Indiecast - The Return Of Oasis, New Music From Geese and Wet Leg, and The Sneaky Indie Dominance Of Lord Huron

Episode Date: July 11, 2025

Steven and Ian open with a conversation about the precarious state of drummers in 2025, with a rash of retirements and firings (1:28). Then they pivot to a conversation about the return of Oasis, and how Steven hopes to see them in London in a few weeks (9:10). They move on to the new album announcement from Geese, the jammy psych-rock band poised to have a big year (16:26). They also touch on the Fantasy Album Draft, which this week features the latest record from Wet Leg (26:30). Then they discuss the LA band Lord Huron, who is secretly one of the most popular indie-rock acts around, with one song that's been streamed more than 3 billion times (34:19).In Recommendation Corner, Ian talks about the emo band My Point Of You and Steven stumps for the Detroit outfit Neu Blume.New episodes of Indiecast drop every Friday. Listen to Episode 247 here and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. You can submit questions for Steve and Ian at [e-mail], and make sure to follow us on Instagram and X (formerly Twitter) for all the latest news. We also recently launched a visualizer for our favorite Indiecast moments. Check those out here.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Indycast is presented by Uprox's indie mixtape. Hello everyone and welcome to Indycast on this show we talk about the biggest indie news of the week, review albums, and we hash out trends. In this episode, we talk about the Oasis Reunion, a new album announcement from Geese and the sneaky hugeness of Lord Huron. My name is Stephen Hayden, and I'm joined by my friend and co-host. He's the new drummer of Pearl Jam. Ian Cohen. Ian, how are you?

I mean, I am at least until Eddie Vedder finds out. bought a car with my own money. Oh, yeah. A sports car? Yeah, you know, going out like Dave Abruziz. That's right. I'm trying to remember what car it was. Yeah, me too.

I was trying to look that up and I wanted the joke to land so I didn't want to ask you. But like I could go look the books on my shelf like two feet away. But yeah, I think it was a sports car. I thought it was a Subaru for some reason. It was something like that. I wrote this book a while ago. So the brand of car that Dave A bought during the versus sessions that really alienated Eddie Vedder is escaping me right now. I'm trying to see if I can Google this quick.

That's okay. We'll move on. For those who aren't aware, Pearl Jam drummer Matt Cameron announced this week that he's retiring from the band after 27 years. He's the fifth Pearl Jam drummer, Ian. We mentioned Dave. Pittsburgh Steelers head coaches, man. Well, but there haven't been that many head coaches in the Steelers organization. This is more like the Carolina Panthers, you know, going through coaches left and right.

Pearl Jam now under their sixth drummer, presumably. I only bring this up because it's been a very interesting year for drummers. Other people have talked about this, but there's been so much. sort of negative action going on with drummers this year. They're either quitting, they're retiring, they're being fired. Matt Cameron leaves of his own volition, which seems a little weird. We talked about this a little bit before the show that being the drummer of Pearl Jam seems like a pretty good job.

I mean, they don't tour very much. And when they tour, they're playing arenas. They're playing stadiums like Wrigley Field, Fenway Park. So it's pretty lucrative. It doesn't sound like he's retiring from music. If you've seen Matt Cameron lately, he's like an amazing shape. I think he like mountain bikes like 20 miles a day. Just incredibly well-muscled for a man his age.

He's got to be in his early 60s probably at this point. So it's weird that he would leave. I don't know what the circumstances of that are. But I don't know if you've kept up with all the drummer news this year so far in 2025. but you had Josh Freeze, fired from the foo fighters. You had the dude from Iron Maiden, Nico McBrain. Are you familiar with Nico McBrain? It's an incredible name.

I don't think it's a very Iron Maiden name, but I... What? It almost rhymes with Iron Maiden. What are you talking about? Nico McBro. It kind of, I think that's like the ultimate Iron Maiden name. It strikes me as maybe more of like the guy that get to fill in on Oasis, but I think you're more the expert on this. This does not strike.

Nico just doesn't strike me as an Iron Maiden name. That's like more of an anthrax name. I don't know. Just, just McBrain, I think is such a metal drummer name. Zach Starkey, of course, fired from the Who, then rehired, then fired again. The dude and Guns and Roses, Frank, I guess he's been drumming for them for a while. I don't know if, I don't know the lineage of G&R drummers. I don't know if he replaced Matt Sorem. if there were other people between Soram and Frank Ferrer. There has to be. There has to be.

He was fired. Like the drummer for Primus, he quit. There was the dude and the new pornographers. I don't know if we want to get into the reasons why he was fired, but it was very sort of not a very good situation there. So I don't know, man. The rhythm sections in our country really being undone. And not just this country in England, too, I guess with Iron Maid. and the Who.

Bad time for drummers this year, Ian. Yeah. And to the further point, like six drummers for Pearl Jam seems like not a lot, I guess. I know that there's not a lot of like... That's a lot. It is. Okay. I feel like that's like not a lot, but...

Well, think of bands in history. How many of them have had six different drummers? That's a lot. Yeah. I mean, definitely not Metallica. I mean, Lars, watch her back, dude. But... Talca, you two, you know, I mean, Food Fighters, they've gone through, I guess it's Dave Grohl, Goldsmith, Taylor Hawkins.

But again, like one of the drummers is the guitar player in the band. So he's still in the band. Pearl Jam, it's an uncommonly, I mean, and a lot of those were just at the beginning. Right. They had like a new drummer like every other year. Like, you know, like Dave Cruzen plays on 10 and then like Matt Chamberlain is in the video. for a live and then you got Dave A coming in and then you got Jack Irons

was playing on a couple records in the mid-90s and then Cameron had the longest tenure of course he was in Soundgarden as well so it's a lot of drummers. I would say it's a lot of drummers. I mean like I'm gonna take your lead on this one but like yeah I 27 years that didn't be hard because

binaural was the last Pearl Jam CD I bought in stores and I guess that's the first Matt Cameron and one? It's the first one he played on. He joined for the Yield Tour because Jack Irons quit after recording Yield. And then, yeah, he's been with them until this year. I should also mention Goose fired a drummer, but they had two drummers at the time. So they already had a drummer. They didn't have to replace, they haven't yet added like a new second drummer. I think they're going to stick with just the one drummer. That is a benefit of going the Jam-Ban route, having two

drummers. Same thing happened in The Grateful Dead with Mickey Hart left for a while. You just have Bill Kreutzman back there. A lot of people think that was the best era of the Grateful Dead where they had one drummer. So yeah, it's good to have a spare drummer, I think. Then you don't have to go through the process of hiring somebody new. Yeah, recession indicator to be a jam band with one drummer. But yeah, I think that what we're going to need here is, as much as I think about the drummers who've left, I'm thinking about like the disgruntled drummers that are just kind of waiting in the wings. I'm thinking like Janet Weiss from Slater

Kinney, Dave Silvera from Corn, just the guys who were like constantly posting like floating the idea of maybe getting back in the band. I mean, William Goldsmith, Food Fighters put out a new song where they just kind of thanked everyone who had been in the band

and Dave Grohl included William Goldsmith, which, you know, it's either like extremely benevolent or just another form of like psychological warfare. Well, it would be worse if he did do it though. People would have been more mad at it, but you got to bring in, you know, you got to bring in the love for William Goldsmith, even though it didn't end well. I mean, I don't know if you've seen the Foo Fighters documentary back and forth, but it's actually

a pretty good documentary. They go pretty in depth into that whole William Goldsmith. Like, they don't whitewash that. William Goldsmith is interviewed in the movie, clearly still pissed off. Yeah. So, yeah, one of the great drummer dramas of modern rock history. for sure. We just need to transfer portal, you know, like to tie it into college football, because

the biggest news of the week for me, at least, is the release of NCAA EA football or EA college football 26. And apparently the transfer portal is insane in that game, same as it is in real life. So, yeah, you just need to be able to pick up like a drummer, you know, Dave Silvera, he's there for you. The guy from Primus, I mean, got, that's a band. I'm very interested to see how many drummers they've had over the years. because if you're not less Playpool or Larry Lalonde,

it just must be the most aggravating band to be a part of. Yeah, I mean, people were saying, oh, Matt Cameron's going to join the foo fighters. But, like, why would he quit Pearl Jam and then join the foo fighters? I just feel like that's, I mean, my thinking is that he doesn't want to play, like, stadium rock shows anymore. Maybe he just, like, wants to go back to playing, like, club gigs and that kind of stuff. So, I don't know, I guess we'll see what happens. Maybe there's going to be some investigative journalism.

talking about Matt Cameron's time and Pearl Jam, and there was some weirdness going on. Who knows? I'm just saying if you're an old rock band, check in on the drummer. There might be some issues going on there. Speaking of old rock bands, Ian, and a band that has had several drummers,

including Zach Starkey, Oasis, had their comeback show, their first show of the comeback tour last Friday, the 4th of July, in Cardiff. And it was, there were clips of it, People were shooting videos of it online, and obviously this was big news for me. I know it's less so for you. But I'm actually going to be in London in a week and a half, and I'm hoping to attend one of the Wembley stadium shows.

There's two of them when I'm in town. I've got a connection. A friend of mine lives there. He said he can get us on the list. He's in a band. He apparently shares a booking agent with Liam Gallagher. so I don't know if that will be enough to hook us up, but seeing Oasis at Wembley Stadium

with Richard Ashcroft opening. Hell yeah. Symphony, that could be pretty epic. But I don't know if you followed any of this. I thought the shows, like the clips I've seen, I thought were pretty good. I thought Liam in particular sounded great. I thought the setlist was for the most part really strong.

They played acquiesce in the second slide. after opening, of course, with hello. And I'm like, oh, okay, they understand the assignment. We're not just going to do the biggest songs. We're going to drop some B-sides. I mean, among Oasis fans, acquiesces a big song. But it's a song for the heads, for sure. And you get to hear Liam sing, the verse, Noel, the chorus, you know,

because we need each other, that whole thing. It's a lot of meta communication going on with that song. Noel Gallagher was like surprisingly emotional. It looked like he was going to burst into tears every time he stepped up to the mic. Clearly was very moved. I'm sure he was psyched to see a crowd that big after doing all of these tours like with the high flying birds, which no disrespect, but it's like, come on, high flying birds are oasis at this point. The choice is pretty clear.

So I don't know. I mean, hopefully I'm going to be seeing this tour in not a long time from me. now and I can report firsthand, do some boots on the ground music journalism. But yeah, I don't know. Oasis is back. It's pretty amazing. And the Oasis haters can't stand it. I love that too.

It's the funniest thing to me, Twitter, generally positive about the reunion? Blue Sky? When I checked in over there, not having it. The Oasis haters have found a home on blue sky. And I feel like that kind of sums up the philosophical differences maybe between these platforms that blue sky would definitely be the anti-oasis platform yeah that's so awesome because there have been a few articles that have tried to i to wrestle or wrangle with the legacy of oasis and yes and i think that's very much a blue sky pursuit as opposed to twitter where well yeah like

well yeah like the thinking is is that okay on one hand these guys are complete morons and then on the other hand, they're responsible for every bad thing that's happened in England and elsewhere in the last 30 years. So they're both morons and they're also like Kaiser Soze in musical form. Yeah. Yeah, I, the thing that struck me and I joked about because it's an obvious thing to make a joke about is the quote shortened version of, do you know what I mean? I got to know it got shortened because there's like the radio edit where you cut out the helicopter sounds and like the backwards guitars. I need more of that. Apparently, the funniest thing from the pitchfork article I read about it was that there was a block of songs from Be Here Now and apparently the energy like noticeably died down during it. But yeah, I don't know about that.

From the clips I saw, the energy was pretty up the entire time. I feel like that's a little bit of a like. Wish casting. Yeah, I'm seeing what I want to see. Right. But I don't know. They were in the room and I wasn't. But just judging by the reaction I could see online.

That crowd was hyped. Yeah. I mean, and it'll be interesting when this tour comes to America because they're probably playing venues that are too large for them. I know, like, here in the Midwest, I think they're playing Soldier Field, which I don't know. I don't know how ticket sales are going for that, but I don't know if they're not doing that many shows in America, but I. Rose Bowl. Two at the Rose Bowl. Damn.

Which even there, again, like Los Angeles is different. Right. I feel like you can sell tickets if you're. well-known band. Chicago, I don't know. Hopefully I'll be proven wrong. I think if they did like the United Center and even like a couple nights, they would be a slam dunk sellout, but I don't know if they're capable doing stadiums

in America, but like in England, it's a whole other story. Oh, yeah. And in that respect, like if you're an oasis hater from England, I sort of get it because you've had this band rammed down your throat, probably your whole life. But, yeah, I don't know. I'm excited to see them over there. I think it'll be a much different experience in seeing them here in America. Well, I'm looking at Stubhub right now.

And the cheapest, if I'm looking correctly, ticket at the current moment in Soldier Field is $500. Really? Yeah. But are you going to London for the sole purpose of seeing Oasis? I better not be because I'm not 100% certain of it, I'm going to one of these shows. I mean, we were going to go. It's a family trip. We were all going to go anyway.

I did pick that week because of the Oasis shows. Gotcha. We could have gone another week in July or in June or whatever, but it was like, okay, this is like a good alignment possibly of the stars if I can go see them. I have faith in my friend. I think he's going to hook me up. I just don't want to bank on it on the off chance. It falls through.

But I don't want to jinx it, but I think I'm going to get in. I have faith I'm going to get in. Yeah, I guess it's just a shame that Pitchfork Festival isn't around anymore to try to book them in America, you know. That was one of the bands they were trying to, the GQ was trying to get back. Well, them and the white stripes. White and white stripes, which, which is, you know, it's funny that, because I always thought Oasis was going to get back together. It just seemed like the money was always going to be too big. The solo careers weren't really, you know, happening in a major way, especially for Noel.

I feel like Liam was really picking up definitely in England, again, because he was sort of assuming the mantle of oasis. Like he would just go out and do these like oasis heavy sets, whereas Noel was really pushing the high flying birds material. And then he got divorced. And yeah, it just seemed like that was a foreground conclusion. The white stripes will never get back together. I feel confident in declaring that. So, Condé nest.

I don't know. Keep throwing money at him. Now that Anna Wintor is out of the picture, right? Yeah, that's true. Let's talk about the new album announcement from Geese. They have a new record coming out September 26th called Getting Killed. They released what I think is a great single called Taxes in a pretty messed up psychedelic video as well for that.

I really wish we would have had this album available to us in the fantasy albums draft because I would have definitely picked this record. We were talking last week about how with the fantasy draft, a lot of times you want to try to pick a record by a band that is on the come-up where there's a lot of goodwill toward them, but they haven't quite gotten the critical coronation yet. and it feels like Geese is one of those bands for 2025, where you have this solo record from the band's leader, Cameron Winter,

which came out at the end of last year in December. That record's called Heavy Metal. A lot of people love that record. Even that record, it came out after all the year-endless were published. So it's gotten really good reviews. I wrote about it, I think, in January and February. But again, it was like, it was almost like released deliberately not to get on year-end lists. I don't know, like, how, like, aware record labels are of that or artists.

I mean, they must be. Because, like, it came out, like, literally the day my list came out, which I think was December 8th or so. So you have all the heavy metal energy going on. I also feel like, and I don't know if you've really listened to this band at all, Ian, but their previous record, 3D country, which, came out in 2023. I feel like that record has had like a slower ground swell to it. And there's certainly people who probably went to that record after getting into heavy metal.

But I think a lot of people, myself included, have really embraced that second geese record. I put it on my year end list in 2023. But like if I were to make a list now of like my favorite records of the decade, like 3D country would be up there. It's one of the most entertaining drug-fueled wild rock records of the 2020s, and I really love it. So I feel like that record is maybe like less celebrated a little bit, but in tandem with heavy metal, I think it's going to really make people want to embrace this latest geese record.

Yeah, I would, I mean, if we had the fantasy draft, like a couple weeks later, this probably would have been my number one pick because we are about to get hit with like a wave of makeup calls. I can't remember the last time that we would see something this strong because I think you're absolutely right in that 3D country was a record where it was a bit divisive because you think back to 2021 when they put out that record projector, which I reviewed that. Now I'm worried that it's got that there's these cameras. winter heads who were just going to like email bomb me like kid cuddy fans did back in the day because they gave it like a 6.6 um but yeah it's interesting to see how their cred has only escalated since they

got rid of the uh you know projector was a very like new york post punk talking heads strokes lcd sound system kind of thing and 3d country was kind of like jam band adjacent um oh yeah and people like there are people who dug that like you know yourself josh terry was like he i remember him text me, it's like, I don't know about this, man, but like they sound kind of like the rolling stones and it's awesome. Totally. Yeah. That's, yeah, it's like goat's head soup era stones. It's, uh, yeah, I mean, there are some fishy elements to that as well, like fishy pH fish. Um, but yeah, it's, it's totally a wild, right. Like I said, like, it's kind of like fun, drug-fueled, like bongo breakdowns, like sassy female backing singers type record. Um, like,

you mentioned projector. I don't think that the Cameron Heads would come after you because I think that there is like a Pablo Honey quality to that album where like you said, it felt very derivative of New York post-punk music in the same way that Pablo Honey was derivative

of like a lot of American alternative in indie rock. And then they come out with their second record The Ben's and it's almost like this is the real first radio head record. This is like where we find our own identity. And with Geese, It really feels like with 3D country, that's where they became the band that they're meant to be.

And then, you know, they end up touring with King Gizzard, which I think was a pretty big deal for a certain kind of music listener. And I was thinking about this. I want to run this by you. In a way, like Cameron Winter reminds me of like an American version of Giordi Grie. You know, and Gis is sort of like an American version of like those. British art rock bands where they're kind of wacky. The singer has like a weird voice. There's kind of a performance art aspect a little bit to what they do in their music and how they present themselves. But I would just say geese doesn't have the theater kid energy that

a lot of those British acts have. And it's more like a rock and roll thing. Like what Josh was saying, like they have like a stone's quality to them. And winter in particular, you know, has like a rock and roll swagger type thing with geese, which is an interesting contrast to his solo record, which is a more sort of introspective, almost like chamber music, like chamber pop or chamber folk rock type thing, a more sensitive type music that also has some weirdness to it.

I don't know if any of that makes any sense to you, but I do see some parallels there. Well, I think there was a very interesting Freudian, and Flub that you said when you asked if it was an American virgin version of Oh, right. But yeah, I think that speaks to the difference I think between the two, whereas like, Jordy Greep is like a freak. He's a weirdo.

And like Black Middy and his solo projects have a very kind of, how do I put this delicately, very like album of the year rate your music type male nerd energy to it. Whereas like I think Cameron Winter is more along the lines of like a Julian Casablancus in a way. Right. Yeah, just the look and the fact that he's from New York City. And I think that's like a big part of it as well because, you know, like New York City kids want a band to be proud of. And, you know, he's got the juice right now, Cameron Winter. I think it almost benefited him to put that record out in the end of December.

And because it's got just like this real head of steam. I mean, he's like Panda Bear in 2007. Bradford Cox in 2008 hitting us with like the band and the solo record on the year end list. So he's got the juice right now. Yeah, and I think there's something to them where a lot of people love heavy metal. They love 3D country. A lot of people are going to hate those records, too. You know, there is like a real, you know, we've talked about the 1975.

One thing we like about them, even though we disagree on the merits of the music sometimes, is that they are a band that you can argue about. And it's not going to turn into some sort of like, oh, you don't like this band because you're XYZ. It is more about the aesthetics of the band. Like someone not liking Cameron Winter because of his voice. I think that's the big polarizing thing with him. I get it. Yeah.

I understand why. Even for myself, I remember I did a recommendation corner on heavy metal when it came out. And I think what I said was I'm putting it here, even though I don't know how I feel about this record yet. But I feel like it's going to be something I love. You know, I was almost hedging my bets a little bit because I didn't love it at first, but I could tell that there was enough there. that if I just sit with this record long enough, it's going to seep in, and that's, of course, what it ended up doing.

But as this band gets more hype, I know that there's going to be a lot of backlash to it as well. And I think that'll be an interesting conversation. Yeah, I think it's going to be a lot of backlash and a lot of reaching as well. Because, I mean, this is like so... It's sort of like when Black Middy was first popping up, where it's like old school 2005, 2006,

sort of indie conversations like, yo, I just don't like this person's voice. And that's a very fair, like, that's like the most irrefutable thing you can say about any artist. Like, yo, I don't like the way this sounds or I don't like this voice. And so there will be some backlash. I think it'll be a reach. It'll be not to the same degree of like the oasis stuff where, you know, it's like it's seen as this like cultural barometer.

But I'm stoked. I like this song a lot. Yeah. Yeah. It's, I think it's a pretty amazing video too. It has some like Darren O'Ranoffs, Darren Aronovsky, like, mother vibes to it. It's like, which I guess that's probably not a recommendation for most people,

but it's pretty wild. And I appreciate them going to that place. I have to say, too, that I like when indie rock gets a little druggie. You know, we haven't had good druggie indie rock in a while, you know, that sort of animal collective vibe, that kind of sinister, psychedelic type thing. And I think geese has that, even though they don't sound like, like Animal Collective, but, you know, that sinister hallucination, I'm in the desert and I'm seeing

an Indian chief like Jim Morrison in the doors type energy. Like I like that and I like that geese is bringing it. So excited to talk more about that in the future. Let's do a quick fantasy album draft update. I have two albums that came out this week that are on my team. One is the Clips record, which was my number one pick. There's no score for that yet. I'm guessing. I'm guessing. that album was embargoed? It's got a four-star review in Rolling Stone. I'm looking at album of the year. Let me look again here.

Maybe I looked last night. That's the only one so far in album of the year. And so that's like, you know, a place where you're going to see the early ones. Yeah. Okay. So I'm feeling pretty good about that, I guess, of Rolling Stone giving it a four-star review. My other album out this week is Moisturizer by. the British post-punk band Wetleg.

They currently have an 84 based on five reviews from European publications. I gotta say I'm like a little worried about this, Ian. 84 is about where I would want them to be. But I guess I was hoping if we're only going to have, you know, like UK press and other, you know, press from surrounding countries,

I was hoping to kind of start with an 87 with them. them and then get dragged down a little bit by the American publications. I don't know if I should be worried about that. Have you heard this record? I've not heard the record. I've heard the singles. And I think what we expected, based on the singles, feels like it's holding true in the reviews, which we've seen, which is like, you know, Room on Fire, Antics, you could have it so much

better with Franz Ferdinand. I think 84 is about where it's going to land. I think you're in fine shape. It's funny because all the 84 is like one of those 84s for every review. an eight or a four star. And, you know, I think that it's going to hold steady. I think that any sort of backlash that met it back in 2022, just lifetime ago, people have probably forgotten like why they got in such backlash in the first place.

And it's going to be, oh, they've stuck around. You know, they're here to stay. And, you know, they're doing their thing, but it's slicker. It's got more of a point of view. It feels less kind of cobbled together from singles. I think it'll be fine. Yeah. I wonder, you know, because I've listened to the record, and I mean, I'm not a huge fan of this band,

and this album hasn't really changed my opinion. It sounds, it's one of those same but slicker type albums, which, you know, is in line with some of those records you mentioned from like the 2000s, like where it's the second album from like the buzzy return of rock band. I mean, Room on Fire, I think is a great record. So I would take that out of the running, but like the second France Ferdinand record. You know, it has that kind of energy to me. It feels a little bland, a little faceless. I don't know.

Again, I'm not a huge fan. And I do wonder in a weird way if the conversation about the backlash, I feel like that helped them three years ago. And now there's not really anything to talk about with these band. Like they're just like a good, like they're like a solid band. But yeah, they put out their first record a while ago. Is there enough juice here for people to care more than like for a spin or two? I don't know.

I felt like three years ago, this was the band that like the 50 year old guy loved. You know, the 50 year old guy that's really excited about the tiny desk concerts, like whenever they come out. Like that genre guy, who I love, I'm not making fun of that guy. You are. They're dis and oasis on blue sky right now. No, no, no. No, no. You are part of the indie cast nation.

I am more like you than I am like most other people. But I just felt like they were a band that like that kind of person gravitated to, along with a lot of younger people, of course. But I don't know. I just feel like do they mean less now because there's not like a force opposing them? That's an interesting thought because like even back in 2022, it was one of those situations that we talk about so often where like some person with like 300 followers on Twitter like post.

I don't I don't like the way Billy Eilish's dress look and it'd be em em eminatacized into this whole thing where it's like every publication and every like mainstream source loves you and thinks you're like the most hype band and then you find like a couple of haters and that becomes a whole story out of nothing. But I think now they're just kind. And again, I'm not saying they sound like idols, but they can occupy that sort of space for a different demographic of, you know, the 40 somethings who don't really stay much in tune. with rock but it's like oh wet leg like i like this it sounds like stuff i like before and they're going to be you know the representative in the mainstream of this entire scene of like kind of talky post-punk music and that's a good path to be on that look uh in the same way that like you pick a kate leban or a cast maccombs record in 2028 if we're still doing this wet leg's still going to get you in 83

you know along those lines and maybe i'm being uh overly influenced by my social media time line, but I really feel like Fontaine's DC, I mean, they had a big year last year. Oh, yeah, huge. But I see more and more people talking about that band, talking about their shows. I mean, they seem like they're now the band of that world. I think that's true. British band. It feels like romance, because you saw idols they put out a record last year where they were

trying to remake themselves. And was James Murphy actually involved in that? I think he was. He was, because it was sort of like an LCD sound system dance punk element that they were bringing into the band and they were wearing suits in the video, which it was got to be careful when the band starts wearing suits, you know, like the Metallica load thing, you know, like where, oh, now. Reflector, yeah. Yeah, we're not, we're not the crazy band. We're wearing like the sleazy suits and we cut her hair and you saw idols doing that. I don't think it totally worked, but Fontaine's DC, they were.

able to expand their sound on their last record in a much more effective way it feels like. Yeah, Fonta's DC to me just seems like a much more broad. Like they're like kind of not like YouTube, but like kind of arcade fire sort of. Yeah. Whereas like wet leg, you know, they got to a place where like say dry cleaning didn't or squid didn't. You know what I mean? So.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. So dry cleaning hasn't made a record in a while. I think they put out one in 2023, right? Well, that's still a few years ago. Yeah. you're right yeah a lifetime ago but that was the one like with the bar of soap with the hair yes yeah boy wet like and dry cleaning very unpleased uh album covers there's there's kind of a theme here

well and the title moisturizer yeah that when you said it like oh right um just the word moist you got avoid that whenever possible yeah but clips could be a 90 like i think that is you know right yeah the only issue i have with that is that a lot It is so a type of guy album. And again, I'm doing a lot of type of guy casting here. But, you know, Stereogum, Tom Bryan put like a brave review of it. GQ's going to love it. The ringer's going to love it.

These are all people I used to, like, you know, share blog rules with in 2005. The problem is they don't have scores. So, but I think clips could be a 90, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was my number one pick. I feel like if that record isn't a disaster, if it's just good. it'll get at least into the 80s.

And if it's like a really good record, like you said, I think it has a shot at 90. So I feel good about that. We'll see what happens when more reviews get in next week. All right, let's move on to our next topic here. And this is partly inspired by our recent conversation about the Velvet Sundown, that AI band that sounds like a folk rock group from Southern California. And one of the bands I thought of instantly when I heard that AI track is a

human band from L.A. called Lord Huron. And this band, they have a new record coming up next week on July 18th. It's called The Cosmic Selecter, Volume 1. And I wrote a column this week where I touch on that record a little bit, but I mainly focused on the insane popularity of the biggest Lord Huron song, which is called The Night We Met. And I know you know this song, Ian. Hell yeah. Because, and, and I want to talk to you. We'll talk about this in a minute. This band has very little press. Like when you Google the band and look, Google is garbage right now.

But, I mean, when you scroll past all the AI slop at the top and you start to look at articles at this band, there aren't that many. And really, I think the most extensive one I've seen is one that you wrote for stereo gum in 2018. So, and I know you have a long history with this band. But it's amazing. to me because you and I, I think, both share an interest in bands that are popular but not famous, you know, where you can tangibly look at different rubrics, whether it's streaming numbers or concert ticket sales or social media following. And you could say, this band is popular. And yet

they're not really a household name. And in indie rock or indie adjacent music, like Lord Huron to me is like a defining example of it. And if you look at the night we met, it is literally one of the 30 biggest songs ever in the history of Spotify. It has 3.1 billion streams, which is as many as like yellow by Coldplay has. Like just to put that in perspective. And then there's like another version of this song that Lord Huron. I don't know if they, I think it was edited to include Phoebe Bridgers. Like she did like a duet on the song.

And that has like another. 325 million streams. So if you add those together, it's like 3.5 billion streams, which is like as big as the biggest Imagine Dragon song on Spotify. It is insanely huge. And like, the explanation

for that is that originally, the song came out in 2015 on the album Strange Trails. It's like the second full-length Lord Huron album. Then two years later, it was featured in this Netflix show called 13 Reasons Why. Yeah. An enormous, like a, the

defining document of like Trump.1, Trump 1.0. Very big show. And it was like a major character on the show. It was like a recurring song. It was like in the first two seasons. It was like a love theme really for that, for that program. What's interesting though is that the song has continued to do really well after that show. Like that show went on.

They stopped making new episodes five years ago. And like I did a tweet in 2023 where I knew. noticed that this song had 1.2 billion streams. That was in January of 2023. It now has almost like three times that many, like in the last like two years. And the number of monthly listeners for Lord Huron, I think in 2023 it was like 11 million. Now it's like 30 million. So there's something about this song that I don't know if like they did something in the Spanish. to make it perfect for Spotify in particular? Or Spotify just loves this song?

Because, like, Apple Music, I don't know if you saw this, but they put out a list of the top 500 songs ever on Apple Music. Did you see that? I didn't, but is one of them American terrorists by RXK Nephew? Because I've definitely put one, at least a couple million on that one in the past four years. I don't know about that, but like the night we met is not, on that list.

It didn't make the top 500. Meanwhile, the other song that I would put in the same company as Lord Huron is that song Sweeter Weather by the Neighborhood another LA band

that it's like popular but not famous. That song has 3.9 billion streams. That's crazy. So that's another song, one of the biggest songs ever on Spotify. That's also on the Apple Music list. It's two spots higher than Bohemian Rhapsody. Okay.

So it's a big song. big song on both platforms, but like Lord Huron, for whatever reason, huge on Spotify, not as big on Apple Music. And to go back to the AI thing, you know, and look, I like listening to Lord Huron. Like, when their records are on, I think they're enjoyable. I think they're well crafted and they sound good. But they are like a human AI band. Like they take from so many other bands, you know, and going back to like, you know, not just like indie rock bands. I mean, they sound, like, my morning jacket, Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear. I mean, the night we met to me sounds like if you took funeral and I'll always love you,

like those two band of horses songs, if you put that into one song, I think you would get something very similar to the night we met. Like if you put it into an AI, you would get that. But they're like a human AI band. And I just feel like on Spotify, it's probably a situation. where you're listening to maybe any number of other artists and then once that is done

you just bring up the Lord Huron song because it just fits with so many other sort of rustic, rootsy indie Americana type music it's kind of like they're kind of like the perfect band that sounds like other bands band like ever

at least for the modern era yeah geez and you know if Ben Bridwell's listening I don't know if he'd mind if you got the title of no one's going to love you slightly off. What did I say? You said, I will always love you. Oh, I'm sorry. No one's going to love you. Ben Brentwell. I love you. I think there's a bit of Laredo

in Lord Huron as well. But yeah, this is crazy because like they were that kind of you know, like band that sounds like other bands from the jump. So I go back with this band to like 2010. I wrote about their EPs at Pitchfork. I think I gave it like an A.0. And let me just tell Into the Sun, Mighty, there's some bangers on that. Into the Sun is like if my morning jacket tried to make off the record back in like the Tennessee Fire Day is like funky reggae styley and, you know, Mighty's got the fleet boxes playing in a wind tunnel sort of deal. I saw them in 2010 open for, I'm going to let you guess.

This is a Southern California band that you wrote about. They did not around anymore. Well, I saw it in the outline, so I can't guess. I was hoping you would sneak that It is a good It's a very good throwback reference though To indie music of that time This is a remember some guys

Band like Avi Buffalo is the band Yeah yeah extremely cancelled now But yeah I remember Seeing Lord Huron open for them back in the day And when I had a conversation with Ben from Lord Huron on 2018 He remembered meeting me that night And I thought I saw them open for Abe Vagoda

It was Avi Buffalo And you know they had the guy wearing the washboard, like a catcher's chest protector. I mean, it was like an incredible 2010 LA memory. And I was really into that band. And then they put out lonesome dreams in 2012. It had The Stranger, which is one of the great song. But I'm like, oh, man, this is like what I didn't know at the time was co-worker music,

which is to say that we talked a little about this back on the last episode. like, you know, the person that you work with who, like, goes to maybe one or two concerts a year. And it's like a night out when they go to a concert. And yeah, it's like along the same lines as shaky graves or Dawes or what have you. But Lord Huron. Way bigger. Yeah, way bigger. Yeah, way bigger.

Way, way bigger. And again, I don't think that they're a cynical band. No, not at all. Not in the least. And, you know, they have a really good live show apparently. And, and Ben Schneider, the songwriter, I mean, he crafts these like elaborate backst stories. Yeah, they're crazy. For the albums. So there's a lot of thought going into it, but just musically, it is,

again, I don't want to disparage the band necessarily because I think they're good at what they do, but they are incredibly derivative in a way that is almost like a human AI, where it'd be like, okay, I want to hear something that sounds like all these other bands I like, but in one package. And they deliver that in a very kind of straightforward way that is obviously, obviously resonating with people. I mean, there's something going on with this song on Spotify, where they're just feeding it to people. I mean, I mean, the Apple music contrast leads to me to believe that people aren't necessarily

seeking this song out, but like they like it when it's on. Yeah. So if you're feeding them this song with an algorithm, they're going to keep it on and enjoy it, but they might not necessarily like punch the song into the search. to seek it out knowingly. Yeah. But it's just kind of like perfect music. If you've listened to like a bunch of 2000s indie rock albums in a row

and then someone forgets to like update the playlist and Spotify just starts playing songs on its own. And it's like, oh yeah, oh yeah, I don't know what this is, but I like this. Lord Huron just seems like that band. Yeah. And I think that this is also true of another band, which I would imagine. is very high on this. Definitely the Spotify list. Apple music, I love it, but it's discovery,

as a discovery tool, it's kind of not great. But I'm thinking like glass animals being kind of similar, where they sound like a lot of bands from that era, but they had that one song, I think heat waves, that got just enormous in 2020. And yeah, they, to me, are like the most algorithmic man because they kind of like delve into hip hop and R&B a bit so they can fit into more playlist.

but I think every kind of mode that you could think of from like 2010's indie has that kind of band. And Lord Huron, I mean, they just crack the code. I don't like I cheer for them because they do care. I mean, that 2018 album had Dave Fridman on production. They're, you know, they're trying. They're trying. But I think there's like a certain degree of earnestness and, you know, black and better term, cornyness that goes into it.

But co-worker music, you can do a lot. worse. Yeah, and there is something about that kind of music where it is so big on streaming platforms. And, you know, people talk about, oh, boom clap music is making a comeback or music that sounds like the luminaires is making a comeback. It's like, no, that music never goes away. Never. I think it just, it just stays popular with like a silent majority audience out there because it's very easy to listen to. I think, again, I think it's well-made music. I, yeah, I, I, Again, my knock on Lord Huron is that it just feels so much like other things that I like that I think are probably better that it would be the knock against it. But yeah, it's like grizzly bear hold some of them streams.

You know, Ed Dross might be able to pay off his student loans. I mean, like, honestly, like band of horses should be getting some of these streams because like funeral is an amazing song. No one's going to love you. But, like, yeah, the C-Lo cover of that also got probably pumped that up a bit. Yeah, but, yeah, he's getting some kickback from that, I'm sure. So, anyway, interesting band. And again, not talked about at all. Like, none.

Not covered. Your article, and I guess maybe mine now, are like two of, like, the more in-depth examinations of this band, who are just absurdly popular, but not famous. Yeah, and that's why they green lit it in the first. place. I remember when I did that and also gang of youths the year prior, it's like they were also fascinated with these like secretly huge bands and like let me delve it. Yo, I have this guy's phone number still. Like let me let me talk to him and it was cool, man. So yeah, my coworkers were, that was like the maybe the one article that I wrote that my co-workers at that time actually read.

We've not reached a part of our episode that we call Recommination Corner where Ian and I talk about something we're into this week. Ian, want you to go first? So this is a band I've talked about online because you know we haven't done recommendation corner in a minute so this might seem like a bit of a throwback but um the name of the band is my point of you again my point of you not my point of view would it be an emo band if i didn't slightly cringe at the band name uh the their ep is called this is my first heist they are from denton texas and kind of like first day back a band i talked about a little bit before they're from like this part of the country that is not known for emo like denton texas is like explosions in the sky

country. And this is a straight up explicit throwback to the late 90s emo thing, specifically like Ryan and Maria, everyone asked about you, the anniversary, co-ed vocals, very literate, you know, a lot of literary references. And I'm hearing this along with First Day Back, which is another, these two bands have gotten a lot of buzz in emo Twitter. And it makes me wonder if it's just a contrast or like a repudiation of the recommended if you like Orga. Tommy Angel, modern baseball, mom jeans, weed emo thing that's been very, very popular for the past couple of years. It's very promising.

If, and there's a lot of good throwback emo going around in this mode that's making the year seem pretty strong. But I'm wondering if there's just something that's going to break containment like the hotel year did in 2014. I'm very interested to see that. Maybe it's this band when they put out their EP. But it's good to see some emo fans actually getting some. attraction outside of, you know, my uprocks year-end list. So, uh, yeah. Awesome. Uh, I want to talk about a

band from Detroit. It's a duo. I guess they're originally from Phoenix, but they move to Detroit. I'm not sure why. I feel like it's normally the opposite direction, although I love the idea of bands moving to the Midwest, making good music. The band is called New Bloom and the album is called Let It Win. Uh, I read about this record in friend of the podcast Josh Terry's newsletter, which is called No Expectations, definitely would recommend anyone subscribe to that album. Josh does a great job of digging deep and finding cool records that no one else is talking about. And this record was included on his list of favorite albums of 2025 so far. I had not heard of it until I read about it in his newsletter.

But as I was scrolling through looking at the records, he got my attention because he mentioned the band Bonnie Dune, who's also from Michigan, the band I like a lot. You might know them from how they backed up Waxahatchie during the St. Cloud era. They played on that record, and they also were her backing band for the shows in support of that album. Bonnie Dune, of course, has made many great records themselves. Definitely recommend checking them out. And I could definitely see the connection to New Bloom. There's a similar feeling of kind of like a chill country rock vibe to.

it that seems really simple the first time you listen to it and then upon repeat listenings the complexities really start to come to the four there's some really great interplay on this record between the guitar and the drums again it sounds simple but the drums in particular have some really kind of cool beats going on that I like a lot and the guitars you know along with the pedal steel of course that's prominent on the record really kind of creates like a great soundscape tapestry that I love listening to I would also bring in and hopefully this gets your attention, Ian. I get some howdy vibes from this record as well, maybe because it is a duo band,

but also because there's a real warmth and welcoming quality to this record. It just sounds like friends coming together to make some really cool songs. And it's a great vibe, really cool record. I like it a lot. Again, it's called Let It Win. And the band is called New Bloom.

Yeah, yeah, you definitely got my attention. with Howdy. And this is a nice segue to next week when we're going to talk about Alex G. But let the people know how you spell this band's name. Oh, yes. New Bloom, N-E-U, sort of like the German band. I guess that German band is, it's pronounced Noe. This could be called Noe-Bloom, but I'm pronouncing it New Bloom.

And Bloom, B-L-U-M-E, like Judy Bloom, the great children's author. That about does it for this episode of Indycast. We'll be back with more news reviews and hashing out trends next week. And if you're looking for more music recommendations, sign up for the Indie Mix 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.