As far as these concert-less times go, Brendan Murphy is having a pretty busy year. His long-running melodic hardcore/metalcore band Counterparts put out a new single with two previously unreleased songs from the sessions for 2019's Nothing Left To Love (Pure Noise), and his newer band END released their first full-length LP, Splinters From An Ever-Changing Face (Closed Casket Activities), earlier this summer.
With no real end to the pandemic in sight, we caught up with Brendan to ask him what music he's been listening to lately, and he made us a playlist called "Rockin' Around The Quarantine" that includes The 1975, Caroline Polachek, Phoebe Bridgers, Fall Out Boy, Killswitch Engage, Rival Schools, Hum, Higher Power, Poison The Well, Chamber, New Radicals, and more. "I feel like my therapist might be able to explain this a bit better than I can lmaoooo," the playlist description reads.
Here's more of what Brendan tells us about it:
Damn, what a fun year we're having. I've barely left the house since March... and even if I have it's been out of necessity and not for an extended period of time. It's very out of the ordinary for me, but I want to believe I'm adjusting. I've been touring full time since I graduated high school in 2009, so it's been rare that I've had more than a month of time off. Quarantine has pretty much been a vacation against my will. However, I have a love-hate relationship with the time at home. I think for the first time in my 29 years I've developed at least SOME kind of routine, which is nice. It's weird, I feel like a lot of my friends have taken this time to explore new things whereas I've kind of nestled into what I find familiar. I feel like with the anxiety looming over my head, it feels nice to rely on things that I know I for sure enjoy. This goes for TV, movies, music, etc... as I'm sure you can gather from my playlist. Not much new music in there eh? I haven't deviated too much from the handful of bands I've already enjoyed for years. Maybe it's because I feel safe with what I know... and if I don't explore I can't be disappointed?
Regardless, I hope you enjoy this playlist. I'm hoping I can one day go back to being THAT kid that spends every day searching for new music. I used to download anything that was posted on It-Leaked and give it all an honest try. I miss that. I'm not sure if it comes from knocking on the door of 30 years old, or if the current state of things has drawn every bit of excitement out of me like a mosquito that's the size of the Undertaker. I'm rambling now, but I hope everyone reading this is doing as well if not better than I am. The one thing keeping me going is that for some reason, people seem to care. Whether it be about me personally, my band, my stupid twitter, or whatever. I appreciate it all.
Listen to Brendan's playlist here:
And stream the new END album and Counterparts single:
