It Could Be Nice(r)
🔀 Shuffle Sundays #88 • Pool Kids, Chet Faker, The Wonder Years, Anthony Gerace, and more!
Hey there!
📸 I recently released a pack of wallpapers with some of my favorite photos I took in NYC over the years, and I’m really excited with the results. If you’re looking for new wallpapers for your phone, especially for the newly redesigned iOS 16 lock screen, you won’t wanna miss this out:
💽 » Pool Kids, by Pool Kids
emo / rock • 12 songs • 47 minutes
If you enjoyed the album I recommended on SS #83, this week’s album will hit the spot one more time. Pool Kids are a Florida-based rock band, and their sophomore self-titled record was a delightful surprise right at the beginning of the first track.
Mixing math and art rock into emo and alternative rock, the 12 tracks are an emotional ride through raw, sentimental, and intimate lyrics discussing trauma, romantic relationships, disillusionment, and more.
As someone who grew up listening to a lot of pop-punk, I’m really enjoying (re)discovering this whole new side of emo.
🎶 » It Could Be Nice, by Chet Faker
The newest single from singer-songwriter Chet Faker, aka Nick Murphy, has everything that a fan of his music could ask for: delicious electronic synth beats paired with Faker’s own soothing vocals in an almost hypnotic way. A new album is still to be announced, but I hope it’s on its way!
🎶 » Old Friends Like Lost Teeth, The Wonder Years
Continuing on the pop-punk/emo train, Old Friends Like Lost Teeth is one of the many great tracks of The Wonder Years’ recently released 7th studio album The Hum Goes on Forever. Even though the band has been playing together for almost two decades, it was only recently that I got into their music. I guess it’s never too late, right?
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🧩 » Random Bits
📸 • The Lay of the Land is a beautiful part-memoir part-photography book by the young landscape and portrait photographer Joe Greer;
📺 • Ended up enjoying A League of Their Own much more than I was expecting;
🔀 • ICYMI: an album recommended by a Shuffle Sundays reader.
⚡️ Visual Inspiration
Anthony Gerace is a UK-based artist and illustrator whose Photography and collage function less as concrete mediums than as elements in an evolving methodology geared toward the exploration of historicity, the passage of time, and the experience of being outside of oneself. Check out his website or Instagram for more. Here are some favorites:
🎶 » New Music
this week’s new albums I'm curious to check out
Also, new singles from The 1975, Nuven, Dingo, Planet Hemp, and many more. If you’re curious to hear some of these songs and more, make sure to follow my 2022 playlist on Spotify, updated weekly with new releases:
Thank you for introducing me to Pool Kids! They're great!
The Wonder Years were new to me, but I loved the video so will have to do a bit more digging on their back catalogue. (Pool Kids next.)
Might have to check out the wallpapers as well, especially given these hit my inbox while I was sitting compiling a 'top five NY bands' list, for a future chapter of my music themed novel, serialised at https://challenge69.substack.com
The list I settled on was:
5) QTY, 4) Television, 3) Velvet Underground, 2) Talking Heads, and 1) The Strokes (just can't get more New York than them!) - what would yours be?
If it's a list that resonates with you, then please consider giving my book a try, I think you'd love it.
Tim