I admittedly haven’t been listening too intently to music since I made the last listening log. I’ve listened to a fair amount of different albums, but with varied levels of investment. Some with a lot of intent, some with scattered. Regardless, here’s what I’ve been up to for the last few weeks.
100 gecs - 1000 gecs (2019)
I actually wrote a review on this one, you can read it here:
Basically what the review it boils down to is that I think it does a pretty good job of being discombobulated and chaotic, to the point where it’s very divisive. It’s brainrot before brainrot became enormous like it is today.
Personally, I think it’s just kind of alright. There’s weirder, less accessible out there, and it’s only about 20 minutes, so you really don’t need to commit a lot to listen to the album. The only real notable thing I have to say is that stupid horse is an amazing song that’s completely wormed its way into my brain for the last few weeks, please get it out of my head.
Jane Remover - Revengeseekerz (2025)
I’ll get to a good listen of Census Designated eventually, but for now… my journey with Jane Remover’s discography continues with her newest album Revengeseekerz, released just this month.
By far my favorite part of this album is how seamless the genres blend together. You’ll find elements of EDM, hyperpop, and even experimental hip hop fused to create a chaotic balancing act that turns out surprisingly well, and even though it’s closer to Frailty compared to Census with its electronic direction, it also sounds almost nothing like it. I for one, am looking to see how her music pans out. The fact that she’s already made something of this quality this early on in her career is very exciting.
Also the album cover just goes so fucking hard, I want a flaming katana too
Parannoul - White Ceiling / Black Dots Wandering Around (2022)
This one’s a relisten of a throwaway EP of tracks that were written for Parannoul’s To See The Next Part of the Dream. Before this revisit, I never returned to anything besides 도피초 (Escape) and 언젠가 (Someday), because they’re more digestible than the others— in particular, I think the former is one of his best songs, which is impressive considering this is a collection of B-sides.
Still, I find it to be a unique part of Parannoul’s discography. Far from his most polished or best, but it provides a zeitgeist of his work at the time, and that makes it cool in its own way. For instance, you can hear traces of 아름다운 세상 (Beautiful World) in Someday. All About Lily Chou-Chou samples are littered throughout the project, as they do in TSTNPOTD. And finally, the centerpiece of this EP has a 17 minute demo of one of his best, 흰천장 (White Ceiling), which sounds nothing like the official version, but is still strikingly emotional in its own way, and incorporates motifs found in other songs1. You can tell what ideas he chose to expand on, and I find that immeasurably fascinating.
Definitely heavy on the ears even by his standards, but he’s my favorite artist. I can excuse it.
HOME - Odyssey (2014)
Honestly? Resonance has held up fantastically. It’s still a great song. Odyssey and by extension HOME wasn’t something I even thought about since 2022, 2023. The rest of the album more or less grew off of me in the sense that they’re still good songs, I just no longer loved them like I used to. But Resonance still hits the prime areas for nostalgia. I could never forget the hypnotic synth rhythm of a lifetime, mixed masterfully to where it vividly echoes in your ears but still has a faint fuzz to where it sounds like it’s from the past.
As for why I even returned to this if I didn’t even think about it for so long, I don’t know. I just felt like it one day thinking I would write about it. And in a sense, I did what my past self wanted. Maybe I should do more revisiting, just in general.
Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not (2006)
The only Arctic Monkeys I had listened to up until this point was AM, which I just wasn’t really fond of. Otherwise, complete neutrality as far as opinions go.
I admittedly didn’t finish listening to this album yet. I believe I got up to Red Light Indicates Doors Are Secured and then never came back to it because I had to go do something. But I really want to finish it because the band pleasantly surprised me here. You see, I knew their debut wasn’t going to have the same pop rock sound that I disliked, but I also didn’t know what exactly I was in for.
I gotta say, I was not expecting something this to be as fun and charismatic as I found it to be. A big part of that is how flashy Alex Turner is as a vocalist— he’s a lot of fun and makes his performances exciting, and that’s only based off of half a listen.
My interest has been piqued, consider me a fan— still don’t care for AM, though.
Hex - Bark Psychosis (1993)
Their sophomore album, Codename: Dustsucker is a 10/10 for me and encouraged me to check out their more lauded album, Hex. I did a little bit of research and apparently this is where the term post-rock was coined, which is pretty interesting2. Post-rock is a funny genre because no one knows exactly what it is. To a good chunk of people, especially online, post-rock is just “very long instrumental guitar songs” which is very reductive. It’s more so that compared to traditional rock songs, post-rock puts more emphasis on atmosphere and texture. The crescendos that you see in later works don’t come until later.
As for the music itself? Very tranquil and a bit jazzy at points, this would go crazy on days with very heavy rain. They blew me away again, it seems.
Mili - Miracle Milk (2016)
As with what is probably most people, I got introduced to Mili through Project Moon and Limbus Company. I liked their work for the game, so it led me to their separate work. Prior to this, I held off on it because I hate Limbus fans, and I didn’t want to like anything they liked. But hating something solely because annoying people like it is silly and unfair, so I decided to give it a go.
My initial reaction is positive, but this is overall a relisten angle. The only thing I got out of this on my first go was that it’s a lot of different genres, with constantly changing sounds and textures. I remember a few that I might have liked, but maybe not really, I don’t know. Definitely unique enough to warrant another try.
Flawed Mangoes - The Unwavering Hand (2024)
You’ve at least heard Dramamine before, I know you have. The nostalgically mellow, loose guitars that build up repetitively that spellbinds you into getting lost in the past. I was caught off guard by it on Instagram reels of all places, and had to find it for myself; thank god for audio attributions in short-form content.
Sadly, I was somewhat disappointed by the rest of the album since it’s just more of the same, Dramamine is really the only one I see myself reasonably coming back to. Not terrible, just a bit forgettable.
Side note, I recently learned that there’s a word for music that’s meant to be reminiscent of aesthetics of the past. It’s called hauntology, and I can’t express how helpful knowing this information is to me. Where was this word my entire life?
Outro
Nothing too major. New reviews probably soon, and I’m getting started on the next Ricecore entry, so stay tuned for whichever comes first. Regardless, thanks for reading up until this point if you did get here, it means a lot.
Too many to list tbh
Unfortunately, the original article that Wikipedia references is locked behind a paywall and a very fucking jumbled UI