CThe Guardian just gave a folk album five stars, and it's a band most of the world has never heard of.
LOkay, you have my attention. Who is it?
CShovel Dance Collective. Experimental folk, based in London. The review calls it a masterpiece.
LShovel Dance Collective. Sounds like they should be opening for a tractor convention.
CDon't judge by the name. The Guardian's album of the week, five stars. They're playing Queen Elizabeth Hall in February.
LA five-star Guardian review is not nothing. That puts them in the same conversation as, like, very serious British folk royalty.
CAnd the album drops tomorrow. So if you want to be the person who knew them before everyone else, your window is closing.
LI'm not saying I'll listen. I'm saying I'll pretend I already did at the next dinner party.
CDifferent corner of the internet now: someone on Bluesky is very excited about an album release that lands on their birthday.
LMysteriousGoober posted, 'New Album releases on my birthday lets go!!!' With three exclamation points.
CThey didn't say which album. So now I'm sitting here wondering: is it Shovel Dance Collective? Is it something else? What are we celebrating?
LThis is the worst kind of post. Genuine joy, zero information. I need to know what album!
CMaybe that's the point. The mystery is the gift.
LNo, no. You can't just drop 'album on my birthday' and walk away. That's a hostage situation for music fans.
CTo be fair, if it's the Shovel Dance Collective album, MysteriousGoober is getting a genuinely great present.
LAnd I still don't know! This is going to bother me all night.
CLet's go somewhere even more chaotic. There's a post on X right now asking if people are just ignoring that 'all of 'em are monsters.'
LWait, monsters in what? Is this about a band?
CIt's about a game called NU: Carnival. An adult game with a plot that involves... let's just say morally complicated men.
LSo the plot is that everyone's a war criminal, and people are just... vibing?
CThat's what the poster, Vivi, is saying. 'That's the plot, that's what the plot is about.'
LI have so many questions, and I'm not sure I want any of the answers.
CIt's a whole corner of fandom that just lives in beautiful, terrible drama. And they're passionate about it.
LPassionate is one word. There's also a post from someone who's been searching for a feather in the game 'every turn' and needs help making sense of it.
CThis is the duality of fandom: one person's unpacking war crimes, another person's lost in a feather side quest.
LAnd honestly? That last one is me in every video game I've ever touched. I'd be the one drowning in feathers.
CWhen you're forty hours into a game and finally realize the feather was in the first room the whole time.
LDon't even joke. That pain is too real.
CWe'll wrap with a quick update on something we mentioned earlier: that Shovel Dance Collective tour date is February 4th at Queen Elizabeth Hall.
LTickets are through Dice, and if the album's anywhere near as good as the Guardian says, that room's going to be very, very quiet in the best way.
CAnd that's your music world in one segment: five-star folk, a post-punk holy fuck, and a birthday mystery we may never solve.
LI will solve it. Mark my words.