Simon said "you suck," and Randy said "you suck."

More than a year ago, I downloaded a mixtape from Liberated Matter's Cross-Pollination series (which you can still download here) because it had a Kevin Devine song on it. I listened through the whole thing in hopes of finding something to sound cool telling my friends about, and the song with the most such potential was a ditty (yeah, I said that) about a hapless American Idol reject named "Stacy J," by Matt Singer. It's been a steady go-to flavor piece in playlists ever since around here, but it was only this month that the album containing "Stacy J" finally came out. And I like it a lot.

The Drought is unapologetically dorky, generous with well-placed fuckwords, and genuinely fun. You can sample the aforementioned "Stacy J" if you download that Cross-Pollination mixtape. You can also get the another version of that and one of album opener "The Poet" from Amie Street for free as part of a Family Records promotion if you go here. Why they don't have his actual album yet I do not know, but I imagine it's coming.

If you like these, you're going to like the whole record (hell, there are only 4 more songs on it, one of which contains the line "they'd tell their friends 'hey check it out, i think he's gonna whip it out, the most amazing dong you've ridden in the motherfuckin' world'"). So go get it.