January 2025 Music Roundup

11 Feb, 2025

📼 Albums Listened To

• The Purple Bird by Bonnie Prince Billy 🌟🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Alt-Country, Contemporary Folk
  • I've listened to his previous albums but never paid enough close attention. He has a warm voice, and I like the calm folk with soft guitar and drums.

• Submarine by The Marias 🌟🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Indie pop, Dream pop.
  • A very late-night vibes type of album. I love the dreamy-ness.

• This Wasn't Meant For You Anyway by Lola Young 🌟🌟🌟½

  • Genre: Indie pop
  • My friend YH recommended me the song 'Messy' and it's a great pop song. The album overall is okay, but it reminded me of Halsey a little bit, where although I enjoyed it, I didn't enjoy enjoy it.

• What Happened To The Heart? by Aurora 🌟🌟🌟🌟½

  • Genre: Indie pop
  • Listening to this reminded me that I should go back and listen to Aurora's discography. My partner shared the song 'Exist for Love' some time back, and that song is one of the most beautiful songs I've ever heard.

• Where We've Been, Where We Go From Here by Friko 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Alternative rock
  • I love this a lot! It reminded me of a more polished and rhythmic Bright Eyes (I feel just okay for that band). Now that I think of it, even the album cover reminds me of Fevers and Mirrors. The main guy's voice is a little quivery, which I imagine not everyone would enjoy, but I think it plays well against the loud drums.

• Hounds of Love by Kate Bush 🌟🌟🌟🌟½

  • Genre: Art rock
  • I was reminded of this album's existence from this excellent review here on Bear Blog by visionaryhussy! My mom has shared the tragic story of Kate Bush multiple times throughout my life, and I never really had the desire to go out and listen to it (a mistake. My first brush with her music was with Running Up That Hill, as I imagine many people did when they watched it being played on that one episode of Stranger Things. I thought it was super fitting, and I was surprised at the age of the song. The entire album feels beyond its years. It was released in 1985, but, it sounds timeless. If you listen to any album here, perhaps try out this one.

• YOU'LL HAVE TO LOSE SOMETHING by Spirit of the Beehive 🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Alternative indie
  • Honestly, this one didn't leave much of an impression on me.

• Everybody Needs a Hero by Orla Gartland 🌟🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Pop, indie rock
  • I like much of Orla's music, from her early EP to the album before this one! This one is definitely not my favourite compared to the other stuff she has done, but I think it will stay as something I would listen to again down the road.

• Silent Alarm by Bloc Party 🌟🌟🌟½

  • Genre: Indie rock, post-punk
  • Fun listen! I liked it enough, but I don't think I have the nostalgic value points that a lot of people on Reddit do. This was my second time, and, I think my opinion of it is still pretty similar to my first listen.

• Dead Club City by Nothing But Thieves 🌟🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Alternative rock, pop rock
  • I listened to Broken Machine by this band sometime last year, but completely forgot about it. This band could be in a similar realm to perhaps a band like Imagine Dragons in terms of the stadium concert vibe it exudes, but I do prefer this. I really like the clean production of the music and the vocalist. Reading Dabi's post on this prompted me to check it out! I need to check out more of their discography, but, so far I like it.

• Paradise State of Mind by Foster the People 🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Synth-pop, indie pop
  • Like many people my age, we've heard Pumped Up Kicks as we grew up. I have many memories of my uncle, who I used to live with who was in his 20s then who loved to play this song in his car and in his home office when he was working on his PCBs. The album didn't leave much for me, unfortunately. But I think it was still a decent listen, and nothing that really made me dislike it.

• Haunted Mountain by Buck Meek 🌟🌟🌟½

  • Genre: Indie folk, singer-songwriter
  • I'm a fan of Big Thief albums. I think they don't have any albums that I've ever not liked, and so I've been following Buck's solo work as well. He has a calm voice and a twang to his enunciation. However, I think this one is just a little too soft for me, but I can see myself replaying it when I want something more calming. Might need to look at the lyrics more closely in the next listen.

• You Are The Morning by jasmine.4.t 🌟🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Indie rock, indie pop
  • I liked this! Guy Fawkes Tesco Dissociation has a feature with Phoebe Bridgers, and I think it was a great combo.

• Sol y sombra by Rose City Band 🌟🌟🌟🌟

  • Genre: Country rock, Americana
  • Rose City Band is one of the gems I've found on Spotify, and I really enjoyed their last album: Garden Party. It's pretty hard to dislike this band honestly - I saw someone describing this as "sunshine-tinged country", and I can see that. It's very warm sounding, and the vocals are not intrusive. In fact, I have 0 idea what the frontman is singing, as this band is mostly my background music as I go through the day at home.

Hey! Thanks for taking a look at my post :) I won't be doing this monthly but rather whenever I feel like I listen to enough music to warrant a compilation like this. So the next one might be a quarterly post, or perhaps there would be one at the end of the year. I like the idea of using my blog as my logging system compared to something like RateYourMusic, so I probably will be migrating some stuff that I've logged from there to here as well. We'll see!

Also, sorry for the low res images for some of these. For some reason, the compression from IMGBB seems to be pretty strong for some of these. I used standard resolution images from Ben Dodson's tool here to minimize the loading speed for the page (do you guys have any hosting alternatives that is quicker? I'm trying to save image hosting space on Bear Blog itself for my personal image archives).

[19/100] for #100DaysToOffload

#100DaysToOffload #music