fiction and creative non-fiction from Brennan Quenneville
Four months ago I launched a newsletter, for which you can sign up---for free!---right here. Today, I'm posting a few of my favorite entries across the newsletter's initial run: We'll discuss Rilo Kiley, Coheed and Cambria, and Lisa Loeb. Let's get to it. Rilo Kiley -- "The Good That Won't Come Out" The Execution of [...]
I don't know what exactly bands owe their fans or what exactly those fans owe the bands they love. The same things we all owe one another, I suppose: compassion, respect, generosity. The songs that engender fandom are not the same as the people who make them, even though the nature of fandom is such [...]
One of the greatest albums reviews I've ever read begins by citing and then disputing this hell of a quote: "Technical knowledge of the art form has disappeared from its discourse. In short, music criticism has turned into lifestyle reporting." That gem came from Ted Gioia of the Daily Beast who was raging against what [...]
I included Circuit Boredom, the most recent album from Ben Kweller, in my list of the best albums of 2020. Though the album is now available on all major streaming platforms, at the time that I published that review, Circuit Boredom was locked behind a paywall on Kweller's personal website. Kweller has adopted a subscription [...]
A recent edition of the Songs & Stories newsletter---subscribe for free today!---covered "The Dark Sentencer," one of the best recent tracks from prog-rock legends Coheed and Cambria. And because that song manages to incorporate a little bit of every era of Coheed, it got me thinking about each record that the band has released over [...]
Part of what I love about Hamilton is that it's a show about everything---well, maybe not everything but the show's characters certainly experience a lot of what makes being a person such a wild experience. All the big ticket themes that you'd expect make appearances: Hamilton and his friends must fight a war before figuring [...]
I never need a reason to think about The Juliana Theory but their recent reemergence, including a pair of new singles and an upcoming album of 'reimagined' classics, provides a perfect excuse to talk about them here. More specifically, to talk about the best tracks from a band that was somehow both deeply beloved and [...]
The Queue is a recurring excuse for me to talk about songs or albums in short form. This week I examine three tracks that explore anxiety about the end of human culture in three very different ways. Let’s investigate. Muse -- "Exo-Politics" In case naming their album Black Holes & Revelations and then choosing a [...]
One of my favorite annual traditions is writing retrospective pieces about the year (or decade) in music. And then, as soon as I publish my vast and all-encompassing thoughts about dozens of albums, I find a great new piece of music from that year that I’ve never heard before. And which I, therefore, haven't written [...]
Much of 2020 was awful but the new music released in this Year of Endless Sorrows™ wasn't. To celebrate, rather than posting one single article about the year in music, I'm going to post a new piece each day this week. Monday through Thursday will cover my four favorite albums of the year and Friday [...]
