Hot Fuss by The Killers
I had a strict routine in eighth grade. Every day, when I got home from school, I would listen to this album, and if I had Spotify at that point, I can only imagine how imbalanced my Wrapped would’ve been. The first few times I heard “Mr. Brightside” on the radio, my parents changed the channel until they noticed how much I liked that song. I quickly decided it was my new favorite song, and it only took a few listens before Hot Fuss was ingrained into the fabric of my life. I celebrated its 15th birthday (June 7th) and forced my friends to listen to it 15 times in commemoration. When I got an iPod, it was the first (and only) album I bought. One Christmas, three separate people bought me The Killers t-shirts.
The Killers was my first concert, and I listened to Hot Fuss the entire plane ride down to Florida. I was one of the youngest people there yet no less eager, and I remember how strangers, who had paid money out of their own pockets, parted the way to let me inch toward the front. I can still remember the sight of Brandon Flowers on the Jumbotron and feeling like he was singing just for me, despite the thousands of people bumping into me. And any time they played a song from Hot Fuss, including the famous “Mr. Brightside,” the whole crowd lit up, voices merging into one. I filmed nearly every song, absolutely demolishing my phone’s storage, yet I have not listened back to any of them, perhaps content to let that memory just live in the mind.
Favorites: “On Top,” “Jenny Was a Friend of Mine,” “Change Your Mind," and “Mr. Brightside” (of course).
1981 EP and RAZZMATAZZ by I DONT KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME
My obsession with iDKHOW neatly aligned with my fascination with The Killers. Every day after I finished listening to Hot Fuss, I would queue the 1981 EP next, and at the festival where I saw The Killers, I was fortunate enough to see iDKHOW the very next day. It was a much smaller crowd, and my mother stayed toward the back, taking the chance to sit. Later, she did tell me that she didn’t “mind” the music, which I’ll take as a compliment. Dallon Weekes exuded such undeniable stage presence that I was swept completely under, and I immediately bought a shirt when I saw one at the merch stand.
I first found iDKHOW through the music video for “Do It All the Time,” a track that felt similar to the 80s music I had grown up on, yet still fresh and compelling, with a unique, retro aesthetic. When I first started listening to them, they only had 6 full songs available online, and I knew all of them by heart. Their debut album, RAZZMATAZZ, dropped in 2020, and I stayed up past midnight to listen and held a listening party with my friends the next day. The lead single, “Leave Me Alone,” was my top song that year, and though it was released in August and Spotify Wrapped stops tracking in November, I accumulated 77 listens and yet have no idea how many times I must have watched the music video. Though my obsession has faded a bit over time, both of these projects are still very meaningful to me (and their newest album, Gloom Division, also has a lot of excellent tracks). And Dallon Weekes’ magnetism has not faded either. His confidence and flamboyance and the way he performs, both for the audience and for himself, are admirable, a model for the way I want to move through the world.
Favorites (1981 EP): “Social Climb,” “Do It All the Time”
Favorites (Razzmatazz): “Clusterhug,” “Kiss Goodnight,” “Mad IQs”
Flamboyant by Dorian Electra
When I saw the video for “Man to Man” for the first time, I felt something shift inside myself. Perhaps it was the opening lyric—“You know I ain't straight/But I'ma say it straight to you”—or their pencil mustache, or the trans tape proudly displayed on their chest, but I was hooked. It was a different sound than I was used to—more electronic, more chaotic, more queer—but the album felt like a revelation. To me, each video is a work of art, dissecting both the wonders and horrors of masculinity through a queer, trans lens. And in every video, on every song, they were so unabashedly themselves, so unafraid to be weird or off-putting or to push boundaries, that I could not help but be in awe.
They were so unabashedly themselves, so unafraid to be weird or off-putting or to push boundaries, that I could not help but be in awe.
I saw them live during my first year of college and even spent money on the meet and greet, yet when I found myself at their side, I was too starstruck to say a word. I could not say anything about how they had impacted me, how their music had sharpened my view of myself, how deeply their words resonated. I could only laugh nervously, my smile too wide, too revealing of everything that I felt and could not say. Like at The Killers concert, I filmed nearly everything, but each video is corrupted by my horrendous singing, which was more like screaming at most points. A few times, I swear they looked right at me as I stood against the barricade, and in that room, surrounded by other queer and trans people, I knew many of them felt just as seen as I did.
Favorites: “Flamboyant,” “Man to Man,” “Career Boy,” “fReAky 4 Life”
The New Abnormal by The Strokes
The Strokes’ debut album, Is This It, has gone down as one of the most beloved albums of the early 2000s and of garage rock, yet my favorite project from The Strokes is their newest one (though I eagerly await their next one). The New Abnormal had the unfortunate privilege of coming out in April of 2020, and though it was recorded before COVID, both its title and its contents felt so timely. I listened to The New Abnormal when I walked my dog, practically the only times I left the solitude of my room. At times, the album is energetic and vibrant, and at times, pensive and slow, and every song feels essential to the whole. The beginning of my favorite song on the album, “Ode to the Mets,” is still a spiritual experience to this day, particularly when the guitar kicks in, and every time I listen to it, I imagine a scene from the music video where the camera slowly pans past photographs on the walls of a flooded room. That song, and in a way the entire album, is a wave of grief and nostalgia, a eulogy for something lost, whether a relationship or perhaps a “normal” world. Every accompanying visual for this album, whether the videos or the cover by Jean-Michel Basquiat, feels so fitting, a mix of the beautiful and the chaotic, the modern and the old. Julian Casablancas sings higher than I ever could on the wonderful album opener “The Adults are Talking,” and when I think of the album, I feel like I’m soaring alongside him, looking down at myself walking through 2020, with my dog at my side and a new world ahead.
That song ["Ode to the Mets"] and in a way the entire album, is a wave of grief and nostalgia, a eulogy for something lost, whether a relationship or perhaps a "normal" world.
Favorites: “Ode to the Mets,” “The Adults Are Talking,” “Why Are Sundays so Depressing,” “Eternal Summer,” “At the Door”
The Provocateur by ADÉLA
I (almost) know the Gnarly dance from memory after seeing it so much and am quite familiar with KATSEYE, but my favorite thing to come out of Dream Academy and one of my favorite artists of 2025 is ADÉLA. Every song on this EP is a banger, and she can dance like no one else (please go watch the video for “Superscar” right now), and yet underneath the club beats, there is something deeper. On “DeathByDevotion,” ADÉLA discusses her all-consuming passion (or obsession?) for dance, something I think any creative person can relate to, and the video is a haunting watch, each move infused with so much care and pain. On “MachineGirl” and “Superscar,” she discusses the reality TV world and music industry, and throughout the EP, ADÉLA fights back against the larger culture that pits women against each other, whether inside or outside the entertainment industry. It is a tight 20 minutes of sheer electronic energy, worth both dancing to and dissecting.
Favorites: “SexOnTheBeat,” “Superscar,” “Homewrecked,” “DeathByDevotion”
NO NOW by Clarence Clarity
Clarence Clarity has made a meteoric rise to become my #2 artist of all time, gaining almost 1,000 listens in just the first two months of 2026. He is just behind Dorian Electra, whom Clarence Clarity frequently produces for. Clarence Clarity may be best known as someone who works behind the scenes, as he has produced the majority of Rina Sawayama’s work (another artist I highly recommend), but his 2015 album NO NOW is an experience, one meant to be listened to in its entirety. I had heard “Alive in the Septic Tank” back in high school, and its oddness, particularly the gibberish at the beginning, was a little off-putting at first until I allowed myself to be fully drawn in. I sought out a few of his other songs from there, but it took me years to get around to listening to any of his albums in full. NO NOW benefits from a repeat listen, as you are able to notice how the main musical motif of “CancerTM in the Water” appears throughout the album and how the closing song, “Now I Am,” transitions into the album opener, “Become Death,” to create a perfect loop. The lyrics are absurdist and often hard to decipher, both when you’re listening to and reading them, and many of the sonic elements are just as odd—but to me, this is a deeply textured listen, and it is so rewarding to peel back the layers. Within is a treatise on religion, sexuality, and one’s place in the modern and online world, an album that feels just as simultaneously unique and familiar as it must have over a decade ago.
The lyrics are absurdist and often hard to decipher, both when you're listening to and reading them, and many of the sonic elements are just as odd—but to me, this is a deeply textured listen, and it is so rewarding to peel back the layers.
Favorites: “Will to Believe,” “Those Who Can’t, Cheat,” “Off My Grid,” “CancerTM in the Water,” “Bloodbarf,” “Meadow Hopping, Traffic Stopping, Death Splash”
