tsunami brain: A Love Letter to The Front Bottoms

 You've probably heard of stream of consciousness before. Well, I'm more of a tsunami of consciousness kind of person. Sometimes, there's so many things zooming through my head in unadulterated chaos, but then some days, I feel like I'm just floating about, suspended in the middle of the ocean with the debris that my tsunami brain's accumulated over time.

That's the fancy way to say I'm kind of a mess. In layman's terms, I'm like a The Front Bottoms song.

I just found out - like literally just today - that "front bottoms" is a euphemism for vagina, and honestly? That's such a The Front Bottoms thing to do. They're... they're literally called The Pussies. Love it.

So I guess they're absurd. That's what they sound like. They're some kind of folk, some kind of drunk, some kind of weed-induced punk-esque poetry book slash diary - or they're just absurd. They're not really trying to be reasonable with any known genre, they're just humans playing music. And that makes them uniquely endearing.

To be honest, I don't think The Front Bottoms knows what they're doing (look at them!). I'm sure they have some kind of manager who plots their schedules and whatnot, but as far as music-making is concerned, I'm pretty sure they just go with whatever. I'm pretty sure they're just stream-of-consciousness-ing this. And that's why I love them so much.

It took me a while to admit to myself that I'm kind of obsessed with control. I mean, how was I even able to deny that when I had some kind of game plan for every future career option I had since I was in kindergarten! And I still do! I can't quit it! I'm like a control junkie! My fetish is to constantly build myself up for disappointment!

When I was a teenager, (said the 19-year-old girl) I used to throw these huge tantrums when things didn't go my way like a total baby, you know? I think I still do just in a less outwardly destructive way and more of like, inward destruction this time.

But imagine trying to control a tsunami. That can't ever end well.

Apparently, the only way to react to a tsunami is to let it happen. You run, it'll catch up to you. You hold it off, you'll get destroyed along. Just let it flow. Just let it flow.

 A Front Bottoms song usually starts some way, like about beers at a party, and then it's about this guy taking steroids to impress a girl, and then when it's over it's suddenly about someone looking into a girl's room from his own house. It's stream of consciousness. Their songs are often like montages, and that's usually how I remember real life myself. Heck, that's usually how I live real life. Even in present tense, I'm in montages. I'm doing this, then I'm doing that, then I'm thinking this, and I'm dreaming this. I'm taking time in linear, but I exist in medias res.

I listen to The Front Bottoms when I'm happy, and I listen to The Front Bottoms when I'm sad, when I'm frustrated, when I'm disappointed, and so on and so forth. They're just like that one friend you can always vent to. These days, I'm usually self-conscious about talking too much and hogging all the air time in conversations and making people uncomfortable, but The Front Bottoms don't care about that. We just like to vent to each other, tsunami to tsunami.

Their latest release is an EP called "Ann", and it's named after one of the band members' grandmother. It's the second in a series of 'grandmother EPs' where they re-mix their really old songs now that they've got all these studio equipment to play with. The first one in the series, "Rose" was the first album I ever heard from these guys.

I've made a spotify playlist just for this article with The Front Bottoms songs from across albums. These songs feel different from the other because these guys like to play around with genres a lot. You'll get used to it. I hope you'll like it! I hope you'll enjoy The Front Bottoms' company as much as I do. If you're weird, you probably will.



And here's the commentary you never asked for:

1. Maps - Brian Sella, the singer of the band (or as he says, the hair of the band), said about this song: "It’s about the idea of not knowing what’s next. Accepting the fact that your life won’t be as comfortable as everyone makes it out to be when you’re younger.  It’s about finding out life is a longer road than you had expected." That's peak emo, right? I dig that shit. My favorite line in the song is "But you are an artist, and your mind don't work the way you want it to"
2. Jim Bogart - This is my favorite song from th Rose EP. Since I found it, this song has been with me through every dumb boy I'd ever fallen madly in love for. "I would sleep better on your floor than I would ever in my bed," like shit. I fall in love like that. This song gets me.
3. Everyone But You - "I doesn't get worse, it doesn't get better. You just get old, it lasts forever," Brian Sella sings in a happy rhythm. That's how I feel about my brain a lot. It's very comforting to hear it from another person. But anyway this song is about falling in love in the midst of a fucked up mental state, and when I'm really low and my brain's just short circuiting, it's how I feel about my boyfriend - "I hate everyone but you."
4. Rhode Island - My favorite The Front Bottoms quote is here! "You have to promise not to break no matter how far you are bent." Two years ago, after a bad mental crash, I wanted it tattooed on my back but chickened out because people say you always regret the words you tattoo in your body. But it's been two years and I still want it on my back. Take that, bitches.
5. Bathtub - I had a huge bender in freshman year and I found myself listening to this a lot. My phone really just went for this everytime I put on shuffle. Favorite line: "Still I scrub and scrub til my body bleeds, convince myself I am coming clean"
6. The Plan (Fuck Jobs) - This is just massively relatable. I love how The Front Bottoms managed to pull out that's been at the back of my brain for a while now - "I fuckin' hate the comments / Why do you feel you have to talk / Nobody asked for your opinion / Your sick sad way of jerkin' off / Every one you think you're better than / What the fuck I'm guilty too / Half the time that I'm complaining / I'm just talking shit on you (I'm sorry)
7. Peach - Brian Sella wrote this for his girlfriend and it's one of the cutest and honest songs I have ever heard. Before I met my boyfriend, I used to daydream about having something like what the song sounds like, and I think I got it down so far, yup.
8. Flying Model Rockets - I was hanging out with my friend Gabriel once and I was singing this song. "You are water twelve feet deep, and I am boots made of concrete" and Gabe turned to me, immensely fascinated and said, "What's that? Did you write that?" That's how I know this song is amazing. Gabriel liked it. He's got a very top-tier taste in things.
9. Today Is Not Real - Everytime The Front Bottoms release an album, I always end up looping something that was the most relatable to me. This was it for Ann. It gets me, man. I have bad days, like really bad days, but "Just leave me alone, there is nothing I need. I'll feel better." I will. I have so far.
10. West Virginia - This is very nostalgic, and now that I've got someone to miss all the way over at New Jersey, I connect to this song more than I ever had.
11. Vacation Town - My boyfriend and I like to sing this to each other because it's literally what the relationship is like. "That comfortable place where you write and read, watch TV, or deeply breath." Actually, my boyfriend's listed in my contacts as "Vacation Town"!
12. Tie Dye Dragon - This is just a bop. It's classic The Front Bottoms lyrics. "I'm just a tie dye dragon." What? But I get it. I don't know what the means, but I get it. I'm a tie dye dragon, too! "Everything's confusing... everything's confusing... everything's confusing..." Same.

An Actual Front Bottom,
Des