New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou

New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou

New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou

New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou

Ok, so here's the deal – writing this usually takes me about 3-4 hours. It's currently 11:10 post meridian on Sunday night. I have to be up at 5. I have absolutely no idea what I have done today other than host a radio show and cook a pot of chili (loyal readers will remember the recipe from a few Top8s back). Let's get this show on the road.

Send your executive dysfunction lifehacks to wtsq.org/contact. God knows I need them. 

Remember Sports - Cut Fruit

There's a lot to like about Remember Sports. The name for one. Good name. Hell of a name. Also, the band has a wonderfully noisy take on indie rock with a bit of power pop. "Cut Fruit" is the new single. I love how this band takes real human drama and pathos and turns it into something exuberant. Think about the best Weezer songs from back when they were worth a good goddamn.

Sweet Pill - No Control

Philly's Sweet Pill has what I think is a pretty rad combination of 90s crunch, emo, and punk. "No Control" leans more into the punk elements, but still hits you with the band's usual sound. This track is a little more fun than what initially got me into them. The band's 2024 EP Starchild, and especially the track "Eternal", has really stuck with me and become one of my favorite releases from the last few years. I am not sure if "No Control" will quite hit that, but it is still pretty damn good.

Robber Robber - Suspicious Minds (Elvis Cover)

Holy hell, these crazy MFs hit us with an Elvis cover. And it's fantastic. I have always thought that if you do a cover, you should try to do something different with the song than the original artist did. Robber Robber certainly accomplished that here. The song is completely rearranged.  The guitars flirt with fuzzed out stoner rock, and the vocals are more or less whispered in a too-cool-to-care monotone. I really, really fuck with this cover, but I will add that the band also recently released an also terrific single called "Talkback" that almost wound up here instead.

Young Mountain - Sympati

"Sympati" has a good measure of rock music catharsis. Things get quiet and then get loud and finally find a struggling, survival of spirit in the midst of it all. Something that I really think only rock music does. There's a lot of other great music out there, don't get me wrong. But these kind of thunderous moments of defiance are best accomplished with a guitar, bass, and drums.

Or that's what I took from it anyway, however I think this song is in Swedish so it could be a grocery list for all I know.

Slut Intent - Peppa Pig

Proper punk rock. Femme fronted and extremely pissed off. This is the kind of thing you catch in a basement and count yourself lucky if you leave without a chipped tooth. Slut Intent brings the whole thing on "Peppa Pig", and really on everything I have heard from them. As a side note, I especially like it when shit is mixed so that you can understand the vocals. A+ from Auntie Em, kids.

The 3Strikes - Time To Say Goodbye

I don't know if this is really true, but there's a part of me that feels that everything will be ok as long as someone is out there playing old school punk in the vein of bands like the Ramones, the Descendants, or Pennywise. Drunken sing along choruses make you best friends with some kid in the pit who loves the same song – for exactly 2 minutes. "Time to Say Goodbye" is a perfect example of this kind of music. I'd have loved this when I was 19-20, just like I love it now. This is the kind of song that makes you remember to tuck your shoelaces in so you don't fall down in the pit.

Automatic - Terminal 

Synth-punk from LA with a little electroclash for good measure. Automatic drops a sort of breakbeat into something that hits the ground running. Or maybe that's dancing. "Terminal" is weird enough to be interesting, but goes hard enough to get your ass moving. This really grabbed a hold of me. Automatic might end up being one of my new favorite bands.

Honeymoan - If I'm Honest

Honeymoan calls themselves pop. I can hear it. And there's nothing wrong with pop. But this sounds way too band-oriented to be a pop track in 2026. "If I'm Honest" has a lot more of an edge to it than pop usually does too. I'd reference 90s stuff like Lush or Garbage as a comparison, just with a little more gloss.

Which brings us to this week's extra innings. These are just a few bonus tracks I am into right now. These aren't new, they are just awesome.

Sweet Pill - Eternal

Smog - Hit the Ground Running

Otis Redding - I've Been Loving You Too Long (To Stop Now) (Live at the Monterey Pop Festival)

And a playlist with everything.

Thank all of you for reading and listening for another year.

-emily. 

Emily

1. Wednesday - Bleeds
2. Snocaps - Snocaps
3. Mei Semones - Animaru
4. They are Gutting a Body of Water - Lotto
5. Lung - The Swankeeper
6. Andrew Adkins - Vandalia
7. Nourished by Time - The Passionate Ones
8. Smerz - Big City Life
9. Tyler Childers - Snipe Hunter
10. Ethel Cain - Willoughby Tucker, I'll Always Love You

Lou (In no particular order)

Oxis - Oxis 7
Oklou - Choke Enough
Wednesday - Bleeds
The 1975 - Still… At Their Very Best (Live From The OA Arena, Manchester, 17.02.24)
The Wild Shoats - Yell In The Shoats
Smerz - Big city life
Mei Semones - Animaru
Dijon - Baby
Water From Your Eyes - It’s a Beautiful Place
Annahstasia - Tether

And here's our collaborative best of 2025.

Thanks to everyone for a great year of music.

Anyway, the ass end of the year continues to be a time when very few bands are dropping new releases. As a result, I have a track from May in here and a few from September. But they are great tracks that I would absolutely have included earlier in the year if I'd heard them.

I have been making a lot more soup and watching some movies. School starts back in a few weeks, so I need to do a lot of human things between now and then. School ruins my life.

Send us a list of what ruins your life at wtsq.org/contact

Agriculture - Bodhidharma

I don't always get super into extremely screamy vocals. They all sound the same and most of the time I can't make out what they are saying. I'm usually into the metal or punk bands they front, but the vocals just don't often set well on my ears. Agriculture is a different kind of band. Their screamyness is in the service of black metal with a fair dose of shoegaze – blackgaze some people call it. Their new album "The Spiritual Sound" has a lot of different sounds and influences. Agriculture pairs the aggression and intensity of black metal together with a lot of textures from other genres from doom to ambient. Hell, there's even some folk here. "Bodhidharma" is the standout track for me, but the whole album is great. This is a refreshing find that kinda wakes me back up to this kind of metal. Thanks out to Bug for putting this on my radar.

Bonus points – if you're into this, make sure you also check out Thou out of NYC.

Forty Winks - Commie bf

Yet another fucking awesome band coming out of Pittsburgh. It must be the pierogies. Forty Winks has a new EP called "Love is a Dog From Hell" (a reference to one of my favorite poets, Charles Bukowski). The whole EP is excellent, and I was torn between "Commie bf" and "Spurs". This is a moody rock band that can bounce between dreamy and clipping insane noise the next. "Commie bf" is a more punk track in the vein of classic Nirvana but with some jangle.

Bloodsports - Rosary

The band's pithy bio calls them "new york city guitar music" and they appear to be as good as their work. "Rosary" starts with a wispy atmosphere before turning into a great thundering mass of guitar noise with a stompy beat.

Total Wife - Second Spring

If I go long enough without hearing a flanging guitar, I start to shake and stutter until someone hits me with an epipen filled with a shot of Souvlaki Space Station. Next time, I could just as easily turn to Total Wife. "Second Spring" shows a really perfected dichotomy of soft-as-a-cloud vocals with supernova levels of crunch and fury. This is really gorgeous and perfectly executed.

Home is Where - artificial grass

It sounds absolutely insane to combine emo and country. Until you hear it – and I have to say, this truly fucks. "Artificial Grass" adds a bit of twanging sweetness to an angular emo guitar figure and eventually finds its way to a time signature change and some intense vocals. I am super into this. The whole album is "Hunting Season" and it's extremely worth a spin.

Good Flying Birds - Eric's Eyes

Another one from Bug. Good Flying Birds are here to chew bubblegum and jangle like motherfuckers and they are all out of bubblegum. You all know how I feel about jangle, but Good Flying Birds are bringing something else here too. Tracks like "Eric's Eyes" show a real lofi punk vibe along with the indie jangle.

Water From Your Eyes - Born 4

I have featured Water From Your Eyes before. These guys combine various synth textures from chiptune to more ambient sounds with sudden and often surprising leaps into distortion and guitars. "Born 4" is typical of this. It features a hyper chiming music box that swirls around your brain and eventually breaks out into something abrasive and noisy. I kinda see this stuff as the 2020s children of one of my all time favorites, Sleigh Bells.

University - Bee

University is a British punk act that keeps the noise and jagged edges of that genre while insisting on the elbow room to explore some other sounds. "Bee" starts out with a vaguely honky-tonk beat but quickly clobbers it with a big wet mess of noise. The guitar seems blithely unconcerned with tune or even timing here, and the track is absolutely the better for it. Think of bands like Sonic Youth.

And this week's extra innings. Just a few other things I am listening to.  Which, this week, is actually just TAGABOW.

They Are Gutting A Body Of Water - Sour Diesel

They Are Gutting A Body Of Water - 63 Skies

They Are Gutting A Body Of Water - jadakiss

And a playlist with everything.

Thank you all for reading and listening.

-emily

New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou

I've been trying to experiment with some very quick meals recently. I cook almost everything I eat more or less from scratch, so quick can be a relative term. The new thing is peanut butter ramen.

Emily's Peanut Butter Ramen

Ingredients

1 pack normal trashy ramen

Some amount of real, oily peanut butter. None of this half sugar Skippy bullshit. 

Chili crisp

Soy sauce

Some kinda seasoning mix / ramen flavor packet

Frozen broccoli

Fried tofu

Directions

1.) Throw your broccoli into the air fryer for 7-8 minutes at whatever temperature you're feeling like. You are a free moral agent. Do what you like, although you should check on it after five minutes or so to make sure it's getting crispy but not burnt. Add extra time as needed.

2.) Boil the ramen. Use slightly more water than normal. We might need a little extra.

3.) Throw a teaspoon or so of some kinda seasoning in that water. I like to use a black pepper or maybe Badia All Purpose Seasoning. Or use the flavor packet that comes with the ramen like a lazy basic bitch. I will be silently judging you.

4.) Put a couple tablespoons of oily peanut butter into a bowl. You need that oil.

5.) When your water first starts to boil, ladle out a fair bit into the bowl. Now mix that hot water up with your peanut butter until it's fairly well dissolved.

6.) Strain out your ramen in a colander or whatever and then dump that in the peanut broth with however much extra broth from the pot that you might like.

7.) Top that with some chili crisp and the broccoli and a shake or two of soy sauce.

8.) If you were feeling real hungry maybe you also fry some tofu up. If so, throw that in the bowl too. I will not be telling you how to fry tofu here. You're on your own.

9.) Eat this and thank me later.

I also like to air fry some tater tots or frozen fries or something to go with this. This is a good warm thing to eat the morning after you had three margaritas at dinner the night before followed by "something else" before losing track of the evening a bit and falling asleep playing Fallout 4.

Maybe that's just me. Anyway, back at that new music grind. Send your hangover recipes to wtsq.org/contact.

p.s. - Just got in late from a show! This might be short and sweet.

Sailor Honeymoon - Armchair

Fun and bouncy egg punk out of Seoul. "Armchair" has some jagged guitars that remind me of bands like Wire, but the bass gets a little dancy. I'd like to see this band live.

Blood Pact - Keep

"Keep" starts like a Smashing Pumpkins song – smaller, quieter solo guitar piece that breaks into something earth shattering. Blood Pact makes the wise choice to swap out nightmarishly nasal vocals for something more shoegazy and buried in the mix. I am always a sucker for this kind of shit. 

Skuzland - Tell Me You Love Me

"Tell Me You Love Me" is a darkwave track that starts out brooding like whoa before it breaks into something between Phantogram and Chvrches in the chorus. Do NOT miss the absolutely bonkers video for this song.

This track comes courtesy of WTSQ founder Chris Long. And I just want to make this clear, I still expect to get paid the same for this blog even though Chris found one of the tracks for me.

Margo Price - Too Many, Too Few (ft. Logan Ledger)

If you wanted to hate someone just for being popular, it might as well be Margo Price. She's a legit Americana superstar. I have always loved her though. "Too Many, Too Few" is standard fare for Price. Note perfect evocations of the old country style, but made for the modern audience. Is it just a little too polished, sure. If she'd lived in the 60's - 70s, she'd have been Tammy Wynette if Tammy Wynette wasn't also busy being Tammy Wynette. Margo's contemporary Sierra Ferrell also does this sort of thing a bit better than she does, but that doesn't take away from what a great track this is.

Almost forgot, Logan Ledger delivers a perfect duet performance here. Just a little harmony, and a lot of country twang. I need to check this guy out too.

Woodbine - Tunnel

We had Woodbine in this space earlier this year too. And yeah, I do reserve the right to put my thumb on the scale for a WV band. But I definitely didn't need to do that here. "Tunnel" is a lush, gorgeous bit of folk with a lot of Appalachian soul, but also a decidedly modern sound. Think of the modern folk of bands like Watchhouse or First Aid Kit. Woodbine is the real thing, and they are right here in Charleston. If you get a chance to see them playing out, don't miss it.

Boy Golden - Cowboy Dreams (ft. Cat Clyde)

"Cowboy Dreams" is a bar song in the best way I can possibly say that. There's a sultry drunk dance in this song and its probably me dancing.

Die Spitz - Punishers

Someone told me recently that they wished they were the girlfriend of every one in Die Spitz. Fair enough. I fucking love this band. They have range for days. Sometimes they are hardcore and crazed. Like the kind of hardcore people that kinda scare you if you're being perfectly honest. Other times, they find something a little more contemplative. "Punishers" is more the latter than the former, but it is still pretty loud. If you're into Mannequin Pussy, you're going to love Die Spitz.

Maneater - The Prize

"The Prize" combines some lofi aesthetic with high energy darkwave to make something I really love. This puts me just slightly in mind of Moon Duo because of the sawing organs driving this one along.  The band tags their music as "sulk pop". I can't top that. 

And this week's extra innings. This week I've got some sad mopey tracks because I am a sad mopey girl.

Julien Baker - Black Top

Field Medic - Tombstone Poetry

Florist - Riding Around in the Dark

And a playlist with everything.

Thank you all for reading and listening.

-emily

New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou

Sometimes I just really wonder what Brie is going to make of these blogs for the newsletter. Imagine being a sane person trying to create some kind of brief digest of the things I write here. The mind boggles.

Anyway, music felt a little thin to me this week. Don't get me wrong, you're going to get 8 awesome songs, and you will love it. But I didn't find as much that really jumped out at me. For this reason, I went back a little further and I looked a little harder and damned if I didn't find some gems.

Send your airfryer tater tot settings to wtsq.org/contact

Venus & The Flytraps - Beneath You

Venus & The Flytraps sounds kinda like one of those bands that played on the last season of Twin Peaks, except a little more indie. I expected the band to be a little goofy from their name, but songs like "Beneath You" have some real darkwave notes and a bit of a claustrophobic atmosphere. I'd bet that fans of La Femme would find something to like here. Pay attention to the lyrics and find something darker still yet. Someone is going to be obsessed with this band. Probably a lot of someones.

F.O. Machete - I'm Fine, Are You?

Glasgow's F.O. Machete is a gazy alt act that's apparently been around for like 19 years. Their discography makes no sense. There's a single released in 2006 and then nothing else until another single last year. A few more singles, and now there's this album "Mother of a Thousand". I am guessing maybe they had some kind of dispute with the master recordings or something? Regardless, "I'm Fine, Are You" is, more or less, post-punky 2000s shoegaze. Except also not. The vocals are mixed very differently than most music in the genre. The tone is fairly upbeat and bouncy. This is, dare I say it, a bop. And a bop with a full on guitar solo.

Lifeguard - Ultra Violence

Proper lo-fi garage stuff here. There is a dark element creeping in around the edges. The band packs in a lot of clashing guitars and stabby bass into three and a half minutes of "Ultra Violence" and bless them for it. Whoever wrote their bio mentioned Chrome. And yeah, they do hit some of the lo-fi garage aspects of that iconic band. There's a secret vein of post-hardcore in this song, and, as someone who occasionally listens to Slint's "Good Morning Captain" 45 times in a row, that works pretty well for me.

Medium Build - White Male Privilege

I don't know why, but I kind of held my breath walking by Medium Build for a while. Maybe I am just overloaded on white folk dudes at the moment. Even after this guy did a song with Julien Baker. And lord knows, I love Julien Baker. Sometimes you just don't really give yourself a chance to love something. Sometimes you're just not really paying attention. But this dude went and released a song called "White Male Privilege". Fine, I'll listen.

And wouldn't you know it, it's a really really great song. Over a minimal guitar, Medium Build spins out a story of modern American ennui so searing that it left me sobbing. We wonder what's wrong with some of these men, and yet we all live in the same world that has sold us capitalism and achievement as ways to fill our souls. By the time most people realize they've been sold a pig in a poke, they fall into despair, believing nothing else is possible anyway. This seems to hit men worse than anyone else, and white men in particular seem especially good at making their desperate struggle for personal meaning everyone else's problem. Just a crushingly brilliant song.

Fine - Moment

I could say a lot of things, but let's be simple for once. "Moment" sounds like a lost Mazzy Star track. I featured Fine back in September with a track called "Portal", but I like Moment even more. Gorgeous stuff from Fine.

Chinese American Bear - Forever Lover

"Forever Lover" brings together some dancy synths that put me in mind of Chvrches or Kero Kero Bonito. There's something a little more free and breezy here though. Maybe it's the little splashes of actual laughter that decorate the song. This is downright cozy.

Yass - Got Hurt

If you ever need to run down a rainy, neon lit alleyway while being pursued by a killer android, you'll want to have this song playing. If you do, maybe you'll survive. "Got Hurt" races ahead so breathlessly that it feels like it lasts two minutes even though it's over five.

DYGL - Man on the Run

This one is a romp. Think of the more hype Fontaines D.C. tracks. "DYGL" is apparently pronounced "Day-glo". I swear to god, I love this song, but for fucksake, can I buy a vowel, Pat? The band is from Japan, but that's still no excuse.

You ever notice that by the time I get to the end, I have completely run out of gas on these?

And this week's extra innings, just a few not-new things I have been listening to. All jazz this time.

Miles Davis Quintet - My Funny Valentine

Bill Evans - B Minor Waltz

Ella Fitzgerald - When I Get Low I Get High

And a playlist with everything.

Thank you all for reading and listening.

-emily

New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou

I am so glad to find the weather cooler and some snow coming as I write this.

I am still not really feeling really creative in this space. But I do have some amazing tracks. Please join me in rocking.

Snocaps - Coast

I cannot express to you how much I love this self-titled album by Snocaps. This was a surprise drop from Alison and Katie Crutchfield. A whole new band from these two brilliant sisters who have been on-and-off collaborators over the years. Early on the sisters had The Ackleys, and then P.S. Eliot. Katie went on to form Waxahatchie, while Alison created Swearin' and later her own solo act. They are back together and joined here by M.J. Lenderman for 12 basically perfect tracks (and a little coda).

The Crutchfield sisters share what might be my favorite voice in indie rock. And they really do seem to share that voice. They are essentially double-tracking a vocal live. All this would just be fine and just kinda cute if it weren't for the fact that they are both brilliant song writers with their own unique styles and flourishes. But they are brilliant writers. And they have made songs that are also musically interesting while still being catchy. Overall, this album has the emotional presence of something like the Beatles "Rubber Soul". It's mostly more upbeat than sad, but still holds a lot of depth. There are some songs to come back to here in the hard times, but also plenty of moments of joy.

With Snocaps, the Crutchfields have made what might end up being my favorite album of the year. I truly love every single one of these songs, so I will just pick one here. Off the top of my head, let's say "Coast".

Lankum - Ghost Town (Specials Cover)

Lankum is brilliantly gloomy. Their signature droning misery is usually presented with an unblinking gothic straight face. On this cover of the Specials' "Ghost Town" though, the mask slips a bit. The band knows this cover is a little nuts. Nonetheless, they lean into it, translating the ska into a lumbering zombie stomp. About half way through the whole thing takes a hard left into an absolutely insane techno freakout.

Nothing - Cannibal World

Nothing is one of my top bands and a key band in the one of the dozen or so shoegaze revivals over the last decade or so. New stuff from them was always going to excite me. "Cannibal World" is especially interesting, because it's kinda different from whatever it was I was expecting from them. There's a jittery sequenced drum sound tapping away against Nothing's wispy wall of sound. The effect makes me think of a remix of a known work more than of an original song. I find this really effective. It's a fresh sound from a genre that, at worst, can be a little sonically homogeneous.

Boy Deluxe - I Found God

You may not be aware of this, but there's a whole subgenre of female artists making absolute aggressive, raging bangers with anywhere from suggestive to completely pornographic lyrics. "I Found God" by Boy Deluxe is relatively PG-13 as far as that goes, but there is still a sorta transgressive intensity here with a lyric that revolves around the feeling of "finding god" while dancing. Come to think of it, that is actually kinda wholesome.

Ratboys - Anywhere

Ratboys have a run, romping sound like The Beths or Wet Leg. "Anywhere" has a power pop vibe with just a few drops of distorted guitar to give it a little color.

Dead Pioneers - Freedom Means Something

Dead Pioneers are boldly critical of the political bullshit we live in. As things get worse, bands like Dead Pioneers only sing and play louder. "Freedom Means Something" is a spoken word piece that rages, "We will tar and feather you with your money." Sign me up for that.

Emerson Woolf & the Wishbones - Thia Kane

Somewhere between early Sierra Ferrell and Brown Bird is Emerson Woolf & the Wishbones. There's a bit of the drunken abandon of The Devil Makes Three here too. "Thia Kane" goes down like a shot of cheap whiskey near the wild part of the night. That shudder can turn into dancing sometimes.

Sprints - Descartes

Sprints will fuck you up. The Dublin four-piece has the aggression and intensity of bands like Lambrini Girls or Mannequin Pussy. Is it punk as fuck to talk about "Descartes"  in a song? Maybe. Regardless, Ireland is not missing these days.

And this week's extra innings, which this week are just three extra tracks from Snocaps that I loved.

Snocaps - You in Rehab

Snocaps - Cherry Hard Candy

Snocaps - Heathcliff

And a playlist with everything.

Thank you for reading and listening,

-emily

New Music Monday playlists released every other Monday! 

Send any new tune suggestions to lou@wtsq.org. Thanks for tuning in to Mornings with Lou, every Monday-Friday 7-9 AM. :-)

Mornings with Lou