Best of 2025 

Rene: Welcome to Earshifter. He's Sean Capstick, 

Sean: And he's Rene Rouleau and Rene, tell us why we're here. Well, Sean, we are here for a special episode of Earshifter. We are gonna be covering the best of 2025. What does that mean? I'll tell you what that means. It means Rene is gonna pick like five either artists or albums or songs that he thought were like the best of 2025.

Then Sean's gonna do it's, and then what about Joe? Yeah, so Joe, guys. Joe is our awesome sound editor. And he has actually given us his five as well. So we're gonna list those off two. And by the way we're actually gonna have individual playlists at ear shifter on Spotify and Apple Music, so you can actually find Sean's best of 2025 and a little playlist to listen to.

And same with Rene. And same with Joe. That'll be fun. It's gonna be a good 

Sean: episode. Yeah. And it's a little bit of special episode. Just finished our first season, so we gotta celebrate that a little bit as well. Yeah, and we're gonna talk about that. Good. Okay. So who goes first? Who's gonna go with a and are you doing this in order?

Do you have a hierarchal list? I do not. There's no way I can commit to an order. How about you? I'm not committing. No. In fact, you go first and then I'll adjust my list. What? No way. You go first. Okay. I'm going to say, we've gone through this year, bands that are important to us and they're older bands, but I'm gonna go through our first episode band 'cause they released an album in 2025, change of Heart in the Wreckage.

And that was a great return to form. That was, I think their first album in got 20 plus years. And I thought it was a great a great album. And, you know, the songs on it were really solid. They were. Reminiscent of what they were, and they were also pleasantly of 

Rene: the moment. Nice. Do you remember what he said at the concert?

We saw just, I think we saw that recently, actually. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Um, do you remember what he said before we got started? No. Did he say, great. We're gonna rush through this so he could hear our old hits. Yes, exactly. He basically said we're gonna play some stuff off our new album and then we're gonna play the songs you want to hear.

It was such a great line. 

Sean: It was such a great line. He also said that he's gonna play again in another eight years, so you've got, this is what we're gonna be listening to for eight years. Yeah. Which is okay. I thought I liked it. I thought it was good. I enjoyed, I wanted to hear some of the new songs off the album.

Rene: Okay. So is it my turn? Okay, so, I'm honestly like, I know this is lame, but I'm gonna tell you something. Spotify of my 79,800 minutes that I listen to Spotify 2025 [00:03:00] in my top five. Car seat headrest. The Scholars album was there twice. Two songs were there, like on the top five songs. So, 

Sean: and how many listens per song 

Rene: do you recall?

I don't recall, but I remember I was really like. Well, you remember that episode, we talked about it and I was not into it. Mm-hmm. And then I became into it, and then I got really into it. So I, that is a hot take for me. I love that album. Uh, and did you listen 

Sean: to the, all of the songs? Like did you listen to the Full Rock Opera?

I did. The entire way through. Yes. 

Rene: A hundred percent. And like. Most car seat headrest albums. I liked about five or six songs outta the album, which is pretty good for Renee. Yeah, 

Intro: very good for Renee 

Rene: and very good for Renee. And I love those songs. Like truly love those songs. So, um, that's my first one. It's Car Seat Headrest, the Scholars.

Okay, so I went through my 

Sean: rap. And my number one song was in the Airplane Over the Sea because I was probably getting ready for our Nutri [00:04:00] Milk episode. Right. But I only listened to that song nine times that year. Right. So I bet you listened to those songs more than nine times. A few. Oh, a hundred percent.

Rene: Absolutely. Yeah. I very, very high for sure. So 

Sean: nine was the. Top song in mind. Wow. I just don't listen to as many songs, but I do think I listen to some 230 albums, which I know that I beat you on that in terms of that probably. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. What's your next one? You said, Hey, listen to this band. And I put it on and I went, wow, this band sounds a lot like Waxahatchee.

Oh. And then I realized it is her and her sister. Yeah. So they did a secret, like a non record label, like marketing album that came out. It's called Snow Caps. And every single song on there is a banger. 

Rene: Yeah, I totally agree. I love that album. It was on my list as well. Guys, for the record, we we're not purposely sharing our top five, [00:05:00] but yeah, that's on my list too.

Silly question, is MJ Lenderman on that album too? Is he part of it or no? No, I think it's just sister. Just the two sisters. Her and sister. Yeah. Okay, gotcha. Alright that's an awesome one. My next one is wet leg moisturizer. Now, Sean, you know, I know how much you like this album. I honestly, man, like that first album I thought, wow, this album is so solid.

There is no skips. And they did it again. They really, in their sophomore album to me, they did it again and they did even better. I think that album is absolutely amazing. I think it's, I think it truly is overlooked in the true ear shifter sense. It, it should be more recognized. It's not on enough people's.

Top 10 of 2025? Honestly absolutely love that album. That would 

Sean: be hard to be as big a fan as you are of Wet Leg. Yeah. But I did like, I think I liked that album better than their first one. There were more songs other than now it's gonna be hard to get. Beat [00:06:00] Chas Lounge. But that is, you know, there, there were more songs that I enjoyed.

Rene: Yeah. And, uh, mange Tout is I think, the way it's pronounced, but that's my favorite one. And, uh, not The Fists. I love Catch Dude, don't Make Me Pick. It's so hard. It's like I'm settling on Mange Tout, but honestly. There are so many CPR Catch these fists. It just goes on. But why don't we listen to just a little taste of the song that I love because this is the song that I'm picking to play a little clip of, okay, you

Clip: fuck me, I take this back here. You read, it says.[00:07:00] 

Golden star, you.

Rene: Yeah. So that's my song. Over to you, Sean. 

Sean: Okay, well I'm gonna go with a guy who's is on a lot of the top of the lists this year. And his band, is it Cameron Winter? Cameron Winters And the Geese. I knew it. It's so good. So, you know, the, his Heavy Metal album was kind of technically released this time last year, but it's still making, you know, the 25 Yeah.

List. 'cause it was released late, but then he came out with getting Killed With a Geese. It's [00:08:00] such a great album. Like I know that you say it's so me, but it's like, and I'm excited that, you know, like there's a, there's an album that. Couldn't be made up 

Rene: because it's so weird. It really is. And, um, I've got a couple things to say about this man.

So, you know, kind of offline that I, I was like, I wanna like geese, but I don't like geese. I appreciate geese. And I was trying to figure out why do I not let geese? And I think it's because a lot of it is based in blues rock. Right. There's a lot of blues rock influence there, and I'm not a big fan of blues rock, so what I did was I went, but I think it's more like Tom Waits blues, which is great blues.

Some songs were like that, but a lot of it was more like, honestly, I got like kind of like a male version of Janice Joplin sometimes I got like just blues rock, and when I looked at the top 100 blues rock bands out of the a hundred, I liked four. Yeah, so [00:09:00] that's how much I like blues rock. It was The Doors Led Zeppelin, a little bit of Jimi Hendrix and John 

Sean: Spencer Blues explosion.

Rene: N no, no, and definitely not Captain Beefheart. Well, he's, he was more experimental, I don't know, blues classified as blues rock in the list. I'm like, is on the list. He's on the list. He finally 

Sean: made a list. Okay. 

Rene: Yeah, so, but I do appreciate geese because they. God damn. They're just like the drum. Even the drumming is just effed up.

Like it's very unique. And so what I did, dude, was I actually went to the previous album 'cause I'm like, I don't like anything on this album. Oh, the 3D country? Yeah. That's great too. Yeah. So 21, what is it called? 21, 22 or something like that. I love that song. That song comes out, it's the, it's the first song on the album Comes out hard.

Banging, like, and then the undoer. I love the undoer too, but that's it for me, man. So I also want to find a support group. So if there's any of you out there that's feeling like me going, I don't get the gi [00:10:00] hype, let's form a group together and, and, and support each other in this, in this confusion and, and feeling left out, 

Sean: or listen to my best of Spotify playlist.

And maybe you'll figure it out. 

Rene: Maybe. But there are, I did find a couple of people that were also equally, like, I don't get the geese hype and I'm like, me too. But are we allowed to say that out loud? I don't know. It's a safe space here. It's a safe space. Nice. Nice. Okay. So I'm gonna say like, good choices on both those and consistent.

Like everyone's, it's the hype of, it's the hype of the year. So guys, if you haven't heard that hype, you better check them out because you don't wanna be left out. Alright. So my next one, well, you stole one of mine, which was snow caps. But my next one I'm gonna steal from you because I actually really liked Wednesday bleeds.

I think it's unique, solid. Didn't know they were around as long as they were and Oh, 

Sean: yeah. Yeah, they've been around for a long time. Both of my sons really liked them, [00:11:00] so I heard Wednesday, you know, in the past, in the background when they get control of the music, which is most of the time, so I'd heard it.

But yeah, this album is head and shoulders above anything that. They had done in the past. 

Rene: Yeah. And again, very unique, very unique approach. So I really enjoyed that. For our producer, it's shoe gaze. Yeah. 

Sean: So he'd like that. Yeah, 

Rene: yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And the country. Yeah. The screaming, it's all Got it. It's all, it's all there.

Yeah. So that was mine, which I probably stole from you. You stole that. Yeah. Okay, 

Sean: so I'll go with my last one then. I'm gonna go Canadian. And I am going to say the album by the Rio Statics. It's called The Great Lakes. It's just come out. Wait, what? They have a new album out. They have a new album.

What the hell? Yeah. So the Rio Statics for dear listeners who ha didn't you know, grow up in Toronto in the eighties and the nineties. So these [00:12:00] were like hardworking hoses from Abaco. And, you know, released album, talking about Canadiana, Dave Badini. Is that Dave Badini? Yeah. Big hockey guy, big hockey guy.

Big baseball guy. Wrote some books about baseball and sports. Yeah. Um, who? Martin. I can't remember the other guys in the band, but yeah. Characters. So they have been producing, they, they you know, speaking of. People who passed in 2025. They did a movie, they did the soundtrack of the movie about Brian Wilson's life, if you remember right.

Was it called Whale Music? Right. That was a, uh, a, it was totally based on Brian Wilson's life, but it was set in Vancouver about a guy who just listened to Wales and lived in his seaside in Vancouver, and made music. It was a total. Beach Boy song. Yeah. Nice. And that was a great album that they released there with the single 'cause.

They, they did the soundtrack, which you would like, 'cause there's no words. 'cause there's no words. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But then because they were like doing the guy's life, they [00:13:00] released some of the, the sixties pop sounds and one of the songs was Torque. Torque. The Beast needs More Torque about a car.

Okay. Because what's the appropriate answer about how much torque does it have? Not enough. Not 

Rene: enough? Yeah. I should have guessed that one. Alright, well that's a surprise for me. So 

Sean: the re, so this album is pretty cool, right? So, okay. It's a double album. It's a concept album. It's all about the Great Lakes.

Wow. And th it's a little bit of Canadian as well. Yeah. Yeah. So nice. Eric? No. Alex Lifeson, not Eric Lifeson. I always think he's a bag a, uh, Viking. The guitarist from Rush absolutely plays on there. Oh, nice. Also has the Inuit throat Singer, Tanya Tack she sings on there. Yeah. Yeah. Um, well she does her throat singing.

Yep. There's a number of poets. Um, nice. And there is a recording of Gordon [00:14:00] Downey who you know, is very much Canadiana. Well, I know, but do our listeners know? Gore Downey from the Tragically Hip. And again, do our listeners know who is, you know, the best kept secret of Canada? Yeah. He was a a Waterkeeper.

He was a an environmentalist and was heavily involved in protecting the Great Lakes. Grew up in Kingston on the Great Lakes, one of the, the cities in, in Ontario on the Great Lakes. And so there's a recording of him talking about. The Great Lakes over this kind of jazzy spacey, fill in the, the blank type music that, that permeates the whole album.

And it's, it's totally cool. Totally different for me. Yeah. I read about it and our friend Chris Shepherd. Yeah. Who should follow on Chris Shepherd? Dot net. And on Instagram he takes haunting still life pictures and one of his subjects is Lake Ontario, so he'll go out and take pictures of Lake [00:15:00] Ontario.

I've seen those. The fruit, the frozen and over. Yes. He likes the ice. Yeah. And so his pictures are part of the album cover, which is pretty cool. Whoa, that's very cool. 

Rene: That's awesome. 

Sean: Wow. Okay. And trigger warning before I put this on, Kevin Hearn is also on the, uh. Kevin Hearn from Bear Naked Ladies.

Oh, no. 

Rene: Okay, but 

Sean: don't hold that against, all right, the band. Okay, so let's hear the single from that double album. Okay. Let's hear it.

Speaker 5: The waves roll. They come and go down in the depths below the sky, above Lake Huron. An airplane chases a UO. Hey.[00:16:00] 

Silver hand is Iron Claw, feared and revered by anybody. So the kept watch on the front neck to Ontario back, Hey.

Sean: Okay, and that's my. CanCon pick for the best of 2025, my second CanCon pick. But yeah, I think it's a pretty good album and a nice surprise as you said. 

Rene: Yeah, surprise for me too. That's pretty cool. Alright, my last one is actually, might surprise you too in a way it's Bruce Springsteen's lost tracks too.

So here's the deal. Like, I love Springsteen, as do you, uh, Nebraska? Not as 

Speaker 6: [00:17:00] much. Maybe. So. I like 

Rene: the lost tracks. You like all 

Sean: the tracks? 

Rene: No, I, I would disagree. I, I, honestly, born in the USA again, that does go to that question, 

Sean: but I mean, you, but you, but you, you genuinely like darkness on the edge of town.

Yeah. You like Candy's room. You like all 

Rene: of the old stuff? Yeah. Racing in the streets. But the lost Tracks two. Actually I never actually knew about Lost Tracks One, so what that did was it brought both of them for me. And what I did was I cherry picked all my faves and created a whole new barista Springsteen lost tracks, uh, playlist for myself, which I loved.

Just lost 

Sean: tracks. Just lost tracks. 

Rene: So, which is your favorite Ooh, remake of the Nebraska album? I actually, none of those songs are made it to my shortest, none of them, because I just wanna listen to Nebraska. I don't want to listen to it like a different version of Nebraska. I love Nebraska the way it is, just like he did and still do.

Sean: Yeah. But I thought it was an interesting kind of to see what he threw away [00:18:00] to get to how perfect Nebraska is. Yeah. Yeah, that's what I thought was interesting. 

Rene: Yeah. 'cause he recorded the whole album with the band. Yeah. And then they threw it all away. Yeah. And he was, he was correct. And 

Sean: he was correct.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. And hindsight's always uh, good. But yeah, it would've been so different that I it would, Bruce Springsteen would been a lot less if he had recorded it with the band. 'cause I thought that. That stripped down Nebraska album of, like 30 odd years ago is 

Rene: still amazing. And my favorite.

Yes, a hundred percent. So anyway, that's, that's my fifth. Okay. Okay, so let's just quickly, so what's some 

Sean: honorable mentions that don't need our support? 

Rene: Yeah. So, okay, so Honorable mentions for me a band called Sharp Pins. Yep. New album out. I got first day back band has a album called Forward.

And I got racing Mount Pleasant. Are they Canadian? No. No, they're not. No, none of these are actually. And then, [00:19:00] uh, and 

Sean: Renee has no Cancun. Maybe she gets to Joe's. Uh uh, 

Rene: yeah. Well, we'll get to Joe's in a second. So those are my kind of just shout outs. Okay. Let's go with Joe's. Uh, let's go with Joe's.

So Joe 

Sean: Joe, our record producer, and wrote our intro outro music. Oh 

Rene: my God, yes, absolutely. So yeah, he's our sound editor and he wrote our intro, outro music, which we absolutely love. Hope you do too. So these are Joe's straight up, uh, ro with the album sofa. So good. It's instrumental and I actually love it as well.

Very unique. We got Hush Valley. They only have singles out. They're the Canadian band, right? They are the Canadian band from Toronto. And we're gonna actually hear a song from Hush Valley, but I'm just gonna finish this up. Next week's washing. Which is also Canadian, also a Canadian band, 

Sean: and they are definitely a potential ear shifter band because they only have 500 monthly listeners.

So, and they only have singles and they're doing a great [00:20:00] little nineties retrospective nineties refresh. Okay. In terms of the little bit that I listened to them, I thought they were just a, a nice, a cute little band. Nice. Who knows where they're going, so that's great. 

Rene: Okay. Okay. Me, Martin and the album is, I'm a tv.

And then I know, I know Joe really well. Charlatans no surprise there. Uh, album We love. I had to 

Sean: make sure that Charlatans released a new album this year. 'cause I was You thought he was cheating? I was kind of cheating. And they did. Yeah. And I listened to the one song and it Yeah, it sounds like the charlatans, but it sounds it's 2025.

Rene: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Alright, so we're gonna listen to Hush Valley and the song is called Strangers.[00:21:00] 

Sean: And that's very Joe, and it's it's very cute too. Yeah. Yeah. Agreed. Okay, so here's my honorable mentions and what I think is great is a lot of these bands we covered in our episodes. Hmm. So the Mountain Goats released a new album this year. Which is a [00:22:00] rock opera, so you should be all over it. As you, uh, listen to it a little bit more, it's about a fishing expedition gone bad and through the fire with the songs of the Band of Horses and Sam Breen released a album.

I'm a little, they do covers of other songs, and I was really hoping the Ketchum Idaho would be Lee's version who's the, not the version that boy Genius does they do the same version of Ketchum Idaho that boy Genius does. Oh, okay. So that's kind of a cool song. Okay. They still haven't found what they were looking for by the YouTube, which I think is very funny.

Yeah. Sparks. Released a new album Mad This Year. True Car Seat Headrest. You've already mentioned shout out. Yeah. So, you know, like this is a good year for year shifter bands. 

Rene: Yeah. And who knows, wet Leg we might cover sometime soon as well. Who knows? 

Sean: Well, I think that it's inevitable, but yes.

But yeah, listeners, stay on your edge. And then I [00:23:00] think bands that don't need our help you know, there was some great albums by Nick Cave. He released a live album this year of the, the tour that I saw getting into concerts. Nice. So that was pretty exciting. It just came out. Big Thief released an album.

I think that's. Solid is hard to follow up. The, the Warm Dragon, uh, uh, record, which was so great from a few years ago, but double infinity's pretty good. You know, I think they're, that, that's solid. And, and you've already mentioned that Springsteen fellow. Yes, yes, yes. Oh, you had that on your list too.

I was gonna say a hundred mention for sure. Yeah. Wow. A hundred percent. Look at that. That's cool. Okay. Okay. Awesome. So, concerts I just mentioned. I saw Nick Cave in The Bad Seeds which was amazing to see them in concert. He's, you know, he is a man of a certain age and he's not slowing down. And this, uh, the Wild God album was great.

He played his, his hits. I was able to. Touch hands with him and have the celebration if you've ever, you touch hands with him. Oh, he reaches out. He's, he is such a [00:24:00] preacher. He reaches out, he stands on the edge of the stage and, you know, wills everybody standing to raise their hands and then he grabs people's hands and then he steps on you and walks in through the crowd.

So, whoa. Yes. So, uh, uh, all of us held Nick cave up. 

Rene: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, side note really quick band of Horses lead singer. He was inspired by Nick Cave's live performances. He, he said he would watch those to like get, get jazzed up for his, his own performance. 

Sean: It's quite a emotional experience.

Yeah. Cathartic. He builds it up and he, and it's old and, and the bass player from some. Band and his the Radiohead oh, shut 

Speaker 6: up. Yeah. Come on now. He plays too. Yeah, he plays, he, I've 

Sean: seen him play with Nick twice. He's really actually a very good bassist. Is it Greenwood? Its not Greenwood. It's Greenwood.

Wow. 

Speaker 6: Jesus 

Sean: Christ. He's one of 

Speaker 6: the 

Sean: bad 

Speaker 6: seats. Unbelievable. 

Rene: Unbelievable. Okay. Alright. Yeah. What else you got? We'll, just rapid [00:25:00] fire him. 

Sean: Okay. Well we saw Porch Radio. At the beginning of the year. I thought that was a great show. It was the last show that they, before they broke up I had to, that was one of my top songs of 25 listening to them to get ready for Oh, wow.

The concert. Yeah. Which I thought was a great concert. Yeah. Yeah. I did see Adrian Linker which was a, again, another wonderful show. She was so much more dynamic than I thought she would be just as sitting, playing her guitar, like a really quite engaging person. We saw the sparks, which was a great, yeah.

Super fun. Yeah, super fun. We saw a wet leg. Uh, super fun. Yep. I saw Wednesday and the best, so that was a great year in concerts. 

Rene: Yeah. And then I saw Granddaddy with your son 'cause I couldn't be there 'cause I was traveling. Yeah. Which was amazing. I can't lie. I saw elbow. With my good friend Trent, who introduced me to Aldos I saw Oasis, which guys, you can't see it, but Sean is eye rolling.

Sean: I wanted I know what I'm really doing is I'm dancing [00:26:00] up and down with my back turned Renee, 

Rene: as they do. Yes. Right. Called the Anne or something like that. I saw cold play, which again, you might be eye rolling. I don't know. But I saw that with my niece. She, she took me, which was pretty awesome. And finally last but not least, but maybe least I saw a Radiohead cover band here in Toronto called Idio Attack.

And I gotta tell you, I was with. Six other people who are hardcore Radiohead fans, and one of them's a musician. And they all said, if you close your eyes, you would think you were at Radiohead. They were that good. So that was awesome. Okay. Sean feels different, of course, but yeah, that's it. It was a great year.

It was pretty good, man. 

Sean: Was fun. Yeah, it's pretty good. And before we talk about our, our anniversary of our first episode, let's go back in time and think about. What happened 50 years ago and 25 years ago, so 50 years ago, horses was released by Patty Smith. Now we haven't [00:27:00] had Patty Smith as an ear shifter artist, but she certainly influenced a lot of the ear shifter artists, and I'm listening to her book on tape right now where she's narrating her own autobiography and she's gone through those years where she released those albums, horses, radio, Ethiopia.

Easter, you know, and it's great to hear firsthand those things. So that was pretty good. Neil Young, tonight's a night was released 50 years ago, which is quite amazing to think that's 50 years old. And that was pretty influential I think, in terms of the whole grunge scene of where he became, you know, that godfather of grunge and, and she was the 

Rene: godmother of punk.

I believe. Yeah, these are pretty influential people. And 

Sean: then there's this, the Born to Run was released I think 50 years ago. Was it really? Oh my God. So that's kind of funny too. Yeah. That Springsteen fellow keeps coming up. Yeah, yeah. But 25 years ago, this is kind of interesting too, to think about.

The Hour of the Bewilder Beast Mm. Badly drawn boy [00:28:00] wasn't that sold. Like things seemed to have changed before and after. That album. That album, I remember being so blown away by Yeah. Just the production and hearing different sounds and being part of that. Wow. 

Rene: Yeah. But again, once again, if we have any British listeners, they're like, yeah, they're of course badly drawn boy, but.

North America didn't really do much here. Like he played, um, Phoenix. That's where Badly drum boy played. When they came here, they played the Phoenix. Oh, that's right. Yes. It's not that big. 

Sean: And that was. Yeah, we saw him. Yeah. And it was, and he, he parted the crowd. He parted the crowd, which is 

Rene: really magical.

I love that. But my point being is that might not also be a ear shifter band down the road. 

Sean: Yeah. And remember, he, he actually also said that he always puts Bruce Springsteen on the guest list. You remember? No, I don't remember that. That's a That's awesome. You remember that? Yeah. God, that Fie Fellow keeps up.

Yeah. We saw badly, Dr. Deanna and I saw badly drum boy. At the Great [00:29:00] Hall a few years later. Oh, nice. And well, it was really nice, but it was also kind of not nice because he couldn't have a fag, he couldn't have a smoke in the, uh, so he left about halfway. He couldn't get his loops going properly, so he left about halfway through the, the show and he said, I, I, I've gotta go get a smoke.

And then he came back and, and everybody was leaving 'cause we didn't think he was coming back on. And he'd be like, well, I just, I just told you I went to get a smoke or I'm coming back on. Wow. So, yeah, he think, yeah, he was, he'd forgotten to fed the fish, I think. Yeah. Well done there. Nice one. Uh, I'll go two more.

All right. The avalanches. Yes. Yes. 25 again, like that totally changed how music got put together with Frontier psychiatrist. And since I left you, that was 25 years ago. Yeah. Wow. And the best, I'm gonna say my favorite episode from our, uh, uh, season. Okay. The weaker Thans. 25 years since [00:30:00] left and leaving came out.

Rene: Wow. And actually that's funny you should say that because, you know, we did this whole ear shifter thing to hopefully introduce people to bands that maybe were overlooked or maybe they never heard of, and hopefully. Turn them to those bands and guess what It's working. Sean. I think it's so wonderful.

Yeah. So I am now a huge weaker Thans fan and, uh, people, if you haven't listened to that episode, I think it's episode six. I'm not, or seven. I was not convinced of the weaker thans on that episode. I liked three songs at the time. Now I am a full fledged, weaker Thans fan. And are you going all the way back to Fallow?

I think there's a couple tracks I'll follow that I'm okay with. Yeah. No, I, I, I listened to them for like, I, I swear to God, two weeks straight. Just nothing but weaker than, so yeah, it's working, but it's working on me if we can be 

Speaker 6: successful even with 

Sean: ourselves, 

Speaker 6: right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Uh, exactly.

Sean: And yeah, so we can [00:31:00] check back in, uh, maybe at the end of our next season to see if. The other challenging bands that I've put forward to. Renee. And you have like the meat puppets. Yeah. That he's gonna be a big 

Speaker 6: fan of the meat puppet. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, and we all know how that went, the last episode.

Yeah. Finishing at a high season one 

Sean: bear, we almost came to blows on whether this an shift your 

Speaker 6: back 

Rene: honestly or not honestly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And Renee, what was your favorite episode, Sean? My favorite episode is episode four, which is granddaddy and there are two reasons that is my favorite episode.

One, it was just lack of a better term buddy, like a lovely episode because I got so surprised. 'cause I didn't know how strongly you felt about Granddaddy. I just didn't know that you introduced 

Sean: me to Granddaddy and that album, that Someday album is great. It's amazing. Yeah. 

Rene: Yeah. So that really like.

Kind of gave me goosebumps and I was really pleased with that. And then, and then on the opposite end of that, I learned that [00:32:00] you hate Radiohead, which is just wild. And I didn't know that about you. So it was a very surprising episode for me on two counts. 

Sean: Okay. And there's an episode, I've got a friend who's an ear shifter listener.

And he never listened to Granddaddy before our episode and now he listens to someday all the time. Alright. Yes. That's awesome. He sent me a text and went click. 

Rene: Nice, nice, nice. Alright, Sean, so what are you looking forward to in 2026? 

Sean: I am looking forward to some more concerts. I've got some good concerts set up, right.

Do you wanna go see dry cleaning again? They're playing in 

Rene: January. I, I like dry cleaning. I like the idea of dry cleaning, but I don't need to see them again. 

Sean: Okay. I'm hoping that they're gonna be. Finishing high on our uh uh, best of 26 list. Okay. 'cause I'm excited about their new album coming out.

We're gonna go see them, want you and I to promise that we'll go see a lot more concerts together in 2026. 

Rene: I mean, they gotta be the right bands. Dude, I'd love to see [00:33:00] Mannequin Pussy. I would love to see that band live. Yep, that'd be really cool. But unfortunately they're opening for Foo Fighters. Nothing against the food fighters.

But that's just a big venue. I didn't wanna see even a big venue as an opening up. Yeah. But I hope they come out with a new album. I am actually, that's on my list. I would love to see a new Mannequin pussy album come out in 2026. And I would love to see Echo Astral. I don't know if I'm saying it right.

Mm-hmm. But I'd love to see them live. They're, I reached out to them. They said, we're trying to get to Canada. We just can't get it to Canada yet, for whatever reason, I don't know why, but hopefully next year. And is Echo gonna be on your best of 25 list? They don't have, 

Sean: They don't have any, they didn't have a No.

That was an older song that you, older album you played for me. Yeah. Yeah, because that was amazing. Yeah. That was, yeah. They were very cool. That was pretty 

Rene: cool. Very cool. But both, uh, both Mannequin, pussy and Echoes all were 20, 24. Hmm. Uh, so, so that would've been a good one to, to cover and then honestly.

The Walkman, anything? Just a song, an album, a tour, just anything. Anything at all. Hope Springs 

Sean: Eternal. 

Rene: Yeah. Hope Springs [00:34:00] Eternal. The Walkman my favorite band. 

Sean: Um, well, and I'm looking forward to some more of the Hasi end dads. Oh, and who are they? Sean? 

Rene: They're Joe's Band Joe, our sound editor. Yes. This is not rehearsed at all.

No. Uh, Joe Joe's the only one of the three of us that actually is a musician, so, and a good one. And a good one, yeah. And a great sound editor as well. 

Sean: Yeah, 

Rene: and a DJ and a surfer, like he's the coolest of the three of us. Easy by far. Yeah. 

Sean: Okay. So, looking back on this season, I think the best thing that's for me and what I get out of preparing for these episodes is, remember we talked about concerts.

I wanna see more concerts. But you know, when you're gonna, the anticipation of seeing a concert where you get to go back in the band's back catalog and hear songs, you haven't. Thought of in a little while and go, oh, I hope they play this. And it brings back memories. Like [00:35:00] if you saw them. Oh, yeah.

Like when I saw them two years ago, they played this song. That's kind of the way I feel about our episodes because. We've gotta think about what we're gonna say. We've gotta think about the band. It makes us listen to the bands that we love and, and maybe remember things that we didn't remember before.

So that's really the, the thing that I'm taking away the most out of this so far. Yeah. Is that fun that I'm having? 

Rene: Yeah. And the fun we're having together, we see each other more, which is pretty awesome. But also just to that point I, dude, I don't know about you, but I find like time just like evaporate.

Like I can't, I have no sense of time when I'm, learning about the band and going online and, and putting my piece together. The time. Just like I, I feel like there's never enough time. Like even if I spend eight hours preparing, I'm like, I could do 20 hours, like and prepare even more, but it just goes and goes and goes and it's just such a joy.

It's like, oh my God, I wish I could get paid for this. 

Sean: Yep. I'm so glad that we're enjoying it and if the [00:36:00] people who are listening are enjoying it as well, that's even better. 

Rene: Yes, yes, indeed. So that's 2025. That's a wrap. That's a wrap. We'll see you next time on Air Shifter. We hope you enjoyed this episode of Air Shifter.

Tune in next time where we'll cover another band that deserves more. You can find Ear shifter on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok. Friend us or listen to our playlist on Spotify and visit air shifter.com for more information. Special thanks. Go to our logo designer Stuart Thorsby and our intro Outro Music by Joe Novak.

You can find him as, bye. Bye. Badman. One word on SoundCloud and a big shout out to Joe for being our awesome sound engineer slash editor. Until next time.