RiYL

In 2019, Idris Vicuña was suddenly everywhere, an overnight success several years in the making on the strength of “Jealous.” The single found the L.A. musician shooting up Spotify charts on the back of viral TikTok videos. “Romantic Lover” and “Something About You” found their own success as gold records, over the next two years. As with its predecessor, 2022’s Full Time Lover finds Eyedress in full collaborative mode – an element that’s been a key to his art, ever since he found likeminded individuals after years of searching. The musician joined us from his L.A. home to discuss a childhood spent moving around and his continued growth as an artist. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

After a pair of albums steeped in the polarizing politics of the era, Welcome 2 Club XIII finds The Drive-By Truckers in a reflective mood. Frontmen Patterson Hood and Mike Cooley find themselves warmly embracing stories from the band’s earliest days. It’s driven, in part, by the manner of reflective soul searching many of us have undergone, over a difficult past few years. The phenomenon was coupled with a brief, pre-pandemic reunion of the pair’s late-80s band, Adam’s House Cat. It’s the ideal moment to catch Hood for a long, career spanning interview about the ups and downs across a quarter-century of the Drive-By Truckers. The sound quality is a bit hit and miss, due to technical difficulties. Hope you still enjoy. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

“Here’s to the next 20 years,” Emily Haines concludes with a laugh. Nearly a quarter-century into Metric’s existence, the band’s frontwoman is looking forward at the lifelong project. As many of their peers burned out or faded away, the Canadian indie-rock darlings have continued to release some of their strongest work, including 2022’s Formentera. A meditation on a rough couple of years for the world, the album finds Haines and co. laying the groundwork for what’s to come. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The pandemic hasn’t been easy, of course, but it has provided at a new way for Mary Gauthier to engage with her music. Her story songs have comfortably made the jump to virtual performances, as she’s embraced the talk show host inside. Earlier this year, she released Dark Enough to See the Stars – her 11th album overall and the first in eight years made up entirely of her own songs. The album follows 2018’s Rifles & Rosary Beads, a collaborative effort that found providing music for lyrics penned by Iraq War veterans. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Every so often, he makes a fist and gently punches his hand, trying to stave off a yawn. I don’t take it personally. It’s less than two days after the 24 hour Best Show marathon, and Tom Scharpling is exhausted. It was, by all accounts, a moment of triumph. The marathon marked both the paperback publication of his 2021 memoir, It Never Ends, as well as a kind of return to form for the beloved radio show-turned podcast. Old friends returned, new names called in and above all, it presented an opportunity for host and listener alike to reconnect with what’s made the program special. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Nothing last forever in the music world – breakups least of all. In February of this year, Frog Eyes’ Carey Mercer announced he was getting the band back together after a four year hiatus. Two months later, the beloved Victoria, BC-based band released its comeback record, The Bees. It was a triumphant return for a band that never really went away, so much as temporarily morphed into a new project, Soft Plastics. The band’s return – coupled with the pandemic – have offered a unique moment for reflection.   Mercer joins us to discuss 20 years of Frog Eyes, while navigating the group’s place in an ever-shifting musical landscape. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

“If anybody has someone in their past that you would still like to maintain some sort of relationship with,” Rory Phillips explains, “but you have some traumatic event that you’ve never talked about, I highly recommend getting a couple of microphones and talking about it.” Fresh off the breakup of The Impossibles, Philips was pair with Jamie Woolford – himself having recently left fellow ska-punk band, Animal Chin. Following the release of their Fueled By Ramen debut, 300, the band soldier on – without Phillips. This year, the reunited group released the crowdfunded Thirteen. Woolford focused on post-production, while Phillips devoted himself to Kings of No Hope, a podcast focused on The Stereo’s story to date. It’s an honest – and sometimes difficult -- portrait of breakups, breakdowns and an exploration of a group that never managed to hit the heights of the bands they inspired.   Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Twelve albums in, Laura Veirs is ready for a fresh start. Emerging from a breakup album dealing with the detachment from her husband and longtime producer, Found Light arrives this month like a jolt of light night. It’s been a strange and fascinating journey to get here. After studying geology and Mandarin, she threw herself into music full-time and never looked back.nAs a songwriter, she’s wildly prolific. For each of the dozen records, a hundred or more songs are written. As processes go, she readily admits it’s not the most efficient – but the results speak for themselves.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

For their many downsides, the past few years have offered an opportunity to reflect and reconnect with friends, family, projects. For Wayne Kramer, 2022 represents a full-throated embrace of a specter that’s loomed large for decades. This year, the musician released the first new songs under the MC5 banner in more than half-a-century. It’s a reinvigorated collective that culminates next month’s arrival of Heavy Lifting, the first LP under the moniker since 1971’s High Time. Kramer’s been plenty busy, of course, through solo albums, collaborations and film scores. He’s also become one of pop culture’s most vocal advocates for prison reform and the founder of Jail Guitar Doors, a project that supplies musical equipment for inmates. Ahead of the album’s release, Kramer discuss his musical and personal journey. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There are birds chirping. Shaun Fleming is making the most out of this beautiful spring day in Los Angeles, taking the call from the front porch. We get into a little lore about some parrots that have colonized Pasadena. Things get personal quickly, as they tend to with these conversations. And while he’s quick to note that his latest record, With People, arrives under the Diane Coffee monitor, it’s still a personal one. The name, after all, has been a fluid one. It’s sometimes a band, sometimes a person. Sometimes him, sometimes not. Male, female. Often in-between. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.