Love a Good Session of Sunning my Holes

Soul Coughing – Ruby Vroom [Slash/Warner Bros Records 1995]

A cult act if there ever was one, this four-piece led by surrealist spoken word poet M. Doughty arrived out of NYC’s experimental jazz scene based in The Knitting Factory. The name of the game, no matter how much Doughty’s a guitarist and a LOUD SINGER, is rhythm though. Provided by standup bassist Sebastian Steinberg and drummer Yuval Gabay the shifting swerving galvanizing technique they put on display is the only thing that can stand up to Doughty’s voice, while Mark De Gli Antoni’s electronic flourishes create tone that’s sometimes paranoid and sometimes contemplative. Naturally the moodier ones I find myself most drawn to, your “True Dreams of Wichita”-s and “Mr. Bitterness”-es but don’t let the impenetrable stabs at sensitive-intellectual posturing in the lyrics distract or confuse you into thinking it’s all pedantic, as “Screenwriters Blues” notes; “You live in Los Angeles and you are going to Reseda/we are all in some way or another going to Reseda someday/to die.” Who says hipsters can’t make a joke? 4.1/5

Sugar – File Under: Easy Listening [Rykodisc/Creation Records 1994]

Six years and three albums removed from his tenure being the noise master in Husker Du the soon to be outed Bob Mould makes a breakup album as loud as it is melodic. If, when you listen, you say to yourself “damn this sounds like Loveless meets The Color and the Shape”, know that you’re correct. Mould, having heard that shoegaze masterpiece when it debuted, was reinvigorated to make guitar sounds after almost calling it quits and his voice just so happens to sound like a certain Nirvana drummer’s who absolutely worshipped every fart Mould recorded. Apologies for band comparisons, usually they’re inaccessible and sound dated as time goes by, but what isn’t about these 40 minutes is despite how loud it is it’s so so warm. 4.1/5

Yin Yin – The Rabbit That Hunts Tigers [Bongo Joe 2019]

A mixture of spaghetti western and eastern Asian influences created by a dude in Scandinavia. A little too much towards appropriation than homage for me but background music is background music right? 2.3/5

Soccer Mommy – Sometimes, Forever [Loma Vista Recordings 2022]

The subject of being overwhelmed by emotion in your early 20’s is a universal one for those who have the privilege enough to think about it, and there have been many truths put to song that are both more enlightening and interesting than Sophie Allison’s latest, including from her many many sad femme contemporaries. I miss how bouncy and raw something like Clean was those long four years ago when insecurity met nature metaphors ranging from fear to fucking. That one ended with a triumph; this ends with self-resignation. 2.3/5

Cassandra Jenkins – An Overview on Phenomenal Nature [Ba Da Bing! 2021]

Pedantry-as-catharsis, meaning convoluted with no payoff musically. 2.0/5

S. G. Goodman – Teeth Marks [UMG Recordings 2022]

Album 2 from thirty-year-old southern lesbian railing for the value of rural Kentucky life. She’s smart and biting which are both points in her favor, but she also doesn’t have the aural instinct to avoid acapella “showstoppers”. I wish I had a lyric sheet from her. 3.4/5

Lizzo – Special [Atlantic 2022]

Candidly, I’m glad she’s back. I appreciated Lizzo’s previous attention to polish that served as a hook for her to spread as much positivity as she could via radical self-love and radical acceptance, necessary tonics to the poison of the Trump era that she broke out into. Nowadays she’s codependent on her girlies, is sultrily vulnerable when she’s nude, tells you how special you are, and wants to celebrate all the girls, gays, and theys who want a stellar birthday—who is anyone to say she doesn’t succeed? Her funk is funky, her pop is catchy as all hell and makes explicit that her positivity is in reaction to the judgment she’s felt her whole life, a kind of cogent honesty in the age of irony saturation. 4.1/5

Open Mike Eagle – Anime, Trauma and Divorce [Auto Reverse 2020]

What helps is its brevity, less than 3 minutes per song on average so that it doesn’t overstay its welcome ruminating on its titular sad subject matter. After he got his hopes up about his TV show, his label, and even his marriage it all came apart, reducing him to mentioning “comfort” on three different tracks and leaving the listener with the undeniable maxim “it’s October and I’m tired”. Not that all is bleak, there’s not one but two collaborations with his young son Little A$e and more jokes than he’s attempted for a few years, some that even yield a chuckle so that he can cope. Subject-wise this is a weeb’s niche, throwing off references to Neon Genesis Evagelion’s famously wimpy and depressed protagonist and the entire Joestar lineage of which he sees himself as a part of, all over plush electrobeats whose BPM is never fast enough to raise the heart rate. Hope he feels better soon. 4.3/5

Low Cut Connie – Call Me Sylvia [Contender Records 2012]

Still a scuzzball but he’s looking for a way out, no? At least that’s what “(no More) Wet T-Shirt Contests” seems like until he says he’s humming in the bosom of the Lord yea. As a South Philly bar band covered in sweat and utilizing what Stephen Thomas Erlewine describes as “a boozy boogie that’s been out of style since at least the Carter administration” these talented misfits led by a sometimes tenor sometimes baritone Adam Weiner prove incredibly rhythmic and incredibly, wildly, horny and pathetic. This is Jerry Lee Lewis for people who order a boilermaker as their first drink on a night out. Down here we call ‘em citywides. 4.2/5