What do you think?
Rate this book
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You is a story of music, obsession, violence, and madness by Scotto Moore
I was home alone on a Saturday night when I experienced the most beautiful piece of music I had ever heard in my life.
Beautiful Remorse is the hot new band on the scene, releasing one track a day for ten days straight. Each track has a mysterious name and a strangely powerful effect on the band's fans.
A curious music blogger decides to investigate the phenomenon up close by following Beautiful Remorse on tour across Texas and Kansas, realizing along the way that the band’s lead singer, is hiding an incredible, impossible secret.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
I was home alone on a Saturday night when I experienced the most beautiful piece of music I had ever heard in my life.
Beautiful Remorse is the hot new band on the scene, releasing one track a day for ten days straight. Each track has a mysterious name and a strangely powerful effect on the band's fans.
A curious music blogger decides to investigate the phenomenon up close by following Beautiful Remorse on tour across Texas and Kansas, realizing along the way that the band’s lead singer, is hiding an incredible, impossible secret.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
128 pages, Kindle Edition
First published July 10, 2016
47 people are currently reading
1683 people want to read
About the author
Scotto Moore
8 books95 followersScotto Moore is the author of BATTLE OF THE LINGUIST MAGES, a science fantasy novel, and YOUR FAVORITE BAND CANNOT SAVE YOU, a sci-fi/horror novella, both published by Tor.com. For fourteen years, he was an active playwright in Seattle, with major productions nearly every year during that time, and 45 short plays produced during that time as well. He wrote book, lyrics, and music for the a cappella sci-fi musical SILHOUETTE, which won the 2018 Gregory Falls Award for Outstanding New Play, presented by Theatre Puget Sound. He also wrote, directed and produced three seasons of the sci-fi/comedy web series THE COFFEE TABLE; and wrote and starred in the horror/comedy play H.P. LOVECRAFT: STAND-UP COMEDIAN!
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 264 reviews
May 5, 2023
ARC provided by the publisher—Tor.com—in exchange for an honest review.
2.5/5 stars
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You would’ve been a better novella if I was the right audience for the genre.
I'll keep this review very brief. If it weren’t due to the fact that I was given an ARC for this book, I honestly wouldn’t have read it. It’s not that the novella sounds bad but more because it’s totally outside of my usual SFF read. In fact, it was so different from my reading preferences that I don’t even know what genre this novella actually belongs to; maybe thriller and supernatural but you might want to take my review for this book with a grain of salt. However, despite me being the wrong audience for the novella, I still had quite a good time with it.
The main character of the novella is a music blogger and the story began when he found out about this new band called Beautiful Remorse that released a new track each day with the result of causing a ridiculously strange, addictive, and powerful effect for any of the listener; the main character then decided to investigate this phenomenon. The novella tells a good story about music, obsession, violence, trance, and madness; Moore did a good job in portraying these themes to the reader with a very fast pacing that I imagine fans of the genre will find a hard time putting it down.
But like I said, this is simply not my kind of book. The characters didn’t feel fleshed out because the book was completely plot-driven for a faster pacing. Plus, despite finishing it pretty quickly, the story didn’t have any lasting impression on me; in the end, I found the overall experience of reading the book to be just okay.
That said, I still would recommend Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You to anyone who’s looking for a short and good thrilling read. It did keep me hooked at times and I envision readers of the genre will have a much better experience with the novella than me.
Official release date: February 5th, 2019
You can order the book HERE!
You can find this and the rest of my reviews at Novel Notions
2.5/5 stars
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You would’ve been a better novella if I was the right audience for the genre.
I'll keep this review very brief. If it weren’t due to the fact that I was given an ARC for this book, I honestly wouldn’t have read it. It’s not that the novella sounds bad but more because it’s totally outside of my usual SFF read. In fact, it was so different from my reading preferences that I don’t even know what genre this novella actually belongs to; maybe thriller and supernatural but you might want to take my review for this book with a grain of salt. However, despite me being the wrong audience for the novella, I still had quite a good time with it.
The main character of the novella is a music blogger and the story began when he found out about this new band called Beautiful Remorse that released a new track each day with the result of causing a ridiculously strange, addictive, and powerful effect for any of the listener; the main character then decided to investigate this phenomenon. The novella tells a good story about music, obsession, violence, trance, and madness; Moore did a good job in portraying these themes to the reader with a very fast pacing that I imagine fans of the genre will find a hard time putting it down.
But like I said, this is simply not my kind of book. The characters didn’t feel fleshed out because the book was completely plot-driven for a faster pacing. Plus, despite finishing it pretty quickly, the story didn’t have any lasting impression on me; in the end, I found the overall experience of reading the book to be just okay.
That said, I still would recommend Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You to anyone who’s looking for a short and good thrilling read. It did keep me hooked at times and I envision readers of the genre will have a much better experience with the novella than me.
Official release date: February 5th, 2019
You can order the book HERE!
You can find this and the rest of my reviews at Novel Notions
March 4, 2019
4 of 5 stars at The BiblioSanctum https://bibliosanctum.com/2019/03/04/...
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You ended up being as quirky and wild as its title suggests, and quite honestly, it’s rare for a book to be this weird but for me to still like it so much. While you could technically classify it as science fiction with a light sprinkling of cosmic horror, at the end of the day, I believe this strange and slightly freaky novella is simply too unique to be pigeonholed into any one category.
I also have a feeling it would work best if the reader knows as little about the plot going in, but I will say that music—especially the passion and critique for it—is the central theme. The story is told from the perspective of a small-time music blogger who one day stumbles across a mysterious track on Bandcamp uploaded by a new artist he’s never heard of before. From the moment the powerful song hit his ears, however, he knew that Beautiful Remorse would be the next big thing. Fronted by its enigmatic singer, Airee MacPherson, the band promises to release a new song every day for the next ten days, much to the delight of its legions of new fans who listened to the first track and couldn’t get enough. There was just something about the song that was so potently addictive and irresistible, almost transcendent.
Before long, our music blogger gives in to curiosity and reaches out to Airee MacPherson, managing to score an interview and a chance to go on tour with Beautiful Remorse. At first, it’s like a dream come true—that is, until he shows up at their first concert and realizes something is seriously wrong with the whole picture. To say that Airee is nothing like he expected is an understatement, but by the time her true intentions are revealed, it is too late for our hapless protagonist to walk away.
Let me just start by saying that the insanity of this book is a feature, and not a bug. As such, it probably won’t be for everyone, but I genuinely enjoyed every moment of the story and it’s one you should check out if you’re looking for something a little different and offbeat. Clocking in at about 120 pages, this novella was also a quick read and well worth the hour or so it took me to read it. Considering how poorly I usually fare when it comes short fiction, or weird books like this for that matter, it surprised me how riveted I was from start to finish.
I’m sure one thing that helped was the main character’s voice. He’s a music nerd, and as such, his attitude was at once endearing and slightly annoying in the way only someone who is a nerd of anything can be. The author certainly captured the nature of fandom and obsession very well, right down to the zealous online communities to the clamor to be first to discover new things and coin new terms. The writing style was so distinctive and full of wit and personality that I could not help but be sucked in right away.
And yes, this was funny. I laughed a lot, though not always for the expected reasons. There were times where we got legitimate moments of chuckle-worthy humor, while at others, I found myself busting a gut at just the sheer absurdity of it all. In any case, you can’t accuse this book of being boring. Bizarre, yes, and even violently dark in places, but there is definitely no room for any downtime or lulls here. Readers are thrown into the thick of it from the get-go, and this fervent energy continues all the way through with no way to predict how anything will play out.
I wish I could say more, but Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You is really one of those books you have to experience for yourself. Needless to say, I had a lot of fun with this one, and if you enjoy fast-paced eccentric stories and don’t mind a slight horror bent with lots of WTFery thrown in, I hope that you will too.
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You ended up being as quirky and wild as its title suggests, and quite honestly, it’s rare for a book to be this weird but for me to still like it so much. While you could technically classify it as science fiction with a light sprinkling of cosmic horror, at the end of the day, I believe this strange and slightly freaky novella is simply too unique to be pigeonholed into any one category.
I also have a feeling it would work best if the reader knows as little about the plot going in, but I will say that music—especially the passion and critique for it—is the central theme. The story is told from the perspective of a small-time music blogger who one day stumbles across a mysterious track on Bandcamp uploaded by a new artist he’s never heard of before. From the moment the powerful song hit his ears, however, he knew that Beautiful Remorse would be the next big thing. Fronted by its enigmatic singer, Airee MacPherson, the band promises to release a new song every day for the next ten days, much to the delight of its legions of new fans who listened to the first track and couldn’t get enough. There was just something about the song that was so potently addictive and irresistible, almost transcendent.
Before long, our music blogger gives in to curiosity and reaches out to Airee MacPherson, managing to score an interview and a chance to go on tour with Beautiful Remorse. At first, it’s like a dream come true—that is, until he shows up at their first concert and realizes something is seriously wrong with the whole picture. To say that Airee is nothing like he expected is an understatement, but by the time her true intentions are revealed, it is too late for our hapless protagonist to walk away.
Let me just start by saying that the insanity of this book is a feature, and not a bug. As such, it probably won’t be for everyone, but I genuinely enjoyed every moment of the story and it’s one you should check out if you’re looking for something a little different and offbeat. Clocking in at about 120 pages, this novella was also a quick read and well worth the hour or so it took me to read it. Considering how poorly I usually fare when it comes short fiction, or weird books like this for that matter, it surprised me how riveted I was from start to finish.
I’m sure one thing that helped was the main character’s voice. He’s a music nerd, and as such, his attitude was at once endearing and slightly annoying in the way only someone who is a nerd of anything can be. The author certainly captured the nature of fandom and obsession very well, right down to the zealous online communities to the clamor to be first to discover new things and coin new terms. The writing style was so distinctive and full of wit and personality that I could not help but be sucked in right away.
And yes, this was funny. I laughed a lot, though not always for the expected reasons. There were times where we got legitimate moments of chuckle-worthy humor, while at others, I found myself busting a gut at just the sheer absurdity of it all. In any case, you can’t accuse this book of being boring. Bizarre, yes, and even violently dark in places, but there is definitely no room for any downtime or lulls here. Readers are thrown into the thick of it from the get-go, and this fervent energy continues all the way through with no way to predict how anything will play out.
I wish I could say more, but Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You is really one of those books you have to experience for yourself. Needless to say, I had a lot of fun with this one, and if you enjoy fast-paced eccentric stories and don’t mind a slight horror bent with lots of WTFery thrown in, I hope that you will too.
April 1, 2023
Weaponized music and world bending shenanigans. I enjoyed it!!
June 23, 2019
Here's the thing about Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You: it is bizarre and creepy and incredibly subversive, which are all amazing things as far as I'm concerned, but there's one small problem. It makes it really difficult to review without spoiling anything. That's not a complaint by any means, but I wanted to be up-front with why this review will be so short and vague.
Given that it's a novella (and an incredibly quick read, even for its length), and that the action starts up pretty fast and never really lets up, the best thing you can do is go into this knowing as little as possible about the events that will unfold.
All I'm going to say is that it was fun, weirdly hilarious at times, a little campy, and I loved it a lot and definitely need to read more from this author in the future.
Thank you so much to Tor.com for providing me with this ARC in exchange for an honest review!
Given that it's a novella (and an incredibly quick read, even for its length), and that the action starts up pretty fast and never really lets up, the best thing you can do is go into this knowing as little as possible about the events that will unfold.
All I'm going to say is that it was fun, weirdly hilarious at times, a little campy, and I loved it a lot and definitely need to read more from this author in the future.
Thank you so much to Tor.com for providing me with this ARC in exchange for an honest review!
May 27, 2021
I have no words that can accurately describe how freaking AMAZING and out of this world this novella was but I’m going to give it a try. I knew it would be good because it’s basically my two favourite things smashed into one, horror and music. But I had no idea just how good it would be and it absolutely blew my mind! It had serious evil Lovecraftian vibes going on and it was insane how good it was. I love the way the music was presented and the role it played, it was so unique and unlike anything I’ve read before. It was dark and gritty and by the end of it I felt like I’d sell my soul for a full length novel or even just s couple pages more!
July 8, 2019
4.25/5stars
Wow. This was the oddest little book I’ve read in a LONG time and I read some WEIRD shit
Wow. This was the oddest little book I’ve read in a LONG time and I read some WEIRD shit
August 19, 2020
Tor.com's novellas often contain little gems of quirky and rather weird speculative fiction. Well, that is right up my alley. Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You has a weird title, so my expectations were high but I was not disappointed.
A mysterious band which is suddenly all over the place, and each new track seems to enthrall its listeners. A music blogger follows the phenomenon. At first, for the likes and the feeling of being part of a discovery, later since there is something much darker going on.
This was a very fast-paced read which dealt with a lot of themes like music and obsession just to name a few. I have mentioned before that I kind of like reading about fake bands, so there's that. I would certainly check out Scotto Moore's next novel.
Find this and other reviews on my blog https://www.urlphantomhive.com
A mysterious band which is suddenly all over the place, and each new track seems to enthrall its listeners. A music blogger follows the phenomenon. At first, for the likes and the feeling of being part of a discovery, later since there is something much darker going on.
This was a very fast-paced read which dealt with a lot of themes like music and obsession just to name a few. I have mentioned before that I kind of like reading about fake bands, so there's that. I would certainly check out Scotto Moore's next novel.
Find this and other reviews on my blog https://www.urlphantomhive.com
September 7, 2020
Starts well, not least because it throws you straight into the action: a music blogger discovers a wildly addictive song by an unknown band and becomes obsessed with their music, which is, unsurprisingly, not exactly natural in origin. At first this concept seems like great fun. The narrator's an annoying little shit, but I can live with that, to an extent. (The tone is very reminiscent of John Dies at the End, which wasn't my bag but clearly works well for lots of people.) What really threw me off, though, was the very slapdash approach to increasingly horrifying events. There's a scene in which a guy knifes himself in the throat on a live video stream and... nobody really reacts? Later, a significant character dies effectively 'off the page', and we only find out about it via one sentence in an email. It felt like the author had lost interest in wrapping up the plot properly. Turns out, the premise is by far the most interesting thing about the story.
TinyLetter | Linktree
TinyLetter | Linktree
October 10, 2018
I listened to this on Soundcloud, where it's available here: https://soundcloud.com/scotto2317/set...
When a music blogger discovers the hottest new track to hit his ears in a while, it's not long before he discovers that there might be more behind the music than just a catchy beat.
This was well-narrated and I enjoyed the story itself as well - the blogger's our narrator, and sometimes makes some terrible decisions, but at every stage he's honest about it and really sounds like a blogger.
This is coming out early next year, and I'll be interested to see where they take this as it transforms into a novella.
When a music blogger discovers the hottest new track to hit his ears in a while, it's not long before he discovers that there might be more behind the music than just a catchy beat.
This was well-narrated and I enjoyed the story itself as well - the blogger's our narrator, and sometimes makes some terrible decisions, but at every stage he's honest about it and really sounds like a blogger.
This is coming out early next year, and I'll be interested to see where they take this as it transforms into a novella.
August 17, 2019
I wasn't expecting that at all. I honestly thought this was just about a guy who is obsessed with this band, but turned out to be so much more than that.
November 22, 2020
weirdest book ive ever read
April 20, 2021
I had that one moment right there where I could have just stepped off the roller coaster. I should have stayed to make sure William was going to be all right. I should have clued in that if these people were planning on running from the police, then the last thing I should do is go with them on the lam. I should have recognized how much antipathy was baked into what they were doing.
But then she said, “Airee’s gonna let you be the first to hear the next track.”
Jesus. Jesus fucking Jesus. I was so entirely owned I couldn’t stand myself, but I got up, threw my shitty hospital coffee in the trash, and followed her out to the van.
This is super fun.
It is not the super fun I signed on for when I picked this out of all the other Tor books I was looking at, because I thought the blogger was more of an investigator and that kind of thing really appeals to me. (Specifically, bloggers investigating shit. Yes I have very niche interests sometimes.) I would have like more actual mysteriousness over bald faced WTF-ness, but that is just me as a reader. (The reliability of our narrator never comes into question in spite of his music before all else aesthetic, which is a rather interesting approach to this whole thing.) My one legitimate small complaint is if you're going to do the full immersion point of view thing where your narrator understandably doesn't relay any personal details, but you ARE going to assign personal details, you need to let me know that "I" am a man ASAP, so that I'm not disappointed when "I" turn out to be a man halfway through the book. But that's a mistake Italo Calvino made too, so Mr. Moore is in good company.
And it really is super fun. The writing is smooth like water and goes down delicious. Funny snark is made. Things are wrecked. Bodies are thrown. Art destroys the world. I am happy. You will be too.
And if you end up thinking, as I did, that you might like more from this author, be happy that Tor has contracted two novels, the first of which is currently titled Battle of the Linguist Mages and will be out in 2022.
(Personal to Pop Sugar: *sticks my tongue out at you* (A book that has the same title as a song)
But then she said, “Airee’s gonna let you be the first to hear the next track.”
Jesus. Jesus fucking Jesus. I was so entirely owned I couldn’t stand myself, but I got up, threw my shitty hospital coffee in the trash, and followed her out to the van.
This is super fun.
It is not the super fun I signed on for when I picked this out of all the other Tor books I was looking at, because I thought the blogger was more of an investigator and that kind of thing really appeals to me. (Specifically, bloggers investigating shit. Yes I have very niche interests sometimes.) I would have like more actual mysteriousness over bald faced WTF-ness, but that is just me as a reader. (The reliability of our narrator never comes into question in spite of his music before all else aesthetic, which is a rather interesting approach to this whole thing.) My one legitimate small complaint is if you're going to do the full immersion point of view thing where your narrator understandably doesn't relay any personal details, but you ARE going to assign personal details, you need to let me know that "I" am a man ASAP, so that I'm not disappointed when "I" turn out to be a man halfway through the book. But that's a mistake Italo Calvino made too, so Mr. Moore is in good company.
And it really is super fun. The writing is smooth like water and goes down delicious. Funny snark is made. Things are wrecked. Bodies are thrown. Art destroys the world. I am happy. You will be too.
And if you end up thinking, as I did, that you might like more from this author, be happy that Tor has contracted two novels, the first of which is currently titled Battle of the Linguist Mages and will be out in 2022.
(Personal to Pop Sugar: *sticks my tongue out at you* (A book that has the same title as a song)
February 28, 2019
Actual rating: 3.5*
The review was originally posted on my blog!
It's been a while since I've finished Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You but I still don't really know what to think about it. The first word that comes to mind is, weird.
At the beginning I was hooked. The story is about a popular music blogger who discovers a new band called Beautiful Remorse and shares their music with the world. Unexpectedly, it seems like everyone who hears it, gets somehow addicted to it no matter what are their preferences in music. The band releases one song a day, and as they get more popular, the blogger decides to seek out the band, asking for an interview from their lead singer, Airee Mcpherson. This meeting, however sets unexpected events into motion, and the blogger finds himself on the road with the band, witnessing things no one would believe. He is unable to leave, fearing someone would take his place and he is not ready to let the music go. Not even when lives are at stake.
At one hand I like the fact that the main character is a blogger, though we only get a small glimpse into his personal life. He has a bunch of other blogger friends he keeps in touch with online, talking about music and sharing the news. I could relate to him, wanting to be the first to post a new song, a new band, to show it to the world. It's a bit similar to the book blogging world, we all want to be first to post a review of a popular upcoming book, and we also have online communities. Imagine you are a book blogger and you get a chance to not only meet, but make an interview with one of the upcoming popular authors. Would you take it? Of course you would, just as this music blogger couldn't miss his chance. Things are going well, until strange things start happening - Beautiful Remorse's music generates a strange energy which affects everyone who hears it, allowing Airee to mentally manipulate them. After a while his goal becomes to learn what exactly is going on, while Airee is on her way to destroy the world.
I liked the writing itself, the prose and the way music was described, but felt like this book would have benefited from being about a 100 pages longer, so we could ease into this blogger's life, get to know him a bit more. Or any other characters, really. I found Airee intriguing if a bit - okay, a lot - crazy, and wanted to learn more about the background of those revelations we get in the last 20% or so of the book. Somewhere about the middle from an intriguing mystery book we are suddenly thrown into a sci-fi-like story with alien monsters without as much as a warning. And it wasn't even the last of the surprises awaiting me.
Overall, Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You is a quick paced read, perfect for a road trip or just a quiet afternoon with a book. If you look for something different, it has a strange mix of music, humor, horror, sci-fi, maybe a tinge of Chtulhu mythos. If you liked We Sould Our Souls, you might like Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You as well.
The review was originally posted on my blog!
It's been a while since I've finished Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You but I still don't really know what to think about it. The first word that comes to mind is, weird.
At the beginning I was hooked. The story is about a popular music blogger who discovers a new band called Beautiful Remorse and shares their music with the world. Unexpectedly, it seems like everyone who hears it, gets somehow addicted to it no matter what are their preferences in music. The band releases one song a day, and as they get more popular, the blogger decides to seek out the band, asking for an interview from their lead singer, Airee Mcpherson. This meeting, however sets unexpected events into motion, and the blogger finds himself on the road with the band, witnessing things no one would believe. He is unable to leave, fearing someone would take his place and he is not ready to let the music go. Not even when lives are at stake.
At one hand I like the fact that the main character is a blogger, though we only get a small glimpse into his personal life. He has a bunch of other blogger friends he keeps in touch with online, talking about music and sharing the news. I could relate to him, wanting to be the first to post a new song, a new band, to show it to the world. It's a bit similar to the book blogging world, we all want to be first to post a review of a popular upcoming book, and we also have online communities. Imagine you are a book blogger and you get a chance to not only meet, but make an interview with one of the upcoming popular authors. Would you take it? Of course you would, just as this music blogger couldn't miss his chance. Things are going well, until strange things start happening - Beautiful Remorse's music generates a strange energy which affects everyone who hears it, allowing Airee to mentally manipulate them. After a while his goal becomes to learn what exactly is going on, while Airee is on her way to destroy the world.
I liked the writing itself, the prose and the way music was described, but felt like this book would have benefited from being about a 100 pages longer, so we could ease into this blogger's life, get to know him a bit more. Or any other characters, really. I found Airee intriguing if a bit - okay, a lot - crazy, and wanted to learn more about the background of those revelations we get in the last 20% or so of the book. Somewhere about the middle from an intriguing mystery book we are suddenly thrown into a sci-fi-like story with alien monsters without as much as a warning. And it wasn't even the last of the surprises awaiting me.
Overall, Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You is a quick paced read, perfect for a road trip or just a quiet afternoon with a book. If you look for something different, it has a strange mix of music, humor, horror, sci-fi, maybe a tinge of Chtulhu mythos. If you liked We Sould Our Souls, you might like Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You as well.
May 24, 2020
Holy whoa! This book is weird, disturbing, and so so good! Scotto Moore created a chilling tale that took a commentary on the transformative power of music and dialed it up to eleven (Spinal Tap reference intended).
This book opens on a music blogger, who has just listened to a song by a previously unheard-of band. His reaction to it is above and beyond what is considered normal, and the blogger becomes obsessed in finding out who this band is- and how they’re able to do the things they do. See, the songs are causing things to happen that shouldn’t be possible. Is it a cult? Magic? Mass hysteria?
One of the (many) things I loved about this book was the no-nonsense language. It wasn’t flowery and the focus was on the bizarre happenings and their cause, the language serving as a conduit to the story. I adore beautiful prose in a book, but in this case the “everyday” language was perfect for the story. It allowed the book to move quickly, and added to the feeling of everything spiraling quickly out of control.
The ending was perfect. I won’t say anything about it, for fear of ruining it, but I smirked. I’m sure it wasn’t a pretty sight. It’s the sort of wrap-up that leaves plenty of room for conjecture. I’ll be revisiting this one in my mind often. It’s a memorable book, and one I’m glad I picked up.
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You has major Chuck Palahniuk vibes. If you’re into that particular brand of weirdness, definitely read this book. You’ll be weirded out, but you won’t be sorry.
*Note: There is suicide, done horror-movie style.
https://wittyandsarcasticbookclub.hom...
This book opens on a music blogger, who has just listened to a song by a previously unheard-of band. His reaction to it is above and beyond what is considered normal, and the blogger becomes obsessed in finding out who this band is- and how they’re able to do the things they do. See, the songs are causing things to happen that shouldn’t be possible. Is it a cult? Magic? Mass hysteria?
One of the (many) things I loved about this book was the no-nonsense language. It wasn’t flowery and the focus was on the bizarre happenings and their cause, the language serving as a conduit to the story. I adore beautiful prose in a book, but in this case the “everyday” language was perfect for the story. It allowed the book to move quickly, and added to the feeling of everything spiraling quickly out of control.
The ending was perfect. I won’t say anything about it, for fear of ruining it, but I smirked. I’m sure it wasn’t a pretty sight. It’s the sort of wrap-up that leaves plenty of room for conjecture. I’ll be revisiting this one in my mind often. It’s a memorable book, and one I’m glad I picked up.
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You has major Chuck Palahniuk vibes. If you’re into that particular brand of weirdness, definitely read this book. You’ll be weirded out, but you won’t be sorry.
*Note: There is suicide, done horror-movie style.
https://wittyandsarcasticbookclub.hom...
April 14, 2020
This book started out promisingly for me: a music blogger finds a new track on Bandcamp by a band that seems to have come out of nowhere. Once he listens to it, it's life-changing: it's the best song he's ever heard, a full-body experience of bliss. And there's going to be 10 more tracks, one released each day...
It's likely that it's best to know as little as possible about this one before going in, but to some extent I found that people saying that made me expect more of a mystery than there actually was. I was hoping for more buildup, more mystery; instead, this book is way more in your face than that. And that's where it kind of lost me: I didn't want it to come straight out and tell me what it was going to be so soon. I felt like the concept of this music was good enough it needed to be strung out for a good long while, teasing the reader.
The places it goes are fun, but it wasn't what I thought I was settling in for, and it felt a bit too... well, like I said: it felt in-your-face. It said the quiet bit out loud. Consequently, it kind of lost me and I didn't buy in for the rest of the ride.
It's likely that it's best to know as little as possible about this one before going in, but to some extent I found that people saying that made me expect more of a mystery than there actually was. I was hoping for more buildup, more mystery; instead, this book is way more in your face than that. And that's where it kind of lost me: I didn't want it to come straight out and tell me what it was going to be so soon. I felt like the concept of this music was good enough it needed to be strung out for a good long while, teasing the reader.
The places it goes are fun, but it wasn't what I thought I was settling in for, and it felt a bit too... well, like I said: it felt in-your-face. It said the quiet bit out loud. Consequently, it kind of lost me and I didn't buy in for the rest of the ride.
July 26, 2022
Sometimes people say "less is more," and I certainly find myself saying that with all these horror novellas I've been devouring this year.
A new band no one's ever heard of before starts putting out a track a day on Bandcamp and it's literally unlike anything anyone has ever heard before. People lose track of time and hours pass by even though the track is only a few minutes long. Actively listening to a track with someone else unlocks a sort of mind-to-mind communication that shouldn't be possible. A music blogger (I don't think he ever gives his name) manages to be the first one to write an article on it, and the lead singer invites him out to a show where they're going to premiere the fourth song.
The premise had me hooked; the ending kind of lost me.
This is the kind of story that, despite being about music, is best told in a written medium because it would be hard to actually compose music that could approximate what the songs in this story were actually accomplishing. The protagonist was logical and didn't make any decisions that left me scratching my head or shouting at the book (one of my personal cardinal sins of horror). And I really liked a sort of almost-cosmic horror story being told in the setting of a rock band on tour; it was definitely a unique take on the genre. The main (and really only) issue I had was when things started being explained I was left with a feeling of, "oh, that's where this is going?" Without spoiling anything, I just wish more would have been left unexplained, but this book was so short that I don't feel like I was robbed of my time or had the rug pulled out from under me.
A new band no one's ever heard of before starts putting out a track a day on Bandcamp and it's literally unlike anything anyone has ever heard before. People lose track of time and hours pass by even though the track is only a few minutes long. Actively listening to a track with someone else unlocks a sort of mind-to-mind communication that shouldn't be possible. A music blogger (I don't think he ever gives his name) manages to be the first one to write an article on it, and the lead singer invites him out to a show where they're going to premiere the fourth song.
The premise had me hooked; the ending kind of lost me.
This is the kind of story that, despite being about music, is best told in a written medium because it would be hard to actually compose music that could approximate what the songs in this story were actually accomplishing. The protagonist was logical and didn't make any decisions that left me scratching my head or shouting at the book (one of my personal cardinal sins of horror). And I really liked a sort of almost-cosmic horror story being told in the setting of a rock band on tour; it was definitely a unique take on the genre. The main (and really only) issue I had was when things started being explained I was left with a feeling of, "oh, that's where this is going?" Without spoiling anything, I just wish more would have been left unexplained, but this book was so short that I don't feel like I was robbed of my time or had the rug pulled out from under me.
December 27, 2019
This is definitely a bizarre novella and I'm sure some people will think the path it took towards the end was a bit too 'out there' but I absolutely loved it. I think anyone who has that one band they were obsessed with in high school where you could listen to that one track on repeat all day will be able to get into this book and relate to it. A very unique read!
April 1, 2019
So I do a weekly radio show.
Every week I spin two hours of bands that most of you have likely never heard of, although it's possible. And with a few years of forced exile, I've been doing this since 1993, an on Sundays here in Cleveland since 2003. And the fact of the matter is, I'd like to think after doing independent radio for twenty-five years and going to literally thousands of shows, I'd like to think I know how things work for small bands out there trying to grow an audience.
Take for example the Canadian band Alvvays (pronounced "Always" and intentionally misspelled so you can find them on the Internet.) They released their self-titled debut in 2014 and played smaller venues, including Cleveland's Beachland Tavern. In 2017, they released their second LP, Antisocialites and played bigger venues (I saw them on that tour at Mr. Smalls in Pittsburgh, which isn't that small.) It took three years for Alvvays to grow their audience where they could go from 100 person venues to 500 person venues, and lead singer/songwriter/guitarist Molly Rankin was not a newcomer to the music industry when she began Alvvays--her late father John was a member of The Rankin Family, who had hits and sold a lot of records in Canada. So when Alvvays came on the scene, Molly and her band knew the amount of work it would take to build that audience and how long it would take, even though their music is some of the catchiest stuff I have ever heard. Remember me, the guy who has been doing radio for a quarter of a century?
Ultimately, this is my problem with Scotto Moore's Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You. The premise of the book is that a band comes out of nowhere posting tracks on Bandcamp (which is a real thing) and anyone who hears it immediately falls under the spell of the music. Thanks to a plucky music blogger and the "dark web" (OH NOES!!!!111) this music runs wild until it is actually able to change the laws of the physical universe and open portals to other dimensions. Here's the problem--I've been doing college radio forever, and for most people, music is a thing in the background that they don't give a shit about. How can Fleetwood Mac tour without mainstay Lindsay Buckingham and still turn a profit? Because people don't care. And when people do care, word of mouth doesn't work as fast as it does in this book. Pitchfork, which is a joke is not mentioned once, and yet I would be willing to argue that for the indie, hipster set, that is where they learn about their music. And so even though this book is fantasy, the stuff that would help ground it into reality just isn't there. The world doesn't work that way.
Personally, I've wanted to take the chance that Scotto Moore does here. Given the years I've spent in the scene, I want to write a novel where a band is the focal point--the problem is, the way music works, it doesn't do well on the printed page and unless you are someone like John Darnielle, you won't be able to write lyrics that are worth a damn for your band to "sing." Moore comes at it from a better direction--he tries to invoke for the reader the sound of that song you just can't ever seem to take off of repeat after the first time you hear it. In that respect he's successful with early descriptions of hearing the tracks that are at the heart of the book. But then he tries to attribute it to magic and brings in some stuff that is better handled in a Charles Stross novel (and Stross does it better), and it just didn't resonate with me.
Pun intended.
Every week I spin two hours of bands that most of you have likely never heard of, although it's possible. And with a few years of forced exile, I've been doing this since 1993, an on Sundays here in Cleveland since 2003. And the fact of the matter is, I'd like to think after doing independent radio for twenty-five years and going to literally thousands of shows, I'd like to think I know how things work for small bands out there trying to grow an audience.
Take for example the Canadian band Alvvays (pronounced "Always" and intentionally misspelled so you can find them on the Internet.) They released their self-titled debut in 2014 and played smaller venues, including Cleveland's Beachland Tavern. In 2017, they released their second LP, Antisocialites and played bigger venues (I saw them on that tour at Mr. Smalls in Pittsburgh, which isn't that small.) It took three years for Alvvays to grow their audience where they could go from 100 person venues to 500 person venues, and lead singer/songwriter/guitarist Molly Rankin was not a newcomer to the music industry when she began Alvvays--her late father John was a member of The Rankin Family, who had hits and sold a lot of records in Canada. So when Alvvays came on the scene, Molly and her band knew the amount of work it would take to build that audience and how long it would take, even though their music is some of the catchiest stuff I have ever heard. Remember me, the guy who has been doing radio for a quarter of a century?
Ultimately, this is my problem with Scotto Moore's Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You. The premise of the book is that a band comes out of nowhere posting tracks on Bandcamp (which is a real thing) and anyone who hears it immediately falls under the spell of the music. Thanks to a plucky music blogger and the "dark web" (OH NOES!!!!111) this music runs wild until it is actually able to change the laws of the physical universe and open portals to other dimensions. Here's the problem--I've been doing college radio forever, and for most people, music is a thing in the background that they don't give a shit about. How can Fleetwood Mac tour without mainstay Lindsay Buckingham and still turn a profit? Because people don't care. And when people do care, word of mouth doesn't work as fast as it does in this book. Pitchfork, which is a joke is not mentioned once, and yet I would be willing to argue that for the indie, hipster set, that is where they learn about their music. And so even though this book is fantasy, the stuff that would help ground it into reality just isn't there. The world doesn't work that way.
Personally, I've wanted to take the chance that Scotto Moore does here. Given the years I've spent in the scene, I want to write a novel where a band is the focal point--the problem is, the way music works, it doesn't do well on the printed page and unless you are someone like John Darnielle, you won't be able to write lyrics that are worth a damn for your band to "sing." Moore comes at it from a better direction--he tries to invoke for the reader the sound of that song you just can't ever seem to take off of repeat after the first time you hear it. In that respect he's successful with early descriptions of hearing the tracks that are at the heart of the book. But then he tries to attribute it to magic and brings in some stuff that is better handled in a Charles Stross novel (and Stross does it better), and it just didn't resonate with me.
Pun intended.
August 4, 2019
It’s happened to all of us. You hear a song and it instantly raises your spirits. Or, you hear a different song and it instantly makes you feel melancholy. Some music makes you want to move, while other music makes you want to relax and be still. Something reminds you of a song and then it is repeatedly playing in your head all day long. Music elicits reactions, whether wanted or unwanted. But what if music were used, intentionally, for questionable purposes? This is the intriguing question explored by Scotto Moore in Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You.
A long-time music blogger realizes that his reactions to a song he has stumbled across are remarkable. He can barely turn the song off, even when he knows that he must. And even then, the memory of the music continues to pull at him. When he searches for the band, called Beautiful Remorse, online he finds they astonishingly have no web-presence. There are no webpages, no Facebook pages, not even on YouTube. The only thing he can find is an entry on Bandcamp, a promotional site for new bands, with little information other than the promise that the band will be releasing a new single the following day.
Calling in some favors from contacts within the music industry, he is told the name of the lead singer, but again, there is little to no information about her available. And then he receives a mysterious email, inviting him to see the band’s first live performance in Austin, Texas. He lives in Portland, Oregon, but makes some last minute travel arrangements to attend the show. But he is not prepared for what happens during or after the concert, nor was he expecting to leave with the band as they make their way to the next venue on their itinerary.
In Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You, music blogger and Seattle playwright Scotto Moore tells a chilling tale where music is being used, and has run amok, the way that science and/or magic are used in other cautionary tales. Instead of secret laboratories and mad scientists, there are bands, music bloggers and the world of music criticism and fandom. Moore provides a window into a world most do not know or rarely think about, describing how intertwined music and social media have become and the networks of online “experts,” those who are “in the know” and always struggling to be the one credited with discovering the next great singer or band. This is a fascinating arena within which to tell the story, and Moore is clearly familiar with it and able to convey its intricacies and extremes. Moore also highlights how focusing your life so intently online can leave one completely unprepared for things happening in the “real” world.
The writing is crisp and the action is, once started, non-stop. The situations Moore describes are frighteningly believable. Music can be a powerful force and historically it has been used, for good or ill, in countless ways. The ideas he posits regarding the contemporary use of ritual music, with contemporary instruments and genres, are fascinating. The result is a quick, but satisfying, read that shifts from laugh out loud funny to more than a bit terrifying as it rushes to an ending that is a bit of a surprise. And it may cause you to pause, for just a moment, before you hit play on a new song by a band with which you are familiar.
Reviewed by Daryl M., Librarian, West Valley Regional Branch Library
A long-time music blogger realizes that his reactions to a song he has stumbled across are remarkable. He can barely turn the song off, even when he knows that he must. And even then, the memory of the music continues to pull at him. When he searches for the band, called Beautiful Remorse, online he finds they astonishingly have no web-presence. There are no webpages, no Facebook pages, not even on YouTube. The only thing he can find is an entry on Bandcamp, a promotional site for new bands, with little information other than the promise that the band will be releasing a new single the following day.
Calling in some favors from contacts within the music industry, he is told the name of the lead singer, but again, there is little to no information about her available. And then he receives a mysterious email, inviting him to see the band’s first live performance in Austin, Texas. He lives in Portland, Oregon, but makes some last minute travel arrangements to attend the show. But he is not prepared for what happens during or after the concert, nor was he expecting to leave with the band as they make their way to the next venue on their itinerary.
In Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You, music blogger and Seattle playwright Scotto Moore tells a chilling tale where music is being used, and has run amok, the way that science and/or magic are used in other cautionary tales. Instead of secret laboratories and mad scientists, there are bands, music bloggers and the world of music criticism and fandom. Moore provides a window into a world most do not know or rarely think about, describing how intertwined music and social media have become and the networks of online “experts,” those who are “in the know” and always struggling to be the one credited with discovering the next great singer or band. This is a fascinating arena within which to tell the story, and Moore is clearly familiar with it and able to convey its intricacies and extremes. Moore also highlights how focusing your life so intently online can leave one completely unprepared for things happening in the “real” world.
The writing is crisp and the action is, once started, non-stop. The situations Moore describes are frighteningly believable. Music can be a powerful force and historically it has been used, for good or ill, in countless ways. The ideas he posits regarding the contemporary use of ritual music, with contemporary instruments and genres, are fascinating. The result is a quick, but satisfying, read that shifts from laugh out loud funny to more than a bit terrifying as it rushes to an ending that is a bit of a surprise. And it may cause you to pause, for just a moment, before you hit play on a new song by a band with which you are familiar.
Reviewed by Daryl M., Librarian, West Valley Regional Branch Library
March 1, 2019
"I was obliterated, really. Just sort of crushed into atoms. And then without warning, something gathered me up in a deep, luscious embrace and reassembled me. I could feel it--I could feel her consoling me, sweeping away the emptiness, signaling the absolute fact of something greater than both of us just out of sight."
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You is a horror/sci-fi novella about a dude that has a music blog called Much Preferred Customers. His musical tastes are eclectic, so when he comes across a weird, yet intoxicating track by a band with no discoverable online presence called Beautiful Remorse, he knows he must get this mp3 out there into the blogosphere. It is unlike anything he has ever heard before. He coins the genre "allurebient," which essentially could be described as seductively trippy. What he soon finds out is that this mysterious band will be dropping a new track daily over the next 10 days. He decides to join them on tour and quickly realizes that something comes over the listeners when they hear the music. As anyone that has fallen in love with a song knows, it hits you in unexplainable ways. No one person hears any one song the same way. It's all so personal.. that experience. How you interpret it. What the impact is on you. But there is something else happening with these tracks that Beautiful Remorse are releasing. Something hypnotic, almost as if the listeners are possessed by a psychic energy during the length of the song.
I'm someone that is always listening to music. While I write, read, shop for groceries, on walks, prepping supper, etc. I was listening to The Bones of a Dying World by the brilliant If These Trees Could Talk while reading this and.. oof. It was the perfect accompaniment, in my opinion!
"The music speaks for itself."
An alien-summoning cult, Lovecraftian monsters coming from the sky, blood sacrifices, psychic viruses, a passion for music.. Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You reminded me of the good bits of Bird Box, as written by China Miéville. It was fucking bonkers and I dug the hell out of it!
Funny, dark, weird. This was just so damn fun!
Scotto Moore has a radical debut on his hands and I look forward to reading whatever he releases next!
(Big thanks to Tor.com Publishing for sending me a copy!)
**The quotes above were taken from an ARC & are subject to change upon publication**
Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You is a horror/sci-fi novella about a dude that has a music blog called Much Preferred Customers. His musical tastes are eclectic, so when he comes across a weird, yet intoxicating track by a band with no discoverable online presence called Beautiful Remorse, he knows he must get this mp3 out there into the blogosphere. It is unlike anything he has ever heard before. He coins the genre "allurebient," which essentially could be described as seductively trippy. What he soon finds out is that this mysterious band will be dropping a new track daily over the next 10 days. He decides to join them on tour and quickly realizes that something comes over the listeners when they hear the music. As anyone that has fallen in love with a song knows, it hits you in unexplainable ways. No one person hears any one song the same way. It's all so personal.. that experience. How you interpret it. What the impact is on you. But there is something else happening with these tracks that Beautiful Remorse are releasing. Something hypnotic, almost as if the listeners are possessed by a psychic energy during the length of the song.
I'm someone that is always listening to music. While I write, read, shop for groceries, on walks, prepping supper, etc. I was listening to The Bones of a Dying World by the brilliant If These Trees Could Talk while reading this and.. oof. It was the perfect accompaniment, in my opinion!
"The music speaks for itself."
An alien-summoning cult, Lovecraftian monsters coming from the sky, blood sacrifices, psychic viruses, a passion for music.. Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You reminded me of the good bits of Bird Box, as written by China Miéville. It was fucking bonkers and I dug the hell out of it!
Funny, dark, weird. This was just so damn fun!
Scotto Moore has a radical debut on his hands and I look forward to reading whatever he releases next!
(Big thanks to Tor.com Publishing for sending me a copy!)
**The quotes above were taken from an ARC & are subject to change upon publication**
April 22, 2018
Beautiful Remorse is your new favorite band. You couldn’t say why if asked. You couldn’t even really say anything about the lyrics. But their music does something for you. To you. It’s like nothing you’ve ever heard, and their singer, Airee MacPherson. She’s fantastic, completely out of this world. Strange things keep happening with each new track they release. Beautiful Remorse is your new favorite band, and your favorite band cannot save you.
Scotto Moore’s Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You: a tale in ten tracks is a quick fun read that’ll pull you along right to the end. The first two thirds of the book is solid genre fiction, but then it gets to a certain point and everything starts to feel kind of rushed. Think of it a little bit like a love letter to the Cthulhu mythos through the lens of modern internet culture.
There are a few bits that needed more attention throughout the book. Without that, the end isn’t a total big lipped alligator moment, but it does still feel under supported. I’d have liked more exposition on Aimee’s plan or the music itself, though the narrator’s limited knowledge goes a ways towards explaining that away.
My other big issue is with the characters. I legitimately cannot remember the narrator’s name or much of anything about him. The same goes for most of the characters that aren’t Airee, they sort of get lost in her or the music and just don’t come up again. I could easily say that this was a purposeful thing and that a big part of the point was a collective nothingness for humanity. It still doesn’t really work for me in the long run though, at the end of the day I’m still very much invested in character over plot.
More than anything, Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You reminds me of a B movie. Despite its faults, the story is aggressively readable and fast paced. It’s eyes off the action to build tension, which works well in a lot of ways. This is a book that could have been a lot better with a little work, but it doesn’t need it to be a fun book. If that makes sense at all. It’s fun, it’s fast, and at the end of the day I still really enjoyed it.
So, where does that leave us? While Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You has some issues, I still had a ton of fun with it. So, from me at least, it gets a four out of five.
Scotto Moore’s Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You: a tale in ten tracks is a quick fun read that’ll pull you along right to the end. The first two thirds of the book is solid genre fiction, but then it gets to a certain point and everything starts to feel kind of rushed. Think of it a little bit like a love letter to the Cthulhu mythos through the lens of modern internet culture.
There are a few bits that needed more attention throughout the book. Without that, the end isn’t a total big lipped alligator moment, but it does still feel under supported. I’d have liked more exposition on Aimee’s plan or the music itself, though the narrator’s limited knowledge goes a ways towards explaining that away.
My other big issue is with the characters. I legitimately cannot remember the narrator’s name or much of anything about him. The same goes for most of the characters that aren’t Airee, they sort of get lost in her or the music and just don’t come up again. I could easily say that this was a purposeful thing and that a big part of the point was a collective nothingness for humanity. It still doesn’t really work for me in the long run though, at the end of the day I’m still very much invested in character over plot.
More than anything, Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You reminds me of a B movie. Despite its faults, the story is aggressively readable and fast paced. It’s eyes off the action to build tension, which works well in a lot of ways. This is a book that could have been a lot better with a little work, but it doesn’t need it to be a fun book. If that makes sense at all. It’s fun, it’s fast, and at the end of the day I still really enjoyed it.
So, where does that leave us? While Your Favorite Band Cannot Save You has some issues, I still had a ton of fun with it. So, from me at least, it gets a four out of five.
March 4, 2019
Dont really know what to classify this as genre wise. Suspense, thriller and scifi maybe? Its really plot driven which is what most novellas are due to their size. I liked the initial setup but it didnt really have the most exciting payoff.
March 8, 2021
Not my thing, unfortunately. It started off okay, with a music blogger discovering a track by a new band and being mesmerized by it. He becomes more involved with the band and things get weird
July 16, 2020
Holy shit! What was that??? 🤯😵
Have you ever imagined what would happen if a psychopathic criminal genius from the future started a band and released music that was as addictive as fentanyl and mind-fucked you into killing people or killing yourself? And, if that wasn’t enough, that future “humans” would use present day earth as a prison for the most psychotic, dangerous criminals of the future, forcing unsuspecting humans to host the minds of these demons? No? You never imagined that? Well good! Because this author has done it for you and WHOA, what a trip!
The writing is shit but DAMN, I didn’t care by the time I got to page 10. I really kinda loved this horror/sci-fi mashup!
Have you ever imagined what would happen if a psychopathic criminal genius from the future started a band and released music that was as addictive as fentanyl and mind-fucked you into killing people or killing yourself? And, if that wasn’t enough, that future “humans” would use present day earth as a prison for the most psychotic, dangerous criminals of the future, forcing unsuspecting humans to host the minds of these demons? No? You never imagined that? Well good! Because this author has done it for you and WHOA, what a trip!
The writing is shit but DAMN, I didn’t care by the time I got to page 10. I really kinda loved this horror/sci-fi mashup!
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 17, 2022
This is an incredibly short and easy read. It reads a lot like a campy horror movie. The idea and intentions are great but the execution was a little flat for me. I think it has less to do with poor writing and more to do with my personal preferences.
I just found the main character to be so wishy washy and it was a lot of information to try to cram into a short story. But I loved the idea of the book very much. Somehow I think this would be an even better comic, as it’s so visual.
I just found the main character to be so wishy washy and it was a lot of information to try to cram into a short story. But I loved the idea of the book very much. Somehow I think this would be an even better comic, as it’s so visual.
June 4, 2019
4/6/19
Overall, I'd say that this story has potential, but not enough pages. The premise is pretty cool: a mysterious band pops up, saying they will release one track a day for ten days. Every is infatuated when the first song comes out, but things slowly take a darker turn. I really liked the eerie feel this story had, but as the story went on, I realised that there was just too much going on for the length of the story. Extradimensional beings, psychic powers, heads exploding, people dying, and I would have loved for the pacing to be a bit slower. I couldn't connect to any of the characters because you really don't get to know any of them that well, so I wasn't really invested in the story.
SPOILERS AHEAD:
Towards the end, the main character gets caught by Maxster, the person who instigated everything and it felt so cheap. He got drugged by drinking wine with barbiturates. You are trying to survive the world going crazy and then you go and drink wine with the person who started it? It was rather nonsensical, and what made it worse is was how the main character survived this entire ordeal. Maxster is trying to turn him into a host by playing occultist music, and he is surprised to see that it's not working on him. The reason was that he was wearing earplugs, and when I read that, I was just like BRUH. This whole hostage situation almost sent this review to two stars, but I'm keeping it at three because of the premise/idea as well as the story overall - the writing was alright and I was able to read this with ease.
18/5/19
A sincere thank you to tor.com for sending over this book!!
You can find me on
Youtube | Instagram | Twitter | Tumblr | Website
Overall, I'd say that this story has potential, but not enough pages. The premise is pretty cool: a mysterious band pops up, saying they will release one track a day for ten days. Every is infatuated when the first song comes out, but things slowly take a darker turn. I really liked the eerie feel this story had, but as the story went on, I realised that there was just too much going on for the length of the story. Extradimensional beings, psychic powers, heads exploding, people dying, and I would have loved for the pacing to be a bit slower. I couldn't connect to any of the characters because you really don't get to know any of them that well, so I wasn't really invested in the story.
SPOILERS AHEAD:
Towards the end, the main character gets caught by Maxster, the person who instigated everything and it felt so cheap. He got drugged by drinking wine with barbiturates. You are trying to survive the world going crazy and then you go and drink wine with the person who started it? It was rather nonsensical, and what made it worse is was how the main character survived this entire ordeal. Maxster is trying to turn him into a host by playing occultist music, and he is surprised to see that it's not working on him. The reason was that he was wearing earplugs, and when I read that, I was just like BRUH. This whole hostage situation almost sent this review to two stars, but I'm keeping it at three because of the premise/idea as well as the story overall - the writing was alright and I was able to read this with ease.
18/5/19
A sincere thank you to tor.com for sending over this book!!
You can find me on
Youtube | Instagram | Twitter | Tumblr | Website
August 29, 2021
Actual rating: 4.5 stars
This novella does for music what House of Leaves does for documentaries and houses - it twists it on its head into some weird, Lovecraftian-adjacent unknowable madness.
And I loved every goddamn page of it.
Turn this boy into a movie ASAP.
This novella does for music what House of Leaves does for documentaries and houses - it twists it on its head into some weird, Lovecraftian-adjacent unknowable madness.
And I loved every goddamn page of it.
Turn this boy into a movie ASAP.
June 5, 2023
Went in completely blind and was definitely pleased and surprised. A quick read that was quite well done. It is reminiscent of "Color Out of Space" by H.P. Lovecraft but music based. Excellent way to kick off summer reading!
February 20, 2019
A delightfully fun romp that any music nerd will enjoy the heck out of. I'd say more but the way the story unfolds is so unique I think I would detract from the reader's joy by even discussing the structure. I listened to the audiobook version, read in the author's voice, and found the narration to be excellent. It's a short read/listen (the audiobook is just over two hours), with a lot of surprises packed into that time.
June 15, 2019
Great modern day tale of music
Awhile ago I read Jacob Slichters So You Want to be a Rock Star - his long road with Semisonic to a 90s hit with Closing Time.
That was the 90s. Thus tale is about music now.
The main character is a music blogger, and he finds a great track on Band camp. Uploads it and boom - everyone is listening to it, and bad things start happening.
I won't tell you what happens next, but for now know that this is a great tale.
Awhile ago I read Jacob Slichters So You Want to be a Rock Star - his long road with Semisonic to a 90s hit with Closing Time.
That was the 90s. Thus tale is about music now.
The main character is a music blogger, and he finds a great track on Band camp. Uploads it and boom - everyone is listening to it, and bad things start happening.
I won't tell you what happens next, but for now know that this is a great tale.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 264 reviews