Episode 69

Welcome to Songs That Don’t Suck with your host, Mark Bradbourne.

Welcome to Songs That Don’t Suck. I am your host, Mark. Every week, you know I am here for you. I’m listening to hundreds and hundreds of newly released songs. The painful, painful process of trying to find a handful of songs that don’t suck so that I can share them with you. You can expand your musical library, and we can all live happily ever after, right? Right. As always, thanks for listening. I appreciate you checking out the podcast. Before we get into the new music, I want to share some things, so let’s get into it.

I was recently listening to Alan Cross’s podcast, The Ongoing History of New Music, which is fantastic. You should all listen to it. Along with, honestly, there’s a ton of great music podcasts, Rock and Roll Autopsy, 60 songs that explain the 90s, Rock Talk Studio, there’s tons of them, and next week is National Rock and Roll Podcast Day, I think it’s on the 15th of May, and we’re going to do some awesome stuff, so stay tuned and go support these awesome podcasts. More on that next episode. Anyway, Alan was talking about the scientific link between music and mental and physical health. The episode was called More and More Medical Mysteries of Music, and I don’t want to recap this whole episode, because I want you to go listen to it, because it’s really cool. But there was one section that I got actually really curious about, which was what types of music are beneficial depending on what you’re doing? And Alan mentioned things like studies that have been done with surgeons who listen to music during surgery. They make far fewer mistakes than those that don’t. And like just anecdotally, my youngest daughter listens to lo-fi hip-hop with no words when she is studying, and she has found it to be very effective for her concentration. So I was curious, like what else has really strong links, and do I actually subconsciously or otherwise listen to those musics when I’m doing those kind of tasks?

So the most common one that I found was classical music. It’s often cited in discussions about music and productivity. Classical music can apparently be really beneficial for tasks that require attention to detail and concentration. Obviously, it lacks lyrics, but there’s a structured harmony, and classical compositions help reduce cognitive distractions. You might have heard of the Mozart Effect. It’s a very popular term to describe the short-term improvements and performance of mental tasks after listening to classical music. I’m not a huge classical music fan. There are certain pieces that I absolutely love, but it’s generally not my go-to for productivity. Now, this isn’t necessarily a genre, but they were talking about nature sounds and ambient music.

So ambient sounds like rain, wind, ocean waves can enhance cognitive function and concentration, but these are usually in a more calming effect, so very less likely to cause a distraction. A lot of people use that kind of stuff for peaceful, going to sleep kind of stuff. I do not do that, although I do know that when it rains naturally, I do sleep better.

Jazz and blues, these genres will enhance creativity and provide a relaxed yet stimulating backdrop for brainstorming or creative works. This I found really interesting because one of the things that I started doing this year was actually teaching myself how to paint. So on any given night, you can find me next to the podcast studio in my paint studio, and I will put on a vinyl record. Generally I go to jazz, and I found that it’s a really nice backdrop for doing that creative medium. So I found that really interesting, I hadn’t really thought about that, but that is what I absolutely gravitate towards. This one I found interesting, electronic music and what they’re called chill out music. This is for things that require endurance or repetitive actions, apparently the steady beat can help maintain energy levels, so think about workouts and things like that.

Pretty cool, pop and upbeat music, good morale booster, booster of energy during mundane and repetitive tasks. They’ve got familiar structures, catchy hooks, and they make the time pass more quickly. So things like cleaning, organizing, or other routine activities, a lot of times people will gravitate towards popping up beat music. I tend to listen to rock when I fold laundry, and that’s the only kind of parallel that I could draw.

And then the last one I mentioned, my daughter listens to lo-fi and instrumental hip hop, and the study that I found is gaining popularity among students, smooth continuous beat helps maintain focus, particularly in reading and writing tasks. It’s repetitive yet soothing, so it works really well for long study sessions or long work hours.

As always, the key is what the personal taste is, right? So everybody’s personal taste is different, it does play a significant role in what works for one person might not work for another. So a lot of experimentation for you personally, if you’re listening to different types of music, it can be very useful, but you probably already know that. So let’s get into the new music this week. Pretty cool week, actually. So here we go. First song this week is Rock Bottom by LovelytheBand. This is the second time on the podcast for LovelytheBand, and rightfully so. This is honestly another great indie rock song from them. I love the lo-fi production at the beginning, the guitar tone, the vocal effect that’s being used, and then it does this really cool shift in the pre-chorus and chorus that gives a really nice contrast from the verses, and then the chorus does this really cool fall back into the verse production, which I just thought was a very fantastic production touch. Lyrically, there’s some great lines in here to be enjoyed for sure. I feel like sometimes good lyrics are hard to find and found some here, which are really great, so you gotta go check that out. There’s a really nice string interlude that I was not expecting that I kind of have classified as a bridge for this song, and overall it was just really well constructed. I’m really intrigued, honestly, as they’ve released two or three singles, I think, this year. I wonder if these are from a new album, they’re hinting at a new album, or if they’re just kind of releasing songs as they record them. Always interesting to see what bands will still put out an album versus just like releasing songs on the random, so enjoy the latest track from LovelytheBand called Rock Bottom.

Second song this week is Trojan Horse by Small Black Arrows. The thing that grabbed me the most when I was listening and reviewing for this week was the bassline. It was the first thing that I kind of really hung on to, it’s very tasty. Small Black Arrows describe themselves as funk folk pop, and from their bio, they are mixing a variety of influences. They mention folk, they mention trip hop, rock, and opera oddly, of all things, and I for one appreciate a well-rounded artist. You can draw things from anywhere and apply it. I love the vocal quality, I really appreciate the sparse instrumentation that’s going on, but it’s really interesting to kind of key in on the different elements as you listen. So like every now and then there’s like this really cool piano lick, obviously I mentioned the bassline, and yeah, it’s just really cool. Last month they released a single entitled The British Museum, slightly different feel, but definitely you can kind of feel the same DNA, still really good. So go check out Small Black Arrows and the song Trojan Horse.

The third song this week is Somebody’s Child from Blessing of Four, and it features Dolly Parton. So this one, I like the song, but I’m honestly including it as a tribute to all the mothers out there as we celebrate Mother’s Day in the United States and in other countries. I hope you got to visit your mom, I hope you got to call your mom, or maybe you just took a few moments to remember your mom if she’s no longer with us. And maybe it’s not your biological mom, maybe it’s just a really strong woman in your life that you see her as that mother figure. Regardless, much love to all your moms. The song, it’s a very sweet song, two very powerful voices. The lyrical content is very touching, and it’s delivered in what I will describe as a gospel R&B style, it’s definitely got some Motown kind of feel to it. The fourth song is actually originally from Nigeria. He came to the United States, he was blind in one eye and they were hoping to be able to treat his vision deficiency, unfortunately he went blind, fully blind by the age of 10, but he had started playing piano before that. And I don’t know, just a really cool story, and it’s a really emotional listen, so I really hope you enjoy this one when you give it a listen.

The fourth song this week is Gone Without Warning by the Commoners. My favorite Southern rock band from Toronto, Canada is back with another Barton Burner of a track. This track is textbook rock, blistering guitars, check, slamming rhythm section check, a little rock piano for good measure, absolutely check, great lead vocal, check. I’m guessing this is coming off their soon to be released album, it’s called Restless, and honestly I’m looking really forward to hearing it. The last album that they put out I thought was fantastic, and if you are in kind of the same vein, you know, if you like bands like Dirty Honey or Rival Sons, you need to check out the Commoners if you haven’t already. The Commoners continue to be on the list of bands that I need to see live, so hopefully this year that’ll happen.

The fifth and final song this week, Hopeless Dreams from HINNI., and I hope I’m pronouncing that right, it’s spelled H-I-N-N-I. Bluesy Dream Pop, the best way that I can probably describe this track, I found this one completely by accident. As I was collecting songs through the review process that I do every week, the Spotify algorithm will suggest songs to add to the playlist, and I was curious, so every now and then I will click through them, most of the times it’s just, you know, whatever. This was a nice find, I really like this song, but I’m gonna use Heaney to gripe about something. Part of my process as I review songs, I always check out the bio of artists. His states, and I quote, you are the only person on earth who reads bios, am I? I don’t think that’s true, and if you’re an artist who kind of slags off your bio to be a smartass or post something useless, you’re missing an opportunity to let people connect with you a little bit. Now granted, there’s a fine line between esoteric nonsense and derivative crap. The amount of indie bands taking the scene by storm and artists going against the mainstream is kind of laughable, because I do read that quite a bit, but at least it’s something, right? They’re trying to give me something to connect to. Anyway, I digress. I like this track from HINNI, Go Check Out Hopeless Dreams, it’s a damn good song.

All right, that is it for this week.

As always, grab your friend who loves music, shake him or her, and say, hey, go listen to songs that don’t suck. It’s good for finding music. That’s the best way to help the show grow. And you guys do that, and I appreciate it. You can follow the show on social media, we’re on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X, and Threads. You can find the podcast anywhere. So regardless of your platform, you can find it. You can check out the website, songsthatdon’tsuck. net. Within the show notes of every show are links to all the songs that I talk about. There’s also links to last year’s complete playlist of 200 plus songs that we discovered, as well as the growing list of songs that we have discovered this year. So with that, please go out, support all these artists, and thanks for listening, and until next week, keep searching for and listening to songs that don’t suck.