Pop Shield: Perspectives On Music Past And Present

The success of Beyonce's new live album and concert film, Homecoming, raises a ton of interesting questions about the future of live albums in the age of streaming, poptimism, and on-demand video. We discuss!

We celebrate the 10th anniversary of a bunch of a great music by counting down our top 5 albums of 2009 and discussing the musical trends that dominated the year.

After Scott Walker passed away, Dan was shocked to learn that Gabe and Darin had never listened to him before. He assigned us one early album (Scott 2) and one late (Tilt) to teach us about Walker's incredible career arc and covert us into fans.

The 20th anniversary of The Olivia Tremor Control's Black Foliage unexpectedly inspired numerous retrospective reviews and discussions. We revisit the record ourselves and try to figure out what makes it such an enduring classic.

It's the 50th anniversary of Jim Morrison's legendary meltdown in Miami, so we mark the occasion by revisiting and ranking every studio album by The Doors. Do they still hold up? Or are The Doors just pretentious dad rock? The guys find out!

Thanks to the streaming era, it seems like albums are either getting really short or really long. Is this an actual trend? Why is it happening? Is it a good thing or a bad thing? The guys get to the bottom of it!

What if instead of releasing so many frustrating albums over the past 23 years, Weezer dropped their 3rd LP today, consisting only of their very best post-Pinkerton songs? Would it be another classic? The guys try to find out!

It's the 10th anniversary of Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion, one of the most acclaimed records in recent memory, but somehow its legacy now seems in serious doubt. Is the backlash justified?

Is it poptimism? Good old fashioned selling out? Something's wrong with Pitchfork, the defining music publication of the last two decades, and the guys are determined to figure out what.