Category Archives: Music You Should Know

THE MOUNTAIN GOATS - DAYS The Mountain Goats have a way of balancing the absurd and the emotional in a witty and catchy way. John Darnielle seems to be mining his memory for the nostalgic new album, D...

NEW RADICALS - "ONE NIGHT ONLY (BREAK LOOSE BREAK FREE!)" I love a surprise come back. Back in the '90s, New Radicals put out one good record with one perfect song, "You Get What You Give." They made ...

COLLECTIVE SOUL - TOUCH AND GO After three decades of alt-rock success, Collective Soul have thrown themselves an unexpected curveball. Touch and Go finds the band embracing a distinctly New Wave soun...

ECHO AND THE BUNNYMEN - SONGS TO LEARN AND SING REISSUE Few compilations have served as a better introduction to a band than Songs to Learn and Sing. Originally released in 1985, it gathered the essen...

INTERPOL - "IRON CITY" Interpol are a band that came out of the ruins of 9/11 New York. It makes sense that their first song since 2022 starts with them, "Alone in Central Park." It builds tension wit...

GREEN DAY - "I'M NEVER GONNA R.I.P." What would Green Day sound like if they were making rockabilly songs in the '90s? I'm thinking it would be pretty close to their newly dropped, "I'm Never Gonna R....

MUSE - THE WOW! SIGNAL Muse have never been subtle (organ with heavy reverb anyone?), and The Wow! Signal fully embraces that. Their tenth album dives headfirst into cosmic themes, inspired by the mys...

DEATH CAB FOR CUTIE - I BUILT YOU A TOWER Death Cab for Cutie finds a rocking, raw sound for their 11th album, I Built You a Tower. An exhausted and frustrated sounding Ben Gibbard distilled his songs...

AUDIOSLAVE - OUT OF EXILE (VINYL REISSUE) Released in 2005, Out of Exile gave Audioslave (one of the best supergroups of the 90s) their only album to debut at the number one spot. The band sounds tigh...

COWBOY JUNKIES - OPEN TO BEAUTY: BEST OF THE 21st CENTURY Just a few months ago I got to see the Cowboy Junkies perform a moody show at the Fitzgerald theater in downtown St. Paul. It was a great remi...