Fellow soccer lover, Popdose alumnus, freelancer and early 50-something Dave Lifton joins me to discuss why today’s music sucks. Or does it? Our conclusions may surprise you. 

At the end, you’ll hear either 30 seconds (Spotify users) or the full blast (Spotify Premium users) of Metric’s Gimme Sympathy, comedian Matt Braunger’s take on white privilege, Jason Isbell’s 24 Frames and The Pretty Reckless’s’s’s Take Me Down. The discussion makes reference to those things and a few others things, such as: 

• Jason Isbell (like me, a former resident of Athens, Ga.) on donating his cut of the royalties from Morgan Wallen’s cover of his song Cover Me Up to the NAACP.
• Elephants by Rachael Yamagata
• Shake It Off by Taylor Swift 
• Rick Beato’s video on quantizing John Bonham 
• Gimme Sympathy by Metric 
• Dear God by Hunter Hayes (and, in passing, Dear God by XTC)  
• 24 Frames by Jason Isbell (live at SiriusXM) 
• Take Me Down, which is basically a 21st century hard-rock retelling of Crossroads, by the Pretty Reckless
• Flow by Trio 111, a band that formed at School of Rock 
• Matt Braunger on white privilege

The bit with Julianne Moore dissing Twilight is from the film Crazy Stupid Love, which is great in places and cringe-worthy in others.

One clarification: Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion’s WAP is due to be included on Cardi B’s next album, but it’s been more than a year since the song was released. The point about the single standing alone without an album release still seems valid.

Finally, check out the New Orleans radio station Dave mentions at WWOZ.org