Arcade Fire

Up late one night and surfing through the mindless hell that is late night television, I came across the most moving musical performance I've ever seen broadcast on T.V. I didn't know who Arcade Fire was but the day after this performance I owned both their albums. I am not afraid to admit that sitting alone in my dark room that night I almost wept. Because they brought something so touching to a fading and irrelevant medium.

American Nightmare

American Nightmare. One of the last hardcore bands I got into. An influential hardcore-ish band emerging from Boston's fruitful hardcore punk scene, American Nightmare is poetry set to punk music. Frontman Wes Eisold's lyrics capture depression and heartache like I've never heard in a hardcore song before. The lyrics are screamed with such passion and pain that spawned a slew of bands trying to emulate the same style. Following a law suit forcing them to change their name, the band continued on a brief stint under the name Give up the Ghost until they broke up in 2004.

Here's a song off their 2001 album "Background Music":

There's a Black Hole in the Shadow of the Pru
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=7ROIFBQU

Fugazi

There are times when I'm tempted to take a definitive stance and declare that Fugazi is better than Minor Threat. I can't bring myself to take that leap, though. I'll just say that I'm an Ian MacKaye fan and leave it at that.

Fugazi is a punk -- or "post hardcore" -- band from the D.C. scene in the late 80's.

I will not upload full albums, but I don't think I can get into trouble for sharing single songs. If you enjoy it, by all means, get the album.

Here's the song Waiting Room from Fugazi's debut 1989 album "13 Songs."

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=CE8I3VM9

(Copy and Paste the link.)