The Analog Cub

Love that finish!

UConn has looked pretty unstoppable throughout the entire tournament. Might be yet another title for them if they keep this up. There's already going to be history with just the title matchup possibilities as LABT mentioned, but I'm personally wanting to see a Big East showdown of UConn vs. Creighton for the added hype. From living there for a time, I know Omaha LOVES their Blue Jays and in addition to hosting the College World Series this would do a lot for them.

Haken (2023 version) 1. Fauna 2. Affinity 3. Virus 4. The Mountain 5. Visions 6. Vector 7. Aquarius They really did outdo themselves with Fauna. It's an instant classic.

Iowa State played an absolutely embarrassing game against Pitt Drake and Iowa also lost their first rounds, but at least Drake's game was a fun match. Caitlin Clark and the Iowa girls team are a terrifying matchup for anyone, though.

This really might be their best album. It's unique in so many ways for them but unmistakably Haken. I loved Virus and Affinity but this is even better. It took of all of the good qualities from Visions, The Mountain, and Affinity, but kept a lot of the heavy flavor they used in Virus to excellent effect.

Fauna is a certified classic. They've really outdone themselves this time. So much good to unpack here.

This album created a formula for success they would replicate on the next few albums. It's a masterpiece. I think they did even better on Wish You Were Here, though. To me, that album is their absolute peak.

Elephants Never Forget sounds like it came off of Aquarius. Has the right amount of silly

Holy shit this album is so good. If you liked Affinity or The Mountain this is for you

Lightwork feels a lot like Sky Blue if I have to compare it to past releases. I like it. Empath is a career defining album for him, but I find it a little too wild for my tastes. Celestial Signals and Call of the Void are fantastic.

If we're open to discussing new discoveries this year, but not necessarily 2022 releases, I've been all over Riverside and TesseracT this year. Both of those bands have amazing catalogs and I'm bummed it took me this long to discover either of them.

I'm kinda done with Muse, I think. I was hopeful when they did Drones in 2015 because it was more of a rock album in the vein of Absolution. While I think Drones is pretty good and better than anything they've done since Black Holes, they've just gotten a bit stale. Will of the People doesn't really grab me, and Simulation Theory was trash.

Porcupine Tree - Closure/Continuation Easily album of the year for me. Fantastic album, and probably Barbieri's most significant. Ghost - Impera Meliora and Prequelle are better. Impera is still pretty good, albeit flaws and too poppy for my tastes. Devin Townsend - Lightwork Reminiscent of the Sky Blue album in terms of feel, not quite as insane and wild as Empath. I'm starting to feel Devin's said all he's need to say musically, but this is a good collection of songs.

First CD I bought with my own money might've been the last Van Halen album, which was around when streaming (Spotify, etc.) really took off so I honestly don't recall buying other CDs. A Different Kind of Truth wasn't a bad album tbh, I was actually impressed how much I liked it. It's a shame Roth really went off the rails live. The Tokyo live album is unlistenable because of it.

So so so excited. The album art is definitely awaesome. Nightingale's a fantastic song. Alphabet of Me is very different. No idea what to expect with this album except that it might be coming back up a bit from the darkness of Vector/Virus based on the two songs we've heard.

I'll be curious what the next one sounds like. I really love the last two, they hadn't put out consistently good albums like that in a while. A View is basically a less restrained evolution of Distance Over Time. Not sure where they can go for the next album without sounding too similar to past efforts.

Oh shit, maybe they'll quit teasing and play Alexander the Great!

Nightingale is a banger. Really curious how they're gonna sound after losing Diego.

YYZ had some trouble but 2112 and Working Man were incredible. Grohl served those songs really well

Spencer Strider threw 16 K's tonight. God damn boy!

So happy Hader is out of the division

I hope he does it, it would be great for the game. I also hope the Twins finally get the monkey off their back and beat them in the playoffs.

N I C E

Affinity is my favorite.

Visions (the title track) is one of the greatest songs they've ever written.