My new song Myself Almost has been out for over a week and people seem to like it? Here’s the lyric video. Thanks for the streams and views and comments, they make a huge difference. The song’s received enough streams to make it into Spotify’s Discover Weekly playlist so hopefully it’ll have some legs — all hail the merciful algorithm.

After a long stretch of rehearsals, we tracked the drums to the new album recording 13 songs over a weekend, whoo-eee. It went pretty well, I think we got good stuff. I’m working on getting them comped and edited so we can move on to tracking the rest. I’ll post some progress clips on the Patreon soon.

Stream shows

I’ve got TEN cover songs to deliver from the album crowdfunding so Ben and I are gonna try working on them live on stream tomorrow at 1pm EST, not sure how that’ll go but feel free to pop by. Next full concert stream will be April 25th.

Stuff I’ve liked

Some things I’ve been into this month:

• Slaughterhouse-Five: The Graphic Novel is an excellent adaptation of the Kurt Vonnegut classic.

• Edward Gorey illustrated a lot of the books by John Bellairs that I loved as a kid but I didn’t know much about him until I read The World of Edward Gorey. (He was also quite the dresser.)

• Ghanaian Fantasy Coffin Maker Paa Joe makes amazing coffins. He has the KISS Kasket beat for sure.

• I dove into the world of fan-made fantasy Nirvana albums — they’re like demo and rarity mixtapes with a helping of AI to modernize the production. AI stem separation is getting scary good and I’m fighting the urge to make my own “lost” Nirvana album.

• ‘Twas the season for me to be re-obsessed with Drew Sarich’s performance of Gethsemane (I Only Want to Say) from Jesus Christ Superstar. I’ve watched every performance by everyone on Youtube and this one’s the best. (Skip to 2:08 for the best part.)

That’s all, thanks everybody!

Brad
Official Website (Vinyl, Shirts & News)
Official Patreon (20+ Unreleased Songs)
Brad Sucks Mailing List (Monthly Updates)
Social: Instagram, Facebook, Threads, Bluesky, Discord

Myself Almost — my new single — is available today everywhere you get your fine organic hand-made artisanal music streams… It’s a vibey indie electronic song about relationships and technology, disconnection despite constant connection. I am typing this into my phone instead of talking to my friends. Hope you like the song. Here’s the lyric video:

Thanks for listening. Also stream show tonight on YouTube 8pm EST/5pm PST.

Putting in work in the basement (Photo by Steve Pelehos)

Well well, we wrapped album rehearsals last Thursday and are headed into drum recording sessions this weekend. About a month behind schedule 😅 but I’m hopeful that won’t mean any changes in the release schedule. 

It’s always tough (for me, anyway) to commit to final versions of songs but it’s been good to take the time to really work on them. They’ve all locked in and stopped changing much so I’m working on reaching the acceptance phase here. The songs sound good in the basement, so I feel like as long as I can get a recording in that ballpark we should be in good shape. This is new territory for me recording-wise so wish me luck.

I call this look: “dead inside due to finishing album” (Photo by Steve Pelehos)

After the drums are recorded, I’ll be getting all the songs into shape and then it’ll be time to track bass, guitars, keys and of course, least enjoyably — my vocals. I’m still tinkering with the words on a bunch of songs even though I’m sure I’m lost in the OCD weeds here.

Also, tangentially related: we’ve got our monthly stream show tomorrow and two weeks after that (April 4th) Ben and I are gonna try live-streaming working on the cover songs we owe everyone from the crowdfunder (10 in total! that’s a whole other album!!) so feel free to come watch us work on songs by Nirvana, Commodores, They Might be Giants, Janet Jackson and many, many, many, many many more.

Also ALSO: I’d be a bad indie musician if I didn’t mention that I have a new song out on all streaming services tomorrow called Myself Almost. It’s about relationships and technology. Give it a listen?

Thank you thank you.

I’ve got a new single streaming on Thursday: Myself Almost. It’s a mostly-electronic song about technology and relationships. Mixed & Mastered by Rob Cosh, with visuals by Mackenzie Glisson.

I’ve included the final audio file for patrons if you want to check it out early. (The demo was called Cell Phone and was posted last June.)

Also: come join Ben & I this Thursday at 8PM EST/5PM PST for a release day live stream!

Brad

Hey everybody, how’s it going? We did it! The Untitled Fifth Album campaign reached 100% funding just in the nick of time, thank you all. Since then I’ve been hustling on the project as there are instantly a lot of scary deadlines. But I feel good about it, I’m excited to get these songs out.

The Making Me Nervous Lexus ad appears to still be airing everywhere, thanks for all your messages about it — I think I’ve heard that it’s on nearly every major TV channel, crazy! Really sweet how excited you all are to see the song pop up IRL, thanks for rooting for me.

New Single March 21st: Myself Almost

I have a new single coming out March 21st! It’s called Myself Almost (the Patreon demo was called Cell Phone). It’s a vibey electronic track about relationships and technology that I wrote last summer.

You can pre-save it if you’re into that or just keep an eye on Instagram/Facebook/YouTube for me trying to promote it. Oh and if you could follow me on Spotify or wherever you stream your music, that’d be a big help. The platforms really like it when folks play a new song on release day and they might be generous enough to play it for other people.

Stream Show: March 21st

Same day as the single release! The next stream show is on March 21st (8pm EST/5pm PST), click the bell on YouTube to get notified when we go live. These are a blast to do, thanks to all of you in the chat. Get your requests in.

I’m Burning Out of Here

Well, I’ve got a bunch of album work to finish up this week and then I’m going missing for March break to hopefully stave off some rising burn-out. Fingers crossed I return with a renewed ability to reply to everyone’s messages, listen to my voicemails and maybe occasionally return a single phone call. Hope you’re all well,

Brad

More from Brad Sucks

Official Website (Vinyl, Merch & News)
Official Patreon (20+ Unreleased Songs)
Brad Sucks Mailing List (Monthly Updates)

Social: Instagram, Facebook, Threads, Bluesky, Discord

Wow, what a wild 24 hours! Before Monday I was like, “well, we made it to 90% of our goal and that’s still totally still great and more than I deserve! 😀😀” but yesterday the campaign wound up blowing past 100% funding in a matter of hours. Unbelievable. Thank you everybody, especially the sweet folks in the Brad Sucks Discord for your support & encouragement yesterday.

A little progress update: we’ve got one more rehearsal while we prep for drum recording on February 24th and 25th. In the meantime I’m working on guide tracks and finalizing lyrics and getting moving on the artwork and release plan. And then there’s basically an entire album of custom cover requests to record(!). It’s gonna be a busy time but I’m excited to get at it. Going forward, I’ll be posting short updates to social media and saving longer updates for Indiegogo, my website and Patreon.

And finally, I just want to say thank you all for being cool with this way of doing things. I feel a bit cheesy asking for cash but in the current streaming era the pre-order/fundraising model seems to be the best way to guarantee there’s enough interest to do these projects. And I’m extremely grateful & validated that there seems to be.

Feel free to message me if you have any questions or comments about the campaign or album or anything. Thank you again!

Brad

Four days until the Untitled Fifth Album campaign wraps up! Thanks so much to everyone who’s contributed — pretty difficult to express what your support means to me but in these especially turbulent music industry times I’m very grateful to get to do this. Even though we’re likely going to land a bit short of 100%, I’m still making the album. I’m lucky to have this amount of budget to work with.

In other news, my song Making Me Nervous is currently in a Lexus commercial! People have reported seeing it on CBS and NBC (and Peacock!), mostly during sports. Don’t worry, I’m still in touch with my root out here driving a lightly damaged Kia Rio. The commercial opportunity came completely out of the blue — they asked, I said yes. I’m an incredible businessman and don’t let anyone tell you any different. It’s pretty nuts that my dumb twenty year old song is still doing stuff. If you see the ad, let me know where you saw it!

Speaking of songs: I’m still writing and recording them! Here’s a new chill demo called Alcohol and Drug Abuse Lake, named after a real place in South Carolina. (It’s a public post on Patreon so you should be able to check it out even if you’re not a patron.)

Oh, and finally Ben & I did a stream show on the 25th that you can watch here. Next one is on February 22nd, I’m told you can hit “notify” on Youtube to be reminded when we go live. Get your requests in so I can badly fumble playing them!

That’s all I got for now, hope your 2024’s off to a good start! Thanks everybody!!

Brad
PS: Oh and I’ll also have a new single coming out next month

MORE FROM BRAD SUCKS

News & merch:  https://www.bradsucks.net
Join the Brad Sucks mailing list: https://www.bradsucks.net/subscribe/
20+ Unreleased Songs on the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/bradsucks
Join the Discord chat: https://discord.gg/czSGKUPsSG

Instagram:  https://instagram.com/bradsucks/
Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/Brad-Sucks-5572237940/
Threads: https://www.threads.net/@bradsucks
Mastodon: https://mastodon.social/@bradsucks

Ben & I are back tonight with another stream show at 8pm EST, hope you can tune in! I've started looking forward to these instead of just being nervous, which is a pretty nice development.

One of my resolutions this year has been to be better at regularly posting & promoting on social media, specifically with video content. After each stream show, Ben’s been reviewing the video (I’ve gotten way better but I still really hate watching myself) and giving me a list of "noteworthy" moments. And then I’ve been editing the “highlights” down to 30-60 second reels to promote the next show. Here are a few I’ve made recently if you haven't seen them:

• "Dad Joke"

• "Mentally Ready"

• "Bloopers" 

Oh, and I also made this dumb little one out of Geoff Gibson (@sisc_daily)'s sweet poster art that he sent me that got posted today.

Nothing amazing, but I think I’m improving at making 'em. So far it’s been difficult to get over the feeling I’m annoying everyone on social media with this constant self-promotion, but it feels like a necessary evil if I want to keep doing this stuff blah blah blah blah? Anyway, time to set up my office for streaming... 

Update time! We’ve been working hard on the songs in the cold basement where we rehearse. Big news: we’ve cut some songs. The tracklist is now down to: Wasting My Potential, Pretty Dumb, This Meeting, Simplifyin, Over & Over & Over, Feeling Pretty Good, Certain Types of People, Naturally, In Trouble, The Comfort Zone and Learning to Lie Again. They were the ones everyone was most interested in working on, sorry if your fave got cut. There's still hope it'll get finished one day.

Fundraiser is at 65% with two weeks to go! Thanks to everyone for your support so far. Seems unlikely we’ll make it to 100% so I’m beginning to sweat how I’m gonna pull this project off with whatever budget we end up with, but we’ll see how it goes. The songs are sounding good, our parts are pretty locked. If we can get everything recorded nicely, I think it’ll turn out really well.

While I'm here I might as well mention that Ben & I have a live stream show Thursday night at 8pm on YouTube that you're invited to. 

Some pics from last Friday's chilly rehearsal:

(Photos by Steve Pelehos)

So my song Making Me Nervous has wound up in a Lexus television commercial, which is the most recent weird event in the thing I sometimes call my music career. Thank you to everybody telling me you saw it on TV, I love to hear it!

While I try not to complain as I’m very grateful I still get to keep making music, it’s been a bit of a rocky year in the Brad Sucks industry. There seem to be a lot of people out there who like my music but with the algorithmic feeds, social media turmoil and focus on video these days (which isn’t exactly my forté) it’s gotten harder and harder for me to reach them. Throw in seeming business/financial downward spirals behind the scenes at Spotify and Bandcamp and the entire digital digital distribution landscape for low-budget independent musicians has gotten a bit discouraging. You might even say it’s been “making me nervous” but I would never say that, ever.

So when a creative company reached out to me late last year asking if it was OK to pitch fancy car-maker Lexus on using Making Me Nervous in a TV advertisement, I was all-in. When I was a teenager we’d call that “selling out” but I don’t know if that term even exists anymore or if it would even apply in this context.

Regardless, this lucky break will give me a much-needed boost, extending the length of time I can confidently continue to call myself a professional musician at least six to eight more months and I’m very pleased about that.

Meanwhile, I’m out here still raising funds for my Untitled Fifth Album and I still have a (free) live stream concert on January 25th you should tune into and I still have a Patreon with 20+ unreleased song demos and the most supportive patrons who help me keep doing what I’m doing, lucky breaks or no. 

Yours Lexusly,

Brad

Over the weekend I hacked together a podcast feature I want: re-run a podcast from its first episode, with following episodes showing up as “new” on either a weekly or daily schedule.

So you can work your way through all the episodes of a podcast as though they started coming out today, if that makes sense.

(Images: a sort of working web UI and the first episode of Serial showing up as a “new” episode within Pocket Casts)

Just sharing in the hopes someone steals the idea and puts it in a decent podcast app so I can use it!

2023 was pretty full! My first album I Don’t Know What I’m Doing turned twenty years old(!) and we dusted off the full live band for our first shows since 2019. We played an anniversary show and it was a blast to meet a lot of you there, I can’t believe how many people travelled from far away. I don’t really tour so it’s very sweet when you come visit me and it was a pretty special night. For those who didn’t make it, Ben & I did a decent number of live stream shows on YouTube and it was awesome to see you in the chat (next one is January 25th btw).

I kept plugging away at making songs for the Brad Sucks Patreon, which is my favorite thing to be doing these days. Thanks to everyone who supports me there, it means a ton and has really helped keep me moving forward. 

2024 should be similarly busy — one of my songs is apparently going to be in a fancy commercial and I announced the campaign for my Untitled Fifth Album which is just about half-funded. So if that’s successful, finishing the new record should take up most of my time when I’m not writing & recording new songs. Here’s hoping!

Anyway, here’s some of the stuff I made or did this year:

PUBLIC

• SONG: The Comfort Zone (youtube, bandcamp, spotify etc)

• SONG: Lotion (Greenskeepers cover re-record) (youtube, patreon)

• SONG: Cell Phone (youtube, patreon)

• SONG: Tell Me Something I Don’t Know (2003 demo) (youtube, patreon)

• SONGS: I Don’t Know What I’m Doing (instrumentals) (youtube)

• POST: All the Brad Sucks tattoos I’ve been sent (instagram)

• VIDEO: Untitled Fifth Album Demos (youtube)

• VIDEO: AI Grimes singing Making Me Nervous (youtube)

• VIDEO: Bee & PuppyCat Dad Box Birthday Song (youtube)

• CASSETTE: Loss Leader (bandcamp)

• FILM: A Brad Sucks song is in the drag-fu film Enter the Drag Dragon and I went to the premiere (instagram)

PATREON

• SONG: Pink Cloud (patreon)

• SONG: Killed by the Very Best (patreon)

• SONG: In Trouble (Extended) (patreon)

• SONG: Mellow Me Nervous (patreon)

• SONG: Naturally (patreon)

• SONG: Banged Up / Mint Condition (patreon)

• SONG: Banged Up / Mint Condition (acoustic version) (patreon)

• SONG: The Motivation (original 2013 demo) (patreon)

• SONG: Simplifyin (2009 demo) (patreon)

• SONG: Certain Types of People (2008 demo) (patreon)

• REMIX: Virg - Secret (patreon)

LIVE

• IRL: Bad Attraction (Live, August 26th, 2023) (youtube)

• IRL: In Trouble (Live, August 26th, 2023) (youtube)

• Stream Clip: The Comfort Zone (April 27th, 2023) (youtube)

• Stream: December 21st, 2023 (youtube)

• Stream: November 23rd, 2023 (youtube)

• Stream: August 31st, 2023 (youtube)

• Stream: July 27th, 2023 (youtube)

• Stream: May 25th, 2023 (youtube)

• Stream: April 27th, 2023 (youtube)

• Stream: March 23rd, 2023 (youtube)

• Stream: February 16th, 2023 (youtube)

I think that’s it! Thank you! My links: web, patreon, instagram, threads, mastodon, facebook, discord ✌️❤️ — Brad

We’re back live this Thursday at 8pm on YouTube!

Thanks to everyone who’s contributed to the Untitled Fifth Album campaign! We’re 41% of the way there with 50 days to go!

Unfortunately, the first thing I need to announce is I MESSED UP!! I didn’t specify shipping on the “SIGNED Limited Edition Vinyl” perk. I feel awful about it, but if you ordered that one I’ll need to ask you to cancel & request a refund and then re-purchase the same perk (which now includes shipping). I’m very, very sorry for the hassle — don’t hesitate to contact me if you need any help with cancelling your order. 

In other campaign news, I’ve added a “Name in credits + Signed Vinyl” tier by request in case you want both of those things at once. 

Folks who posted custom cover songs: I'll be reaching out to find out what your song selections are soon!

In actual album production developments: we’ve gone ahead and started working on the songs and filming the process, so assuming things go well for the budget, we’re targeting a late February recording date for the drums, tracking the rest shortly after.

I posted a live clip of us playing the unreleased song In Trouble on Youtube if you want to check that out. (A clip of Bad Attraction from my first album is up there as well.)

Anyway other than my dumb shipping mistake, it's been going well so far and I'm optimistic. The support has been really encouraging, thank you so much!

Brad
PS: Ben & I are doing a live stream show on Thursday 8pm EST, come on out to see if I've forgiven myself by then!

Hey everybody! Despite the many indications to the contrary, I believe it’s time to put a new Brad Sucks album together! Which unfortunately means I’m about to awkwardly beg you for support (waits for approving roar of the crowd to die down.)

This time I’m hoping to do things a little differently than my usual DIY af situation — I want to involve my awesome live band in the process. I’ve already got a batch of songs ready to go and if I can raise the funds to pull it off, I think it’ll turn out pretty cool & special. I’ve never done an album like this before and I’d love the chance to.

If you think you might want to get involved, I’ve got a whole Indiegogo over here that you can hop on with more details, rewards you can get and all that. Thanks for checking it out, I really appreciate your support!

Oh, and while I’ve got you here:

Stream Shows!

• Next stream show, December 21st 8pm EST! Save the date!

• Here’s the replay from the November 23rd show, thanks for tuning in, the chat was a blast!

Follow me? Instagram, Threads, Mastodon, Facebook, mostly.

Thank you so much!!

Brad

Just a reminder that Ben and I are back live streaming tonight at 8pm EST! We had no idea it was American Thanksgiving today when we agreed on it, but hopefully some people will still tune in. I'll try not to schedule the next one on a major national holiday (unless it goes really well and then major national holidays only from now on.)

Been feeling a bit guilty towards my $10/month Patrons as I haven’t been digging up any good embarrassment content lately so I decided to throw your names (minus last name for privacy) on the opening and closing stream screens. No shade to the other Patreon tiers, just thought it might be a fun thing to try out as a thank you for that extra support.

Anyway, missed doing this so I’m looking forward to getting back at it, see you in the chat!

Brad

I return this month to report that Starfield is a boring video game and not the mental and emotional space vacation I was hoping for so I’m regretfully back to living in the real world again. So sad.

Spookily though, I re-recorded my cover of Lotion by The Greenskeepers. Check the new version with some creepy animation by my buddy Allen here:

It’s also available for free download on Patreon even if you’re not a patron!

Stream show

Ben & I return from hiatus to stream at you once again on November 23rd, any requests? I request that you hit the “Notify me” bell on the video if you want a reminder when it’s close.

Other stuff

• New Patreon demo: Killed by the Very Best - wrote a rock song, no idea if it’s any good.

• I’ve been working on planning out a new big Brad Sucks project… hope to have news of that to you once my fear of failure is cured completely and forever.

Social media

Seems like it’s getting harder to stay connected online lately which is a drag. For the record, I’m still posting on: Instagram, Threads, Mastodon and Facebook. Anything important gets mentioned on Patreon and the mailing list.  Oh and come hang out in the Brad Sucks Discord, it’s a cool little group there.

Thanks for listening, til next time!

Brad

Oh boy, I’m about to hit this long weekend running. It’s nice weather & Starfield for the foreseeable future for me, thank you very much. But after that? The plan is to return even more powerful.

20 years 🥳

I Don’t Know What I’m Doing turned twenty years old! Crazy. That’s so many years! Thanks for all your kind messages, it means a lot.

The Rainbow

We played a show, it went well! Last Friday was a great time as I mentioned on Instagram:

Wow, what a night that was. So many people came from far away: Hungary, North Carolina, Missouri, New Orleans, Michigan, Texas — incredible, I’m really overwhelmed and touched… thanks to you all. I hope we rocked for you? We played nearly every song we know, for the most part successfully (swipe to the last pic to see when I took full blame for screwing up a song.)

Super fun night! Really enjoyed meeting some of you and hope the show was worth the journey.

Sorta final live stream

Ben and I did our last scheduled live stream last night, ending a multi-month campaign of scheduled stream-rocking. Thanks for hanging out with us if you popped by, it’s been really fun to play and read the comments. Haven’t decided what to do next… I’d love to experiment a bit more maybe? Let me know if you have any thoughts or requests or ideas.

Other stuff I posted

• The I Don’t Know What I’m Doing Instrumentals are on YouTube now

• I posted all the Brad Sucks tattoos I’ve been sent

• Patreon: In Trouble (Extended) - working on this one for the next single(?)

Social media

When not in the sunshine or playing Starfield I’ll be on social media:  Instagram, Threads, Mastodon, X and Facebook. Anything important gets mentioned on Patreon and the mailing list.

Thanks for listening, til next time!

Brad

Hey all! Hope the summer’s treating you well. Huge news here: I took a pickleball beginner’s class and my body hurts. Also one of my guitars broke and I’m waiting for its replacement to arrive. (These events were unrelated.)

In I guess professional news, I put a song called Cell Phone on YouTube., but mostly I’d like to remind you that the full band and I are doing an I Don’t Know What I’m Doing 20th anniversary show on Friday, August 25th in Ottawa, Ontario (Canada):

We plan to live stream it on my YouTube channel but that’s no excuse not to attend! Plus the live streaming might not even work, who knows? Take the safe route and travel alllll the way to Canada to see a small indie rock band: tickets available here.

Ben and I did a live stream show last week, here’s the replay if you’re interested, which I am not. Still hate watching myself! I wonder if that’ll ever get any better? And I put all the I Don’t Know What I’m Doing instrumentals online because some people told me they wanted that for some reason 🤷🏻‍♂️.

Okay, gotta run — looking forward to a full band rehearsal tonight preparing for the 25th. It’s been a real joy to get back to playing. After the long break I wasn’t sure it would ever happen again so I’m feeling extra grateful when it happens these days.

Thanks for listening, commenting, subscribing, patreoning, reading, I appreciate it all. I’m a bit behind in email right now but I swear I’m gonna catch up… very soon. See ya,

Brad

PS: Social media’s a mess — I don’t know where exactly to put my posting efforts these days but I’m trying to post on: Instagram, Threads, Mastodon, Bluesky, sometimes  Twitter and Facebook, until I can allow myself to stop. All real news goes to the mailing list , website and of course the Patreon.

Some folks have asked me for these to be on YouTube, so here are the instrumentals for I Don’t Know What I’m Doing. Sounds better without my voice in it.

This album’s gonna be 20 years old next month! We’re doing a show in my hometown of Ottawa on August 25th that you should come to. I think we’re gonna try and live stream as well. Also I’m doing a stream show on July 27th with Ben, so come hang for that. All dates: https://www.bradsucks.net/shows/