This week, I’ll be writing about songs featured in some of my favorite musical moments from some of my favorite TV shows. Be warned that I don’t shy away from spoilers. “Last Exit to Springfield” is an essential episode of The Simpsons, and perhaps its most revered. Inventive and satirical, it traces Homer’s bumbled but ultimately…
This week, I’ll be writing about songs featured in some of my favorite musical moments from some of my favorite TV shows. Be warned that I don’t shy away from spoilers. The second and final series of The Office (UK) is a bleak masterpiece, subverting all of our expectations of storytelling arcs. The final episode ends with…
This week, I’ll be writing about songs featured in some of my favorite musical moments from some of my favorite TV shows. Be warned that I don’t shy away from spoilers. Towards the early-middle of Community’s first season, just as the show as hitting its stride and starting to take creative risks, came this. It’s…
This week, I’ll be writing about songs featured in some of my favorite musical moments from some of my favorite TV shows. Be warned that I don’t shy away from spoilers. Ned’s Declassified School Survival Guide is an absolutely bananas slice of early 21st century TV. Targeted at middle schoolers but made by smart writers,…
This week, I’ll be writing about songs featured in some of my favorite musical moments from some of my favorite TV shows. Be warned that I don’t shy away from spoilers. It’s built around a spoof of a semi-viral YouTube video… which is scored by a mediocre Chris Brown song… which is an extended jingle…
Ah, the early nineties, when it was a generational statement to say you were bored. In the post-cocaine, post-yuppie world, many of the cultural heroes were shitheads in, or recently out of, school who didn’t know what do with their lives, and didn’t particularly care. Think Bart Simpson and Beavis and Butt-Head. Richard Linklater even…
Part of the trifecta of my favorite songs when I was a little kid (along with “Help” by The Beatles and “I Go To Extremes” by Billy Joel). The soaring guitar riff that works as the song’s hook is probably its most memorable element. I love the track’s feeling of synthesis. Even 25+ years later,…
When I was maybe twelve years old, my uncle and cousin (both devout born-again Christians) gave me two CD’s for Christmas: a Skillet album and a best-of Newsboys album. Both, unsurprisingly to me, have strong Christian messages. While I ended up enjoying both of them, I really stuck to The Newsboys (not to be confused…
Ah, Teenage Fanclub: the terribly named but wonderful band. Their best album is the terribly titled (and covered) but wonderful Bandwagonesque. It’s one of my favorite albums of all time: a slightly grungy blend of power pop and off-kilter indie sensibility. The band shows off fuzzy guitar licks without sacrificing the hooks. TFC rocks fairly simple tunes that glow…
I’ve never dug particularly deep into Neil Young’s discography, which is a shame, because the one album I’ve spun on repeat before is an absolute favorite of mine: The poetic Rust Never Sleeps. Young, with backing band Crazy Horse, blends live sets with studio recordings, all-acoustic numbers with electric powerhouses, all with some of the…