No Filler Music Podcast - Best of 2021 - Part Four

Episode Date: December 27, 2021

Our final episode of the year means it's our final 10 tracks in our best of 2021 countdown. Join us as we listen to everything from progressive metal to psychedelic folk. Thanks as always for listening! Tracklist: Shame - This Side Of The Sun Paul Jacobs - Christopher Robbins Mr. Twin Sister - Despoil Letting Up Despite Great Faults - Corners Pressed Beach House - Once Twice Melody Alice Phoebe Lou - Only When I Mastadon - The Beast Courtney Barnett - I'll Be Your Mirror ( The Velvet Underground cover) Dry Cleaning - New Long Leg The Soundcarriers - Waves Bo Burnham - Welcome To The Internet Visit tiestatea.com and use promo code NOFILLER15 for 15% off at checkout. A bold tea for a bold you. This show is part of the Pantheon Podcast network. Pantheon is a proud partner of AKG by Harman. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Unwrap holiday magic at Holt Renfrew with gifts that say I know you. From festive and cozy fashion to lux beauty and fragrance sets, our special selection has something for every style and price point. Visit our Holtz holiday shop and store or online at Holtrenfrew.com. And welcome to No Filler, the music podcast dedicated to sharing the often overlooked hidden gyms that fill the space between the singles on our favorite records. My name is Quentin. With me as always is my brother Travis.

And this is our final 10, dude, our final favey faves of 2021. This is it, man. I've been obsessing over these final five picks. it's been pretty, I mean, pretty consistent. Like the ones that were my top five when we started this thing, for the most part, a few of them are still there. But I've been like rotating in and out, ones that I can't decide on, you know, switching, especially like trying to figure out which song on these records to play.

Right. Because like I'm pretty confident that like, here are my top five bands that I loved this year with their, with the stuff that they put out. but trying to pick just one track off the record was tough. Yeah, I'm bringing five completely different ones than what I originally had planned for like my 20 for the year. So you're talking about like artist is different and everything based on like what, you know, the five, I mean, that means you removed five songs from your original list.

Yeah, well, like my original list was like 60 songs total. So, you know, I have a lot to pick from. And two of them that I'm bringing tonight, I just found out about last week. And they're from two of my favorite artists. So I was super pumped to find out that they had both brought music, new music this year. So I have to play him, dude. You know, I just have to. All right, Quel, before we get started with the tunes here, I wanted to just say, man.

This morning I tried something that you. that you texted me about and it was it was delightful so you would say hey you know t s to tea we've been drinking it a lot lately right yeah that's what i said to you and you're like oh yeah and then you yeah and then you said have you know i'm paraphrasing here cue but you said have you tried it in your coffee yet and i had to pick up bits and pieces of my brain strewn across the room because if my mind was blown i was like no i haven't tried that yet so i did exactly what you suggested I took the nutty almond cream, which is what I've been talking about, as like my favorite of the the dry flight starter pack that they sent us.

And I brewed it with my, like, you know, I just mixed in like a teaspoon with my ground coffee, brood like I always do, like I do like a pour over. It was great, man. It was really good. It brings in just a very subtle hint of cinnamon and a little bit of nutty flavor, man. Yeah, like I used to put like cinnamon and like sometimes like cardamom into my coffee grounds. Yeah. To get some subtle flavors like that.

But with this, it's like just just put some of that loose leaf tea from Testa tea straight into your grinds, man. It was great. So I'm going to try that with the, I was thinking maybe doing that with the Earl Grey that they have and like the chai and just just kind of bit, you know, see what happens. Yeah. And, you know, we're speaking to the coffee lovers out here. If you're, you know, if you're hesitant about drinking tea, if you're always been a coffee drinker, try this, man. It's, it's, it just enhances the flavor of your coffee. And so this morning I tried it with a teaspoonful of their chai tea.

But that was great. It was really good. That's got cardamom in it, probably. It's got cardamom. And it gives you a little bit more of a boost with your, you know, your caffeine dose of the day because, you know, it's black tea. So, you know, as you guys all know, right, you can get 15% off your oil. order at tsd t st.com if you use promo code no filler 15 at checkout it might be too late for for the last minute christmas shopping unless you want to pay for like overnight shipping or

something but um you know treat yourself you know get yourself something nice you know you you deserve it you know anyway tsat com promo code no filler 15 at checkout for 15% off your order let's dive into the tunes queue this is it this is what we're all here for So our last 10 of the year. This is it. This is how we closed out, 2021. All right, I'm going to go first because you went first last week, and that's how it works, right? That's how it works, dude.

So I am bringing a band that could be familiar to those of you who listen to No Filler on the regular. Because, Q, you brought these guys early this year for like a, it may have been our first or second what you heard of the year. I'm bringing a band called Shame. So in January they came out with a album called Drunk Tank Pink Such a good album, dude Really good album

Just a solid post-punk indie band from the UK They're from South London And just There's nothing not to like about these guys They've been active since 2014 Which I was kind of surprised at when I read that Well and from what I've heard

They've changed up their sound quite a bit They're a little more aggressive, more like standard post-punk previously. Yeah, I've actually heard even from like their last record songs of praise came out in 2018. There's a huge difference between that one and drug tank pink. So like even within the last two records. Anyway, I am not bringing a song from drunk tank pink because they've put out a couple new singles. Oh, shit.

I didn't know that. They have a song that came out in November that I'm going to bring to the table here. And yeah, I'm just going to let it speak for itself here because it's a it's a bang. man. It's a great way to start the our final 10. So here you go. This is a song again from a band called Shame and this song

is called This Side of the Sun. Dude, I was getting some Britt Daniel vibes. In the vocals? Vocals and that guitar riff. That sounded like old school spoon to me.

Yeah, yeah. I can hear that. I love it, man. Um, So, all right, let me just read this real quick. So I really like this description of the song. This is a paste magazine, which you may be familiar with. But they said, the track features, and this is probably the guitar you're talking about you, the track features guitars so sharp you'd come away bloody if you touched them. Yes.

That is what I was saying. And then they say, meanwhile, vocalist Charlie Steen bemoans the way making art can feel like commodifying one's sense of self. singing almost under his breath. I give myself away every day to every person that I meet. What does that make me? It's a deep, deep thought. Yeah. Anyway, you know, there's obviously,

now I thought this was interesting because I picked up vocally. I was thinking a little bit of, especially in that line, Frankie broils of. Yes. Balkans. And you could host thinking that too. What's interesting here is Pace even called out

a band called Omni, which is Frankie Boyle's play guitar for this band called Omni. Oh, wow. It says here, the danceable track evokes the best of bands like Omni and the Strokes. Wow, cool. With riffs like razors and disillusionment, wafting through the room and melodic clouds. Totally. Nice, dude. I feel like with bands like this and idols, right, when I hear those two bands, I just think England.

You know what I mean? I just like, it almost makes me think of like, When Oasis really took over and all those Brit pop bands in the 90s, it kind of like put attention on Britain and like the music scene. I feel like bands like idols and shame are kind of doing the same again. Yeah. And also Fontaine's DC. Yeah, exactly.

Big their album of Hero's death last year too. Yeah, dude. Yeah, there's definitely kind of a post-punk scene happening over there right now. Anyway, that song again was this side of the sun from shame. And Q, I'm going to hand it over to you what you got for your first pick. All right, man, this is going to be a nice transition. So this is an artist I don't know too much about. And his name's Paul Jacobs.

He's from Montreal, Quebec. And it's just a solid, like, psychedelic poppy folk kind of stuff. He says on his band camp, mix between this and that. that's what his bio is. That's it. You know, yeah, that's it. That's all it says. He has an album that came out this year called Pink Dogs on the Green Grass.

And I just want to play the song and then get your fresh take on it, dude. I'm not going to say too much else about it. Big fan of this album. And this song has been an earworm for pretty much all year. It came out in April. So again, the artist is Paul Jacobs. And this song is called Christopher. Robbins.

Yeah, kind of like a psychedelic folk type thing, right? So like not psych rock necessarily, at least that track. Yeah, I know he's kind of all over the place. Reminds me of kind of the stuff that the OCs do. Hmm. Or he's getting a lot of comparisons to Kurt Vile or... Well, you know who I thought of. And this is like a 60s artist, but I thought of Donovan.

Oh, shit. Are you familiar with Donovan? A little bit, yeah. Sunshine, Superman is like his, one of his big hits. But that's kind of a psychedelic folk type thing. Like his vocals were a little bit like that.

It reminded me a little bit of Donovan. So this is a one-man band, so everything you hear is him. He also plays drums in a post-punk quintet called Pottery. Not familiar with him at all, but I'm going to check him out. Dig in their album art. But yeah. So he mixes rounds, you know, in the music scene.

So, yeah, that is Paul Jacobs, and that was Christopher Robbins, which is, of course, the beloved little kid with a little Winnie the Pooh Bear, stuffed animal that comes to life, right? Last week I brought a track cue about the protagonist from Spirited Away, right? Oh, yeah. Chihiro, which I mispronounced as Cheerio. Chirio, yeah, right. So, yeah, again, the album is Pink Dogs on the Greengrass. Give it a listen. The whole album's great. All right, Triff, pick number two for you and what you got.

All right, well, this was, you know, there's no way that this band wasn't going to show up on my best of the year list because I love everything they do. And they put out a brand new record this year. And I'm talking about Mr. Twin Sister, of course. Of course. So we've talked about them and featured them almost since the beginning of the podcast. because I believe on the Tyco episode that we did, a Mr. Twin Sister, actually just twin sister at the time,

track was brought by you. It was Lady Daydream. Yeah, which is still one of my favorite songs of theirs. I love Lady Daydream. And that's off of their very first record. That's a little EP, yeah. Or EP, yeah. So anyway, you know, this band has kind of gone through some transformations.

We've done an episode on their self-titled Mr. Twin Sister record. But before that, they went by just twin sister. But yeah, we played a single off of this record earlier in the year on like a what you heard intro, like it was our intro song. I believe that was expressions. So we played expressions earlier in this year. Anyway, they came out with their latest record, Al Mundo Azul. not too long ago. It was November 19th, so just about a month ago. And I'm just going to play the tune and then we'll talk about it. So yeah, I'm going to play the track here. This was, this again, dude, this was tough. The whole record's great. So here we go. I'm going to play a song here called Despoil off of Mr. Twin Sisters brand new record, Al Mundo Azul. I'd say one of the best albums of the year.

Easily. Yeah. I agree with you. So, okay, here's what I wanted to talk about. I feel like a lot of, a lot of the tracks that we brought the last few weeks have sort of fall under, like, the disco, sort of electronic kind of resurgence like us. Oh, yeah. And Mr. Twin Sister has sort of been, like, at the front of that, like, it's almost like they were ahead of their time with that a few years ago when they came out with, with, their self-titled Mr. Twin Sister record.

Yeah. And like this is just a continuation of that. This record is actually kind of more, has a lot more energy to it and like, has a lot more dance quality to it maybe than their last two records. But like it's still in that same kind of fusion of disco and house music. That's what they're really, really good at. This stuff reminds me of Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound machine. reminds me of that kind of stuff.

Yeah. Yeah. Which was, you know, what, late 80s, early 90s, I guess. Yeah, and I think that's kind of like the fusion of like disco and synth stuff with like house music. Although Gloria didn't really have any house elements to it. But yeah, it's that like, yeah, Latin, I guess kind of flare. Yeah. You know.

But yeah, they even have some, a couple of tracks on this record actually are Spanish spoken. Oh, that's right. or song. Yeah. Anyway, I wanted to read... I mean, the shit, the album name is Almundo Azul. Right, right, right.

Yeah, the singer Andrea Estella, she actually, I think there was a song on the last two records that, you know, this isn't the first time she's done it, but she'll sing in Spanish quite a bit. But I'm going to read a quote from pitchfork here, Q, because I like the way that they kind of say it. Mr. Twin Sister anticipate trends with alarming precision. and this is kind of what I'm talking about. Their 2014 self-titled breakout, fused R&B with low-key, nocturnal dance music,

years before OkCaya and Erica de Cajer emerged as indie darlings. I don't know who those people are. While Salt, the band's 2018 follow-up incorporated tasteful two-step beats with lush jazz textures before pink pantheris had even sat her A-levels. Again, I don't know who this is. But the point they're trying to make is, as they say here at this last sentence, slowly but surely, Andrea Estella, Gable D'Amico, Udbav, Gupta, and Eric Cardona's distinctive sensibility has inched its way into the zeitgeist.

So yeah, they've been ahead of the game with this kind of sound, and it's slowly starting to seep into more mainstream type stuff, which I think is really interesting because of Mr. Twin Sister doesn't really get much attention, right? But they've been doing this for a long time. They're one of my favorite groups to come out in the last decade, hands down, and, like, I will anticipate and, like, listen to every single thing they put out from here until the end of time, because I love them. Anyway, that was Mr. Twin Sister.

The song was called Despoil off of their record, Al Mundo Azul. Give it a listen, and I'm going to pass it back to you. What you got? All right, dude, so Christmas came early for me this year, man. And I shared my delight and excitement with you last week when I found out. One of my favorite proper dream pop bands from the last decade. And I say proper dream pop because this group blends like classic loveless, well, not that level of noise, loveless, but classic shoegaze with really dreamy pop better than most bands that are trying to do it.

Letting Up Despite Great Faults. I think everyone knows by now. One of my favorite groups from the early O's. They actually, their first album, their self-title was out in 2008 or 2009. And they haven't really released any new stuff in a few years. So I just found out that they, I want to say just last week, they dropped a new single. So their last full-length album was back in 2014. So it has been a minute since they've released anything.

Apparently, a couple of the members went off and did a side project for a little bit. So they're back and, man, this song is so great, dude. They're just coming back with the sound and vibes that they do best. This is letting up despite great faults. And this song is called Corners Pressed. Just a warm blanket, dude. I fucking love everything that they do. I would, yeah, I feel like they, they fall more, you know, on the dream, the dream pop side of the, the suitcase coin, right?

Yes. I think they're, like, anytime someone is looking for a good, you know, example of dream pop from the last, you know, 20 years. Yeah. I'm going to point to letting up to Spike Ray Fault. This flavor of dream pop, there's no one better, in my opinion. Yeah, yeah. So you've, I mean, you've been a fan since their self-titled record. in 2009. I remember we had featured them on our music blog quite a bit. Yeah, I got to interview,

I think it was the lead singer through New Dust. Oh, that's one of our few interviews that we did. That's great. Yeah. Yeah, dude. So like, how would you say they've changed since that self-title? Because I remember the self-title had a little bit more, I don't know, it wasn't as subtle, I guess. I would say they brought his vocals up a little bit more in the mix. Like they did more of the washed in sound kind of stuff. Yeah. And maybe that was because Joe Wave was happening at the same time. I don't know.

Yeah. I think they've removed themselves a little bit from that wall of sound. You know, I mentioned that they do a great blend of shoegaze and Dream Pop. I know 100 times over we've said it a million times now. Dream Pop and Shoegates are the same thing, but everyone knows what we're talking about. When there's, you know, I mean, they're the same thing, but they're different. Yeah. They have very distinct elements to them.

And that's why we never really thought of it as the same thing. It's that fuzzy guitar, you know, just drowned in sound kind of stuff. They're twigs on the same branch or whatever, you know? Yeah. If you will. Yeah. But yeah, but they've always done that really like, just more upbeat kind of poppy sound to, this style of Dream Pop and Shugays.

So yeah, they've got a new album set to release on March 4th. So I cannot wait, dude. Cannot wait. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, so let me read this right up real quick on a website called BuzzBans. That's so funny that they're still considered a buzz band, even though they've been around for over a decade. Well, I don't know what kind of artists buzz bands brings to their blog. but yeah.

Anyways, it says here, the new singles, so there's two new singles. The new singles are exemplary of letting up's gazing, shimmering dream pop, with Lee's presence and the mix incrementally more forward than on much of the band's catalog. Reliably, they are lush soundscapes for those swirling emotions that go round and round and eventually find a home in your personal ether. I mean, that's it, dude. Well, there you go, Q. And let me tell you, dude.

I've got the perfect the perfect segue for this. That's what I'm talking about, dude. The perfect. I mean, we're going to plan this better. We never do. So, speaking of Dream Pop,

arguably the best, almost like definitive Dream Pop band from the last decade plus is Beach House. Yes. And they are getting ready to release a brand new record in 2022. It's a two,

like a double L-EPS. album and they're releasing it in chapters. So the first two chapters have been released already. So there's already eight tracks available from this record. Anyway, it's called Once Twice Melody. Did you watch that video? I said, I didn't, but I was hoping that you talk about it. We'll check it out. No, so we are actually bringing Beach House's Teen Dream as the first album that we're going to cover for 2022. Okay. So I'll hold off on that. But it's a whole video on how they've been. basically become synonymous with the like 2010's resurgence of Dreampop. It's Beach House. Yeah, you could say that they were responsible for it for sure. They were like the forefront

and led the way and sort of became synonymous with the 2010s like Dream Pop sound, right? Yep. So anyway, here they are a decade later, right? And I feel like this record of the songs I've heard so far from this record. And I confess I haven't really paid all that much attention to them since Teen Dream? I listened to some of the stuff off of Bloom, a handful of tracks off of Depression Cherry. I really like Depression Cherry. It's a great album.

Compared to Teen Dream, like, her vocals have become less, this is the only word I can think about, less punch to it. I feel like with Team Dream, her delivery had some kind of like, I don't know the word to use. Well, it was more, like, their songs were,

more sparse, I guess. So her vocals were always right there in the forefront of it. And there was some fuzz to it and stuff like that. Yeah. It was really just her organ and his guitar. You know, like, it was very, it was much more like pared down, I guess, because now they're, they're big, right? Like, their recordings, all the the instrumentations and everything. It's a lot, it's a lot bigger sound. Totally. Well, with this record, again, from what I've heard, it's very surreal and dreamlike, which is what it should be because it's dream pop. But here we go. We're going to listen to the title track off the record.

So again, this is Beach House, and this song is called Once Twice Melody. Nobody does it like that, dude. They're like showing their, I don't know if maturity is the right word, but you know, like here we are as a seasoned group. We've been around the block a few times. Yeah. Ten years on, like, this is it. Right. Yeah, I think it's great.

So we actually saw them, I don't know if they, were they the headliner or? I don't remember, but washed out open for them. It was washed out. It was like the quintessential like 2010's concert, right? But who else was there? Was it just them to? It might have been washed out open for them and they were the head. Yeah. Yeah. But we saw them for the Teen Dream tour. Dude, and this was one of those like we were floating on cloud down because we got those tickets for free.

Right. Yeah. through new dust. Right. Those are good times. But anyway, so yeah, I mean, we've been there since kind of, since they really took off at least, because they've been around for a little bit. You know, they've got a couple of records that came out before Teen Dream. Yeah.

They have a self-titled. And then they have a record called Devotion. Devotion's great, too. Devotion's really, really, like I was saying, that pared down kind of just like with her vocals front and center. Yeah. Yeah, man. So, yeah, I mean, if you don't know much about who these. people are, it's a two-piece. It's a duo. It's Victoria LeGrand, which is the vocalist and a keyboardist.

And then Alex Scali, guitarist, keyboardist, backup vocalist, and that's it. It's just those two. Yeah. So for this record, apparently they have brought on a orchestra to add. You actually heard it there in the last part of that song. I don't know if it's like a fool. It's probably just like a quartet or something like that or like a string. a string section, right? But yeah, let me quote pitchfork again here about this song in particular. It says here juxtaposing prismatic visuals and lax vocals

the song evokes the sensual slowness of a hot summer day of sinking into the grass with a paleta dripping in your hand. It's like a Mexican frozen popsicle thing, right? Anyway, you know, I think this is probably one of the most anticipated records going into 2022 for sure because of who it is and

how long it's been since their last record. I think seven was their last record came out in 2018. So it's been a few years. Anyway, you can listen to chapters one and two of this record already. So it's called Once Twice Melody. That's the name of the record and the song I just played. Again, that was Beach House. And I'm going to throw it back to you, Q. What are you going to do? Do we have more shoegaze or what are we doing? Well, I'm bringing probably one of my favorite folk pop discoveries of the year. I just found out, just discovered this artist earlier in the year. Her name is Alice Phoebe Lou.

I actually brought a song, Dirty Mouth as one of, as what you heard earlier this year from her album, Glow. And this blew my mind. I was reading the Wikipedia page of her. and another artist that I brought earlier this year on a watcha was Strongboy. Remember that artist? Yeah. That's her.

That's one of her side projects, man. Oh. And that's one of my favorite, what's the song, Tough Girl, I think is what it's called. So you really like this artist. Yeah, she's fantastic, man. And I'm going to play the opening song from Glow. This song, this was one of those,

like I had to pick my jaw off the floor, dude. And this is right, the intro song, this is the first thing you hear. This song blew me away. So again, Alice Phoebe-Lou is the artist. This is from an album, Glow. This song is called Only When I. feel the rage that would show on shut them and not always be I'll spread your love so thickly so I can reminisce some more

even if we're done Yeah, song gives me chills dude every time Yeah, I love the little like twinkling Almost sounded like a harp kind of keyboard Yeah, in the background that she kind of had in there Really well produced song, right? So who is the producer on the right?

Like, is it her? Is it self-produced? Oh, I don't know, man. And there's actually not even the Wikipedia article on the album. Okay. Oh, self-released. Self-released. Yeah, she's great, man. I remember the track that you brought earlier this year had a whole different vibe to it. Way different vibe. Yeah. So she's super talented.

Yeah, that song is so sensual, dude. You know? Yeah. And the lyrics, too, it's, you know, very like, moody and and like intimate. Just her vocals and the way she, yeah, records. Yeah, her voice is great. Yeah, I know what you mean. Like her voice is just right there. It's very vulnerable sounding too.

Like there's like a quiver to it. Anyways, man. Yeah, I love everything she does. If you liked that, check out her side project, Strongboy that she does with Siv Yaman, which I believe, I typed in his name under Google, And there's a bunch of, like, live videos of her performing as Alice Phoebe Lou. And he's there with her.

So I think he's just someone that she works with a lot and, you know, plays in her groups. So, yeah, check out Strongboy. Check out this album, Glow from Alice Phoebe Lou. One of my favorite albums of the year. All right, dude. We got two more each. Are we going to pivot at all? I feel like we've been transitioning well throughout this episode, man.

Well, I am going to one 80s because that's what I'm here for. Is it metal? You bringing more metal, dude? Technically, yes, but the track itself is not. What makes this a unique track is that it's a metal band, but they're doing something really interesting on this track. Cool. So this is a band called Mastodon.

And, you know, they've had a pretty extensive. of catalog. I mean, they've been around since like the early 2000s. Oh, man. I thought they were around since like the 80s. Oh, no. So much I know. Mastodon.

I don't know, dude. Anyway, but they, are you thinking of like Megadeth or something? Probably. Anyway, so Mastodon, like, by and large, is kind of like a, almost like a sludge metal, stoner metal, like, melodic grindcore?

That's my joke every time. If you were to look at their catalog of the whole, right? That's kind of what they follow. They're like heavy metal, but like stoner sludge metal, right? This new record that they put out this year called hushed and grim kind of falls more under the progressive metal umbrella, like, meaning like because of like the wide range of like styles and stuff that you're going to hear on it, it's not, you can't really pinpoint it under one specific style of metal, right?

case and point is this song I'm bringing here. So this song really blew me away the first time I heard it. And I'm going to have to play two clips, Q, because it's pretty long, and it's got these two distinct movements to it that are just really awesome. So here we got. This song, I'm just going to say it almost has kind of a southern rock sound to it, kind of like Kings of Leon maybe, but just the beginning at least. and then it kind of transitions into this other thing.

So anyway, I'm just going to let this play. I'm going to play the first part, at least, from this song. So again, this is Mastodon, and this song is called The Beast. That's that a lot, dude. So I would call that, like, the first movement, because you heard that transition that started happened? Oh, yeah. It changes completely, and this next part is, like, one of my favorite moments in a song

all year. So I'll just say that. But, well, yeah, what I loved about that, like I said, it's kind of got this southern rock kind of flared to it. I hope I don't get skewered for saying this, but he sounded kind of like Chris Cornell to me. Yeah, maybe. I can maybe hear that. Maybe. Now, I don't know anything else about Mastodon.

So is this in line with how he always sings and how they're, okay. Not at all. So, like, they actually have two different singers. And you're about to hear the next, the other singer on this next part. But this is Brent Hines. So let me get the roster spelled out here. So it's Troy Sanders, bass vocals, Brent Hines, Lee guitar and vocals, Bill Kelleher, rhythm guitar and backing vocals, and Brand Daler drums and vocals.

So Brent Hines, that's the guy who's singing that first and second verse there. He is the main singer and guitar player. but this other guy, Brand Daler, is the drummer, and he also sings, which, you know, that's always cool. I like it when drummers sing. Phil Collins, dude. Yeah, Phil Collins. All day. Yep.

Now, let me transition to this to this next part here, but let me just say this real quick here. So I was reading this article, Kerrang again, who is, I referenced them last week when I talked about Gojira, right? So they're like a really well-known metal publication. But they were kind of going through, like, how thematically and, like, lyrically and stuff like that. Mastodon has always kind of dealt with like death and loss in their music. So they kind of go through, you know, some records like they had a record called Crack the Sky, which dealt with the death of the drummer's sister. The Hunter was a tribute to guitarist Brent Hines' brother. And then their last album before this one, Imper of Sand, was informed by bassist Troy Sanders'

wife's battle with cancer, with which she's recovered since then, but either way. And so for this record, it's the band's late manager, Nick John, who passed away in 2018. So anyway, they are always dealing with like death and loss and stuff like that through their music. And I think this song kind of touches on some of that kind of stuff. Again, it's called The Beast, right? And that's what metals for, dude. Yeah, dealing with that kind of stuff. All right, anyway, so I'm going to pick this up right where we left off here. Again, this song is called The Beast. The guitar solo, dude. Was that Andy Timmons?

That sounded like an Andy Timmons guitar solo. Yeah, definitely like a fusion guitar solo for sure. Yeah. Which, great. Yeah. And there you go, right? So there's like some Southern rock in the beginning. The middle part is more kind of kind of a traditional metal, progressive metal type sound.

And there's that like fusion guitar solo at the end and then it transitions back into the Southern rock sound. But yeah, really great. The pipes on that guy too, man. Yeah. other guy. That's, uh, that's Brand Daler, the drummer. But yeah, I just love the lyrics. How the hell do you sing like that and play drums at the same time? Seriously. I don't know. You have to ask him and Phil Collins. But yeah, um, anyway, I don't know, dude. That's a good question. That's a good question. But yeah, anyway, I just loved everything about this song. Lyrically, let me just read some lyrics here.

I still hear the beast is breathing. Should I fall upon my sword? Make sure they know that I fought for them. Make sure they know that they know I tried. I scraped and clawed. I gave my all. So I don't know what the beast is in this song, but it sounds like something he's maybe struggling.

I think the beast is cancer, dude. Well, no. That's another. What is the song about? Sorry. That's a different record. I don't know what the song is about exactly. It sounds like it's a losing battle.

So he's saying, should I just give up? Yeah. And fall on my sword. It's almost like this beast maybe is like a personal struggle that he's dealing with. He can still hear it breathing it's still there, you know. Yeah. But he gave it his all. Like he fought for them, whoever that is.

Maybe it's, who knows, I'm not going to try to interpret it. But anyway, great track. Like I said, it blew me away. I loved the different kind of parts in it. And from what I can tell, I mean, I haven't listened to Macedon's entire discography, but there's really nothing that I've heard that sounds like. that. So, you know, that's them kind of, uh, maybe experimenting a little bit with their sound. Um, anyway, you know, this record has gotten mixed reviews. Some Macedon diehard fans, maybe don't

like it all that much, but again, I was, I was impressed with that track at least. So anyway, that was Mastodon, the Beast. The record was called hushed and grim. And I'm going to throw it back to Yuki. What do you got? All right, man, I'm going to, I mean, I think this could be considered a 180 because this is going to be as paired down as you can get compared to all that noise. So there was an amazing compilation record tribute album that came out back in September. It was a tribute to the Velvet Underground and Nico with, man, Michael Stipe shows up on here. Kurt Vile, Andrew Bird, St. Vincent, Thurston Moore from Sonic Youth. Wow, okay.

Fontaine's DC. Anyways, the album is called I'll be your mirror, which also happens to be my favorite Nico song from the Velvet Underground. And guess who happens to cover it? Who covers her cue? Courtney Barnett, dude, who will always be one of my favorite singer-songwriters of the last decade, for sure.

So this was a no-brainer for me, dude. I had to bring it this year for the end of end of year list. And I really love her version of it. It's really great. So here we go, dude. Courtney Barnett's cover of I'll be your mirror.

I'll be your mirror. Reflect what you are in case you don't know. I'll be the wind, the rain and the sunset, the light on your door to show that you're home when you think the night

has seen your mind that inside you're twisted and unkind let me stand to show that you are blind please put down your hands because I see you I find it hard to believe that you don't know the beauty you are but if you don't let me be your eyes a hand to your dark Dude not be afraid When you think the night has seen your mind That inside you're twisted and unkind Well, let me stand to show that you are blind

Please put down your dark see you Dude, what a great, great cover Have you heard this song before? The real one? I don't think I have, actually. Dude, this is one of my favorite songs of all time. Wow, okay. Dang.

So how faithful was that to the song? Like with the background instruments and stuff like that? It's only faithful in the melody of it. Okay. Okay. Do you want to hear that? Let's listen to it a little bit. I can't believe you haven't heard this, dude.

So first off, I absolutely love the lyrics of this song. If it's not obvious, it's about a person that just doesn't feel too loved. They don't really, you know, love themselves very much. And, you know, self-hate and all that stuff. And this is a song about a person in their life that is like, are you, are you, how can you not know how awesome you are. Like when you're feeling down, I will be there to lift you back up, that kind of stuff. All right, dude, let's play the original song, man. All right.

So again, this is the Velvet Underground and Nico. This is from the Andy Warhol record. came out in 1967. All right, here is I'll Be Your Mirror. I be your mirror. Reflect what you are in case you don't know. I be the wind, the rain and the sunset, light on your door to show that you're home. When you think the night has seen your mind, that inside you're twisted and unkind.

Please stand to show that you are blind, please put down your hair, because I see you. You don't know the beauty you are. But if you don't, let me be your eyes, a hand to your darkness, so you won't be afraid when you think the night has in your mind

that inside you're twisted and unkind. stand to show that you are blind please put down your hair because I see you She's one of the most unique vocalist of all time Absolutely I love Nika I really haven't like listened to them all that much

So like that's not that's obviously not like a I'm not saying anything groundbreaking there right But I just I'm always so like Taking aback by her vocals you know Listen to Chelsea girl if you haven't Trev That's her. That's her solo record. Yeah.

Everyone knows these days because it showed up on... A West Andersonville, probably. Yeah, I think it was rural Tannenbaum's. I feel like a lot. He's dipped into Velvet Underground quite a bit, I think. Yeah, he's a huge fan. Yeah. Anyways, so, yeah, that was...

Well, that was the original. But yeah, that was Courtney Barnett's version of it. I love her stripped down just acoustic version, you know. And Courtney says here, I love them. She's speaking. course about Velvet Underground and Nico. When I listen to I'll Be Your Mirror and read the lyrics, I realize it's a perfect song.

I can relate to every inch of it. I just felt like I could get inside the world of this song. So when she was approached to be a part of this compilation record, she called Dibs on I'll Be Your Mirror, which is the, they ended up going with that as the name of the compilation record. I'll be your mirror. So anyways, man.

Yeah, I think it's a fiddick song for her to sing, you know, as far as her style and stuff. Yeah, yeah. Anyways, man. Love it. The compilation record's fantastic as well. Give it a listen. I mean, how can you not with people like Thurston Moore showing up? He sings a heroin, which is really haunting Lou Reed track. Anyways, yeah. So that was, again, I'll Be Your Mirror by Courtney Barnett covering Velvet Underground and Nico. All right, dude, last pick of the year for you. How are you going to wrap it up for us? Yeah, I think it's safe to call this my favorite record of the year because it was so different and like so, I don't know, man, it just, I was captivated by it when I heard it for the first time. So you say that you brought this band to what you heard.

I don't remember you doing stuff. So I mentioned them. I thought that I did, but I mentioned them because I was bringing another artist that to me sounded very simple. And we haven't even mentioned who we're talking about. Yeah, yeah. So this band is called dry cleaning. And, man, her vocal delivery just completely captivated me. Yeah, she's not singing at all.

That's the whole thing. And it's, she never sings. You know what I mean? No, it's like, it's kind of like beat poetry. Like you, I heard that dry cleaning album earlier this year. And I was also taken aback by her vocal delivery and how interesting it was. Yeah. And then I found, you know, I was trying to think like, obviously this has been done before, you know, but like it's not done and paired with the, the music as well that dry cleaning brings, which makes it really unique.

But this artist, oh, little Annie is what her name is. Yeah, it was the last song of the last pick of mine for our what you heard back in, it was back in August, the Good Vives Bart edition. Her song, I Think of You is very similar to dry cleaning, but like with more of a hip hop band as far as like the beats, the drumbeat and everything. Anyways. Yeah, man. Fantastic album.

So the record is called New Long Leg. And what I love the most about it is because of how dry her delivery is because it really is just like stream of consciousness, like spoken word, like poetry, right? Yeah. The backing band. and I'm going to make sure, let me just make sure I read off the roster here, because she may actually play an instrument.

Let's see here. Yeah, so it's, okay, she just sings. So, vocalist Florence Shaw, guitarist Tom Dow's, bassist Louis Maynard, and drummer Nick Buxton. So, you know, the musicians behind her, their music is so expressive. I think almost to like make up for her delivery, you know? Yeah. That it works so well together.

And what they're doing for the most part is like a post-punk sound. I love the sound of this band. And it comes off. It's just so perfect, man. Everything works perfectly. Yeah, I love this record too, man. All right. Well, I'm going to play the title track.

No, let me tell you, dude. This was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. Pick one song to play from this record. But after much back and forth, I'm just going to play the title track. So again, this album is called New Long Leg, and I'm going to play the title track. Again, the band is Dry Cleaning. You are. No, you are.

Let me see a maze, peas rolling, a useless long leg. Photo, you're a spoon, pal. You are. You don't remember anyone. Sorry. Do do do my stateroom or chondry done on the ship. And what are the prices? Are there some kind of reverse platform shoes that make you go into the ground

wall, make you reach a lower level? Do you choose a dentist with a messy back garden like that? I don't think so. The do-doos, man. Like that's the one time she really like brings any sort of. Some sort of a melodic. Yeah, to her voice. But yeah, what a, I'd say probably the most unique album of the,

a year. Maybe under this umbrella, this genre. Yeah, the music's not different at all, but also still fantastic. Like just, even just as an instrumental record, it would be worth a listen. That's what I like about it. It's like the band, they, I feel like they're, they are so expressive and melodic to, because of the way she delivers vocals, and that's why it works so well is they're bringing all the melody, right?

But like it, that song in particular almost had like a alt rock, almost like an REM kind of sound to it melodically. But like there's, there's a, you know, track two on here on Smart Lady has kind of a punk rock almost like. I like that one a lot. Classic rock sound to it with one of the riffs, almost like a death, not death metal, but like a doom metal kind of sludge kind of sound to it. So like they're all over the map with their music, but, you know, by and large. It's like a post-punk type of sound. But anyway, let me read this quote from a Rolling Stone article that crack me up. She's talking about how she writes her lyrics, right?

She says here, many of Shaw's lyrics come from her writing exercises in a notebook of lined paper. And then she says, sometimes you just can't be fucked with a lot of topics. She says, you're like, the only thing I care about right now is baked beans. Or the only thing I care about is Star Trek, the next generation. That is my interest and everything else can fuck off. And so she said, I'll write whatever I can think of about that and all my feelings about it. Sometimes it'll go off into another subject. It's just a way to make me go.

So yeah, it's a literally stream of consciousness, right? Yeah. That's why if you look at the lyrics on this song, she talks about like, Well, they let me bring my shampoo on the ship. Will there be shampoo in the state room? Sounds like they're planning on going on a cruise or something. Yeah, she's like, would you trust a dentist with a backyard that looks like that? I'm not going to let him clean my teeth if he if he's got a garden that's overgrown and gross like

that. You kidding me? Yeah, exactly. Just completely random, right? But somehow it works really well. Anyway, if you, you know, I think a lot of people are probably going to be turned off by her vocal delivery or they just can't do it for that long, right? Because it's, you know, 41 minutes and that's what she does. I honestly, I've kind of felt that way when I first listened to it. But I keep going back to it. But you got to, yeah, you got to kind of, you got to embrace it and realize that that's what you're in for, right? And to me, it just, it just, I was mostly just captivated by it because I never really heard anything like that. I kind of reminded me of some of the stuff that like Kim Gordon of Sonic Youth. She would do kind of spoke a word stuff like that sometimes.

Oh, yeah. But yeah, anyway, so again, that was dry cleaning. The album is called New Long Leg. Check it out. If you didn't like that, you're going to hate the record. Maybe, maybe listen for the music because melodically, I think a lot of the stuff that, the band is doing is great. But if you if you can't get behind that vocal delivery, then this band's not for you, right? But I loved it. I loved everything about it. All right, Q,

this is it, man. The last pick of the year, the last song played on no filler for 2021. What are you going to do for us here? All right, man, I saved. Remember when I said Christmas came early, dude? Yeah. Well, it's not only because of letting up despite great faults. I found found out on the same day within the same hour because it just popped up on my Spotify. One of if not my favorite psych rock groups of this era, the sound carriers, is back, dude. It's been eight years since they've done anything. The sound carriers to me, like the amount of excitement that you and I get when we find out that there's new music from Kings of Convenience.

Which happened this year as well. Yeah, right. That's how I am with the sound carriers. And I mean, for a while, their music wasn't even on Spotify. Like only their debut album was on there, which came out in 2009. So I'd been missing, like being able to just stream their stuff whenever I wanted because they only have three full-length albums and they're all phenomenal. I've brought them up many times before on past episodes.

They are just like they have perfected the, I don't know, like, if, Peter Paul and Mary or Mamas and the Pappas had more of like a psychedelic rock flare to their music. That's what the sound carriers do. And this is what they are through and through. Like they're, you know, that's just they're going to make music like this always and forever. They're never going to change. And I'm all for it. I don't even care if every album of theirs sounds like their debut.

I'm all about it because it's always amazing. They have a new album coming out. towards the end of January. So I'm just going to call it right now, dude. I guarantee you that our intro song for our first what you heard of next year is going to be from this album. Because I mean, shit, I will hold off and make sure that we don't even record until I get to play one of these songs as the intro. Because we always try to bring like a brand new song, you know, for the intro on our watches. Anyways.

So they really take their time between releases. they, it says here I'm going to, from this article on Under the Radar Mag, band member Adam Cannes says, we've always done things our own way and without any outside pressure. Making music like this keeps things fresh. You always lose something and gain something as you go along, but I think of it as just another chapter. So here is their latest single. It is called Waves. That's a perfect track, you? That's, man, that's just what they do, dude. And they, They do it so well. Yeah, they've perfected it.

Yeah. Man, I'm telling you. Dude, I'm going to be all over this album because another thing about them, it is, unless you want to drop 400 bucks, you're not going to get one of their records on final. Very, like, short run releases of their records on final. Why don't you pre-order this one? I don't know if that's the thing you can do. Probably. Maybe.

A lot of bands do that. Anyways. So, yeah, I'm finally going to get my hands on a. on a sound carrier's record without, you know, whatever I got to do. Yeah, I love the flute. Those show it up in the background there. The little triangle tings. Yeah, yeah.

And I love their, like I faded it out. I love just how they repeated that line over and over at the end there. I just love that kind of stuff. My favorite album of theirs, I believe, if I had to pinpoint one, would be Celeste from 2010. Is that this year that you brought what you heard from that record? I know you brought a track from from this record at some point.

Yeah, I don't remember which one I brought. It was a killer track. Oh, yeah, dude. They're all great. And Tropicalia from 2014 is also a unbelievable record. Anyways, dude. Yeah, I'm stoked. I can't wait.

That's about a month away from now, or at least from the time that we recorded this. So again, that is the sound carriers. That is a brand new. single Waves that will be featured on their next album called Wilds, which is due out January 21st of next year. Awesome. Yes, sir.

And that's it, man. There it is, man. Another year. Come and gone on no filler. This might be our best year yet, dude. I was going to say, man, we haven't really had a chance to, like, reflect back. But, man, we had some good times this year. We brought a lot of great music.

I feel like we did good, man. Not to mention we had, we got to interview, I feel like the Sonic Youth Encyclopedia, David Brown. That was unbelievable. That was great. We got to chat with our buddy Josh Stewart a couple times. Reminis about the old New Dust Days. Yeah. Yeah, man.

Good stuff. So, yeah, we're just going to keep chugging along, dude. Yeah, next year, like we say, we're going to kick off the year with an episode on Beach House's Teen Dream, you know, kind of the record that sort of put the... them on the map, right? And then who knows, we'll probably just stick around in that era, the 2010s, kind of like we talked about doing after we did our 100th episode, 200th episode. We might need to reach back out to Josh because he's expressed interest in joining us again. And I feel like he would be a great guest to have to chat about pretty much any of the bands from that era, because that was the New Dust era as well. So we were covering these bands with Josh on New Dust.

Yeah, I'm sure he'd love to talk about Beach House. I don't even remember. He may have been there at the show with us. I don't remember if he... I don't know. But yeah, anyway. All right, Key. Well, I know what our plan is for the outro song here.

But, yeah, let's just talk about this documentary or special, comedy special, I guess, for a little bit here. Yeah, so, you know, last year we brought at the end of every episode, you know, because of the pandemic and a lot of the kind of lockdowns that were going on and cycle. throughout 2020 and still shit still this year as well but like there was a lot of really interesting and cool things happening musically with artists you know doing stuff out of their bedroom or you know what have you and we would bring our you know favorite moments of 2021 favorite favorite music moments of 2021 at the end of each of our year and episodes last year I would say that this comedy special by bow burnham would have to be one of my for sure favorite moments in music that happened this year Me too, hands down. And like one of my favorite maybe comedy specials of all time.

Well, actually, you know what, dude? Let's get into this, man. Because historically, you are not a fan. In fact, I'd say you might even hate musical comedy. Like Tenacious D or Flight of the Concords. I love Tenacious D. But that's just because they were approached to it. Right. I love Jack Black. But yeah, for the most part, Flight of the Concords, I'm not a fan of. Weird Al, Yankovic. They might be giants. Weird all is tolerable, but like I'm not going to, much like you, typically you say, I'm not going to listen to metal on my own. I'm not going to seek it out. Yeah. That's how I just, I can't do it. But Bo Burnham, for some reason, I've just always been a fan of him.

Dude, I was shocked, shocked when you texted me at how much you love this because, you know, like I just, usually you don't like this kind of stuff. But there was a level of like, you know, it was a very, you know, so the comedy special is called Insight. side. Yeah. And, you know, he basically we got to see his creative process being locked up in his house, you know, during the pandemic last year, right? That's when he filmed it. This is just a little, I don't even think this is his house, dude. He's actually used the space quite a bit. So it's like his recording space or something? It's something. I don't, yeah, he rinse it out, I think, from time to time. But he actually in one of his stand-up specials from a few years back, he does this thing where he walks out, he walks behind stage and opens a door and he walks in and

guess what, it's the same freaking room from inside. And he sits down on his piano and starts playing. So anyways, I don't know if he actually owns this space, but yeah. And the whole thing was I'm trapped here, basically locked down, whatever. I'm going to get started on my next comedy special and I'm just going to record it on my own. That was the premise of the special. And yeah, I mean, I think he won some awards for this. Yeah, he better. Because he's, It was just, it was genius, right? Anyway, there's just something about the, something we could all relate to, you know what I mean?

Right. Watching him, watching his struggle, trying to piece this thing together. The topics that he would talk about. He is a dead ringer sometimes for Weird Al, dude. Like his, his, he's definitely our generation's weird owl, I would think. Yeah, I'd say that for sure. But anyway, I don't know, I just have a soft spot for, for Bo.

You know, I remember seeing his videos on YouTube a long, long time ago. Right. we couldn't figure out what song to play though like we need to we need to figure this out right now dude because i think so the the song that blew me away was that funny feeling which is because it was a more serious track it was a serious song and the lyrics are i mean really really smart and clever singing about like just ironic things that that happen all the time around us and it's just like do we not see the irony here like that kind of stuff he all of his His lyrics are very, very smart.

He's a super smart dude. Yeah, yeah. But let's go, let's go more funny, dude. That's more reflective of the special. Yeah. All right, well, let's figure out what song we're going to play. But first, we'll just say, well, mind the people here. Follow us on Instagram, all that good stuff, at No Filler Podcast.

You can find us on the Pantheon podcast network. That's Pantheon podcast.com. And, of course, use No Filler 15 at checkout on T.STA. com if you want 15% off your order. There we go. So yeah, that's it, man. We'll pick this all up again next year like we were saying. And what did you, did you figure it out in the last 10 seconds queue? Let's just fade out with Welcome to the internet. Okay. Welcome to the internet was a standout track, I think. Yeah. And you know what? We all live on the internet. So yeah, we'll fade out with that. Bill Burnham's welcome to the internet from his comedy special inside. And,

That's a wrap on 2021, dude. We'll see you guys next year. Get it. All right, man. So thank you, as always, for listening. My name is Quentin. My name is Travis. Y'all take care.

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