Hi. I'm Brian Pretus. I play guitar, sing harmonies, talk to the crowd and use the internet in PEARS. This list isnt exactly in any particlar order. But yeah, Do yourself a favor; get comfy, take a deep breath, and try to keep up. This is gonna be wierd. 1. Night Birds - "Mutiny At Muscle Beach" - I spent the majority of my "free time" for the first half of 2014 on my fiancée's parents' porch booking the first few PEARS tours and fuh-ReAkINg the fuck out about Night Birds. I didn't ask for this. It's just what happens because spotify is sooo horribly awesome. I randomly heard the title track on some sort of shuffle thing (cuz I'm poor), and literally didn't move for the entirety of the song, just stared into space smoking a cigarette, accepting the brain spanking, and in 2 minutes they'd become one of my favorite bands. Through touring and being a dork (mostly the latter) we've gotten to know some of the Birds, and Brian graciously sent me this album a month or 2 before it came out, and admittedly, I was hesitant to listen to it, for like an hour. I mean, born to die in suburbia was so perfect, and they'd just signed to Fat (which automatically makes you a total PoSeUr), i'z like 'they betta not fuck this up'. Sure enough, they did not dissapoint. Shits like Adolescents if they were born in a reasonable decade (like the 80s), plus sweeter riffs and if they weren't so freakin serious all the time (sheeeeesh). Fucking buy it. Twice. And get me one cuz i can't afford it. 2. Teenage Bottlerocket - "Tales From Wyoming" - This album IS the best pop punk album of all time. In the last year I thibk we played about 6,7089 shows with these dudes, and I literally watched them every single night. We were with them when they found out the album was in the billboard charts and I remember not being surprised at all, the album is absolutely perfect. Every single song on it is a total banger (no pun intended), and on this album in particular it feels like they really perfected what they do, and they do that pop punk thing as good, if not better than the ramones (based on TBR's "incredible song / stinker" ratio (99 good -1 bad) vs that of the Ramones (1 good -2 bad)). Now, by using the comment section, please try to prove me wrong sans-insults and vague assumptions. And also, please use some from of percent graph or ratios to prove your theory. R.I.P. bran bran. We fucking love and miss you so much. 3. G.L.O.S.S. - "Demo (2015)" - Nick Woods (from Direct Hit) showed this to me some time way earlier this year, along with this other band, AJAX from New York (no relation, just at the same time) and I was able to sleep better knowing this band existed. G.L.O.S.S. is not only totally slammin (and jammin, duh, calm down), but they're a super important entity for punk rock in general. They have a lot to say about shit people dont say enough about, and whether you relate directly to what they sing (i mean 'yell'. calm down.) about, their message, whether its meant to be or not, goes much deeper than whats on the surface, and that in itself is such a fucking huge thing missing from a lot of music these days (in my own opinion, based on 0 facts and vague knowledge of an admitadly, pathetically small number of musical genres...). Not saying it's anyones job to carry a torch or nothing, because it's not, but its nice to see bands doing their own thing for a change. I haven't been able to see them live because I don't know how to read or tie my shoes, but I'm sure it's amazing, and you should go out and support them, they're music and lyrics are strong as fuck and i can't wait to see what they do next. 4. Brutal Youth - Bottoming Out - When PEARS first got together, I was totally into the internet, and looking for new good bands (on spotify. Calm down). Stumbled across Brutal Youth one night when I was sitting on my porch (not my fiancée's parents' porch, a different one. With a couch.) All high or whatever, and instantly fell in love with them. It was like the first time I heard Kid Dynamite. But faster. And Patty doesn't sing as sharp as the other guy. Not that being a little off key a lil bit is a bad thing. Anyways, I was feelin confident cuz I'd lost 5 pounds that week from working a labor job in the hot sun and not being able to afford food, so I sent them a message professing my love for them, and desire for our bands to play together. Fast forward to now, they're like some of our best pals on da road. Even though they're from Canada where everyone is known for their mean-ness and poutine burned my tongue. They sent this album to me a long time ago, before it came out, and i put it on my phone. During our live shows we have some clips that come from the same phone, and i just recently realized every night as soon as we ended, the phone played brutal youths unreleased songs for everyone at the club to hear, every night. For months. Kind of a dick move, but hey, like 5 people have asked us who it was and, I got to promote da homieeeez. Side note: Please don't play our unreleased songs as house music at your shows. My bad dudes. It's Dante's fault. And plus. I love hearing it every day cuz it fucking rips. 5. Swingin' Utters - Fistful Of Hollow - I feel like Swingin' Utters is one of the most underrated bands in punk history. How many more times do they have to write a better album than their last one for you guys to cough it up and give these dudes their millions?! Sheesh! Yall greedy. But no, really, this album covers a ton of musical ground in such a tasteful fashion, and all the songs are so smart and original, it's truly inspiring. 6. toyGuitar - "In This Mess" - Heard this first on Ryan Young from Off With Their Heads (just in case you do live under a gigantic rock with no computer) podcast, Anxious and Angry. Every new day where there isn't a new Briefs album I search for bands that satisfy that kind of craving for me, and toyGuitar was the kind of thing that made me not even care that there wasn't wasn't a new Briefs album (at least for at while), because it's so fucking perfect. I don't know if I'm clinically inane or not, but when I listen to this album I'm pretty sure my heart beat syncs up with the 4/4 kick drum, and it's like a religious experience (alone, in my car, while I'm stuck in hot traffic with no A/C sweating through my clothes), if religion wasn't so fucking stupid. 7. Red City Radio - "Red City Radio" - One time in Germany I was taking a shit and shaving my face at the same time in a bathroom at one of the shows. We'd been on tour in Europe with Red City Radio for like 3 weeks at that point, and everyone in my band forgot to pack their beard trimmers. Thing is, nobody ever taught me how to shave (thanks dad) and Ryan Donovan looked at my face afterwards, took em under his arm, brought me back into the bathroom and taught me how to properly shave my face. But, FUCK those dudes can sing. Garret Dale sure does know how to write a hook or 2. And Jojo only wears PEARS shirts, and I don't blame him. Their best stuff to date, fa sho. 8. Donovan Wolfington - "How to Treat The Ones You Love" - D wolf is from New Orleans, and we've been pals with them forever. Their singer Neil sent me this album months before it came out and I literally listened to it, only, for like an entire month. Genre - wise it's all over the place in such a good way. It's mostly like a much more badass Weezer, if they never even BEGAN to suck, mixed with an even angrier Minor Threat for a song, and doom metal spurts, plus, like, only the 5 or 6 good Pixies songs if they were much better and were written by some tewwwwtally chill bro'z whom I love dearly. I told Neil I wouldn't show anybody, but I did. I showed a bunch of people. Sorry Neil. 9. Woozy - "Blistered" - More New Orleans friends. John from Woozy lived with Zach, our singer, for a while, and during this time I was forced to realize that there isn't really a band in the world that makes more beautiful epic music than Woozy does. I never want to actually say "so many feels", but I really don't know what else to say about this album. It'll give ya da chills a whole bunch. 10. Thou / The Body - "Released From Love/You, Whom I Have" - Thou is ALSO (kinda) from New Orleans, and i can't actually believe there's 3 New Orleans bands on this list. That fucking rules. Way to go, hometown. Thou consistently makes the heaviest most brutal sounding music I've heard to date. And just last year I got turned on to The Body, who is also just about as intense, except the vocals are there sonic opposite of Thou's vocals, and both bands play on all the songs, which makes for the scariest album maybe of all time. But like, imagine, 2 full doom bands, playing the same thing in purpose, and one has a big scary demon man who works at the Loyola library for a singer, and the other has a little scared shrieking ghost/ghoul for a singer. I know, Right? Heh-veeeee. But seriously, calm down, you're out like out of control right now. I'm never letting you drink soda at the movies again. ***honorable mention*** Direct Hit - "More Of The Same (Satanic Singles: 2010 - 2014)" - The first time we slept at Nick and Kate Woods' house they'd JUST got new carpet installed in their basement, where we were told we could sleep. We were hanging out eating pizza (Kate taught me that a certain pizza chain has a cheese sauce that you can get to dip your crust in which changed my life), and Nick and I were flipping through his records and talking at eachothers heads about who knows what. I put my beer down on the ledge above us as we sit on the floor. Nick says "pleeeease don't spill that beer on our brand new carpet or my records". I tell him "okay". And not even a minute later, mid-hand-gesture, I bash knock the full beer off the ledge, it lands open side down, flat on top the crate of records, basically using the records as an accomplice while it evacuated beer at an alarming rate, all over all of his records and all over their brand new carpet. This is when I knew we'd be friends forever. Also, Devon is DJ'ing my wedding, Steve made me some cables from scratch. Thanks Steve! Are you really still reading this? Don't you realize I'm not even talking about the album? Get a fucking job and contribute to society you dummy! Gosh bless you all. 4evz. Fa real. Brian Pretus 2017! "Impeach, then get me!" Vote for me for prezdent or fuck you
