Not Animal

This played and I listened and then it was over

I started off a bit underwhelmed, then became more whelmed by the end. I really enjoyed the back half of the album. Not sure if it grew on me or was genuinely the better half… but I’ll check this out again I think.

This was a pretty nice album. Started out sounding like Radiohead and then progressed and became more like vampire weekend. Definitely a bit more unique than both those previous bands lyrically but style and instrumentals it felt similar to both. It was a good chill listen that’s worth revisiting. 7.0/10

Maybe it’s because I’m high but it’s been over 24 hours since I listened to this and I honestly couldn’t tell u a single thing about this album. I vaguely remember not liking it a ton and that’s it.

Rating: 8/10 Best songs: A children’s crusade on acid, Hello vagina, Papers written on a wall

Sounded good 4*

nice soft indie. 3.6

Never heard of this group before but I found it an interesting listen. I was hoping for a little more range and change in tone from the vocals. But this is one of the rare times I’m going to round up. I’d give this a 3.5 ish. I’d definitely listen to select songs again but maybe not the whole album. Decent

This is really good. Kind of Radio Head-ish but less pretentious. I've heard this band before but haven't listened to an entire album by them. I will now though! 4 stars.

Nice album choice ! 4

Nice indie rock/pop album. I like the (more rock) second half a bit better. Good vocals and overall performance.

Had this come out a decade prior, I think this band would have had a huge Pitchfork following and would be reissuing albums like this. The additional decade means I've since had a lot of similar albums come and go, but it was very good, grand and sweeping.

Another run of the mill generic indie rock band from the mid 2000s. It's competently made but just fine. Nothing special. Started a bit interesting but there are hundreds of these types of albums out there. Not essential to listen to. My personal rating: 3/5 My rating relative to the list: 4/5 Should this have been included on the original list? No.

A nice little mid-2000s rock/folk type deal. Not incredibly remarkable but it's a genre I enjoy, so I had a good time with it.

Indie rock. Ni fu ni fa.

This was nice, I enjoyed listening to it. It is one of many of its genre in the lists.

Appreciated a singer-songwriter LP with a bit more to it in the instrumental department. Some of the orchestral elements felt a bit much and the lyricism didn’t do much for me, but it was nice to listen to an early-aughts indie effort that had some meat on its bones.

Very much in a particular genre what we used to just all alt rock and now always seems to require a handful of genre descriptions. The brainchild of some hipster intellectual, probably gen-xer? Maybe early millennial, has a chip on his shoulder in the interview arena about the scope of his success and recognition, of course a dude, lot of drama in the band/label department... it comes with a vocal style that's serviceable but to me gets dull at length. For all that some pretty interesting things came in musically around the last third. I'm on the fence but intrigued enough I think I will check out the other, what I gather to be the band's preferred version (? if I read the Wikipedia page right) version of this material.

3.5

An American Travis

Not bad

Evocative and fairly pleasing on the ears, with lyrics that are intriguing without being overwrought. I liked this for the most part, but somehow it feels like goes on longer than it actually does. Fave Songs: German Motor Car, Broadripple Is Burning, Holy Cow!, A Children's Crusade on Acid

An a-okay listen

Yea, quite nice.

Melbourne yesterday, Indianapolis today with Margot & the Nuclear So and So's! "I wanna gouge out your eyes"- least psychopathic indie band A couple great songs- see below- but a lot more okay ones in my eyes(ears). It helps that I'm already drawn to this sort of semi-acoustic indie rock. If you enjoy this I recommend Harlequin Dream by Boy & Bear (2013). HL: "Pages Written on a Wall", "Broadripple Is Burning", "German Motor Car" April 2, 2025

Another fun if quite inconsequential 00s indie record. There’s a good variety of tunes on here - it generally has a quite eccentric Vampire Weekend kind of vibe but some of the more acoustic songs are like a less depressed Bright Eyes, and Shivers (I’ve Got ‘Em) has a very Queens of the Stone Age groove. I enjoyed it on the whole and got more out of the album as it went on but it didn’t quite break through for me

I struggled to find this online. It wasn't on Spotify and both the full album streams I found on YouTube were fake. I eventually found the song "Broadripple is burning" on YouTube. The one song I listened to was exactly what I expected but the name/album art, which was folksy hipster soft rock. I hate this sort of stuff. Maybe they're great at it, but it just all sounds annoying to me. 2/5.

I don't know how to describe my experience with this album, except that it has a good vocalist, although his songs didn't inspire any emotion in me, not even the most popular ones. His style is very "narrative" and more acoustic, but I don't think it ever ends up aspiring to something more, which makes it just another indie album. 1.5 stars