Melissa Kacar

everyone for ten minutes  proves that "Bleachers is for anyone, not everyone". This record sets forth into building out - and diving deeper into - the band's lore and mythology surrounding what Bleachers is, was, and becoming. It makes it clear that this album especially is made for the people who have connected with and truly understand the ethos of all their music represents and the community they have cultivated around it.  It feels like such a powerful reflection of the stage of Jack Antonoff 's career he's in right now. With the mantra "Only my people can see me" sitting at the heart of the album, it becomes a commentary on the accessibility of artists in the age of social media and the necessity of managing that access by offering it only in short, controlled doses to the public. The dynamics of being perceived so publicly and widely by people who don't necessarily know anything about who you are or what your music stands for - but still want ...

The Terrible Thrills project was created as a concept by Jack Antonoff and his collaborators in 2010 to reimagine his band's music through the voices of a wide range of incredibly talented female artists. It began with Volume 1, with a collection of Steel Train songs reinterpreted and reshaped by some of the band's personal favorite musicians. The tradition continued with Bleachers for Volume 2, which featured new versions of Strange Desire in its entirety (which is so underrated), expanding the idea into this new chapter of his artistry.  In 2019, the project evolved again into a new format as an exclusive vinyl club series. Four songs were reimagined by incredible artists, paired with demos and alternate versions of tracks from Gone Now . It became such a unique, ever‑changing concept - one that grew over nearly a decade, adapting to each album cycle in its own way. On the band's webstore, they wrote; "The concept behind Terrible Thrills is to create a final vers...

"the cure" by Olivia Rodrigo The second single off of Olivia 's you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love is such a cathartic, existential, and melodramatic masterpiece - all of which are traits that have continually made up so much of her best work to date. If the lead single "drop dead" is the embodiment of the girl so in love portion of the album title, then "the cure" in turn feels like the representation of the you seem pretty sad aspect of the time in her life that inspired her to write this. Coming in at the midpoint of the album's tracklist, it's definitely going to serve as a crucial transition piece for the album's overarching narrative. The build‑up to the bridge and the explosive final chorus is absolutely incredible and feels so powerful with every single listen. It's genuinely one of the best songs Olivia has ever written, and also one of the greatest pop songs of recent memory, which is not an overstatement in the slig...