The New Dad Rock presents a field-recorded farewell.

This wasn’t the episode we planned—but it’s the one we had to make. Episode 100 is a requiem for Rubén, Keith’s dear friend and one of the few true guerilla contributors to this podcast.

Keith was supposed to meet Rubén in Lucerne, Switzerland the first couple days of June 2025, but Ruben left this world ten days before Keith arrived. Keith didn’t change his plans. How could he?

What you’ll hear are unfiltered field recordings—no overdubs, no edits—captured on September 2, 2021, February 17, 2022, June 4, 2022, and December 7, 2023. These were originally recorded as part of our unofficial, off-the-cuff episodes. This episode was edited over two days in June 2025 while Keith was in Lucerne.

Rubén would’ve loved this. He always encouraged the art, the chaos, the beauty in the imperfect.

At one point, around 14 minutes in, Rubén talks about visiting people’s homes and listening to their records, saying it’s like trying on someone else’s clothes. Keith tells Rubén he is never inviting him over to his house. Rubén just laughs: "We’re the same size."

Six months later, Rubén and Keith are at Rubén's friend’s house playing music together and Rubén suggests they switch shirts, which they did. The picture used as the podcast thumbnail is them post-shirt exchange.

This episode isn’t just about Rubén. It is Rubén.

🎙️ EPISODIO 100: Un Réquiem por Rubén
The New Dad Rock presenta una despedida grabada en campo.

Este no era el episodio que habíamos planeado, pero era el que teníamos que hacer. El episodio 100 es un réquiem por Rubén, querido amigo de Keith y uno de los pocos colaboradores verdaderamente guerrilleros de este podcast.

Keith debía encontrarse con Rubén en Lucerna, Suiza, a principios de junio de 2025, pero Rubén dejó este mundo diez días antes de que Keith llegara. Keith no cambió sus planes. ¿Cómo pudo?

Lo que escucharán son grabaciones de campo sin filtro (sin sobregrabaciones ni ediciones) capturadas el 2 de septiembre de 2021, el 17 de febrero de 2022, el 4 de junio de 2022 y el 7 de diciembre de 2023. Estas grabaciones se realizaron originalmente como parte de nuestros episodios no oficiales e improvisados. Este episodio fue editado durante dos días en junio de 2025 mientras Keith estaba en Lucerna.

A Rubén le habría encantado. Siempre promovía el arte, el caos, la belleza en lo imperfecto.

En un momento dado, alrededor del minuto 14, Rubén habla de visitar casas de gente y escuchar sus discos, diciendo que es como probarse la ropa de otra persona. Keith le dice a Rubén que nunca lo invita a su casa. Rubén simplemente se ríe: "Somos de la misma talla".

Seis meses después, Rubén y Keith están en casa de un amigo de Rubén tocando música juntos y Rubén sugiere que intercambien camisetas, lo cual hicieron. La imagen que se usa como miniatura del podcast es de ellos después del intercambio de camisetas.

Este episodio no se trata de Rubén. Se trata de Rubén.

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On July 3, 1999 Mark Sandman, frontman and two-string slide bassist of Morphine collapsed and died while performing onstage in Palestrina, Italy. Ironically a few years earlier he wrote aa song in which he sang about hoping to have french fries with pepper on September 9th of that year.

But don't let that get you down. As we approach our 100th episode, we turn back the clock 25 years to the strange, beautiful, and paranoid world of 1999. Clinton was impeached, Napster was born, and people were hoarding water in fear of Y2K. Now in 2024, we’ve got AI making music, faking voices, and threatening to write this podcast for us. Coincidence?

We explore the eerie parallels between Y2K fear and AI anxiety, all through the lens of the incredible music that defined the end of the millennium. Featuring everything from The Flaming Lips’ cinematic masterpiece The Soft Bulletin to Fiona Apple’s poetic rage, and from Rage Against the Machine's fury to Beck’s freaky funk, this episode is a tribute to the year that birthed some of the deepest—and weirdest—dad rock we still love today, including:

• The indie guitar heroics and existential hooks of Built to Spill’s “Keep It Like a Secret”
• The strange and defiant Primus’ “Antipop”
• Moby’s soundtrack to the digital dawn “Play”
• Pavement’s bittersweet farewell produced by Nigel Godrich “Terror Twilight”
• And Wilco’s “Summerteeth” which is Dad Rock and not New Dad Rock

This isn’t just a nostalgia trip—it’s a portal between two centuries, two technopanic moments, and a lot of great records.

🎧 Episode 100 is coming next… and it’s all about YOU. Send us your questions, dad rock confessions, or AI fears before the robots take over for real.

Let us know what’s up.

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🎙️ Episode 98: Montauk Mix and UFO Flix

Strap in for a cosmic ride back to the Summer of '98—when alternative rock was maturing, Montauk was still weird and wonderful, and UFOs might have been hovering just offshore.

Steve and Keith dig through the musical treasures of 1998, spinning tracks from Neutral Milk Hotel, Elliott Smith, Mercury Rev, Beastie Boys, Sunny Day Real Estate, and more. It's the year of In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, XO, Deserter’s Songs, and Hello Nasty—a golden moment when indie, emo, electronica, and even Madonna (Ray of Light!) all collided on our Walkmans and Discmen.

☀️ Along the way:

• Summers in Montauk: sand in cassette decks, longboard surf sessions, and the quiet magic of a sleepy beach town
• The Montauk Project: time travel? psychic experiments? Stranger Things vibes years before Netflix
• Lights in the sky, rumors around bonfires, and the sweet mystery of pre-Y2K anxiety

🛸 Expect music nerdery, heartfelt nostalgia, and just maybe a few unexplained sightings along the dunes.

Tagline: The year alt-rock grew up... and Montauk got even weirder.

Cue the mixtape, cue the conspiracy theories—it's Episode 98!

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🎙️ Episode 1997: Desert Island Classics – The Year That Was Everything

What if you could only bring one year of music to your desert island? For The New Dad Rock, that year just might be 1997.

In this special “Desert Island Classics” edition, Keith makes the case for a trio of albums that still echo through indie rock history:

🎸 Modest Mouse – The Lonesome Crowded West
🎸 Pavement – Brighten the Corners
🎸 Radiohead – OK Computer

These three towering releases helped define an era, a mindset, and a mood—sprawling, angular, atmospheric, and occasionally absurd. Steve and Keith unpack their enduring influence, share personal memories tied to these records, and debate what makes an album truly castaway-worthy.

🌴 Also in this episode:

• What counts as a “desert island disc”?
• Are we really alone out there—with only our CD wallets and Discmen to keep us company?
• And which albums from 1997 still feel like survival essentials?
  

No filler. All killer. Come wade into the waters of a year that still resonates like a perfectly delayed guitar loop.

The New Dad Rock—where nostalgia meets noise.

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1996 was a wild, weird, and wonderful year for music. Alternative rock was shifting in unexpected ways, techno was taking over clubs and airwaves, and Gen X was riding the high of a pre-Y2K world—blissfully unaware of what was to come. In this episode of The New Dad Rock, Steve & Keith take a joyride through the sonic landscape of ‘96, from scrappy indie rock to stadium-filling anthems to the rise of electronic music that made rock purists sweat.

So what was in that five-disc CD changer back in ‘96? This episode revisits some of the era-defining records, including:

🎸 Beck – Odelay (Genre-bending brilliance)
🎸 Modest Mouse – This Is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About (A lo-fi road trip for the soul)
🎸 Oasis – (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? (Champagne Supernova, anyone?)
🎸 Cake – Fashion Nugget (Quirky, ironic, undeniable earworms)
🎸 The Olivia Tremor Control – Dusk at Cubist Castle (The Elephant 6 movement at its trippiest)
🎸 Neutral Milk Hotel – Everything Is EP (The precursor to Aeroplane Over the Sea)
🎸 Prodigy – The Fat of the Land (Firestarter ignited a whole new sound)
🎸 Chemical Brothers – Exit Planet Dust (Rock meets rave culture)
🎸 Sublime – Sublime (Laid-back anthems, sun-drenched SoCal vibes)
🎸 Fugees – The Score (One of the greatest hip-hop albums ever)

Along the way, Keith recounts his legendary summer road trips, complete with mixtapes, underrated indie gems, and a time when Olivia Tremor Control was a best-kept secret. The guys also dive into the great genre debate of 1996: Was rock dead? Or was it just evolving into something new—thanks to the rise of electronic music titans like Underworld, The Chemical Brothers, and The Dust Brothers?

It was a halcyon year—carefree, creative, and chaotic. So jump in, roll the windows down, and take a ride back to 1996 with The New Dad Rock.

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Step into 1995—a time when five-disc CD changers ruled the bedroom, cassette Walkmans were essential for the commute, and a record player still held a place of honor in the living room. Not a single MP3 in sight. This was also the golden age of mixtapes, crafted with care and burned onto CDs, blending the past and future of rock into something unmistakably 1995.

This episode of The New Dad Rock explores the birth of an alternative nation, when rock’s underground darlings started gaining mainstream traction, and genre lines blurred in ways that would shape music for decades to come. Steve and Keith take you through the landmark releases that defined this pivotal year, including:

🔥 Pavement – Wowee Zowee (Lo-fi weirdness at its best)
🔥 Morphine – Yes (Jazz-infused, sax-laden grit)
🔥 PJ Harvey – Down By the Water (Haunting, bluesy, and powerful)
🔥 Primus – Tales From the Punchbowl (Les Claypool’s bass wizardry in full force)
🔥 Bjork – Post (Eclectic, Icelandic and electronic)
🔥 Sonic Youth – Washing Machine (Experimental alt-rock, pushing boundaries)
🔥 Smashing Pumpkins – Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (Epic, overstuffed, and unforgettable)
🔥 Red Hot Chili Peppers – One Hot Minute (Dave Navarro steps in, things get weird)
🔥 Blind Melon – Soup (A deep-cut masterpiece, tragically overlooked)
🔥 Everclear – Santa Monica (Power-pop angst distilled into one perfect track)
🔥 Thurston Moore – Psychic Hearts (Sonic Youth’s frontman goes solo)

And as the alt-rock establishment took shape, 1995 also marked the birth of some future legends, including Wilco, Cat Power, Sparklehorse, and Rammstein—all of whom would go on to define their own corners of New Dad Rock.

What albums still hold up? What sounds haven’t aged well? And what exactly was in that five-disc changer back then? Tune in as Steve & Keith revisit the birth of an alternative nation—when mixtapes ruled, rock evolved and Gen X finally had their own classic rock.

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Tune in as The New Dad Rock breaks it all down—one track at a time.

1994 was a year of seismic shifts—both in music and in pop culture. Nirvana’s Unplugged set the tone for the band's tragic final chapter, while Woodstock ‘94 marked the peak (and beginning of the end) of the alternative rock explosion. Meanwhile, the slow-speed chase of O.J. Simpson had the world glued to their TVs, raising the question: What were you listening to that summer?

Steve and Keith dive deep into the unforgettable music of 1994, revisiting the albums, artists, and soundtracks that shaped their listening habits. Was this truly the greatest year in music? Or is that just what a really good YouTube playlist told us? Either way, they explore the grunge, hip-hop, indie, and genre-bending albums that still hold up today.

10 Albums We Talk About in This Episode:

1. Nirvana – MTV Unplugged in New York
2. Weezer – Blue Album
3. Nine Inch Nails – The Downward Spiral
4. Portishead – Dummy
5. Pavement – Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain
6. Beastie Boys – Ill Communication
7. Soundgarden – Superunknown
8. Built to Spill – There’s Nothing Wrong with Love
9. Nas – Illmatic
10. The Offspring – Smash

Expect deep cuts, hot takes, and wild tangents as Steve and Keith debate whether 1994 was really the greatest year in music history? Or is that just nostalgia talking like when CDs came in longboxes and Pulp Fiction was on repeat.

Tune in as The New Dad Rock breaks it all down—one track at a time.

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Oh, the nerve of the season, the audacious charade,
Of this barber shop simulation where reality’s frayed!
I plopped in a chair, unassuming and tame,
In this den of shears and holiday fame.
With old barbers tending, and old carols a-playing,
The sort of tunes that leave your spirit decaying.
Oh, the pomp and the fuss, the ho-ho-humbug so trite,
In a soundtrack that’s anything but merry or bright.
But then came the moment—oh, you wouldn't believe!
A riff so electric, it made me perceive
A fracture! A tear! In the fabric of fate—
It was Halford’s Donner & Blitzen! My confusion was great.
The barbers snipped on, not a soul banged a head,
As the anthem of metal filled me with dread.
Was I the only one who could hear the intrusion?
Was this a glitch in our grand illusion?
And when the song ended, back to yule-tide’s bore,
The hoary old jingles returned once more.
Oh, simulation, you sly, cunning beast,
To slip Rob Halford into this stuffy feast.
So I ask you now, was it code or was it cheer?
Did the matrix hiccup or was my mind unclear?
Either way, dear reader, I’ll cherish this glitch,
For even a Grinch loves a good metal switch. 🎄🤘

Let us know what’s up.

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Did you know that The New Dad Rock has swag? Coffee mugs, pillow and t-shirts in a multitude of colors and arm lengths.