New Post!: Colin Parker's Candlenights Gift For Me

NOFX

So there's a holiday started by the McElroy brothers (of MBMBAM/The Adventure Zone/etc fame) called Candlenights and a couple of groups I'm in do Candlenights gift exchanges. One such Candlenights exchange got me a gift from Colin M Parker (The Podboss of The Scavengers Network) where he counted down the Top 5 songs from our friendship and I'm going to share that show with you right now! Enjoy! (I'll post the Countdown


Colin's Candlenights Gift to Me (Top 5 Songs of Our Friendship)

***Featuring***
The Ataris
blink-182
MxPx
NOFX
The Wonder Years

New Countdown!: June 2019!

Billie Eilish

We're entering summer and the artist picture for this month could not be more appropriate, as you'll find out! Enjoy!


Countdown #406

***Featuring***
AJR
The Ataris
Billie Eilish
The Black Keys
Cage the Elephant
Catfish & the Bottlemen
Half Alive
The Head and the Heart
The Lumineers
Mumford & Sons
Of Monsters & Men
Oliver Tree
Panic! At the Disco
SHAED
twentyonepilots

Special Countdown: 12 Years of Last.fm (Part 2) (#40-#31)

Lagwagon

In lieu of the last episode for May, here's another part of the countdown of my most listened-to artists according to Last.fm for the period of 2/14/06-2/14/18. 12 Years and I'm counting them down.


12 Years of Last.fm (Part 2)

***Featuring***
The Ataris
Ben Folds Five
Death Cab For Cutie
Foo Fighters
Jimmy Eat World
Lagwagon
Paramore
Rocky Votolato
Taking Back Sunday
Weezer
Yellowcard

New Countdown: Rock Against [Insert Name Here]

Walk the Moon

Hey! It's a new countdown this week with some new punk rock bonus songs and maybe even some new songs on the countdown! Who knows?!??? :-D

Enjoy :)


Countdown #375

***Featuring***
AJR featuring Rivers Cuomo
Alice Merton
The Ataris
Foster the People
Imagine Dragons
The Killers
lovelytheband
Moon Taxi
Muse
Pennywise
Portugal. The Man
Walk the Moon

One Year, 100 Albums: #6 The Ataris "End is Forever"

The Ataris End is Forever, 2001

This is, if the list is to be believed, my favorite pop-punk album. And I think that, outside of the list,  it's certainly way up near the top.

I had first heard The Ataris on the Life in the Fat Lane Fat Wreck Chords comp. The song was "San Dimas High School Football Rules" and, if you've ever heard that song, you'll agree, it's one of the greatest pop-punk songs of all times.

So I tracked down the Fat Wreck Chords EP that had that song on it: Look Forward to Failure and I got some songs on Napster and I tracked down the Kung Fu Records album that song on it: Blue Skies, Broken Hearts, Next 12 Exits. And I absorbed it all. All the frustration and longing and anger and humor of being a teenager who was constantly wanting girls but never wanted by them was there.

Then I heard that they had a new album coming soon: End is Forever.

I often think that New Found Glory's Sticks and Stones was the first pop-punk album I ever eagerly anticipated, but that's not entirely right. It was the first album I ever eagerly anticipated with other people.

I eagerly anticipated End is Forever 100% on my own. And that first time I put it in my Discman was GLORIOUS. Actually, I can't think of a time that I've played this album and not been moved. Something about the heartfelt lyrics, fast pace, and clips from Clerks and Good Will Hunting make for a nearly perfect pop-punk experience.

The Ataris - I.O.U. One Galaxy
The Ataris - Fast Times at Drop-out High

You can buy End is Forever at Amazon, Amazon MP3, and iTunes

Three things!

1. There are still several spots left on the mix CD I'm making. Don't be shy :) It's going to be fun! I've used my random integer generator (well it's not mine, but I use it when I need random numbers) to generate my two letters. Should I tell you what they are? ;-)

2. So, apparently, Bob Dylan is going to be releasing an album on April 28th (in America) called Together Through Life. Awesome :) Modern Times was so good and I'm hoping this is just as awesome. It seems like it just randomly showed up, though. I kind of like that though, it's like a nice little surprise.

3. Warped Tour this year. I'm pretty sure my sister doesn't read this (or know about it), so I feel confident that I won't be giving anything away if I spill the beans on here. It's my sister's 15th birthday on 4/1 and I thought it would be a fun gift to give her tickets to her first Warped Tour (and really first concert). So that's the plan. So, here is a list of the bands scheduled to play that I'm excited to see (of course the list of dates that these bands are playing hasn't been posted yet, so it might be that some of the following won't be there at our venue.

*Anti-Flag
*Bad Religion
*Big D and the Kids Table (I've actually only heard a couple of songs by these guys, but I like what I hear and hey, it's a nice Boston ska band, what more can you ask for?)
*Bouncing Souls
*Escape the Fate (a buddy of mine just turned me on to these guys. The song "We Won't Back Down" is one of my current jams (and I would post it here, but I'm typing from my bedroom and the portable hard drive is in my office. If you can't find it, email me and I'll see that you get it)
*Flogging Molly
*Less than Jake (they WILL play "Scott Farcas Takes it On the Chin" this time or I swear to God, they'll regret it. No, I'm not making a threat. It's just that this will be like the 5th or 6th time seeing them and they've NEVER played it and I REALLY want them to!)
*NOFX
*Streetlight Manifesto
*The Ataris
*Thrice

The other thing is, unless they've changed the way they do it, they pick the schedule for each venue the morning of the show, so it could be that there are conflicts that will prevent me from seeing some of those. Also, my sister has bands that she wants to see that aren't listed above. So I'm hoping to get a good post out of this. And some good sibling bonding :)

A More Creative Title Perhaps? (More Voting, Random Thoughts, Mixes)

Perhaps not.

I've reached another point in my blogging where I am a bit behind and so I have all these things that I want to talk about and they're just overloading me and then I don't blog so they build up more and more and more. So I'm going to attempt to get them all down. Or at least most of them.

Round 1F!!!

1.The Beatles vs. Taking Back Sunday

The Beatles - I've Got a Feeling from Let It Be

Taking Back Sunday - Spin from Louder Now

2. Lagwagon vs. The Ataris

Lagwagon - Automatic from Resolve
The Ataris - Not Capable of Love from Welcome the Night


In other news, I've been making and receiving lots of mixes from all over the world. I guess this salvo began with Andy coming up for a visit bearing the latest installment in a series of mixes we've been doing for a year or so.
Here's a song from that:
The Decemberists - Oceanside
I also received a mix from Wayne as part of Anna's Mix CD exchange. The theme this time was "Sub 3-minute songs" and Wayne's mix was eclectic and yet it fit together like a jigsaw puzzle.

Here's a song from that:

The Housemartins - Happy Hour

and here's a song that quotes that song and I never knew it!

Barenaked Ladies - Hello City from Gordon


And then I received not one, but TWO mixes from Anna which are both based on Lost (one a little more than the other) which is just amazing and it made me want to skip out on work and just go home and watch Lost DVD's

A song for waking up in the hatch. :)
Mama Cass Elliot - Make Your Own Kind of Music

Oh, also, I got a USB record player and have, so far, ripped two LP's and I'm fairly pleased. The second album, Sly and the Family Stone's Fresh was rather frustrating because it has all these little hops in it that I didn't notice when it was recording (because I was in the other room...)

But here's a song that isn't bad.

Sly and the Family Stone - In Time from Fresh


And finally, you should go check out The Hold Steady and My Morning Jacket's new albums:

The Hold Steady - Ask Her For Adderall from Stay Positive
My Morning Jacket - Aluminum Park from Evil Urges