Not Long
Progressive Rock, Melodic Hardcore, Hypnagogic Pop, Indie Pop, Power Pop, Death Metal and more!
Afternoon to y’all out there.
I’d love to get some feedback from y’all: now that I’m running the Digging for Something series of posts—go read the first and the second editions if you haven’t!—how should I handle those regarding emails? Should all my posts push through to your inboxes? Only some of them? Both, but limit to 2 emails a week? Whatever it may be, I would appreciate the input. I don’t want the emails to become annoying.
Before I get to the reviews, here’s some interesting things that I’ve engaged with recently:
I Found a Lost Music Generator From the 90s: this video from Harke covers “Microsoft Music Producer”, a neat royalty free music generator from the 90s. In case you are wondering what "Miserable Rag Time Honky Tonk" sounds like.
The Courtesy Desk / Turntable Report best of 2025 list (so far) is required reading, imo! Consistently one of the best places to get tipped off to music you need to hear.
Enjoy my capsule reviews, and let me know if anything here tickles your fancy, yeah?
Emoji legend:
⛏️ denotes picks of the week, my favs.
🌱 seedling denotes albums like a lot and expect could grow on me over the year.
✨ albums I would recommend to fans of the genre (i.e. it might not convert new listeners, but you should check it out.)
✂ denotes favourite tracks from a given record.
As always, feel free to reach out over on BlueSky or join the Rosy Overdrive Discord server where I can be found now and again.
You can also find me in the corners of Rate Your Music scrounging for obscure emo, hardcore, indie rock and pop punk.
Don’t forget: if you’re reading this in your email it will be cut off.
Read on the web for the full list of reviews!
⛏️ great area - Good Coding (2025)
Genre: Hypnagogic Pop, Indie Pop
This reminded me a little of more subdued early JJ, but without the lightly clubby drugginess. Very slight, slinky bedroom pop songs lead by slippery bass lines and clicky percussion under whispered indie pop vocals. Really enjoyed this, could see it sneaking up on me. A real mood-setter (or mood-confirmer?)
✨ Frankie Cosmos - Different Talking (2025)
Genres: Indie Pop, Indie Rock, Bedroom Pop
To be honest, I can't remember if I listened to Inner World Peace in 2022 but I do know I was keeping up with Frankie Cosmos at least up until Close It Quietly.
For people who already know their sound, this is more really sweet and pleasant indie pop rock. They are known for short, sometimes twee sometimes not, peppy and also melancholic tunes. This is more of that! It's very solid, and I will likely return to it so in that way it is possible it creeps up in star rating by the end of the year.
✨ Swimming - Old (2025)
Genres: Midwest Emo, Math Rock, Power Pop
Well balanced modern emo stuff that fits snugly in the "midwestern" sound as it has been re-defined by the revival scene. Not overly noodly to the point of being distractingly mathy, but also not just blocky power poppy riffing either. This just narrowly avoids that "weed emo" thing as well, which is nice because too much of that vibe can also be off-putting.
Really, the only thing here that stops it from getting higher grades is that I just can't get myself too excited about this sound these days. I think it kicks ass that they are from Newfoundland, so there's that. I think if you go nuts for this kind of sound, this is a good example of a band doing it well.
✨ Corrupter - Gloria in profundis (2025)
Genre: Death Metal
This is cool stuff, but there's something about it—that I can't put my finger on—which resulted it in kind of floating in one ear and out the other.
Might be because I wasn't paying super close attention to it while listening and it all went by in a blur of smudged riffs. Will need to circle back on this, but it was satisfying while it was on.
✨ HLLLYH - Uruburu (2025)
Genres: Indie Rock, Noise Pop
"Why did this band name themselves after an album by The Mae Shi? They certainly sound a lot like a band influenced by them" I thought, before realizing it's actually members of that band doing new music. Apparently this was originally going to be a new release under that name as well.
Turns out, this sounds a little like The Mae Shi but older and maybe a little mature? It's a bit all over the place (when weren't they? This is the same band that put an 11 minute remix of the album you were already listening to smack dab in the middle of the tracklist).
Ultimately, I think this is a nice little bonus for people who like the band already but I'm not sure it reaches the heights of their namesake. Maybe in time it'll grow, as the album they're named after also grew in cult status over the years. Nice to hear from them again, though, regardless.
⛏️ Steve Hillage - Green (1978)
Genres: Space Rock, Progressive Rock, Psychedelic Rock, Progressive Electronic, Canterbury Scene
This was a little hard to grasp at first, since it's a mix of progressive rock and electronic, lots of synths and guitars jutted up against one another. I wasn't really sure how to take it - as a straight prog record, something more prog-pop, or experimental stuff. But it works remarkably well as a whole.
Very cheesy lyrics, and "Ether Ships" had me thinking they were going for some kind of progressive U2 vibe, before finally erupting into a kind of fusion-esque jam. But by the time "Activation Meditation" segues into "The Glorious Om Riff", I was totally converted. This kicks ass.
✨ Small Talk - Laugh on the Wrong Side of One's Mouth (1999)
Genre: Melodic Hardcore
This is 20 minutes of melodic hardcore from Brazil, and (according to the Instagram post I found announcing that it would be added to streaming for its 25th anniversary) is "one of the most influential records of the Brazilian underground".
I can definitely see how this would be held up as an example of an underground scene, because it's well executed and fits snugly into the genre. YouTube posts of the album are stuffed with Portuguese comments about how this is a seminal album.
I'm generally a bit more favorable to stuff like this when it's largely unknown, and in North America I feel like this isn't too known unless you know Brazilian emo/hardcore/etc. I'm going to nudge a little higher on the score here because I feel like for what this is, it's a good example of the genre and they're playing with a solid amount of passion and energy, even if the songs aren't the most memorable in the world.
✨ Gentle Giant - Free Hand (1975)
Genres: Progressive Rock, Jazz-Rock, Zolo, Neo-Medieval Folk
The general consensus for this band's trajectory is that they were one of the greatest Progressive Rock bands, who then tried to lean into more accessible material to mixed results (first with Interview and then fully on The Missing Piece and finally with their attempt to adapt to the 80s on Civilian).
Not sure why, but by starting with The Missing Piece and moving back to Interview, I had a really enjoyable experience. Both of those albums kick ass, and Interview in particular strikes an amazing balance of eccentricity and accessibility while retaining the prog elements that are so enjoyable.
Travelling further backwards to Free Hand finds the band residing more comfortably in Progressive Rock territories. Still relatively accessible from a melodic and track-length perspective, but also a little more expected of the genre. "Time to Kill" is pretty killer, and there's a fun jazziness to songs like "His Last Voyage."
And yet, I am left with a craving to listen to Interview again, to be honest. This is good, and I imagine I will be able to find some time to return to this, but another part of me wants to move forward to see what Giant for a Day sounds like.
✨ Druid - Toward the Sun (1975)
Genres: Symphonic Prog, Progressive Rock
Apparently I have a good amount of patience for bands celled Yes-clones, it would seem. Tons of reviews calling this Yes-worship (which it surely is to some degree) but there's something in here that grabbed me regardless.
"Voices" is a helluva opener, very majestic in all the right ways. More of a pastoral sound on "Remembering". A lot of this sits on the less-than-challenging side of progressive rock, which is why it feels a bit less of a clone and more like a smoothing out of an already established sound. I like the band when they're a bit more focused on the extended jams and solos ("Theme") than the floaty-doaty stuff.
This isn't bad, though it hardly feels essential.
✨ None More Black - This Is Satire (2006)
Genres: Punk Rock, Pop Punk, Alternative Rock, Power Pop
Back when this was released, it was easy to feel disappointed. Even with the band having experimented with less-than-punk elements on Loud About Loathing, this still felt like a big left-turn away from melodic, poppy punk and further into other genres. They go full-on jangly pop featuring orchestral bells on "Who Crosses State Lines Without a Shirt?", and "I See London" is a wildly low-tempo emotive rock dirge (that I like, but imagine most wouldn't.)
They make sure to toss in a few songs that sound like File Under Black-era None More Black ("You Suck! But Your Peanut Butter Is OK") but a goooood chunk of this is going to be a let down for someone expecting a punk rock album. I have a lot of time for Shevchuk as a melody-creator and as a singer, so the slower tempos don't completely bother me.
Ultimately, I couldn't argue that on this album and Icons they fully became a playlist band. Pick the best songs off their 2 final albums and you've got something even better, but I still don't mind revisiting this one now and again.
The Curse - The Curse (2003)
Genre: Melodic Hardcore
I know I've stumbled across this album a bunch over the years (possibly through reviews in zines) because I always remember the album art for some reason. Or maybe I was trying to find more bands in the extended Lifetime / Kid Dynamite / Paint It Black family tree, since this is Dave Hause from The Loved Ones and Paint it Black.
Are you still wondering what this album sounds like? It sounds like melodic hardcore from a member of bands in that aforementioned family tree. Sometimes short and fast, sometimes a little more mid-tempo, always anchored by a melodic approach to hardcore vocals and guitar riffs. You could sneak any of these songs onto a Kid Dynamite album and claim it's just a guest vocalist for that song, and you'd buy it. "Sell It Somewhere Else" even pulls all the same songwriting tricks.
If you are absolutely, crushingly addicted to this kind of thing and are really, really dying for 9 minutes of the genre that you haven't heard yet, here's that.
I feel like these songs are just average, otherwise.
That’s it, that’s all. Be excellent to one other.