Megadeth’s final LP is simply titled “Megadeth.” In my opinion, it’s a fitting title because, after several listens, the impression I’m left with is that this work is a tribute to himself, to his different eras.
With their latest release, Barry Johnson and company prove that you can grow up without losing the ability to synthesize high-stakes emo/pop/punk drama into less than two hundred seconds. Under the baton of Brett Gurewitz (the Epitaph big shot), the group dispatches nine cuts in a 20-minute breath, maintaining the brevity that has become their trademark.
In the early 2000s, independent cinema began nurturing a female character archetype designed to rescue emotionally stunted male protagonists from their own insecurities through eccentricity, vinyl records, and “cute” tunes: the Manic Pixie Dream Girl phenomenon. Notable examples included Kirsten Dunst in Elizabethtown, Zooey Deschanel in (500) Days of Summer, or Mary-Elizabeth Winstead in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. Garden State (2004) didn’t invent the manic pixie dream girl trope, but it certainly popularized and fueled it in this scene between Natalie Portman and Zach Braff.
The Canadian band is kicking off January 2026 with the release of their sixth studio effort, doubling down on their forays into sounds much closer to hardcore—as evidenced by tracks like “Blood for Blood”. It is a fascinating evolution; they’ve traveled from the more juvenile pop-punk of their debut EP, A Way With Words (where … Read more
Let’s imagine an external observer looking at Earth, trying to understand its characteristic sounds. Which genre would be the most cross-cutting in today’s music?
An Americana singer-songwriter releasing a 25-song behemoth clocking in at 1 hour and 18 minutes: cue the panic and cold sweats… Everyone stay calm, the ghost of an aimless Ryan Adams hasn’t possessed him just yet.
Disbanded is our tribute section to bands that are no longer active. Our small contribution to keeping their memory alive. My arrival at Archers of Loaf could be described as a stroke of luck, following a musical obsession defined by the sound of bands like Sunny Day Real Estate. That search led me to Madee, … Read more
This week’s pick is Beanpole, the debut album by Australian artist Georgia Knight. Its inclusion is something of a mea culpa for not featuring it in our “NOVO 2025: New Voices of the Year” selection.
Wrapped might think it knows us inside out, but there’s nothing like reaching the end of the year to reflect on what truly stayed with us after a year of exploring new sounds.