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Hey tyler hopefully this doesnât violate some PI.FYI golden rule
But after nearly two years of writing, editing and arguing, my book about the EP is coming out in May and can be preordered here:
https://hozacrecords.com/product/aifl/
The book is about the origins, history and cultural impact of the EP since these little objects first started coming out in the 50s.
Over 50 of my music biz friends then helped me shape the list and review the top 200 ever released, according to us (ha).
For those of you who are into this kind of geekery/snobbery, I canât wait to hear what you think. A labor of love, as all books are! â¤ď¸
Mar 27, 2024
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Shameless self promotion alert -- my new book (published by the good folks at HoZac) is officially out on Friday and some of the advance press is now starting to land, which is fun to see. (You can order it here, if you're so inclined: https://hozacrecords.com/product/aifl/)
Our friends at Flood Magazine were among the first to write it up and decided to feature a book about EPs by.... posting a playlist of some of my/contributors' favorite songs from their favorite EPs. Sounds about right!
"His new book An Ideal for Living: A Celebration of the EP, both makes a case for the formatâs legitimacy and backs that claim up with a fairly bulletproof top-25 EPs list for every decade dating back to the 1950s. From the Joy Division release referenced in the bookâs title to the iconic Simon & Garfunkel collection depicted on the bookâs cover and well beyond, duBrowa is intent on helping readers understand the value of these truncated tracklists as being much more than an afterthought in an artistâs oeuvre."
BONUS POINTS FOR THE USE OF THE WORD OEUVRE. :)
May 30, 2024
One of my favorite books about music. Checks all the boxes for me.
Here's the official blurb:
SELLOUT: The Major Label Feeding Frenzy That Swept Punk, Emo, and Hardcore (1994-2007)
The stories of 11 bands and their major label debut albums, including:
Green Day, Jawbreaker, Jimmy Eat World, Blink-182, At the Drive-In, The Donnas, Thursday, The Distillers, My Chemical Romance, Rise Against, Against Me!
Feb 2, 2024
Wanted to talk about this album a little because I just bought AG Cook tickets and I am so excited to see him live again. Maybe there is some bias here, but Iâm not an actual music journalist so yeah, Iâm going with my opinions.Â
AG Cook is a pioneer to modern electronic music, and laid a lot of groundwork for what is now understood as modern hyperpop. Before hyperpop, it was PC Music, the label made under his creative expertise, housing artists that took on this electronic, avant-garde approach to their music that wasnât really being seen anywhere else. PC Music was both an actual music label, but also served as a genre title for artists like SOPHIE, Hannah Diamond, Danny L Harle, amongst many. PC Music kind of birthed 100 gecs and a lot of modern âhyperpopâ artists.
Britpop is Cook's 3rd studio album having been released in May 2024. Note that a few months prior the official PC Music accounts announced that the label was not going to continue on with releasing music, and would only continue to be around for archival purposes. I could get into maybe why this is the case, but to put it shortly I think that Cook and other high ups involved with PCMus figured that this niche style of music has begun to go mainstream, so they were not necessarily the hub that housed and promoted all of the artists of this style. And sometimes, good things just need to come to an end. PCMus was never the same after the unfortunate passing of SOPHIE, but its resident artists continue to create and release fantastic, boundary-pushing pop music.
Though this whole record, isnât really Britpop by definition, a genre of the 90s in the UK that was led by the likes of Blur, Oasis, Pulp and Suede - an alternative rock sound that pulled influence from the 1960s sound that was defined by the Beatles. It also was a direct response to the rise in Grunge in the US. Perhaps an electronic approach is a new way of understanding britpop in an even fresher way, when bands in the 90s took from the 60s, now in the 2020s we are taking from the 90s. I think you could argue thereâs some of that influence in this record.
This nearly 2 hour long record is noisy in the best ways, dizzying and almost magical. Cook does a great job at building soundscapes, and there are universes that exist within the Britpop album. Some notable tracks is the title track âBritpopâ that features vocals from none other that Charli xcx, a longtime collaborator and friend to Cook. (I could write a whole post on their growth and dynamic as a duo. Soon!!) Other tracks that stand out to me was the almost sugary sound of Crescent Sun, which may or may not be my favorite track on the album, despite only being the 5th track of a 24 track album. It builds up beautifully and crescendos in a way that feels fully realized. It was an incredible song to hear live as well, I might add. Some other notable tracks would be Heartache, Serenade, Greatly, Bewitched, and Lucifer. There is definitely a narrative in this album, which is why it is laid out into 3 discs, Past, Present and Future. Starting out with a classic sound expected of Cook or any PCMus adjacent artist, this past sound is something we are familiar with- but it does not feel like it has been overdone. The Present disc shows the most britpop influences, having a very grunge-esque, rock sound to it, using a lot of guitar. The Future disc moves back into a more understood and evolved idea of what Cook's signature sound is, and what the PC Music legacy really is.Â
In whole this album takes a lot from his previous two albums, but utilizes his signature style in a way that feels much more cohesive as an entire album.
I donât hesitate to say that AG Cook is one of the greatest producers in our lifetime, and his work is seen across many artists and genres, and his own personal projects prove his status as legendary time and time again. I had the pleasure of catching one of his sets at the SF Electronic/Dance music festival - âPortolaâ and it was one of the highlights of my weekend. I was super excited to hear he announced a standalone show in San Francisco, I already secured my tickets. If you havenât listened to any of Cookâs personal projects, I highly recommend it. If you stumbled upon Charli xcx through BRAT, AG Cook is essential listening if you want to dive more into her sonic universe and the people that orbit within it.Â
5d ago
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âSongs Of a Lost Worldâ coming to a goth listening station near you Nov 1 đ¤
The fr FW Me Friday the 13th the world was looking for
Sep 14, 2024
I will fail to explain just how much this band meant to me in the 90s.
So I will borrow from AV Club who did a fine job of distilling it:
âUnwound is the best band of the â90s. Not just because of how prolific, consistent, and uncompromising it was, but because of how perfectly Unwound nested in a unique space between some of the most vital forms of music that decade: punk, post-rock, indie rock, post-hardcore, slow-core, and experimental noise. That jumble of subgenres doesnât say much; in fact, it falls far short of what Unwound truly synthesized and stood for. Unwound stood for Unwound. But in a decade where most bands were either stridently earnest or stridently ironic, Unwound wasnât stridently anything. It was only itself. In one sense Unwound was the quietest band of the â90s, skulking around like a nerdy terror cell. In another sense it was the loudest, sculpting raw noise into contorted visions of inner turmoil and frustration.â
R.I.P. Vern Rumsey.
This is their finest song, from their finest album.
I really canât say enough about the sheer bloody minded genius of this group. đ¤
Mar 23, 2024
Oct 4, 2024