ANGELFIRED

It’s Succession season, and we are guilty of stimulating HBO’s SEO on this episode (along with every other ageing youth publication lol). We do NOT mention THAT meme but we do spoil everything via a certified crash course in Shakespeare. The impending return of Dave, The Bear and The White Lotus births an impromptu writer's room for a Kitchen Confidential show and a Succession prequel, aptly title...

I’m in my bad boy era (again). Self-loathing has inverted into self-indulgence and I’m back on Instagram, dabbling in vapes and have attempted to quit sleep in favour of reading The Shards. I joined the Hydralyte hive after a dehydration scare, which had absolutely no influence on my rare merch cops from The Garden and Frost Children. Meanwhile, Harry has been busy on his own (mostly secondhand) s...

We’re dishing out unsolicited festival reviews once again, dusty off the back of Golden Plains and in anticipation of the upcoming return of Iceage, Dev Hynes and the debut tour of our Meemaw Ethel Cain. We sit through an episode of Australian Idol as a form of self-harm and stare into the void of hedonism as we unpack the state of capitalism and the internet while abstaining from downing bottles...

⊹✎ 𝕻𝖆𝖗𝖙 2 𝖔𝖋 2 𝖎𝖓 𝖔𝖚𝖗 𝕰𝖚𝖗𝖔𝖕𝖊 𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖛𝖊𝖑 𝖉𝖎𝖆𝖗𝖎𝖊𝖘 ✎⊹ It’s too easy to curate the perfect holiday album online, but what starts as a fairytale can quickly become an episode of ‘The Amazing Race’. What really goes down in transit? Harry, Jae, and I sit down for our second group therapy session after *that* Euro summer trip together to shed some light on the reality of escapism. [ TOPICS ] (00:00:00) Mia M...

⊹✎ 𝕻𝖆𝖗𝖙 1 𝖔𝖋 2 𝖎𝖓 𝖔𝖚𝖗 𝕰𝖚𝖗𝖔𝖕𝖊 𝖙𝖗𝖆𝖛𝖊𝖑 𝖉𝖎𝖆𝖗𝖎𝖊𝖘 ✎⊹ It’s too easy to curate the perfect holiday album online, but what starts as a fairytale can quickly become an episode of ‘The Amazing Race’. What really goes down in transit? Harry, Jae, and I sit down for our first group therapy session after *that* Euro summer trip together to shed some light on the reality of escapism. [ TOPICS ] (00:00:00) Group...

Harry and I digress from the alluring hellscape of LA to an analytical autopsy of Hipsterisms after listening to Matty Healy on The B.E.E Podcast. We address the corporate tongue wags at the relevancy of youth culture, the spokenwordification of text, the evolution of memes, the lore of celebrities and how their clout can kill trends. ☹ 𝓘𝓷 𝓵𝓸𝓿𝓲𝓷𝓰 𝓶𝓮𝓶𝓸𝓻𝔂 𝓸𝓯 𝓙𝓲𝓫𝓫𝓲𝓽𝔃 ☹ ₂₀₂₀₋₂₀₂₂ ♱ [ TOPICS ] (00:00:0...

We’re talking facades this week because what you see isn’t always what you get. Will the final season of Succession follow the King Lear lore? Does the censorship of Roald Dahl promote inclusivity or remove accountability? Do community guidelines help us or censor us? If social media is just a shopfront for capitalism, then why are we so obsessed with it? Are we all just a bunch of wannabe capital...

How well do you know your neighbours? This week, we peek underneath the surface of Australia’s most family-friendly franchise: The Wiggles. Why are these dudes hanging out with a dinosaur? What’s the deal with Jeff only waking up for a fat bag? What in the name of nepotism is this new blue Wiggle up to? The hard launch hot potato of Chambie/Role Model, Em Rata/Eric Andre, Pharrell Williams/Louis V...

POV: It's 2020. Harry and I are front row at Sydney Laneway Festival, watching The 1975 in the pouring rain. The pandemic is looming but the lockdowns haven't started yet. We have no idea how significant this moment is. This memory foreshadows our return to Melbourne Laneway Festival in 2023. The commemorative merch dates serve as a polarising reminder that time has indeed passed, and nothing is c...

We’re cranky off a vape come down and it’s being rapidly worsened by wokeist-pitch-deck-films and irrational fears about Toadzilla and the other “T word”. Could all of our problems be solved by medicinal MDMA and mushrooms? Only Albo and his arts agenda can save us now.  Read Harry's Op-Ed About Labor’s National Culture Policy: https://themusicnetwork.com/national-cultural-policy-opinion/
 [TOPICS...

The curated niches we find comfort in aren’t underground they're clout-mined micro-trends absorbed by algorithms to hive-mind us into the icky oblivion of mass consumption. Is anything good in excess? Are internet friends real friends? How do we escape the echo chamber of clout and co-signs? Is the pursuit of relevancy just a gambling addiction? How do we exit the Matrix if we kind of like it in h...

The Australian Open is in full swing so Harry and I head on an excursion to brandland to critique activations and observe the behaviours of execs, influencers and punters on-ground. As we desperately search for Oat Milk on-premise, we realise that Lavazza has a first-drop contract locked so we’re forced to down a soy cap as we A&R the next big social media stars of tennis. We watch Ben Shelton...

Yung Lean was wrapping up his 'Stardust' tour in Melbourne, so we scurried back just in time for Harry to say 'Hej Hej' to his favourite Swedish cousin. How has the Yung Lean crowd held up after the second wave of 'Ginseng Strip 2002' virality? What differentiates a drainer and a sad boy? How much realtree camo does it take to become a forest? We perceive the fandom wildly, muse over minimalism vs...

Harry and I have emerged from our post-Falls Festival cocoon as haggard butterflies with just enough flutter to bash out a pod. We're dishing out retrospective commentary on brand activations, lobster boys, festival fashion, and live music with ratings inclusive. Pitchfork, who? Suffer through our unsolicited performance feedback of Genesis Owusu, Anna Lunoe, DMAs, Amine, Lil Nas X, DJ Seinfeld, M...

The Fitzroy Garage Sesh has caused a global uproar among ex-hipsters and current vest lovers. Is this a reaction to the rise of Aussie narcissism or just another conversation about classism? How has the ~gentrification of vintage~ and the #baileysmithification of the mullet impacted our ability to read virtue signals? Skaters and DJs have always been the blueprint for jocks to buy into. What's cha...

Hollywood is a cult, so the Nepo baby list holds no surprises. It’s the closeted Nepo babies that walk among us that you should worry about. They’re in your sharehouse. They’re at your local thrift store. They’re at your kick ons shouting the loudest about social issues they’ve seen trending online. You can’t choose your wealth, but you can distribute it. If you are a masked rich kid: EXPOSE YOURS...

Twitter is imploding at the mercy of mean Mr. Musk. The hive mind is fragmenting! On one end, we have 'The Paranoid' scrambling to find a new platform to fill their impending Twitter-shaped void. On the other, we have 'The Tweet Huggers' ready to weather the storm of censorship, guarding their mid-2000s-built micro-community for dear life. What is next for the voyeurs? And where will all the shit...

Harry and I discuss the dystopian future of retail after The Fabricant posed the question: ‘Will physical fashion become obsolete?’, Australian department store David Jones is sold as a ‘Christmas Bargain’ for $150Million to private investors, and SHEIN is named the top brand of the year. Harry (The Economist) breaks down the bleak state of inflation reflected in alternative milk, coffee, and cine...

WTF is Y2K? A hashtag that once swept the internet has infiltrated the real world and spawned countless subgenres of throwaway trends. Does anyone know what the millennium bug was? Who actually watched 2000s-era MTV? Why does everyone look so pristine at the club? What happened to hot messy trashbags? Jae and I revisit some of our cursed looks over the years and try to make sense of how we arrived...

Sean Monahan coined the term ‘Vibe Shift’ via his 8Ball substack in 2021 and suggested a return to rock. We suffered through the ‘Indie Sleaze’ headlines, fearful for the return of American Apparel galaxy leggings. Was his prophecy fulfilled? In The Guardian, Sean predicts a return to the real world. Is 2023 the year of logging off? Harry and I discuss the likelihood of social media death. Read th...

We rank the best (and some of the worst) of 2022. Are we aligned? Mostly. Are we the same? Definitely not. We gatekept our Spotify Wrapped results in shame, so we reveal all in this time capsule episode to humble ourselves and make better life decisions in 2023.  [ TOPICS ] Song Of The Year Artist Of The Year Album Of The Year Live Show Of The Year Spotify Wrapped EXPOSED TV Show Of The Year Movie...