Month: June 2025

We’re falling out of place

| Michelle

Hello again from the void.
It’s been years since I last posted. The truth? I couldn’t get back into my account. A bad breakup sent me spiraling, and instead of fixing it, I just… didn’t. I ghosted this space, this voice, this part of me. But here I am now—resurfacing. Ready again to talk about the only thing that ever really makes sense to me: music.

And what better way to come back than with something massive—something bigger than I’m even comfortable holding. TURNSTILE’s latest album, NEVER ENOUGH, is more than just a record. It’s a goddamn cultural moment. A love letter to sound. A blueprint for survival.

Here in Phoenix, TURNSTILE shows are packed. Overflowing. Exploding. You step into a room and you’re immediately swallowed by this chaotic, melodic, physical force. They don’t just play—they move you. Frantic, thrashing, emotional propulsion. And what’s wild is how they’re built: each member feels like they don’t match, like they wandered into the wrong band… and somehow that’s what makes it perfect. They’re the audio equivalent of strangers becoming family during a power outage. That kind of imperfect unity? That’s how I want to see humanity survive—learning to speak the same language through noise, through music, through presence.

Their last album, GLOW ON, was the spark. It landed like a meteor. It felt like a culmination of everything we needed right then: catharsis, chaos, beauty, truth. It marked the moment they weren’t just “around”—they became essential. And now with NEVER ENOUGH, they’ve refined that urgency into something even sharper. This album flows like a great vinyl—built with intention, with emotional pacing. It doesn’t just slap you track after track. It ebbs. It swells. It lets you breathe just before it knocks the wind out of you again.

It jumps genres without asking permission—swinging between 80s drum machine shimmer and hardcore sweat. One moment, it’s The Breakfast Club ending scene: strangers, fists in the air, bonded by pain. The next, it’s pure, glorious fury. That’s the genius of this record. It doesn’t want to be labeled—it wants to be felt. And that’s exactly what we need right now. Not algorithms. Not purity tests. Not posturing. Just music that dares to let different energies coexist.

TURNSTILE gets it. They’re what empathy sounds like when it learns how to scream. They remind us that misunderstanding doesn’t have to be the end of the conversation. It can be the beginning.
All you have to do is show up.
Be loud. Be soft. Be real.
Listen.

…shouldn’t talk about it…

| Michelle

I was unconsciously listening to this band—half-distracted, multitasking my way through homework—when something caught in my chest and made me stop. I paused everything and listened to the whole album start to finish without even realizing I had surrendered to it. There’s something drunkenly beautiful about hearing something you weren’t prepared for. No build-up. No anticipation. Just impact. And with all the mental quaffs I’ve poured myself this week, I’d say this band hit the top shelf.

It’s a short album, but every second feels steeped in honesty and quiet desperation. It doesn’t beg you to like it—it just exists, wide-eyed and open-palmed. It’s the sound of someone telling the truth even when it doesn’t help them. That kind of emotional exposure hits hard, especially when you’re not asking for it. This album doesn’t show off—it shows what I already know: that we try.

We try to love, and more often than not, we already know the outcome before it begins. Every new connection comes laced with an echo of its ending. We can sense it, deep down—feel the warning in our chest, hear the murmur in our own gut. But we ignore it. Because we want to be surprised. This album plays like that moment of quiet clarity you get after the chaos, when you realize how often you’ve hurt someone just by not being ready.

It’s a slow collapse wrapped in melody. A kind of emotional post-mortem. There’s guilt in these songs, and grief, and also an exhausted kind of hope—the kind that still bothers to show up even when you’re certain you’ve screwed it all up. This isn’t background music. This is a mirror you don’t want to look into, but can’t quite turn away from. It’s beautiful because it’s cracked.

And maybe that’s the point. That some of the most moving music doesn’t fix you. It just tells you you’re not the only one who’s broken in this exact shape. And for right now, that’s enough.