Oh, and one more thing

I snatched the new Thermals album as soon as it came out just to help my ratio on OiNK (it's helping a lot), but I really like it. Really sounds like John Darnielle got a band and an electric guitar and put all of his loud tracks on one album. I really love the lyrics, they don't get needlessly convoluted. I agree with Amanda Petrusich here: "Both in theory and execution, The Body, The Blood, The Machine hits like a less playful, less suburban American Idiot, its apocalyptic, heavily religious iconography conveniently layered over pounding, Ramones-style pop-punk." I really heard a Mountain Goats-esque thing going on there, with Hutch Harris' sort of nasally voice and the story-like lyrics. I'm glad Amanda Petrusich noticed that too, when I read the review later. Gosh, when was the last time a genuinely good, angry straight-up rock album came out? A while ago, that's for sure.