Show more

๐ŸŽง Motorpsycho, "Kingdom of Oblivion". Some afternoon psych-prog from Norway. Their albums are like little journeys - take off, ascent, cruising altitude, descent, and landing. Great band, and don't let the "prog" deter you - these guys are a fun listen. Killer riffs and deep grooves.

๐ŸŽง Rocket From The Tombs, "Rocket Redux". RFTT was the best "proto-punk" band on the mid-70s Cleveland scene. Re-formed in 2003, they finally recorded a clutch of their best songs for this album. In between RFTT stints, David Thomas, Cheetah Chrome, Craig Bell et al went on to form three of the mid-70s most important bands: Pere Ubu, Dead Boys, and Saucers. We all know "Sonic Reducer" but "Amphetamine" is one of my all time favorite songs. .

๐ŸŽง Quantic Soul Orchestra, "Stampede". This is the funk/jazz full band project of DJ/Producer Will Holland. If Fela Kuti walked into a funk jam session, it might sound like this. It might not. There are a lot of ethno-music theories being tossed around here, but the grooves are solid and the feeling is loose. This works in the living room or on the dance floor.

๐ŸŽง Supreme Beings of Leisure, "11I". I don't know, can you listen to SBL on a Thursday work-morning? Seems like more of a post-rave Saturday night thing - when the drugs are fading and the reality of Sunday hasn't kicked in. Geri Soriano's voice works any time for me. "Rescue me from these everyday fires" is a choice lyric. This record has aged really well.

๐ŸŽงPool Kids, โ€œI Hope Youโ€™re Rightโ€. PK is one of my top bands right now. They integrate twisty guitar/bass parts into their indie rock foundation. Their new single has dropped ahead of a July LP. This new stuff is a leap forward for them, and they arenโ€™t chucking musicianship in favor of sugaring things up. Yeah the harmonies are sweet but the music is muscular. Check out all of their releases (all streamers). Video is here: youtu.be/2Ky9eXEjlhY.

๐ŸŽง WEEN, "The Pod". Say what you will, but when WEEN was at the peak of their Scotchgard-huffing, nose-thumbing madness, they were masters of a dozen genres. The lo-fi recordings were a smoke screen (listen to "The Mollusk" LP for proof), they always knew exactly what they were doing - they just didn't have the desire to wait for a bored record industry to catch up. If "GodWeenSatan" is their opening salvo, this may be their manifesto.

๐ŸŽง King Crimson, "Three of a Perfect Pair". Meetings are over for the day and now back to the music. Just an absolute monster of a record and what was supposed to be Robert Fripp's second final word on KC. This is the work of a group that already knew the end was nigh and played with such controlled recklessness you had to wonder if they were putting you on. The entire second side is a seminar on post-rock experimentalism. I love it.

๐ŸŽง The Tubes, "Young and Rich". Top five bands I wish I'd been old enough to see live when they were a thing. Wrapped inside the kooky stage show and the cultural references were some serious musical chops. Fee Waybill had zero vocal range, but the instrumentalists were all major players. Long live The Tubes!

๐ŸŽง Maggie Gently, "Peppermint". Another example of a band recommending another band. I got this via the singer of the band Biitchseat. Maggie is based in SanFran. Her songs toggle between emo, pop, and power pop. There are some big, sweeping emotions on this one. Always thrilled to discover another "new-to-me" artist.

๐ŸŽง Metric, "Fantasies". I was talking with the band J Graves the other day (they are amazing btw) and they mentioned Metric as an influence. I remember where I was when I first heard the song "Gimme Sympathy" ("Who would you rather be/The Beatles or The Rolling Stones" is a great hook). So I dialed up this 2009 album to start the day.

And there I am with my 10 and 13 yo. cheering on and high-fiving other revelers and thinking "how could ANYONE hate this." Everyone is smiling. Every major company in town and (by my count) 9 churches have contingents of hundreds representing them in the parade. This is unity. This is love. This is inclusion. This is a red-state city sending a message. Right? +

(Parade photo Lars Miller Photography)

Believe it or not, Indianapolis has one of the largest and heavily attended pride events in the country. We havenโ€™t had one in two years but tomorrow the event returns in full force with a two hour parade and all day/night festival and concert. PMy company is one of the larger corporate sponsors and me and my fam will be there showing our ally colors. Looking forward to something fun and hopefully the assholes will stay home. Happy Pride Month!!

Good friends of mine run a streaming radio station that serves the Indiana music community. I finally talked them into doing a โ€œnon-localโ€ show and they asked me to sit in. We may play a lot of very cool indie music or we may get drunk and eat burgers. It will be entertaining either way. Links and info in the photo.

๐ŸŽง Danielle Ponder, "The Only Way Out". This gets 5 "Holy Cows". ๐Ÿ„ ๐Ÿ„ ๐Ÿ„ ๐Ÿ„ ๐Ÿ„ What a voice!

๐ŸŽง The Complete Stax/Volt Singles 1959-1968 (Vol. 7). You can start anywhere randomly in this massive 9 volume 200+ song set and feel your soul being enlightened (and your other parts, too).

๐ŸŽง Summerbruise, "The View Never Changes". Indy had a pretty good music scene for a while. It's completely de-evolved now. But a couple of really good bands remain. Summerbruise is one. I don't like to "genre-fy" music. There are two genres IMHO, "good" and "shit". Summerbruise is a good band. And they've been doing what they do for a long time - fun, thoughtful, smart rock songs, maybe "emo" but don't let that deter you. This new release is well worth 24 of your minutes.

๐ŸŽง New singles from CUSP and Pinkshift. CUSP (Chicago) lay out a sweet blueprint for indie rock, it's smart and a little witty. Big churning guitars and good melodies. Pinkshift (Baltimore) is basically the gold standard for punk-pop right now. Lead singer Ashrita Kumar is the quintessential angry Gen-Z front person. As the kids say, the songs are bangers.

Show more

MP Cavalier

CounterSocial is the first Social Network Platform to take a zero-tolerance stance to hostile nations, bot accounts and trolls who are weaponizing OUR social media platforms and freedoms to engage in influence operations against us. And we're here to counter it.