I was so transfixed by the Bittersweets' "Hurtin' Kind" (1967) that I sat in the car in front of my house listening until it was done. The 1965 original is solid, stoner-flavored garage rock with its keyboard stomp and harmonica wail, but the all-female cover has that guitar line like a Shepard tone, the ghostly descant in the vocals, the singer's voice falling off at the end of every verse: it sounds like an out-of-body experience of heartbreak. The outro comes on like a prelude to Patti Smith.

If I had a nickel for every time I heard two songs about mental unwellness within the same couple of hours, actually I'd be swimming in nickels, but I appreciated the contrast of the slow-rolling dread-flashover of Doechii's "Anxiety" (2025) with Marmozets' "Major System Error" (2017) just crashing in at gale force panic attack. Hat-tip to rushthatspeaks for the former. I must say that I am missing my extinct music blogs much less now that I spend so much time in the car with college radio on.

"Who'll Stand with Us?" (2025) is the most Billy Bragg-like song I have heard from the Dropkick Murphys and a little horrifically timely.

Non-musically, I think I might explode. The curse tablets are not cutting it.