as a songwriter. Maybe she'll have some of that lyrical depth as she gets a little bit older and a little bit more experience. But like, I gotta say like this record to me, like it's a pretty immediate, likable record. I don't know if it's going to like change my life or anything, but like when it's on, I tend to enjoy it. Yeah, for me, it's, um, where to even begin? Like, I think that a lot of, I actually put this on our most anticipated albums list when we did that episode a month or so back because I always appreciate when I'm like thrown a bone and given like

even the slightest window into the thoughts of like a younger generation. You know, TikTok and I've still not really gone in two feet with that. But to see like, oh, Bidubi, well, people really love her. She's like actually popular. And also it sounds like music that I listened to when I was 16. Cool. maybe this will like allow me to relate to a younger generation on a certain level but when i hear this album and you know the lyrics are kind of intentionally a bit like surface level like diet red is

kind of hilarious and like how um i kind of it's like you know very very straightforward like scribbling your like uh trapper keeper like fuck you type lyricism But I hear this, I hear like you saying cranberries. I hear like Varouca Salt, like maybe not American thighs so much as like eight arms to hold you era. Wow. Look for the second record. Yeah, look, you hear Volcano Girls in Trader Joe sometimes. But it doesn't sound like it doesn't sound like it was made in the 90s to me.

Like when I hear this, it does sound like kind of 90 style alt rock, but like with more of Apollo. of, you know, Avril Levine or Michelle Branch or what have you. But in the same way that I hear a band, like on a completely different side of things, like higher power or narrowhead, these bands that sound like kind of the B list of 90s alt rock. Right. Like local, like, I love local age, but like let's talk, we're talking about bands that like maybe had one MTV hit and like kind of face.

in the periphery. Or sponge. Spunge. Yeah, well, yeah. Wax ecstatic. Like, we are very pro-wax ecstatic on this podcast. We could do a sponge episode. That's how much we are.

Shout to Vinnie Dombrovsky. Roddy Penaena, man. But, yeah, it's like, okay, it's cool. Like, they're doing the sound, and I have, like, a good grounds to, like, assess it. But also, I sold those CDs back to disco round, you know? Like, there's a reason that happened. And with this one, I do think that I would like to think that I actually said on Twitter the other day.

It's like I think too many bands are like trying to emulate not just Nirvana's sound or smashing pumpkin sound, but like Nirvana's kind of ethical ground. Like, but I was wondering like where is the new bush? Where is the new Stone Temple Pilots? The band that just wants to make these like just trashy pop hits. And in some way Biba Dube does it. but also it has this kind of added onus upon being like the voice of a generation of like this is what people listen to on TikTok. This is like kind of the new vanguard.

And the way that a lot of dirty hit artists try to be, I know Matt Maddie Healy back when he did interviews would talk about like how he dirty hit was in a way like him making up for like the guilty feels as like a band of white guys. A lot of the artists you see on dirty hit, whether we're talking about, you know, pale waves or Rina Sawan Yama or a Japanese house are like more reflective of the diversity that's you know coming to the indie realm so like in a way there's like a lot more pressure on this album than there was on say Stone Temple Pilots or Silver Chair for that matter and you know it sounds cool like the album sounds cool have I thought about it since I've listened to it I mean not really but

I think critically it's like done really really well, but I think there's kind of, sometimes you'll see like a kind of if you can't beat them, join them sort of approach nowadays, particularly with like the line between, you know, quote, indie and pop all about disintegrating. It's like you don't want to be the person who, you know, 10 years from now looks like a grump because they didn't understand the thing that 18 year olds were listening to. And, you know, I think wait, wait and see approach for me with this one. Yeah, but I feel like this record, you know, as you've said, like if you're like an older music critic or something, this is like pretty easy to digest. There's like definitely music among, that's popular among zoomers that I hear and I'm like, I don't know what the hell this is. Yeah, this is not for me. I'm not going to like even like wade into this. I'm not going to be like, oh, yeah, what are the kids listening to now like that Stephen Bishemi, you know, skateboard. Yeah. Hello fellow kids. Like there's definitely music like that where I wouldn't even like try to insert myself. But I feel like this record is almost courting that in a way.

Like we mentioned the Stephen Malkmus song. She has a song called I Want to be Stephen Malkmus, which I think you- Who can relate? Well, and in our outline, didn't you like liken that to Booksmart, like that movie? Like we're, like, these young girls are into like older indie rock that like- Yeah, Book-Smart was like, it was a good movie in a way, but I think like there's a, and I don't want to say this is a similar thing because like Biba Dewey really is 20 years old and you know is like I think this album comes by its influences honestly but there's sometimes like in teen movies a tendency for adults to write teenagers as they want to imagine themselves as teenagers rather than actual teenagers so with BookSmart it was kind of like you would hear them listening to LCD sound system

and death grips and like I counted on two hands the amount of 2013 best new music bands that popped up in that. But yeah, I think there's sometimes a tendency with like teen material for people in their 30s or 40s to kind of like want the teens to reflect their own politics and their own sort of tastes. And yeah, I mean, crying to Stephen Malchmus, what went like the song, I want to be Stephen Malchman. It's like, do payment fans even cry to Stephen Malchmus? Or is that just like, you know, just the kind of like Twitter argot where people like, oh, I'm

like crying to this or, you know, they have to be very demonstrative about it. So, you know, we could take her out of a word that, yeah, she's, in the song's called I wish I was Stephen Macbush, I think I said I wanted to Stephen Malcolmus. But anyway, I think two things can be true at the same time that, you know, I'm sure she weeps to wawi, Zowie, all the time. And then that's also a good thing to get music critics attention. If you're going to drop a Stephen Malchmus ref in your early single, you know, the graying, you know, 43-year-old music critic will go, oh, wow, okay, well, let me check this out. And, you know, so I think there's some of that as well. There is, I think, again, like a pan-generational

appeal to her music maybe than like a lot of artists her age. But I think you made a good point about this is that it's not slavishly retro. I don't think it sounds like it was recorded in the 90s. I think that there's certain qualities that harken back to, again, like the poppiest versions of All Rock, especially from like the late 90s more than like the early 90s is what I hear. But she's definitely speaking to her own

people, her own generation here. And I mean, I think that again, essentially this is a record that's going to appeal to people that don't care about the context of indie rock. Maybe they know Soccer Mommy, but they're not going to care about the progression of like that record came out first and this record

might be biting it a little bit. It's going to be for people that just hear, you know, songs like care or worth it on a playlist. They're like, that's a catchy song. I like that. It's music that you hear on a streaming platform and you like it immediately, you know. This record, like, I remember the hooks. I cannot remember a single verse.

And I think that, like, works to its advantage because this, it reminds me a bit of, like, the first 1975 album in that regard. Like, I, like, shout out to Jason Green. Great guy, great writer, but I vehemently disagreed with the content of his 1975 self-titled review, except that all the songs basically go like verse, chorus, verse, and there's like no bridges at all. This album, like, is very well suited to be taken in bite-sized bits, like for TikTok or like if you hear 30 seconds on Spotify or an Apple music preview, you're probably going to hear the chorus. And the chorus is always hit.

So it's very well designed to that degree in a way that like a song like say Circle the Drain by Soccer Mommy, which is a five minute song and has much more of a build to it. Like this one's much more direct and hence this is why Biba Doobie is like 18 million Spotify followers. Right. Yeah. The average listener's not sitting there going where are the bridges? Like there are more bridges here. You know, I think again, if it comes up on your playlist or on your Spotify random or whatever it is,

these songs are very likable right away, which just leads me to believe that she, I mean, she's already huge. I think she, if you haven't heard of her already, I think you will be hearing a lot about her in the months ahead. 18.0001 million, thanks to this episode. All right, we have now reached the part of our episode that we call Recommendation Corner,

where Ian and I recommend something that we're into this week. Ian, why don't you go first? All right, so one of the, themes that tie this podcast together is that we often we we always bring up like lists like you know the rolling stone list old pitchfork lists and it's like why why are these things so important to us well i think if especially if you're trying to like reverse engineer music fandom it's important to like find out uh what were the major things back then and you know it's it can be kind of disappointing even in modern times like as you know the they get more consensus

based and it's just like a rearranging of like the most popular stuff that you kind of miss out on that second layer of things that were like acclaimed and maybe popular but not something that was you know elite and one of the bands that I would that got kind of referred to in the 90s was a band called Ida it's it just popped up randomly like a couple people started talking about them and like I got them confused like I know. knew they were like a late 90s, early 2000s band. I believe they were from New York. They were like a duo and then became a trio.

And I was stuck in the emergency, stuck in urgent care, getting my foot look after. So it's like, I'm going to check out Ida. Like they were a band that was talked about as like kind of being a little twee, a little slowcore. And I listened to their album, I Know About You from 1996. Also, I'd gotten them confused with Ivy and Idaho, which are two kind of like Tweed-ish slow core bands. And I think to myself, like, where has this been all my life? Like, this is what this album I Know About You sounds, it sounds a lot like low.

Like the low comparisons are impossible to ignore because it's like two people singing in harmonially, almost constantly over very slow tempos. but kind of more Rainer Maria-esque. Like, there's something undefinably emo about this band. They also signed a polyvinyl later on in their career, so that. And you look back at their pitchfork reviews from the late 90s, early 2000s, and they got shit on. So that means they're emo, too. But I would recommend this band,

particularly for people who are looking for more autumnal slash winter type songs. There's bells. There's acoustic guitars. There's, you know, just very sweet love songs. And it's, and it just, I always look for this kind of, like, if you're just like digging around and Spotify, like hitting that oil weller, it's a band that you haven't really heard of before, but they're still kind of new to you. And that is so much harder to come by, particularly since Spotify fans also like tend to be pretty restrictive. It's like, oh, what do I kind of like that sort of sounds like low? and it's like, oh, Red House Painters, I'll hurt all of them.

But Ida is a band that I think a lot of band. If you're into the sort of music, I'm into like the softer Atumil side of emo. They probably like Ida. So I would start with I Know About You and work your way forward. Like a very rich vein of music to tap here. Very cool. Excited to check that out. The record I'm going to be talking about is called Optizma.

It's by a band called Songhoi Blues. This album is out today. And Songhwee Blues, they're a band from Mali. They're a North African Desert Blues Band. If you've heard of Bombino, Tenorwin, Mokdar, they're in a similar vein. And it's really fascinating to me. If you're the type of person who derives a lot of pleasure from like hard riffing bluesy rock, you know, you would think that there's not a lot of that music being made by like American bands,

certainly like prominent, like great American bands. obviously if you dig deep certainly into like bar band type scenes you're going to find groups like that but Derek's trucks still going strong and hey Tedeschi trucks I'll talk about them probably not on this podcast but anyway

really like the best bands making that kind of music today like again like ZZ Top dire straits type rock are all these bands from from North Africa and Songhoi Blues this record definitely fits in that vein I would say it's also probably more upbeat than those records. There's a real energy to them, a real sense, again, of optimism, as is

alluded to in the album title. But if you like, you know, hard rhythm sections, if you like really great guitar solos, this record is going to hit you right where you live and breathe. And I guess this is a record that I would shoehorn into an indie rock podcast because the latest album was produced by Matt Sweeney. Of course, Matt Sweeney has been involved. in so many different indie projects. He is a bit of a zealig, I think, in the indie rock scene. He seems to be in every corner of many things that have happened significantly in the last 30 years. But I think he's probably best known for his band Chavez,

which was one of the great sort of guitar hero indie rock bands of the 1990s. And I think that makes him a very comfortable fit as a producer of this record. because again, I feel like in terms of American bands, it's hard to come by really great bands that are playing this kind of music these days. But if you go to North Africa, it just seems like you're just tripping over guitar heroes left and right that just have this great sort of trance-like quality to them.

I mean, they come from the desert. This music has the vastness of the desert. It has the sort of sweep that you would associate with that landscape. But again, I think songholy blues, I think one thing that would set them apart maybe from some of these other bands is just their energy and their enthusiasm. So I think we could all use a shot of that these days. You know, if you obviously, we have Ida. That is for, I guess, like, if you're going for like the sort of more overcast part of autumn, then put on this record if you, you know, want that shot of adrenaline maybe early in the morning. So I think we've got a little bit of both.

we've got the Saturday night and Sunday morning double shot here in Recommendation Corner so Indycast double shot Indycast double shot We need to have like that be a bit We need the but we need the zoo crew button That we can hit the end

Well I think that is all we have For this week on Indycast So thank you again for listening to our show If you like us, please leave us a review on iTunes Or wherever else you wherever else you get your pods. But again, thank you for your support. Thank you for listening.

And we'll be back with more reviews and news and trends and all the rest next week. And if you're looking for more music recommendations, sign up for the Indie Mix Taped 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. More indie cast double shots.