At First Listen

Users on social media platforms have been acting Frank Ocean's "Solo" from his 2016 studio album, Blonde. 

Dominique and Andrew discuss what might have sparked this trend, why Frank Ocean is such a pivotal artist for LGBTQ+-identifying people and André 3000's contribution to the accompanying "Solo (Reprise)" track from the album.

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It turns out that Americans have been pretty well misinterpreting Smiths songs for quite a long time now. On this episode our guest, comedian and South London native Shem Pennant, leads a seminar on The Smiths and their iconic 1986 album, The Queen Is Dead.
 
Shem offers much needed context to the album, explains why the Smiths’ phenomenon was so uniquely British, and why he doesn’t let Morrissey’s post-Smiths political statements detract from his enjoyment of the band's music.

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(Episode 32.)

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We have a very serious conversation about gender conformance, surrounding a very unserious song by Detroit-based rapper Rob Apollo.

Apollo's song "SHE / THEY" has been circulating on TikTok lately, mainly due to a racy lyric in the chorus that you'd think self-righteous Zoomers would hate. 

Dominique and Andrew discuss what teens, tweens and queer people find so fun about the song, and why no one is actually as mad about pronouns as you think they are.

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Diamond returns to At First Listen to dig into her favorite album of 2024, Sabrina Carpenter's mega-breakthrough Short n' Sweet. 

With hits like "Espresso," "Please, Please, Please," "Taste" and "Bed Chem," Short n' Sweet is brimming with personality.

Diamond says there are multiple hits on the album that she's yet to tire of, and she doesn't meet much resistance from Andrew and Dominique. 

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(Episode 31.)

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In this mini episode we're focusing on "The Giver," Chappell Roan's attempt at a lesbian country song that's making waves in the pop music world.

Is "The Giver" a legitimate country song or is it a mere novelty — or is it branding? Is any country music legitimate? We also discuss why Chappell Roan is allowed to “go country,” but it was controversial when Beyoncé or Lil Nas X did it.

We talk about Chappell's recent SNL performance, and how "The Giver" is makng Dominique more of a fan but Andrew possibly less of a fan?

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We're sorting through Lady Gaga's seventh studio pop album Mayhem with Gaga superfan and iHeartRadio personality Nick Gomez. 

Nick is an almost lifelong Little Monster, who credits Gaga with inspiring the love of pop music that steered him towards a career in radio, where he can be heard at night on Hot 99.5FM, Washington D.C.'s #1 Hit Music Station, and in the afternoon on Pride Radio. 

Andrew and Dominique prod Nick about Mayhem's place in Gaga's catalog and he provides all the answers!

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(Episode 30.)

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UCBLK's Justin Catchens joins us to celebrate one of his favorite albums of the '00s, Lupe Fiasco's Food & Liquor, the debut album by the Chicago-based rapper-turned-MIT-and-Johns Hopkins University professor!

Food & Liquor is as dense with prose as a classic work of literature, and we do our best to wrap our heads around the storytelling and social/political messages in Lupe's lyrics. We also discuss Lupe's connection to the 'conscious rap' genre, why this album was his commercial peak and how hip hop never fully embraced him. 

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(Episode 29.)

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In the second episode our new cohosts recorded together, Andrew gauges Dominique's taste for the hard stuff with one of his favorite metal albums from last decade, Deftones' 2010 mid-career masterpiece Diamond Eyes — by far the most extreme-sounding record we've discussed on the show.

We explore why this album was a turning point for the Deftones, why it was the record that converted Andrew to a fan, its place in the "metal" genre and how excited we are to see Deftones on their first arena headlining tour this spring!

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(Episode 28.)

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New York metal singer and rapper Mizzie from the X introduces us to Doja Cat's debut album, Amala. 

We explore Doja's complicated persona and reckless online presence. Mizzie explains how Doja's freewheeling art continually inspires her in hip hop, heavy metal and beyond.

Mizzie has released two albums with her metal band Dishonest Escape and last year she launched her rap career with the debut single, "Ivy."

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(Episode 27.)

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Talkin’ ‘Tok - For the second in our bonus series about viral songs on social media, we get into the newfound popularity of “Lockjaw,” an album cut from Sir Mix-A-Lot’s 1992 Mack Daddy album.
 
The song has become a favorite in social media’s ‘makeover’/‘glowup’ genre of videos, so naturally, the conversation turns to mewing, mogging, maxing out, and other Internet sad boy terms that Andrew has never heard.

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