Is three too many new episode types for one year? Because that's what we're bringing to the table.
Two words: Greatest Sh**s. (You can fill in the blanks. I believe in you.) The premise is this: we take an artist that is seen by a wide group of people - including some or all of us jerk hosts - as not being great. Critically panned. Goofed on.
You can certainly think of some immediately, as could we... but there was always going to be one artist that we dissected as the subject of the first episode. Chances are, it's an artist you thought of as you read this.
Tbat artist is none other than Nickelback.
Once we had the artist nailed down, the goal was simple: build a sort of "greatest hits" album, spanning their entire discography. One song per album. We couldn't skip albums; rather, we had to pick one song from every single full-length release, to make up our Greatest Sh**s album.
Sure, we're covering powerhouse albums such as Silver Side Up and All the Right Reasons. We're also covering far less popular releases, like Curb and Feed the Machine. No stone is left unturned, no sh** left ungreatened. Ew. Sorry.
But how did we do? Was Nickelback deserving of our ire in the first place? Did we find the diamonds in the very, very rough? Let us know in all the usual ways:
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: hang out in the parking lot of your favorite team, fire up your portable grill, and put on these songs before the big game. It's tailgating songs. I kinda gave that one away. That's my bad. That's on me.
You know what you should give away? Ass kickings. Because you should Keep. Kicking. Ass.

I apparently love August, at least inasmuch as what the "food months" are for August, according to Wikipedia. I haven't looked at other months, so I may love them all - food do be like that, after all. But here's what we were working with in August:
National Catfish Month, National Dippin' Dots Month, Family Meals Month, National Goat Cheese Month, National Panini Month, Peach Month, Sandwich Month.
All of the above, please. Maybe not the dippin' dots... let's just double up on the goat cheese instead. But the rest are solid.
What was I... OH! August reviews. Yes. We review August. Albums, newly-charting singles, the works. And by "the works", I mean "specifically the two things that I pointed out before I said 'the works'". Words are hards.
As always though, our words are only as good as you'll allow them to be. So what do you allow from our lists? What did you like, and what would you replace our albums and charting singles with if you could? Let us know in all the usual ways:

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: a terrible thing. It involves a lot of Nickelback, and we hated it, and we can only hope that you hate it slightly less than we did.
Until then, make sure to Keep. Kicking. Ass.

When we write up these descriptions, we love to give you some funny insight, some witty repartee, some... something. However, when the thing does exactly what it says on the tin, it's tough.
Enter: this week's REWIND episode, straight out of our vault, originally posted on September 27, 2023. The episode title is "Top 5 Happy-Sounding Sad Songs". And... yeah. That's pretty much it right there. The songs are sad lyrically, but if you don't listen closely enough they sound happy to the ear. That's the thing. I can't tell you more, as there's no more to tell.
What I CAN tell you, however, is that there were some surprises here! Some unexpected songs that ended up being real bummers, some popular songs with deeper meanings, and tons of fun to be had talking about absolute downer after downer. It's what we signed up for, nearly two years ago from where we sit now, but... damn.
Did we get it right back then? Is it any more right or wrong now than it was in 2023? Let us know in all the usual ways, and think for a minute about how a word as short as "usual" has two u's in it, like really what the hell is up with that:
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: August reviews! But for real, since our last description also mentioned August reviews and was very wrong. Will it stack up to the powerhouse that was July? We still don't know! Well, we know, but you will still have to tune in to find out.
And until then, make sure to Keep. Kicking. Ass.

John, Paul, George, and Ringo?
Not today.
Instead, let's go with John Paul (that's one guy), John, Jimmy, and Robert.
We One Song'd the HELL out of one of the most legendary bands of all time. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? First ballot, of course. An entry on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list, from 2003? Try five... along with six songs on the Greatest Songs list from 2004. GQ Men of the Year from 2008, for what that's worth. Oddly, only one Grammy - for live album Celebration Day, released in 2012, over 30 years after the band's breakup. Let's call that a miss from the Recording Academy.
And, most importantly, one song that can be considered their very best work. 1 of 1. The top of Mount Zeppmore (analogy not to be confused with our Rush episodes, which you can also find wherever you get your ass kicked).
Yes, we tell you exactly which song we feel is the best of their catalog. We made our cases throughout the episode, and as always, it's up to all of you to tell us who was right... or were none of us right? Let us know the correct answer to the question of best Led Zeppelin song of all time, in all the usual ways:
But we're not here to drop insider tennis terms on you: we're here to talk about music. And in this episode, our years were J with 1988, Dan with 2004, and Zack bringing up the rear (front, I guess?) with 2023.
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/
Next week: August reviews! Will it stack up to the powerhouse that was July? Tune in to find out.
And until then, make sure to Keep. Kicking. Ass.

Ah, SomeOnes. That time-honored tradition that we have tradished only once before, but traditions gotta start somewhere, right? ...right?

The premise is simple in its complexity: each of us (Dan, J, and Zack, your KickAss Krew) get a randomly-generated year before the show. We then have to find a song that hit #1 on a chart (thus the name!), and write about it. That's it. That's the sum total of the guardrails that we have.
Which chart? All of 'em. Which country even? All of 'em. What do we have to write about our song of choice? Literally anything.
We go in a few directions, as you can guess, but that's part of the fun! Because really, this podcast is about expecting the unexpected, and if you don't even know what to expect, then you don't know what to unexpect either. Game. Set. Win.
But we're not here to drop insider tennis terms on you: we're here to talk about music. And in this episode, our years were J with 1988, Dan with 2004, and Zack bringing up the rear (front, I guess?) with 2023.
How did we do with our assignments? Would you have picked a different song from a different chart for a different reason? Let us know in all the usual ways:
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: TBD. We're taking our time and casually figuring out which direction to go, but as soon as we know, you'll know.
Luckily, you already know what else you should know: and that's to Keep. Kicking. Ass.

I feel like, the more we do this podcast, the quicker things come back around. Like Monthly Reviews: we just did those a few days ago! Or so it seems. In reality, the reviews for June were posted on July 9th, which is about a month ago, which makes perfect sense. And yet... it feels so recent.
Maybe this podcast is aging, right alongside us. Maybe this podcast is no longer "hip" with all the "lingo". Maybe this podcast longs for a better time, a simpler time, a time when Justin Bieber wasn't hogging a good percentage of the Billboard Hot 100.
In a way, we're ALL this podcast.
Thankfully, besides Bieber's Swag (the album, not the personality trait), the rest of the month was pretty solid! Dan has much to say about all the newly-charting top 40 singles, and J and Zack both hit you with the best albums of the month.
But we didn't listen to everything, and certainly missed out on some gems. So let us have it in the comments for overlooking one of your favorite artists/albums/songs:
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/
Next week: We transport you all back to 1988, 2004, and 2023 - all at the same time. Eat your sometimes-poisoned heart out, Erwin Schrödinger.
But instead of that, all of YOU should eat a snack! And then you should Keep. Kicking. Ass.

Beats?
Beats??
BEATS???
Beats.
Beats is good.
[nods]
Yes, I ripped that dumb bit off of The Road to El Dorado... because it's a good bit! And it describes perfectly what we're talking about today, being beats.
We listened to them... we istened to a LOT of them, in fact... and then we ranked them, in our usual way. It was one of the more fun listening journeys that we've been down, and the outcome was awesome too. We had some similar stuff of course, some overlapping picks, and some stuff that was only on one of our lists. Many of the producers that you know and love were represented.
But did we miss any? Did we get any wrong, or leave any out? Let us know what you think!
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: July Reviews! They're like Yelp Reviews, but we make far less money than Yelp does. You know what's never gonna cost a dime though? That's you, having the ability to Keep. Kicking. Ass.

2001: a year where a LOT of stuff changed. A year that we could talk about, for hours on end, and never once scratch the surface of music. But, despite how important the other historical things were, we absolutely have to scratch. Because our random number generator fell here, and we can't say no to a good ol' RNG.
Specifically, that RNG gave us the year to take the year-end Billboard chart, and to fix it, because it's oh so wrong. Your three hosts always agree that the original list is wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong, wrong-wrong-wrong-wrong... it's wrong.
But we haven't really had a year much like this, where we have match after match on our lists, KickAss synergy after KickAss synergy. It was unsettling. I hope you're unsettled.
...but not too unsettled to hit us up on socials and let us know what you think!

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: the beat goes on, and the beat goes on... and we don't even have to tell you that Kicking. Ass. also goes on. Because you already know what it do. (It Kicks Ass. We just established that.)

**NEW EPISODE TYPE ALERT**
**NEW EPISODE TYPE ALERT**

Tell all your friends! The KickAss Krew is back with another pilot episode. We're calling this one Musical Confessions, and the concept is simple: each host comes to the show with an odd, interesting, or generally against-the-grain take in the world of music. It's something that they feel is true... unless it isn't, and it's a total lie.

Who can say? Well, the othe hosts can. They ask questions to try and suss out any mistruths, or to verify that the take has actually been taken by the host in question. The hosts who aren't presenting will then vote on whether they think that it's true or not, after which the big reveal happens. The hosts who were right on their guesses get a point, and if a hosts stumps everyone, they get a point too. Most points at the end get one of the hosts saying "you won the most points" to them. If you're familiar with the Popular British show, Would I Lie To You... it's basically that. If you're NOT familiar, then go watch it because it's an absolute hoot.

Now, we always wanna know what you think of an ep, but with this being a new ep we really wanna know. So let us know how you feel about it!

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: a space odyssey! I think! I didn't read the schedule too closely, so I'm going with it.

And the only place you need to go is wherever you can Keep. Kicking. Ass.

Yikes. Big yikes.

Let it be known that we tried to make something out of June for these here monthly reviews, but it was tough. For once, all three of us had a super-mid month, with very few great newly-charting singles or albums to speak of. Not much more to say about it... at least not for us. But perhaps YOU have something to say! Maybe? Possibly?

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/fairlykickass.bsky.social
Instagram: https://instagram.com/fairlykickass
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fairlykickass
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@fairlykickass
Website (for Ride-Along Playlists): https://fairlykickass.com/

Next week: a new thing! Musical Confessions. We're going to confess music... whatever that means. Look, we haven't ironed it out completely yet, but trust me when I say that it will be one of THE episodes of this show, which is already one of THE podcasts that you can listen to.

And no matter what other (and demonstrably better) podcasts you listen to, always remember to Keep. Kicking. Ass.