108: New Music falling from the sky

Luke Oliver

19 Oct 2025 • 4 min read

This is a photo of me getting "sniped" by a friend of mine. "Sniping" is a practice of taking pictures of people from a specific group (in this case wind power) when you see them outside of the normal context, and then sending the photo in a dedicated groupchat channel. It's a fun little practice, and I think adds to group cohesion.

I am a huge fan of finding new releases by artists I like, or discovering new artists and albums I haven't listened to before. My listening style is very album-based, I listen to albums all the way through, in order, as god intended (no hate on playlist people, I'm just not one myself). It feels like there have been so many more new releases in the last few weeks/months than is normal, and it's both great and mildly annoying. It's awesome, obviously, because it means there's more good music for me to listen to, but it also has a decision-paralysis based downside, where normally I would know exactly what I'm going to listen to at any point, I now have a decision between a good number of great albums, which gives me pause every time. I also feel like I'm not getting to enjoy or absorb the albums as fully as if they had hit one at a time, because I'm splitting my listening time between them, rather than committing fully to one or another.

It's a very silly "problem" to have, I just wanted to talk about it.

The albums in question are the eponymous bbno$, Deadbeat by Tame Impala, Afterglow by Saint Motel, and the TRON: Ares (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) by Nine Inch Nails. A little older, but still impacted by this influx of new stuff because I would have listened to them more were it not for the new entries, are Lovesick by The Happy Fits, and Man's Best Friend by Sabrina Carpenter, which are both amazing.