Modern Minstrels

Punk Reminiscing

Mike's love of Deja Entendu prompted him to list some of the albums that he heard that got him into this style of music. Since Mike was the one who got me into punk, I figured I would list some of the first albums punk albums.

The summer of my sophomore year, I was talking to Mike on AIM on day and he sent me a couple mp3s by The Get Up Kids, and a couple by a band called A New Found Glory. Shortly after that I had ordered Something to Write Home About and Red Letter Day by The Get Up Kids and Nothing Gold Can Stay by A New Found Glory. Those are all excellent albums, all three of which I still go back and listen to quick frequently.

Mike also introduced me to AbsolutePunk.net which has become my most frequently visited website. It is a wonderful place to find out about amazing new punk and indie bands.

Mike and I spent much of our freshman year of college finding live performances and other rare mp3s on Napster and sending them back and forth to each other. That was much fun.

One band I want to mention that Mike introduced me to is LWL. They were a pop-punk band from New Jersey and their album Quarter Life Crisis is probably one of my favorite, but often forgotten albums. I listened to it a lot freshman year, and my roomate and I seemed to constantly have Emone and Rubberband stuck in our heads. The band broke up a few years ago, so their album often gets lost as music collection grows, but when I remember it and listen to it, I'm reminded of what a fun pop-punk album it is. And one classic moment involving LWL was last summer when a bunch of us went to New York City, and Mike came up for a day. We ended up going in Toys R Us, and we both start singing LWL's Pop Punk Kid, which is of course set to the tune of the Toys R Us Kid song.

My sophomore year of college I met Sarah, and found out she had the same tastes in music that I did. The first clue I had was her complimenting my A New Found Glory shirt. We've introduced each other to numerous bands. She definitely knows a lot more indie bands than I do and got me interested in bands such as Cake, Death Cab for Cutie (Ben Gibbard is a lyrical genius), Jets to Brazil, Lifehouse, and Switchfoot.

Sarah was the first person I met at CWRU that had actually heard of even half of the bands I had songs by. Meeting Sarah also led to attending my first concert and many, many, many more after that. Of course they are all listed on my Concert Page. The first concert I went to (New Found Glory, Something Corporate, Finch, Further Seems Forever) is still my favorite concert. Even though I did end up paying $100 for a ticket, it was well worth it. The band line up for that concert was amazing, it introduced me to Further Seems Forever (who I really want to see again), and all 4 bands put on excellent live shows.

This post ended up being much longer than I expected, but what can I say, music is a large part of my life. I love finding out about new bands, listening to an album for the first time, finding albums that I listen to over and over again, finding the meaning behind the song writer's lyrics, applying my own meaning to a song, and as the slogan for AbsolutePunk.net says, "Music mends broken hearts."