Blog: Student Loans For Beer Money

Taking Back Sunday released 4 studio albums before their newest one "New Again." Everyone and anyone who was ever a teenager with a chemical imbalance (myself included) remembers such Taking Back Sunday hits like "Cute Without The E" or "Decade Under The Influence" or "There's No I In Team" or any of the other songs in their bevy of moody emo-pop classics. Their last album "Louder Now" was the last to feature their SECOND back-up singer. It was decent, it had some decent songs and it even attracted mainstream listeners. So the question of the hour is whether or not [...]

I have it. First impressions are that it is really shitty. I figure I'll post a review later. It's another rock opera... great?

Think of 20 albums that had such a profound effect on you they changed your life or the way you looked at it. They sucked you in and took you over for days, weeks, months, years. These are the albums that you can use to identify time, places, people, emotions. These are the albums that no matter what they were thought of musically shaped your world. When you finish, tag 20 others, including me. Make sure you copy and paste this part so they know the drill. *I got tagged in this, so I figured what the hell. [...]

UPDATE: Yeah, so I've spent ANOTHER week listening to Bomb The Music Industry's newest CD, "Scrambles," and I've actually grown quite fond of it. It's a challenging CD, but there's so much in it that you don't catch on the first listen that it's becoming one of my favorites from BTMI. Check it out if you wished "Album Minus Band" wasn't pieced together in an afternoon on Garageband. Also funny anecdote about "Scrambles." Rosenstock, forever a lazy asshole, recorded it in roughly 14 days because of plug-in demos he was trying out for free. He had [...]

As you may infer from my adorable title, I don't like Bomb The Music Industry's newest CD "Scrambles." I've sat on this feeling for a few days now, because I wanted to make sure there was no possible way to redeem it in my eyes. There wasn't. It's garbage. BTMI's last release "Get Warmer" was an unbelievably strong culmination of the noise/folk/ska/meth Bruce Springsteen sound front man Jeff Rosenstock had been working with on Garageband alone blown out huge in a studio. "Get Warmer" was eccletic without being outdated, it was harsh but still painted beautiful [...]

(*I wrote this for the 2/12 Hofstra Chronicle. I wanted to post it now though for timeliness.) Sunday night there was a domestic disturbia involving Chris Brown and Rihanna. According to police Chris Brown was all like " kiss, kiss me baby" and Rihanna was like " Shut up and drive ." Rumors were that Chris Brown thought she was being unfaithful . Things then escalated and Mr. Brown began throwing her from wall to wall . He then threw her from the car, screaming " Run it! " Ms. Rihanna [...]

New Found Glory's new CD leaked. A whopping full month before it's intended release. I have the leak, I'm not sure if it's the real deal, but it sounds it. I guess Wikipedia needs to be updated: "They... said that they would try to keep this record quiet for as long as possible, because they didn't want people to hear the songs before the March 2009 release." I've been waiting for this one for a long time, since hearing that not only were they going back into the studio after "Tip Of The Iceberg," which I [...]

I meant to write more about this a week ago when I first got the album, but I've been indisposed and just didn't have the time to wax on about it (Translation: Just way too lazy. There was a Powerpuff Girls marathon on). You, Me, And Everyone We Know put out their "So Young, So Insane EP" in November, but it sadly slipped under my radar. Both their releases, "So Young, So Insane" and "Party For The Grown And Sexy" were both released for free, but for limited times only. This was just the first of many things [...]

You, Me, And Everyone album, "So Young, So Insane" is absolutely terrific.

Driver F is a band I came across by accident the other day and since then they have been all I've been listening to. They're terrific, their CD reminds me of how I felt the first time I heard a Brand New CD or Starting Line CD. My favorite thing about them, though, is they fact they have a trumpet and a trombone. They aren't ska, or even remotely close, but the sound of a trumpet and a trombone still wreck havoc on my nostalgic head when I hear them. Another terrific thing about Driver F [...]

I repeat myself. What the fuck is a Lady Gaga? I first heard about her a year ago and wrote her off as a MIA, Estelle wannabe. Something about the influx of really tan (or possibly black...? I'm never sure) 20 year old women in Urban Outfitters clothing sing-rapping with a British accent... or vocoder breeds marginalization. After a heinous couple months of ironically-not-for-irony shutter shade releases-- things have filtered out and each singer has kind of their own thing going on, I suppose. Actually upon further reflection I feel like Katie Perry belongs in there too. [...]

Jesse Lacey is an asshole. That is a known fact. Like the way you know that spring will come has the same certainty as the fact that Jesse Lacey will do something that is completely unreasonable and dickish. First he went crazy, completely ditched any semblance of the music sound that made "Brand New" famous and created a break through album that actually did better than their first... commercially. While recording their third album, he went crazy again, threw away 9 demo songs that were absolutely terrific, and made a shoegaze album. A lot of frontmen [...]

I watched "The Fall" yesterday. For a simple explanation of what the fuck I was watching, consult the equation below: "Little Miss Sunshine" (-Greg Kinnear) + "Big Fish" (-Lot's of gay stuff) + Brand New Spike Jonze Gay stuff + The good parts of "League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen" = "The Fall" Here's a weird clip, completely out of context to give you an idea of what a brain enema it actually is.

New Music Dump! All American Rejects - "When The World Comes Down" 2 Stars It's alright in doses. Most of the tracks are garbage, but the singles alright, like if you're really drunk or something. I'd suggest the album for people who think new Weezer is too inaccessible. The rest of the album just kinda sounds like really crappy party rock. The ballads are pretty miserable themselves too. And once again, the mystery of what exactly the bass is doing is still a live and strong. This Town Needs Guns - "Animals" 3 1/2 Stars Terrific [...]

I often like to raid Myspace for new bands in the already beaten horse corpse that is the pop punk/emo/screamo/mo/core/core scene to see what kids are trying out to revive a clearly destroyed section of music. One band I've kept my eye on just because I like a few of things they are trying out is "Attack Attack!" To describe their sound, its kind of like they poured the white stuff at the bottom of a bunch of different glasses of milk into one glass, making this weird hodgepodge of crap other bands do a lot better. [...]

I got the new Fall Out Boy album a couple weeks ago. I've been sitting on saying anything for a while... It's decent... sorta... Like it's just kinda stale and really, really, outrageous. I was going to write a whole huge thing about Fall Out Boy from "Take This To My Grave" to "Folie A Deux" and what's changed (answer: everything) and what hasn't (kitschy lyrics that are kind of puns, but aren't), but I just kinda decided it wasn't worth it. You can listen to it for yourselves, see what you think...

"Day And Age," by The Killers has done something that I really didn't think they could do again and that's surprise me. "Hot Fuss" was pretty cookie cutter synth pop and then they come out with "Sam's Town" and boom! they not only sound like a 'real' band, they fucking sound like a 'real' good band. Who knew? Apparently, nobody because every nerdy white guy critic this side of XXL magazine jumped in screaming about the second coming of Bruce Springstein like the minute "Sam's Town" closed, we'd all be raptured up to heartland rock heaven. Their third [...]

For anyone with an X and Y chromosome "Twilight" is something of a mystery. When early trailers for it aired on television, I quickly dismissed the movie, knowing nothing about it, and thinking it was just like every other teen movie about some moody dude and some bookwormish girl falling in love or something. I had seen vampires in it and shrugged it off thinking "oh boy, what has Hollywood concocted this time?" It looked like "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" mixed with "Dracula." Anyone unfamiliar with any of it would judge it simply by the sum of its parts [...]

Bring Me The Horizon's first album "Count Your Blessings" was outrageous. Goblin screams created from overdubbing vocalist Oliver Sykes' squeals and lows together ride above and in between incredibly heavy throwdown guitar parts and over the top fantasy metal guitar solos throughout the whole album. If you haven't heard BMTH, chances are you have no God damn idea what I'm talking about. BMTH (as they will be called from here on out, maybe until the end, just to add a sense of drama or something, because their name is way to fucking long) quickly became the Backstreet Boys [...]

It's a safe bet you've heard the singles. It's a safer bet you said "what the fuck am I listening to?" when you heard them. I have a full review of "808s & Heartbreak" on the way, but what I've really been itching to do is get some things off my chest concerning Mr. West's discography. The first full album I grabbed from West was "Graduation" last year. I had always loved his singles (before they were over played into oblivion). The album evolved for me into becoming my favorite "complete" hip hop record. When I say complete [...]