anodynes & antigens

(Source: Spotify)

When I recall my most insane high school experiences, it’s difficult to untangle what truly happened, what seems retrospectively plausible, and what I pretend to remember in my mind. No film has ever combined those three realities as adroitly as Dazed and Confused. But that’s not something you can realize by watching it once. Mythology requires repetition.

—“Dazed and Confused: Not So Long Ago, But Very Far Away” by Chuck Klosterman

The amount of the gas in the air has not been this high for at least three million years, and scientists believe the rise portends large changes in the climate and sea level.

(Source: Spotify)

Swedish indie folk group Junip release their self-titled second album on April 23 via Mute. The trio features acclaimed Swedish-Argentine singer-songwriter José González. He describes the theme of the record as “finding that hopeful feeling between the lines” during “those life-changing moments that shake people up.”

Yo La Tengo: Still ‘Around,’ Thank God

February 26, 2013 Ira Kaplan, Georgia Hubley and James McNew have been making wonderful music together for more than 20 years. They performed some of the best songs from their new album, Fade, live on KEXP, including this gorgeous rendition of “I’ll Be Around.”

We have far more than 87,000 rapes in this country every year, but each of them is invariably portrayed as an isolated incident. We have dots so close they’re splatters melting into a stain, but hardly anyone connects them, or names that stain. In India they did. They said that this is a civil rights issue, it’s a human rights issue, it’s everyone’s problem, it’s not isolated, and it’s never going to be acceptable again. It has to change. It’s your job to change it, and mine, and ours.

…Which brings us around to Optica, the new fourth album by the Swedish band Shout Out Louds, and particularly its song “Illusions.” Listening to it in 2013, it’s as if someone traveled back in time 30 years and slipped The Thompson Twins the biggest hit of their career, and now a young band is tapping into our shared nostalgia by rehashing a hit that’s somehow been lodged in our memory banks all along. “Illusions” may be brand-new, but it already feels eternal.