Thanks For Sharing!!!

You know, we ask you to send us your music, and you do it. In great volume. So it won't do for us to neglect you, dear reader/submitter. Here's a post that will feature some of the people who sent in their own indie music without the benefit of fancy pants agents and PR people to help (we'll get to you guys in another post).

Now, I'm going to be working BACKWARDS through the ol' pile, so those of you who submitted most recently will be featured right now. If I miss you and you want in, send an email and I'll make sure to hit you

up next time.

"The Always"

Hamilton Sean, who is Fort Lauderdale band The Always, sent us a link to his EP. Now I suppose it is nice to hear some Elliot Smith coming out of the mouths of bab

es all the way from what is firmly death met

al country, but I have a heart of cold stone, and twee alternative lacking any real depth just doesn't impress me, no matter how well-recorded. Your mileage may vary, of course, and The Always just might be your cup of rooibos.

"Bobby Sick"

Wow. Okay. So, saying that your act is 'horrorcore' is bad enough, because that genre happens to be full of shame and failure as it is. Add onto that a perverse pride in being a Juggalo... there is so much wrong there that I just cannot even begin to explain. On a recent trip down to California to visit with my inlaws, I discovered much to my horror that pretty much all the males between 12 a

nd 50 were Juggalos, sporting Insane Clown Posse tattoos and jumpsuits and... eurgh. Thankfully, my father-in-law was not one of them. Now, there was a day when the Insane Clown Posse were kind of a funny joke rap-metal band. They have since metamorphosed into some sort of horrid memetic nightmare that expresses the concept 'cult of stupidity' like no other group that isn't actually a major world religion.

That being said, with all the strikes against him, all the 'horror' trappings and facepaint and spikes and dildos, Bobby Sick commits the cardina

l sin for a transgressive artist: he really really sucks. Seriously, click the link above and watch his performance. GG Allin could crap in a bag offstage and it would be more entertaining. Nothing personal, Bobby, but please... since you're local, don't murder me.

"The Sudden Passion"

From what I can glean, The Sudden Passion is an acoustic project that has moved on to being a full band. I was initially not impressed with their behind-the-music banter and faux distressed video ethos, but on further listening they're not bad.

"Twoversusone"

Well, if you are not going to have a picture of yourself/your band on your website, then you will just have to allow me to put up the first result from an image search for your band's name. And you'll like it!

So, interestingly enough, though they are perhaps inspiring to a Jandek-level shyness, and

list him as an influence, Twoversusone actually produces music, and it's kind of tight and crazy cool. So let me tell you about Jandek: he's shit. Absolute unredeemable shitty music and a ridiculous schtick that decades of people have deluded themselves into thinking is cool. Fuck you, Jandek. I'd rather listen to Bobby Sick on a loop than one of your songs. Fuck.

"The Owlsley Brothers"

So this one just came in under the transom, so to speak, as I was writing this. In fact, it may be the straw that breaks this blog post's back. Let's see what's up.

First warning sign, The Owlsley Brothers sent two emails right in a row, with slightly different subject lines and identical content. Almost incoherent and randomly capitalized content, to be specific. And get a load of this set of influences: Black Keys, Tom Waits, Man Man, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Flaming lips, White Stripes

The Owlsley Brothers need to check themselves before they wreck themselves. Tom Waits should raise a big red flag. He's the poster child of independent music gone horribly, horribly wrong. Throw a mention of him in with some more current retro-minded bands, and you have a recipe for cloying hipster nonsense. I mean, look at the picture! What the hell, man!?!?!?!

Oh yeah, the music. It's pretty much crap. Judge for yourself, but I don't think I'm wrong in saying that The Owlsley Brothers should spend less time on trying to be clever and more time... well, not sucking.

"Brad Sanzenbacher"

You know, I was just about giving up hope. I was thinking that there must be some good stuff in the tons of submissions, but that maybe I wasn't strong enough to wade through all of them. One more, I said. Luckily, I happened on Brad Sanzenbacher, who apart from seeming like a humble and cool dude, makes some very polished and professional soft rock. Now, maybe he doesn't have the depth of a Rolla Olak, but this is good stuff. Check it out!