-
2 months ago | 
daily.bandcamp.com | Matt Watton
LISTS The Unstoppable Mike Watt By Matt Watton · April 08, 2025 Mike Watt is a living legend, rightly hailed for his definitive bass playing in the singular SST band the Minutemen. Watt’s approach reimagined the tone and timbre of the bass in punk. Eschewing a pick, he gravitated towards the funky and the percussive, seamlessly blending scene-stealing licks with a water-tight rhythm. Watt established a new paradigm of punk bass as a surgical instrument rather than a blunt object.
-
Feb 11, 2025 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
Thunder Perfect Mind is a loose concept album narrating the sudden abduction of an unsuspecting pedestrian by a dark, expanding cloud. A lesser band would use this conceit as mere metaphor, but Motherhood is fully committed to the bit, creating a lyrical and sonic soundscape that feels as disorienting and exhilarating as a genuine alien encounter.
-
Oct 27, 2024 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
by Matt Watton (@brotinus)Few bands have literary ambitions, and fewer still capitalize on those ambitions quite like Nap Eyes. The Neon Gate, the band’s fifth album and their first since 2020, achieves a kind of cerebral simplicity, fusing ambiguous and atmospheric musical gestures with alluringly mysterious lyricism.
-
Aug 22, 2024 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
by Matt Watton (@brotinus)Oakland, CA’s Fake Fruit are back with their sophomore record, Mucho Mistrust. They set the bar high with their 2021 self-titled debut and, to nobody’s surprise, they’ve cleared that bar. Still present is the marriage of scraggly guitars and unrelenting melody, stark vocals and powerful full-band swells.
-
Jul 8, 2024 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
by Matt Watton (@brotinus)The Spatulas are the project of Miranda Soileau-Pratt, an artist equal parts poet and bandleader. Their debut LP. Beehive Mind, is an exercise in space and subtlety, at once unassuming and arresting. Coming close on the heels of last December’s EP, March Chant, The Spatulas seem to be bursting with artistic desire.
-
Jun 9, 2024 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
by Matt Watton (@brotinus)The humble EP is less of a full-blown statement and more of an announcement – it’s a short transmission to say: this is what our band is all about. What does Pardoner, the well-established San Francisco (and sometimes Vancouver, now Philly) band, have to announce? Their declaration is simple: we’re a rock band, and we play rock and roll music. On Paranoid in Hell, out now on Convulse Records, it takes just four short songs to prove this point.
-
Apr 4, 2024 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
by Matt Watton (@brotinus)Dana Gavanski is not afraid to write songs. On her third full length album, LATE SLAP out on Full Time Hobby, we are treated to fully formed, fleshed out arrangements that relish in their own musicality. While her previous releases showcased her arresting voice and undeniable spirit, they feel reserved and somber in comparison to this new record – LATE SLAP is teeming with life, in all its joy, heaviness, and whimsy.
-
Feb 29, 2024 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
by Matt Watton (@brotinus)The Minneapolis Uranium Club Band are burdened with expectations. Their music is expected to be hard hitting and immediate, their lyrics expected to be cerebral and absurd, their live performances rapturous and intense, their band profile tantalizingly minimal. These expectations only grew stronger as time elapsed between releases (six years since the full-length Cosmo Cleaners) and sporadic live performances.
-
Feb 22, 2024 | 
spectrumculture.com | Matt Watton
The Dream Syndicate’s history follows an increasingly common story arc for alt-legacy acts. Burst onto the scene in the ‘80s to acclaim among the cool kids and tastemakers. Years of relentless touring, internecine conflict, personnel changes and diminishing musical returns all lead to a breakup. Genius band mastermind (Steve Wynn in this case) dabbles in solo projects (and, in Wynn’s case, a baseball-themed supergroup), only to reunite in the 2010s to fan and critical delight.
-
Feb 11, 2024 | 
post-trash.com | Matt Watton
by Matt Watton (@brotinus)Imagine being on a rollercoaster about to plunge from its highest peak, and they announce the breaks are out – then you drop: the inevitable fear is tempered, ironically, by an uncontrollable exhilaration. Your heart races at each breakneck turn, the uncertainty and intensity at once dismaying and vitalizing. That’s what it’s like to listen to Wet Dip. The Austin-based trio make bilingual no-wave that is unsettlingly anxious but also life-affirming and necessary.
