albums i listened to all the way through

posted this week and every week (9)

Mar 30, 2025

Good afternoon fellow music lovers and curious bystanders,

I’ll be honest. I fell into a pretty serious Robber Robber phase this week, thanks to Thomas Morra’s insistence. He assured me in our Zoom meeting last Sunday that if I liked Sonic Youth, Robber Robber would be the perfect fit for my ears. He was totally on the money with that recommendation. I must have listened to their newest album Wild Guess five times this past week. I suggest you all do the same if you’re looking for some fresh finds that will blow your mind. (Also, go read his write-up on this incredible band and the insane game of musical chairs that is their friend group.)

On that note, we spent an hour talking about the current Burlington, Vermont music scene, which of course includes Robber Robber and other favorites like Lily Seabird, Brunch, the Greg Freeman Band, and Lutalo. One day, someone will write the book or make the documentary on this special group of musicians. We’ll look back on them the way we look back on Laurel Canyon and the East Village in the 60s and 70s.

Perhaps a better comparison might be the Elephant 6 collective from Ruston, Louisiana and Athens, Georgia led by Neutral Milk Hotel, The Apples in Stereo, and The Olivia Tremor Control. Three words could easily describe both scenes—small, incestuous, and ridiculously transformative. (Okay, so maybe four. I needed that adverb to communicate how life changing this music is, okay?)

This new obsession means I’ve had to push listening to the new Lucy Dacus and Japanese Breakfast albums to this first week of April. If this weekly album series has shown me anything, it’s that the careful listening approach often means taking music in as it comes, rather than feeling the pressure to join the desperate rat race and be the first one to listen at midnight on release day.

It’s funny. For all Gen Z says about our perpetual longing for a pre-digital existence, we still revel in the instant gratification of midnight releases on Spotify and Apple Music. We get upset when the pre-ordered vinyl records, CDs, and cassettes from our favorite artists don’t arrive exactly when they are supposed to. Even if we don’t actually have the technology to play that physical media, we can always count on the streaming release to keep up with the Joneses by posting about our favorite new song on our Instagram stories.

In other words, we constantly feel the need to look coooool or smart or funny or girlypop or whatever the fuck.

Many Gen Z and millennial-aged artists have perfected this process, Taylor Swift being dominant among them. I’m all for artists promoting their work by any means necessary, but if I get one more text message from Lucy Dacus’ record label about this new album, I will commit arson. Seriously. I thought Gen Z was the generation that cringed at the the very idea of double texting. Yet, here are we are, being force fed regurgitated marketing texts and algorithmically generated “New Release” playlists like we’re baby birds still stuck in the nest.

Well—some of us, maybe.

On that note, I saw a video from that subway take guy where this twenty-something had the audacity to say sharing memes and sending music to your friends is practically emotional cheating. I had to blink a few times to reboot my hardware because my brain short-circuited. If we’re following that logic, I’m emotionally cheating on everyone I know with *gasp* everyone I know.

Look, I’m not trying to call her out specifically. I’ve got enough internalized misogyny to unpack for six lifetimes. It’s not about her. I think this is more a symptom of being chronically online and taking relationship advice from trad wives on TikTok. It’s just, you know, I hate to say it, but for all the Gen Z defending I do to Gen X’ers and Boomers on a daily basis, my peers are giving me nothing in return. They are literally killing my brain cells and stepping on my feet with their too-long, baggy jeans and grungy adidas sambas.

I love you all, I do. I just need you to pay your taxes for a couple of years, read anything nonfiction, and get on your own healthcare plan. Maybe, then, we’ll talk. Just know—cynicism grows exponentially. We’re too young to be this fucked up.

Anyway—I’ve felt like a pretty lousy gay person this release season. I’ll admit it. I don’t totally love the Lucy Dacus singles on this new album. They just didn’t immediately grab me the way the Historian and Home Video singles did. However, I’m open to letting them grow over me like ivy. No, really! I am!

I mean, did she, alongside Phoebe Bridgers, sort of sell-out? Debatable. Can sellouts still make good music? Sure. I may be a snob, but I’m no party traitor. We gotta support our own! Southern queers rise up!

This week, I will give Forever Is A Feeling a proper listen and be open to the prospect of enjoying it. If anything else, the fact that several songs on it are sapphic love songs about Julien Baker (the hottest guitar-wielding lesbian to ever exist) is enough to keep the romantic in me coming back every single time.

Here are the albums I listened to all the way through this past week:

Wild Guess (2024) by Robber Robber~X
Wonderful Rainbow (2003) by Lightning Bolt~
Watch Me Drive Them Dogs Wild (2024) by Merce Lemon
1000 Variations on the Same Song (2025) by Frog

(As a side note, I really liked the Lighting Bolt album and also recommend it if you have a burning passion for noise rock and/or a true dedication to all things rhythm section.)