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The Middle of Culture is what happens when two siblings with too many opinions and not enough chill dive headfirst into movies, music, video games, and whatever else is rotting our brains this week. It’s part pop culture podcast, part sibling rivalry, and fully unfiltered. Expect passionate arguments, niche references, unsolicited rankings, and the occasional moment of unexpected insight. If you’ve ever wanted to eavesdrop on the kind of argument you’d hear at the family dinner table—only with better audio—this is your show.
Peter
00:00
I hated every note on this sh album.
Eden
00:21
Welcome back to the Middle of Culture. I am one of your hosts, Eden.
Peter
00:25
And I am your other host, Peter. Peter, how are you?
Eden
00:29
Sleepy. Sleep you know, not so much sleepy weary.
Peter
00:33
I see the weariness. I'm just ti the last few days I decided, and I know this isn't that big of a deal But I had decided I'm gonna make sure I get to at least 12,500 steps every day in addition to lifting weights and all this kind of stuff. And that's just enough that um it I feel it. I'm feeling it a little bit. And then today Saturdays are always just busy. But how were you?
Eden
01:01
You know it's been a week, Peter. Yeah?
Peter
01:07
What's that?
Eden
01:07
Have you you not I mean you are uh you know Uh tangentially related to um higher education, education stuff.
Peter
01:17
I wondered if you guys were were were Canva customers. I mean excuse me, Canvas customers. Are you a Canva school? Uh, so the good news is I don't actually have to do anything that's uh that that is online curriculum related.
Eden
01:35
That doesn't super surprise me. I know as I've been pulling the data on like accessibility in the course sites and stuff, I've noticed that our med school doesn't use the online platform a whole lot.
Peter
01:47
Well, and since all they're doing with me is a clinical rotation, there is no, I mean I get uh I get an evaluation to do at the end of each rotation. Sure. And I don't even remember off the top of my head what that platform is because I get the platform for the medical school and the platform from the family practice residency confused all the time. So I don't know which one is which. Fair. Well anyway, listeners, in case you're not involved in education, on April 29th.
Eden
02:18
A notorious black hat organization called Shiny Hunters hacked Canvas, aka the largest LMS learning management software on the planet They currently have uh basically affected market capture over the course of the last 15 years and currently hold, I think last time I heard, 54% of all online LMSs are running Canvas. So, lots of schools. On April 29th, the shiny hunters took Canvas down and stole a lot of information. We're still not sure a hundred percent what they stole. But then they came back and they said, hey, are we stole 9,000 plus schools data? Um if you don't want us to leak this shit. You better pay us a lot of money by May 6th. Here's our contact info on the dark web. And Canvas was able to In structure, the company that owns Canvas, was able to get Canvas up and running again They thought they had Shiny Hunters locked out, and you know, we were all good. We thought. Mm-hmm. Canvas or instruction was not telling anyone who was on the affected schools list. So we spent the first few days of May not knowing whether or not we were one of the affected schools or not. Sure. Because again, the shiny hunter said they had 9,000 plus schools worth of data. That's fewer schools than are using Canvas. Um May 7th comes along. 3 p. m. Central, May 7th, Canvas goes down again. And this time the shiny hunters were kind enough to put in their own image as they brought down Canvas that said, Hi, we're the Shiny Hunters. We've brought Canvas down a second time. In case you didn't know, we did this last week too, and we stole all of your information. Here's a list of all the schools that have been affected. Canvas, you've got till A May twelfth to pay us off, or we are going to release all of this information. And hey, if you're in that affected schools list, here's a contact uh method for you to reach out And you can pay the ransom in case Canvas doesn't want to. You can pay to keep your information secure. Have fun. See ya on the 12th. And it was down from 3 p. m. Central till about midnight central that day. Again, this is the Thursday. For us, it's the Thursday before finals week. There are classes, there are uh some institutions that were doing finals this week. And so it was down for them during finals week. Um and They're not gonna s not pay it. They're they're not gonna pay it. And so I fully expect that it's gonna come down again next week. So I got to spend four hours in Zoom calls on Friday, all day basically, trying to figure out what do we tell faculty? So that they can still finish the semester. We're doing things like, hey, now that you have access again, go download the CSV of your gradebook right now. because I don't think you're going to have access to your gradebook next week. Hey, if you're do- if you were planning on doing your a final exam through Canvas You might want to change how you're going to do that. If you're going to have students turn things in through Canvas, you're probably going to want to figure out if you could have them email it to you or maybe use OneDrive or some sort of Dropbox sort of scenario. I would not under any circumstance rely on Canvas being available to you next week. Uh I don't know whether or not the faculty we're paying attention to any of their emails because as we have uh mentioned many times on this podcast. We know they're bad at that. They're bad at that. So if they were not personally logging in between three PM and midnight on Thursday, they didn't probably even know it happened. In fact, I know that's the case because I had a couple faculty members who are married to each other, customers of the comic shop, come in, and I was chatting with them today, and they said, oh, how was your week, Eden? And I was like, oh boy. And they were like, what? And I was like, oh, the shiny hunters thing. And they were like, what And I was like, oh oh, you should you should read the emails the provost s sends, guys. You should read the emails the provost sends. And then I said, really, no, go home and before you go to bed tonight, download your gradebooks, at the very least. Because you still need to be able to submit grades, so you better have backups of your grades so you can submit them. Uh it's uh it was a disaster. So that's where I'm at. I believe it. I'm sure it was. So that's been the fun in working in university IT for the last week. What it is what you been up to, Peter? How have you how have you been d distracting yourself from the horrors? The horrors in general, because there's plenty of them. Yeah, the horrors. Capital T, capital H, the horrors. What have you been doing?
Peter
07:15
What have you been up to? Well, let's hit some new music that's come out in the last few weeks. Before we spend some more time talking about music today.
Eden
07:24
We're gonna talk about a lot of music today.
Peter
07:26
Hey, so guess what? Did you know Eden Sevendust is still around and they're still releasing albums? Uh have I ever told you my story about Sevendust? I don't remember.
Eden
07:36
I have an axe to grind against Sevendust. Okay. Because I downloaded all of Sevendust's discography without how using a VPN about fifteen years ago when I lived in the Purple House, and I got a big old strike from my ISP because Sevendust was pissed that I was downloading their music so I could listen to it in an MP3 format. You should just Was it them or was it their label? I don't care. It was Sevendust. It said Sevendust.
Peter
08:03
It was their label.
Eden
08:04
It was their label. But the fact remains the label should just be glad anyone wanted to listen to Sevendust. Come on, guys. And I'm being rude. I'm being rude. I liked I I was specifically downloading home, I think was the one that I really liked of theirs.
Peter
08:18
And then Animosity was the one that came out after that. Home and Animation.
Eden
08:21
Yeah, those two were both pretty damn good albums. Uh but I haven't listened to 'em since uh I got s hit with that uh with strike warning. The two the two groups that I ever got in trouble for downloading uh music illegally Sevendust and the Beatles. And one of those makes sense to me and the other one is Sevendust. Anyway, new Sevendust.
Peter
08:41
That's true. New Sevendust. It's it's pretty okay. I mean look, here's the thing. I like Sevendust. I don't love Sevendust. I've never loved Sevendust Yeah, but Le John Witherspoon, he sounds as good as always. So new Sevendust album. It's all right. Uh after six years, Draconian released a new album. In Somnolent Ruin. Draconian are kind of a gothic death doom. They've got the really nice, really good female vocalist. And then they've got the harsh dudes. And then there's somewhere they've got to be bringing somebody else in for some clean male vocals as well.
Eden
09:18
Okay.
Peter
09:19
But they've really got that kind of you know, Jekyll and Hyde uh sort of aesthetic going on. It's really good. If you want mopey, sad sounding music that that you listen to and go, oh, I I probably should have a knife and where are my wrists? That's that kind of music. Uh but you know, I'm really liking it. This is a better one than their 2020 release to me, so I've enjoyed that a lot. And then finally, uh starting continuing a trend that was started back in 2024, Testament has released a remaster of their third album, 1989's Practice What You Preach. They did it back in 24. I think it was the same day. The Legacy and the New Order both were released with Remasters. Oh, okay. They definitely sounded better. Practice What You Preach sounds better. It needed it badly. Practice what you preach is one of those where I bought it on like Kobus or something, and I was like, the first track sounds okay, and then it gets like real Really quiet the rest of the album and sometimes it's up. And I'm like, this is weird. I bought the CD so that I could rip it myself in case there was something going on there. Hey, guess what? My ripped versions sounded just as bad. It was really weird. That's weird. Yeah, so this is really bad 80s mastering come to bear. And so it's nice to have a version that sounds better. Uh practice what you preach sounds great. I don't know how long they're gonna keep doing this if they're gonna do more. I could see uh 1990s Souls of Black getting this. And probably deserving it. I think after that they sound good enough that they would probably they should probably leave those alone. Um but yeah, it's you know, listening to Old Testament again is just a reminder that There's a reason they're my favorite thrash band and I like them way more than any of the big four. Sure. So uh little TV, you know, season whatever 21 of Taskmaster is out. We actually didn't I think we've only watched one episode in the last week. In the meantime, we didn't have anything to watch, and me being a little late to the game, my wife was like, let's watch the good place. That show's great. That's a delightful show. We're just at the start of season two, and I'm just having a fun time laughing out loud at multiple points during every episode. episode. Um so I I'm enjoying that. Nice. Uh a little bit of gaming to go along. Actually first, let's talk books. Uh I thought that once I was done with Dungeon Crawler Carl, I would start a new series. I sat down and started the Red Rising series by I think it's Pierce Brown now. My my brain wants to go there. Anyway, I started it. It didn't grab me immediately. And then all of a sudden I was like, you know what? Hey, book eight of Dungeon Crawler Carl comes out this time. Tuesday, maybe I'll do something else. And hey, guess what came out? Uh we have the new uh system collapse, I think. I think is the title of the new MurderBot this last Tuesday. Penultimate Murderbot she announced. Yep. So I I made it through the most recent murderbot. It's another fun murderbot. It Uh it's not at this point surprising or anything, but it's pretty much what you expect to get, which is some fun existential enui uh and contemplation about uh what it's like to be human through the eyes of a non-human And so it's another good one. It uh yeah, continues the trend.
Eden
12:50
Do you feel like it has set up something that will be like What are your expectations for the final book now that you've read the penultimate book and she's announced I've got one more in me until I'm done? I'm throwing Murderbot in the recycle pile. Does it feel like it's building does it feel like it's building to a climax like overall arc like an overarching climax? Or does it still kind has it still kind of felt kind of like monster of the wiki in each book?
Peter
13:17
No, the last few have definitely moved to a bigger conflict between Preservation Ox and Barish-Estranza, one of the corps, the special, specifically a mining corporation. The last few novellas have really focused on members of uh members of preservation coming in contact in conflict with Barish-Estranza. And this one in particular very much is setting up uh, okay, yeah, there's gonna be something's gonna come to a head, I think, between preservation and And so I expect that that's where this last one's gonna go. Because she's been building it that way over the last couple.
Eden
13:58
Okay. Well, it'll be interesting to see how that turns out.
Peter
14:01
Yeah. And you know, I I will because again, we've talked about them. I enjoy them. They're light. They're fluffy. I look forward to book eight of Dungeon Crawler Carl that comes out on Tuesday. So uh and then the final thing I'll mention is some games I've been playing. It's 2026, so of course, guess what time it is? It's time for another Diablo 4 expansion The previous expansion, Vessel of Hatred, didn't grip me. I never actually finished the story of Vessel of Hatred, and I didn't find the spirit-borne class I don't know. It just wasn't clicking really well for me. And I don't know if it was the class itself or if it was the story of that campaign that Just something about um uh Vessel of Hatred didn't really do much for me. I am much more enjoying this most recent one, Lord of Hatred. Uh the new two classes that they introduced, the Paladin class. I played a little paladin. prior to the release because I pre-ordered it because of course I did. I knew I was gonna get it. Whatever. Played some paladin. Uh didn't get too far with a paladin. This time I am playing through the campaign. as a warlock. And that's a ton of fun. I mean, come on. Killing demons by summoning your own demons. I'm down for it. Um there you go. You know The so Warlock is fun. I'm enjoying the Warlock class so far. And I don't know how far I am into this story. But I mean I think I'm at like level 47. or something. So usually you wrap up the story somewhere around to level 50. So I expect I'm getting close to the end.
Eden
15:36
I did see that uh in this month's humble choice, Diablo 4's base game.
Peter
15:41
Diablo 4 is in there.
Eden
15:43
So I guess I'll finally have Diablo Four and I won't have the excuse of well I don't want to give Blizzard my blood money. Diablo 4 is pretty good. I like it. The thing is, is I'm being a little bit of a hater, but every time I've played a Diablo game, I've had a fine time with it. They've just never gotten the hooks in me that I've wanted to play them long term. Like I've never played one of them and been like, oh, this'll be my treadmill forever game. I don't know. They don't do that for me, but like I had a fine time with two. I had a fine time with three. I'll probably have a fine time with four.
Peter
16:15
You know, there is no game that does that for me. me. There's no game that and that's my personality, I understand. I know there are some people who love that and keep coming back, but I have never played a game. that I just continue to play. Yeah, I've played all of Mass Effect many times, but it's like, I play through the trilogy. Few years pass. I play through the trilogy. Few years pass.
Eden
16:35
I mean that's not built that's not built for forever gaming in the way that Diablo 4 is where there is a there's like a gear treadmill that you get on if you want to be like placing on the leaderboards
Peter
16:48
Yeah, and that metagaming that comes along with it. That holds no appeal to me. It holds zero appeal to me as well. So but you know what does hold a lot of appeal for me? What's that, Peter? Is Vampire Crawler. Oh yeah, isn't it like a it's like a deck builder? Oh, it's so flipping good. I am having so much fun with dungeon crawlers or vampire crawlers. How much Slay the Spire have you played? Um, I played both the first and some of the second.
Eden
17:18
As good as? Better than? Not quite as good as? What are you thinking? Because like, for my money. Slay the Spire remains probably the best of those roguelikes roguelike deck builders that I've played. Now, Inscription is a cooler game. But it's not a game I want to go back to and play often, whereas Slay the Spire is one of those ones where it's like, oh I got 15 minutes.
Peter
17:39
Fucking open Slay the Spire. Let's fucking let's fucking sling some cards. So right now I would say Pretty much, uh for me at least, I think it's about as good as. Hell yeah. The the one difference is that it is a dungeon crawl. Okay. So so you know, old school You've got the little forward, side, side, backward, turn-turn keys at the bottom. So you're moving forward through the dungeon one space at a time.
Eden
18:07
We'll move forward turn rather than say you've got it's like an Ultima or a Legend of Grimrock for being like a bellback version.
Peter
18:14
Yeah. Okay. That was the one I was trying to think of, Legend of Grimrock. So I never have really gotten into any of those. Uh but But this this does that well. So you're building up your and and you'll run into fun little things on the course of a level where you can upgrade a card or you can fuse cards or you can trade a card in for a permanent boost in this or you can do that or you can pick up other random cards. And there's a fun combo system to it that I really enjoy that once I kind of realized what the the idea with the combo system was, it just really opened the game for me. And the combo system is very simple. It's just you want to make sure that you're playing cards in order of increasing mana cost. So if you play a card, your first you you always start out, you've got your hand there. My first card if I can is almost always zero mana card And then I want to play something with one mana because if you go the one mana after the zero, now it's doubled its damage. If you then go one zero mana and a one mana, now if you've got a two mana card, it's going to be even more powerful when it hits. And then there are cards that are wilds that will link together no matter what order you're playing that that the next card will get the bonus of a combo. You can get little gems that you can socket in cards that will say, hey, this treats it as if it's part of a combo no matter what. You can get sockets where it's okay, this one now does double damage. Or, you know, you get more powerful cards like three mana or four mana cards, and they'll have multiple sockets in the card that you can put more things in. I got this one where. It was like a two-mana card that gives you back like three mana when you play it. So and then I got a uh a returns to hand and duplicates itself and socketed that in there And so then I could go in and I could get three mana and then it would immediately come back to my hand, get three more mana, and then it would duplicate itself, get three more mana, and then I had like a bunch of mana in my pool to start playing high-value cards. stuff. So I think it's that blend of all these different things that has made it just extremely, extremely engaging for me. Uh I've played a lot of it in the last week. week or so. And you know, I don't remember off the top of my head how much it costs.
Eden
20:26
I'm sure it's I'm looking it up right now. It is ten dollars. So double double the price of vampire survivors.
Peter
20:34
They're bilking us all. Yeah, I couldn't, I could not highly recommend this enough. I mean, especially at $10. It's a I've easily gotten $10 of enjoyment out of it just this last week. So Dungeon Crawl Our Vampire Crawlers is a lot of fun. I'm really digging it.
Eden
20:52
I mean I really like Vampire Survivors
Peter
20:55
Yeah.
Eden
20:56
And the nice thing about this, I never actually bought Vampire Survivors. I played that when it was on uh Xbox Live back before I stopped giving John Microsoft its their blood money for Xbox Game Pass. You can get Survivors and Crawlers for 13 bucks.
Peter
21:11
That's a hell of a it's hard to go wrong there. Both of those are really fun games. So So yeah, that's what I've been checking out. But what about you? What have you been using to make it through things like Canvas being getting ransomware?
Eden
21:29
So obviously, as I said, main job has been busy. Side job also busy because last week was free comic book day. Yep, it was it was Buck Wild And for lots of reasons, but I gotta say, I don't want to read Dungeon Crawler Carl, but I gotta give that m barefooted pervert some props. 'Cause we had people lined up outside our shop that opens at ten at eight forty five because they wanted Dungeon Crawler Carl issue zero that bad. It was the first comic that we ran out of. And we ran out of it by like 1115. The masses yearn for a dungeon crawler Carl OGN, apparently. And they all wanted to. And to be fair, this was not just us. It was not just us. I was seeing people selling them on eBay for $34 by the end of that Tuesday. By the end of the day on Free Comic Book Day, people were already flipping on eBay for $30 plus dollars. Which is buckwild because the book is coming out soon, guys. Just it's an OGN. It's not it's not you don't even need this. This is the prelude this is the first fifteen pages of a book that's coming out in like two months. It did, however, make my boss go like, I think I need to order more copies of this shit than I was planning on ordering. And I was like, Yeah, you pro you we probably want to have a a few on hand. This is normally when a new book comes out Unless we know it's popular, unless we have like really good vibes about it, or we know it's coming from a creator who's established who we know sells comics in our shop. We usually only get one, maybe two of a new book, but often we just get one of a new book. If it sells, great, we'll stock two maybe if it sells in the first couple of days. But often it sits on the shelves for a bit and then it'll eventually sell and we'll replace it with one. That's how it goes. There are some exceptions, like I say. Dungeon Crawler Carl is gonna be one of those exceptions. I think we're gonna probably order ten copies of that Yeah, and I think we'll probably smart. I think we'll probably run out fairly quick. Um But yeah, it's uh it was wild. On top of that, it was our most successful free comic book day ever. Um Mo last year was already the most successful day the shop had ever had ever in its history. And we skunked it by like 3K in sales this year. year. Awesome. It was six it was wild. We had the line was outside of the door and all the way down to the theater halfway down the block until 1230. So two and a half two and a half hours of line after we opened. It was buck wild. Um, but it was fun, but we were all very drained afterwards. So we all we all went to Georgia's and got a hamburger and drank some booze and then went home. It was great. Um but that means I haven't had a whole lot of time between busyness at both works. I've not done a whole lot of stuff. Um, I've read a couple comics. I read uh I read the it's a Moto Hagio book from the s 70s. Motohagio, very, very famous. early shoujo mangaka. So she was one of the first uh manga artists who was specifically being I am making manga for teen girls like That is that is my this is the audience that we are going for. This is who I'm trying to write books for. She does great stuff. Heart of Thomas, uh Poe Clan, Otherworld Barbara. She's done a lot of really cool books. I'd never gotten around to They Were Eleven. It was never translated into English until fairly recently. Um it is a weird sci-fi book. Um and it is about like There are these ten students who as the end of their schooling, they're all from different planets all around the solar system. They're from different species. Some of them are humans, some of them are other different alien species. And these ten get assigned randomly in a group together, and they're like, okay, we are gonna like pull a ship up and we're gonna just throw you all out into space. You gotta get onto this ship that's out in space, get on it, and like Survive for 52 days. We'll come back in 52 days. If you survive, then you passed. At any time you can push the button, we'll come pick you up. But the goal is to make it all 52 days. So they shove them all out into space, they spacesuit over into the docking bay, they close the docking bay. There's 11 people there, and there's only supposed to be 10 of them. So what's going on? Why are there eleven? Um, and then bombs start going off all over the ship that they're on. And chaos ensues as slowly but surely it starts decelerating and getting sucked into the nearby sun that they should have been fine if there hadn't been these explosions. But because of these explosions, it's thrown them off uh off uh orbit around the planet they were orbiting, and they're falling into the sun. So what are these people going to do, especially when they feel like there's someone here who's not supposed to be here? Are they a sure? Are they a m a malign uh agent? w what's the story? It was cool. It was a really good, fun, poppy, easy like read really quick And most importantly, it looks like that. Moto Hagio is one of the greats. Like she has such a distinctive style that like really big eyes, you know, really kind of pointy faces, and and it and she just really excels. at that early shoujo style. It's like her and Ryoko Ikida who are the two like queens of that in my heart. This was great. I had a great time doing it. It wasn't like weird moody melodrama in a school, which is what most of her stuff is, or weird, moody melodrama with immortal vampire siblings, which is what the poke line is. It was weird moody melodrama in space. So I had a great time with it.
Peter
27:27
Space.
Eden
27:28
Yeah, that's the that's the vibe. It was really, really fun. And that's, you know, that's the only thing I've really had time to read. It was one of those things where like I talked about those uh um Clemen West books. I really liked them. I read like four of those suckers in two weeks, and I ain't opened a prose book since Because I've been fried and I haven't had time or energy to do anything. Um, let's see if there's anything else worth mentioning. I have gone back to Wuthering Waves. because new characters came out and there was new story that like tied up some of the stuff and so everyone's like, oh, you gotta go back and play Withering Waves. And I was like, okay, I'll go back and play Withering Waves. And the thing is, the writing's not great in that game. It's pretty good for like that kind of game. It's not great. The thing that that game excels at. Number one, the combat is the most dynamic and fun of any of these like open world like uh free-to-play games that I've ever played. Like Sure. It just has the tightest interplay between you have three characters on your team. They've got, you know, abilities. They've got ultimates that you're trying to build energy for. They've got interplay between them when you intro and outro from one character to another. If you've done certain things to make their intro or outro more powerful. And it's just, it's, it, it plays really good. Like the combat's really tight for this type of game. And the other thing that Kuro does that like none of these other ones do, the cutscenes are fucking bonkers, dog. There's this scene in the newest, uh, the newest patch Where you are piloting a mech and you're going up against this other mech. And it was one of the wildest cutscenes I've seen in a video game in a hot minute. It was so good and like Like it looks cool and the action is exciting, but it also is emotionally impactful. They're really good at like wringing the emotion out of these characters that are kind of mid written. They're not like poorly written, but they're not really well written. And we're not talking about a game like it's not going to win riding of the year, any of these games. Sure, sure. But it could win cutscene of the year. It could win action scene of the year because they look freaking bonkers. Um, so it's been fun. It's been fun to go back to that. The other thing worth mentioning is I played and have already uninstalled the uh stupidly named Neverness to Everness which is Okay, that is a terrible name. It's a terrible name. Neverness to Everness Um it's an and it's another open world gotcha game. Um it is specifically trying to be like What if we took like the open world exploration of a game like Genshin or Withering Waves with like the haunted urban feel of Zenless Zone Zero, and also you have this huge like GTA-esque world to run around in. Like to such a degree that like when you don't feel like doing main quests, you can just go be a taxi. You can just be like, oh, I'm gonna turn I'm gonna get online and I'm on I'm an Uber driver now and I'm told to drive here and I've got so I've got X amount of time to get to the pickup and then I gotta pick up a passenger and then I gotta get them I got X amount of time before they get pissed off and they want me to drop them off wherever And the faster I get them there, the more money I'm gonna make and the better ratings I'm gonna get, which means I'm gonna get like it is genuinely driving a freaking Uber. Uh and so there's all this sorts of cool stuff in it. It's a pretty okay game. The writing was not great. It did not put its best foot forward. Like the second main quest was surrounding this terrible mascot character that only ever says his name like he's a freaking Pokemon and it was not it was not the thing. They should not have made that the second main quest of the game. But then there was this whole thing where people discovered that a huge number of like background stuff in this big urban world was generative AI. With like no human hand whatsoever. They were just like, Chat GPT, shit us out 15 posters, and then they slapped them all over the world or whatever. And like that was one thing, but then their res their like response was like, oh, you know, we we were gonna fix those things, and then we just never got around to it. But we've replaced them now. And then we went and like people went into the game and looked at the replacements. They were like, that's that's just more generative AI stuff. You You just generated new things. You didn't you this still wasn't done by a person. And I was like, I don't want to support this. I don't want to do this. And so between that and like I don't really need another big open world game to explore in if I'm also going back and playing Wuthering Waves again, because here's the here's another big reason why I went back to Wuthering Waves. Next patch is the Cyberpunk crossover. Oh, very nice. So guess what I'm gonna get to do? I'm gonna get to ride Jackie Estacado's motorcycle. And Rebecca and Lucy from Cyberpunk Edgerunners are going to be there, and I can play as them. And so I was like, I don't really have the time and energy to do two of these games. I'm gonna just stick with the one that I know. And so I uninstalled Neverness to Everness. Again, both both terrible names. I ain't out here saying Wuthering Waves is a good name. It's a dog shit name.
Peter
32:54
It doesn't make any sense. But it's better than never.
Eden
32:57
It's better than neverness to everness. Anyway, that's what I've been up to. Not a whole lot of anything. But what another thing I've been doing is listening to a lot of music that I might not have listened to otherwise. Because dear listeners, my stupid idea this week was, hey, why don't I go look at the album of the year website where they like chart you know, uh metacritic ratings, um, critic ratings, all those sorts of things for all the music that comes out over the course of a year And pick some stuff that neither Peter or I might have listened to already. Not really necessarily in either of our wheelhouses. One of them is sort of in my wheelhouse. Um it's a It's an artist who I have really liked in the past, but haven't listened to in a long time because she hasn't put an album out in eight years. I didn't even know she had a new album. Um, but so I picked four things for Peter and I to listen to. um that kind of run the genre gamut of of things that we haven't really listened to before, things that aren't really our style. And I wanted us both to listen to them and be like. What are the critics getting out of these things that might not necessarily be things that we would normally listen to? And do we find any value in that? Like what do we get out of stretching ourselves musically into new genres? I don't know. Oh, go ahead.
Peter
34:26
I have gone and found it now, and I would just like to say that of the top ten albums with the highest ratings, uh, five of them. are albums that I have listened to and are in my music library.
Eden
34:39
The thing about album of the year, I have two I have two theories. Either the person who runs it is a huge metalhead. Or metal reviewers are too forgiving. Because when you I have used this many years in the past to just kind of see what was going on. Metal is overrepresented in the highest of highest scores.
Peter
35:01
No, no, no. I I know exactly why it's overrepresented. I can tell you right now. Fewer reviews for every metal album.
Eden
35:09
Oh, so it's easier to get a high score because there's fewer reviews.
Peter
35:12
So your your N is much lower. So you look the number one highest-rated album. Now I'm not going to argue with it, An Undying Love for a Burning World. Let's go. But it's only seven reviews. Cryptic Shift number three, that's five. Converge is the highest number. Converge's album, Love Is Not Enough, only has 12 reviews. You look at the immolation, descent. That's got five. At the gates, Ghost of a Future Dead has seven. And then you get to things like Mitsuki, nothing about to happen to me. That's got to 29. You know what's a good album though?
Eden
35:45
That new Mitsuki record. But I didn't pick that one because I know and have listened to Mitsuki since uh puberty too. Anyway, anyway, that was my aside.
Peter
35:54
I just wanted to say that the metal was You're right, slightly overrepresented. Although I think all five of those in the top ten are very, very good albums.
Eden
36:02
I don't doubt it. I don't doubt it. When I saw there was a new Converge album, I was like Hot damn, do I need to go back to uh very, very fast metal o'clock and listen to some Converge?
Peter
36:12
I mean, there's a second Converge album coming out in June.
Eden
36:15
Hell yeah, guys. Hell yeah. Those those guys were a wild concert, I tell you what. I believe that. Those guys play fast. Uh anyway, so the four albums that I picked for us to listen to, I'll name them all off and then I'll let you pick where we want to start.
Peter
36:30
Okay. And then briefly I'm just gonna say because you you very kindly let me throw in a metal album that you haven't listened to that was not neurosis. I did. And I went a decade old. And we'll talk about why when we get
Eden
36:43
there. But hot damn it was good. We'll get to it. We'll get to it. That's gonna be our that's gonna be our cream at the end. That's our dessert at the very end of our conversation.
Peter
36:51
Okay.
Eden
36:52
Because it is from a decade ago and the rest of these came out like in the last two months. So uh we have Wendy Eisenberg's album, Wendy Eisenberg, self-titled. We have Robyn's album, Sexistential. We have uh Ella Langley's album, Dandelion, and we have Mandy, Indiana's album, URGH. So Peter, where would you like to start talking about these four weird alb four weird records I picked for us to talk about?
Peter
37:22
Let's start with Robyn, because that was the one you said to me that you were a Robyn sicko, and so you were pretty sure you were already gonna like it.
Eden
37:29
I have been. The Body Talk trilogy came out in 2010 and it rewired my brain. When I heard dancing on my own for the first time, I was like, yo, dance pop. And I have been a Robyn fan ever since. Her EP that she did with Royksöpp is one of the greatest AP EPs ever written. Like It's such a banger. Uh I cannot speak highly enough of it. Uh Do It Again is one of the greatest songs ever written. Uh and I just had not heard from her in years. She put out her last album in twenty eighteen. Honey, it was good. I liked it, but I hadn't thought about Gin in a hot minute. And then I went to album of the year and I saw, oh Robyn put out an album a month ago. It's called Sexistential. And then I put it on and I was like, it's 2010 again. And I'm listening to Body Talk Part 4. Because this album sounds like it is Body Talk Part 4, except Robyn is 16 years older, and now she's talking about, yo, your body kind of sucks when you're 49, huh? Anyway, what did you think about this album?
Peter
38:38
She's not wrong. No, she's not. I'm gonna tip my hand early here. Hit me. And and I'm gonna say, if I had to pick a favorite out of these four albums in terms of the one that I was like, this is the one I find most enjoyable to listen to, it would absolutely have been Sexistential Bar. Robyn. Okay. Nice. So I mean, here's the thing: it goes down pretty easy. Oh, it's smooth, listening. Real smooth, real listenable.
Eden
39:10
It's 30 minutes long.
Peter
39:12
Yes. I mean it's just this is this is this is easy, fun, light. It does exactly I I assume I am wrong. I could be wrong, but in thinking of kind of what I would say, well, what was it, what does a dance pop album want to do? This does that. Oh yeah. I mean, I feel like this just does that.
Eden
39:34
Yeah. This is this, like I say, this really does feel like, and this is what it said, you know, as I was reading about it. She said, I want to capture the feel of body talk again. And I think she truly does. Like this really feels like Body Talk Part 4. Um, in terms of the way it's produced, in terms of the way the hooks work, in terms of the way that the beats hit. It's very d it's not very different. It's a bit different from the stuff she was doing that's a little more experimental, a little weirder when she was working with Royksöpp in the mid-2010s. This feels like a little more return to form for her than even Woo Honey was in 2018. But it it's real smooth. I I turned it on and it was one of those things that I was like I haven't listened to Robyn since pre-pandemic. I don't think I've put on a single Robyn album in six years. Is it still gonna hit? And I tell you what, I put it in, I push play, and really real started, and I was like, Robyn, you got me again. I'm back on board. She's just good at it. Like she just writes and performs bangers that just go down so smooth and everything hits nicely and you just want to move your body. I just want to dance when I'm listening to a Robyn album And I had a delightful time listening to this bad boy.
Peter
40:53
Nice. Nice. I'm glad. I'm glad that it it It it met expec it sounds like it met expectations.
Eden
41:00
It absolutely met.
Peter
41:01
I don't think it exceeded.
Eden
41:03
It didn't it it's not Robyn's best album. It's not. Body Talk still is her best album. Uh or that rooksop EP, one of the two. Um, it's better than honey. I liked it better than honey. I thought it was really fun. Um, it is a funny name, um, sexistential. Um Even though the songs aren't really about sex as much as I would have expected with the name Sexistential, um, they are like about being embodied and they're sensual. But they're not like it's not like pornographic.
Peter
41:32
Like you might the name might imply. There is definitely an underlying again, and this I think this is kind of what I got from it, is some of this is Robyn uh dealing with her identity yeah as a you know almost 50-year-old person and as an almost 50-year-old person I can tell you that you start to have these sorts of existential thoughts. And I think that one of the big questions, and and I see this from a professional standpoint, because of the type of work I do. But there are a lot of people for whom that type of human contact, that intimacy, sex, it dies at this age already. I mean, there are a lot of people. who just i it just becomes something that, well, that was for when I was 20 and 30. And I feel like some of this is her Trying to come to terms with what does it mean to still be a vibrant sexual person when so much of the world looks at me and says, you're not supposed to want to do that. anymore.
Eden
42:35
You're not supposed to feel that anymore. And part of that's tied up is she had a kid. She had a kid in 2023. So like you're a mom. And and you're not like a MILF. So you can't be a sexual being the way a MILF would be. And it's and so it yeah, it does feel like like it has that both coming to terms with aging, um, with the themes in some of these songs, but also like still finding joy in being who you want to be and at and and like Being an active participant in your life, um, in all that that entails, you know. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I thought it was really fun. I had a very good time with it. Um, and uh She's back. Robyn's back. And that was such a fun thing to find.
Peter
43:25
Good. Good. Well, I think you should pick our next one
Eden
43:28
All right. Well, I think that we should go from this one to the one that I think you maybe hated the most if I had to guess. Although I kind of feel like it's between two, but I'm gonna guess Dandelion by Ella Langley might have been your least favorite.
Peter
43:45
I fucking hated every note on this shitty ass shit album.
Eden
43:54
Tell me how you really feel. Yeah, so it's not really my jam. Yeah, I didn't think it would be. And here's the you want to know what the saddest part is? I like alt country pretty okay. This is this is not alt country. This is here's what I'll say about Ella Langley. It's very traditional, present like 2020s country, but it's good 2020s country. It's better than most everything you hear when you go to the dive bar that's playing country the whole time. You're there that you're there. Okay. It is. I believe I'll believe you. But also, do you know who came out with an album like three days ago? That's ten times better if you want a country album? Casey Musgraves came out with an album like three days ago. And I feel like it was for me because there's a song on it called Horses and Divorces. So it's my album. It's my country album of the year because it's got a song called Horses and Divorces on it. Um, but yeah, I I thought Ella Langley was uh I thought that her voice is really great. She has some good hooks.
Peter
45:00
I think her voice is shit. Okay, tell me why. I think she's got a good country voice, but tell me why you don't like it. Maybe the problem is is I just hate country voices, but I hated everything about it. And this is again, and this is a stylistic thing. So this is not necessarily her. But and and we'll come back to this exact same problem I hate swoopers. I hate swoopers. I hate them so, so much. Tell listeners what swoopers are, in case they don't know. So. Every note's gotta go and it's gonna swoop from one to the next. Yeah. It's bad. And and I felt vindicated when I was sharing with my wife the the person in the family with the masters in vocal performance. Uh-huh. Uh I I was sharing with her the things that you inflicted upon me, and she heard the first line of Ella Langley, and she would turn to me and she said Oh, she's awful. She has a terrible voice. And I went, yes. Vindication. Vindication. Vindication! Yeah. But no, like I I know this sounds hyperbolic to say this, but I truly do. I honestly have a visceral physical revulsion to country music. That's fair. And and and I will honestly tell you, this was the one I did not listen to. I listened to moments of every song to try and find And then it was skip, skip, skip. Also, also, my hell, come on. Nineteen fucking songs. Yeah, it's too long.
Eden
46:30
It's it's twice as long as it should be.
Peter
46:32
It's ridiculous. Yeah, I I I tr I would listen to a few seconds. I was like, nope, nope, right out. Go to the next one. Next. Next. I think I made it to track about 17 and I was just like, no, there is there's literally no way there's anything on these last two tracks. that would redeem this album for me. And so I did not listen to it.
Eden
46:51
You know, that's fair. Uh I picked that one hoping it would be okay and I sent it to you before I listened to a single note. And then I booted it up and I booted it up and I was like, oh, I don't know about this one, guys. And then again, I was very disappointed to have Casey Musgraves put out an album like the day after I sent you the list. And I was like, God damn it. You know, I Casey Musgraves is good when it comes to country. Like, I don't even like country that much, but Casey Musgraves is a good country artist. Ella Ella Langley ain't got it like Casey
Peter
47:24
This is this is good because then this way we could have this conversation and I could shit all over this album and it didn't turn into something. No, this ain't gonna be a fight.
Eden
47:35
This is not no, this is not gonna be a fight
Peter
47:37
I wanted to like it.
Eden
47:38
I did not like it.
Peter
47:40
I didn't like it.
Eden
47:41
I wanted to.
Peter
47:42
It was so bad. I hated everything about it.
Eden
47:44
Yeah. It was, yeah, it was really disappointing. But hey. At least we gave it a try. At least we tried it. We gave it a try. And again, Casey gave me a good country album. If I'm feeling country, I can go turn on. The brand new album from uh Casey Musgrave's Middle of Nowhere. It's good. But that's because she does like again, uh Ella Langley is doing very traditional country here. Up to and including, if you listen to the so the title track, Dandelion, sec first real song on the album, because there's like a dumb intro out song. Mm-hmm. And it's like the most stereotypical country it could be. The Bible in my blood and the Bama in my veins? Come on. Oh yeah. Come on. Alabama. It's so boring. Uh yeah. Real bad. So it's not good. Um, but you know, there is good country out there. I don't think Ella Langley was it. I liked, I wanted to like it.
Peter
48:37
But I didn't like it.
Eden
48:38
Okay.
Peter
48:38
It didn't last for me. All right, pick Patoon. I tried to go in with an open mind and it took that intro song and then I was like, mm-hmm. And then it got to dandelion and I just, again, I was like Nope, this is exactly what I expected.
Eden
48:54
Yeah, yeah.
Peter
48:55
So well. Um, you know what? Let's go to Wendy Eisenberg.
Eden
49:00
This is one that, you know, I you said that Robyn was your favorite. Um I actually really liked this Wendy Risen. Album. I'm not familiar with Wendy Eisenberg's work. Alright. I had never really listened to her before. This is like her eighth album. It's folk rock, country, sort of folky music. But the fun part is she actually plays a kind of mean guitar. She picks a pretty mean guitar. Um and I thought this was a pretty fun album. It's not like, you know, it's not gonna be in my end of year rankings or anything Um, but it there was like there was a certain level of composition that I got out of this that I was not getting from like the Ella Langley stuff. Like it felt like there was more um thought and intention behind the way that the songs were put together. I thought this one was pretty good. I had a fun time with it.
Peter
49:53
What do you think about it? Good. I think that there is a chance I could have not hated this if she wasn't the singer. Go on. I hate her voice and everything about it.
Eden
50:04
Uh why? I didn't I didn't that much.
Peter
50:07
Oh, it's horrible. So again, she does the swooping up and down every note, every note she swoops, whether it's up or down, every single note. But the big thing for me is that, and again, I believe I could be wrong. But I believe that this is this kind of is, again, an affectation of this particular type of indie slash indie pop slash indie rock country, whatever. But her vocal, like her singing is so tragically unsupported Okay. Like she she has no support behind a single note that she sings on this album. Every one of them is just like it's barely there. And it leads to her being flat all over this damn record. Yeah, she ha they they have some flatness, yeah. It's kind of And again I think that that's part of the affectation of this. But I found that just so aggravating that even if there was a song that music, I was like, this is kind of interesting, I could not get past her Not even there is not even that they're breathy because you can have breathy vocals that still have good support behind them. But this was just again, no support. All of the sound was just coming from her throat. There was nothing down in her stomach, her chest, her diaphragm was not contributing anything. to the words that were coming out of her mouth. And I don't know why that made me so irrationally annoyed. Maybe again, it's because I live with a vocal coach? Could be. But I hated it.
Eden
51:48
Could be. Okay, I did find out one thing important while I was Googling while you were talking. Um Non-binary solidarity with me and Wendy Eisenberg. They use they-them pronouns, so apologies to them. We didn't know till literally right now.
Peter
52:00
There we go.
Eden
52:01
Reve reverse all those things we said. They-them pronouns. Non-binary solidarity, Wendy Eisenberg. Guess what? I like your album more now that I'm just kidding. I did like it. That's the thing though. I liked your album, Wendy Eisenberg, and not because not because you're non-binary. And Peter didn't like it, not because you're non-binary. Just because he doesn't like your voice.
Peter
52:20
Just because of your stylistic choices, and that's okay.
Eden
52:23
I just I I thought that it was just like especially when it was just them and the guitar.
Peter
52:30
I just really liked it.
Eden
52:31
It was very chamberfolky. Um that the album cover looks like it's from let not her their picture, but like the the styling of the album cover looks like this is an album from 1974. Um, and that is kind of the way that the vibe feels of the album. Oh yeah. I thought it was I thought it was really fun. I will keep listening to this and uh I'd probably check out some of their older stuff too. Um I had a really good time with this one.
Peter
52:57
Yeah. Like I say, this one i it I didn't hate it the way I hated the uh the Ella Langley album. I do think it's very funny.
Eden
53:06
I'm looking at reviews on a different website and this person gave it two out of five stars. And says, uh, you know, talking about their voice, uh, um, they just flat out don't got it And when they go for the high notes, look the fuck out.
Peter
53:27
Well, and that was the problem is there were a few different times where they were singing at the limits of their range. And you could tell. It was it was real rough. Both high and low. I real rough.
Eden
53:38
I bet it would be real rough live. If that's what you got in the studio, I would be shocked to hear these babies live Yeah. But I I just I like this one. Uh I will absolutely keep listening to this album from time to time as the uh as the year goes on
Peter
53:54
What it made me do is it made me go, oh, I don't hate this kind of music because when somebody like Emma Ruth Rundle does it, I like it. Yeah. That's true. That's very true. Yeah.
Eden
54:06
All right, now on to our last one, which is Mandy, Indiana is the name of the band, and the album is named URGH U-R-G-H. This one Was the one that I when I started it up, I thought to myself, oh my God. Peter's gonna hate this I think I kind of like it. And the more I listened to it, the less I felt like I kind of liked it. I think ultimately it's not what I wanted it to be. Um It's it's a real kind of a mess of an album. Uh I can see why people are into it. I can see why it's getting press and why it's got a pretty high critic score. Um it is a weird noise rock. album.
Peter
54:51
And and emphasis on the word noise. This felt are you familiar with math
Eden
54:58
Uh no. This felt like they were trying to channel the dead sp I don't even know if Matt Mose is still around. I ain't listened to him in fifteen years. I really got into Matmos because they had an album uh that was entirely made of the sounds of surgical equipment. Um, and that's cool as shit. Even if the album's not very much fun to listen to, cause Matmos is a very weird noise band. uh the idea that you especially you as a medical professional might be able to listen to and be like oh that's this that's a drill or that's a that that's a the other thing Uh but it felt like they were trying to channel some of that like real chaos that Matmos uh was delivering in the aughts Um, but I I just I wanted to like it, but it just didn't quite land for me when it was all said and done. I felt like it started strong. The first track or two I was like, okay, I'm into this. But by the end, uh it I just felt like I had been bludgeoned for 40 or for 30 minutes.
Peter
55:54
Yeah, so if I had to say this is my second favorite of the four, but You heard what I felt about. It's just because of how much you disliked the other two. In part, yes. But like I like as you said, this is more noise than it is music. Uh-huh. And so I could totally see myself turning this on if I just wanted sound. If all I cared about is I want sound. I don't want silence. I want sound. Yeah. I could see myself turning this on. But as you said, give it two, three tracks, and you're kind of like, okay. And then you by the time you get to four tracks in, you're like, I am done for now. And then give me a break. And then maybe the next day I could come back and do a couple more tracks, that sort of thing. This was a thing where there was no way I was gonna sit down and listen to this one all the way through start to finish. No, I did not make it through all the way through. Yeah Um, and this one, no. This one I needed a break after two, three songs.
Eden
57:03
Yeah, it's really it feels It's an alienating and dehumanizing experience to listen to it, which maybe if that's the mood that you're into and that's what you want from the music, you could sit down and listen to all 34 minutes of it at a pop. I felt alienated and dehumanized by it. So I would have to take breaks while I was listening to it. Yeah. But i i i think that's the vibe they were going for. The problem is the lyrics are in French. And I don't really speak f that much French. My French is very old. It's been a decade plus since I had to read or speak French. So I'm rusty. And I never was that good at that one to begin with.
Peter
57:41
So question, did you what did you listen to this on? Where did you listen to this? I downloaded it from Bandcamp. Okay. So Getting to your dehumanization, blah, blah, blah, you know, that. This is interesting. This is one of the things I actually really dig about some Apple music. uh albums where they do weird stuff with the art. But I'm gonna see if I can show you the art and you're gonna see what it changes. And you're gonna go, no, that's exactly what they were going for. Yeah, that's the vibe.
Eden
58:13
So if I mean you've got to listeners, if you haven't seen the cover, the the cover for the album Erg is like a a a series of four different colors, uh four different images in the different like Uh there's a m magenta one, there's a blue one, there is a yellow one. Um so they're all three of them are superimposed on top of each other. And one is like a skull and one is like a face and one is a different face. And so what it's doing while you're playing the music, this is the sort of thing I'm sure Spotify does this too with this album. It did it with albums when I used to use Spotify. It is like smearing colors across so that you're only seeing parts of this of this cover at at a time. And that really does kind of contribute to like the disorientation and the dehumanization of the whole thing. Again, I I had some MP3s I downloaded from Bay well, I guess there were some flax that I bound downloaded from Bandcamp and I threw in FUBAR 2000. So Cause I'm doing it in ye olden days. I gotta scroll.
Peter
59:15
That's important.
Eden
59:16
That's important It's very important. Also, you shouldn't name your band this. I'm looking at the album of the year. This is unrelated, but I was looking at I saw Mandy, Indiana, and then I went down to and I saw a band named Urn, U-R-N-E. And all I could think was urine.
Peter
59:33
They're good.
Eden
59:33
Setting fire to the sky. Don't call your band urine. Don't call your band urine. I bet sludge Sludge Progressive Atmospheric Sludge. That sounds like melodic metal chord. That's the sort of shit I'm into when I listen to metal.
Peter
59:51
So they're good friends with Mastodon.
Eden
59:53
Well, they shouldn't have named their band Urin.
Peter
59:55
Uh you know, you know. They're a good band.
Eden
59:58
Well, I might have to listen to them, but I'm gonna make fun of their names every time I think about them.
Peter
01:00:02
Alright, so the dessert.
Eden
01:00:05
The thing Peter. So I said I I I feel a little bad because I know from the jump I'm gonna like this Robyn album, and as you all heard, I did. So I said, Peter, give me a metal album that you think I should listen to that I haven't listened to yet. And so what did you give me, Peter?
Peter
01:00:20
Well, we've talked about it here on the podcast on a few different occasions, especially when we did our desert island album. Because that was when in putting together those five albums where I was like, okay, what are the five albums? If I could only listen to these albums for the rest of my life, what are the five? And this was one of them. And I knew it would be one of them going in. But over the last two years, this album has far and away taken over as my most listened to album. And that album is 2016's Slow Forever from Colorado Duo Cobalt.
Eden
01:00:53
You know it was a pretty good album.
Peter
01:00:56
It's slow forever. Oh. Holy. I'm so glad to hear that.
Eden
01:01:02
Holy god. I started this thing up and I was like, oh. Okay. Okay. Like it's not honestly, it's not as heavy as I expected it to be. For being your number one all-time best album, like it's heavy. I ain't out here saying it ain't heavy. But it's way I mean it's some black and sludge, but like that's the thing, is is so okay, so real briefly, Cobalt's been around since 2002 was and and they've released they quote they released
Peter
01:01:28
War Metal, Eater of Birds, and Gin in 2009. Gin in 2009 was almost universally penned as one of the albums of the year for on the metal scene. And is really sort of credited as being If you had to say what are some of the most important American black metal bands, Ginn would be in that top three. Sure. With s you know, with bands like Agilak and others where where the sound of the music Is essentially tied to their geography. Sure. You know, you listen to Agalloch and you cannot. You can feel the Pacific Northwest.
Eden
01:02:09
You feel like you're in forks and you feel like the vampires in forks are gonna come and uh save you when a car almost hits you. I'm joking, but like it is the vibe When you're watching Twilight and you see those vistas, you're like, oh, that's an Agalloch album.
Peter
01:02:23
What if they played that instead of Muse?
Eden
01:02:25
Maybe I'd like these movies even more.
Peter
01:02:28
And and I think that, you know, 2009's Gin really cemented that and kind of Western American, Western Americana. Uh-huh. But then there was a lot of turmoil in the band. The previous vocalist had served a couple tours in the army, both in Iraq and in South Korea. And was suffering from some PTSD, but was kinda online going on some homophobic, misogyn misogynistic rants. And so Eric Wonder kind of reached out and he's like, you know what? Look at that. Like you're you're out. Like you're out. I'm sorry. I can't condone that. You're out. And so then he gets um from oh god, what's the guy's name? Anyway, he gets a new vocalist. Charlie Together, Charlie Fell, thank you, from Lord Mantis. And uh they get together and they start working on Slow Forever. And it takes until 2016 for this album to come out. So it's seven years from Gin before it finally comes out. comes out. And in the meantime, this is no longer a black metal album. Slow Forever is, like you said, it is it is progressive, sludgy, posty with blackened overtones sprinkled through the earth. throughout. Yeah. And as much as I love Gin, this is a better album because of that. Because I mean look, Eric Wonder is It he does all of the instruments. Uh-huh. So all of the instruments were Eric. Charlie Fell does the vocals, but Eric at his heart is a drummer. That's what he did when he toured and played with Jarbo, is he was drummer for drummer. For at least some time. He played drums for Jarbo. So, and you can tell, like when you listen to Slow Forever, you're like
Eden
01:04:04
Oh yeah, the drums are really, really forward.
Peter
01:04:08
Oh yeah, forward and crisp, and they've got a punch to them and they're very dynamic. But there are moments where I'm listening to it and you can go. Oh no, there's even some like Danny Carey elements and influence in here. There's some there's some tool drumming vibes as well that he's bringing in. So so they really bring a lot of stuff together to make Slow Forever. Um what about it did you like? I'm curious. I mean you said you this was a pretty good album.
Eden
01:04:35
What what what no I I was really from the start really impressed with it. I felt like the s like the The sound was just really dynamic. Like the instrumentals were really, really solid. I was I had no idea it was one dude. Excuse me. Yeah, I had I had no idea it was one guy uh doing all of this. But it's got like really good hooks. Um, you know, it is really aggressive. It has riffs that really shine, and as you said, the drumming is really, really strong. Like it just sounds, it sounds self-assured And it makes sense that this is like a fourth or fifth album that a band would put out, even if there was, you know, some some some uh tumult beforehand in the band. This is a guy who knows what he wants to make musically, and he's putting it all on the page.
Peter
01:05:27
He's playing. For like 84 minutes.
Eden
01:05:30
Yeah, he's putting it all on the page. To use Gen Z Parlance, he's putting his whole ghetto russy out there. Like he is doing the damn thing. And the vocals are really solid. Like it the you know, it's uh he he has a good uh scream. Like it's not like I have a lot of problem with screams over growls. I prefer a growl over a scream if we're doing medals. You know, there are some exceptions to that, but I I I'm a growler, not a screamer when it comes to listening. I like it down here. I don't like it up here Is it pretty good?
Peter
01:06:03
It's a good it's a good whale. Um and and intelligible, surprisingly. You can understand most of the words. You can understand a lot of the words. Which is Rare for a blackened metal screen. Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
Eden
01:06:17
I mean I've spent my time in the Ulver mines back when Ulver was a black metal band. You don't know what those I it might be in German. I don't fucking know. There's no way of knowing. Because all you can hear is you can't understand it. Um that's there's a reason those guys pivoted to like singing. It's because they're like, I can't do this for the rest of my fucking life.
Peter
01:06:37
Right.
Eden
01:06:38
I'm impressed by any metal vocalist who can. But yeah, no, I had a really good time with it. I'm gonna keep this is absolutely entering the rotation of things I'm gonna be listening to for the next few months, too. I was really impressed with it. It's too it's too long. It should be 50 minutes. 80 minutes is too long. It is at least two discs. Um, but it is very long two discs. Uh but I had a good time with it. I was I really it was one of those ones that every time you've brought it up, I've thought to myself, I should go listen to that. And then I never have. So I'm glad that you finally had me do it. Because it was worth my time and uh worth the effort of uh of of giving it its eighty-four minutes or however long it is.
Peter
01:07:16
And and and it is long. You are right. It is long. I am the sicko who I go, but I couldn't cut anything. Even iconoclast, which is mostly just a little bit of guitar and you know Ernest Hemingway talking for a couple minutes. You need the breathing. It's still like it's in there You need the breather between Final Will and Slow Forever. Well, and again, yeah, that's the thing, is the way that Slow Forever comes pummeling in out of the gate with that riff and the just the brrrrrrrrums just having that break in there. Yeah. But it was a lot of fun. I'm glad you liked it. I I think that and and of course, you know, as I mentioned a few months ago in that when it was announced. I am incredibly saddened that Eric Wonder has passed away. You know, wish him and his family still all all the best. Uh it's sad that we'll never get any more cobalt, but uh what a hell of a thing to go out on. What a way to go out. Between this and Gin, which you know again, I would highly recommend listening to Agalloch, understanding that it is more of a black metal album. uh but it is really, really good. A and so is Eater of Birds. I mean they're just they're both great. But for me this there's a passage here I'm gonna read from King Rust that I think says it best and encapsulates why I think I identify with this album so much. Go for it. There is throughout this album, you feel these conflicting, this conflicting sense of both weariness at the world, but also rage. Against the weird the what in the world is causing that weariness. For sure. And you know, King Rust, it says, has the following lines and it builds to this, and this is one of my favorite moments in the whole album. He says. Stained glass sanity to doubt existence is all she needs, hoisting myself out of myself, pushing and pulling and clawing my way, spitting out moondust and pushing away. and hearts unmend, and bodies unmend, and prayers unattended, and answers unquestioned, and I resist. If I could be a fly on shit, if I could just get some rest, and you could break my arms, and I could find some solace. But I resist. Hell yeah.
Eden
01:09:25
And you know what you need in 2026? That vibe. 100%.
Peter
01:09:30
I could be some fly on shit, but I resist. Hell yeah. But I resist. Hell yeah. So well good. I'm glad that you enjoyed it. I was worried. I was worried that it wasn't gonna click for you. And that's okay. That's good. It's totally okay, but mmm, love it. Well that was a fun I appreciate a fun little journey.
Eden
01:09:50
Everyone should go listen to Robyn is the mess. Well, the message from this twofold. If you are a metal listener, go listen to Slow Forever by Cobalt. If you haven't already. The many times it's been mentioned. If you just are like a regular degular music listener, you're like, metal isn't for me. Go listen to Robyn's Sexistential, and it's 29 minutes long, and you'll move your ass. You'll get out of your seat and you'll move your booty. It's great. Yeah. Listen to it. Anyway, we'll be back in two weeks with a new episode. Um, leave us a review, leave us stars, all those normal things. Um, and we'll be back soon and it'll be fun. Talk to you then. Bye.