Jul 2, 2026 · 3 hr 13 min · 6 segments
On this episode of **Stairway to Eleven**, we start by sharing the albums and artists that have been dominating our playlists so far in 2026. Then, for our featured discussion, we discuss our favorite…
Jay, any albums at Midyear that you've enjoyed so far that came out this year?
Well, I hate doing this because I'm just so not in tune with what's coming out right now.
I
am with you, brother.
Yeah, and I'm more than willing to admit that, though.
There are always new things I hear and stuff like that, but I have a couple things to mention.
and let's just call them new things to me.
Um, I had, and I brought up, actually, I can't remember what we talked about in this podcast too, but since it just started again, the bear season five is out now.
And, um, I've learned so much cool music from that show.
So that's something into a lot of interesting, like I mentioned, the Decemberists and some other things like that, that are on there and these cool acoustic versions of songs.
And, um, And I'll just say the bear soundtrack is something I'm really interested in.
There's so many.
If you go to Spotify or whatever you use, inevitably somebody has made a playlist of it.
And there's a lot, a lot, a lot of songs.
And some of them are old soul songs and stuff.
But a lot of it is new to me.
So that's been cool.
And that's not new music, but there you go.
But I will mention also that sometimes you do one of those backwards deep dives.
And what I mean is a band that you've loved for a long time, but you just kind of didn't pay attention to their last few records.
Mm-hmm.
And I'm going to give you two.
One is I mentioned these guys on probably this cast and another cast, but I didn't really realize how good some of the super late era ZZ Top Records are.
There's one called Futura.
That's the last one they made before Dusty Hill died.
Jay, any albums at Midyear that you've enjoyed so far that came out this year?
Well, I hate doing this because I'm just so not in tune with what's coming out right now.
I
am with you, brother.
Yeah, and I'm more than willing to admit that, though.
There are always new things I hear and stuff like that, but I have a couple things to mention.
and let's just call them new things to me.
Um, I had, and I brought up, actually, I can't remember what we talked about in this podcast too, but since it just started again, the bear season five is out now.
And, um, I've learned so much cool music from that show.
So that's something into a lot of interesting, like I mentioned, the Decemberists and some other things like that, that are on there and these cool acoustic versions of songs.
And, um, And I'll just say the bear soundtrack is something I'm really interested in.
There's so many.
If you go to Spotify or whatever you use, inevitably somebody has made a playlist of it.
And there's a lot, a lot, a lot of songs.
And some of them are old soul songs and stuff.
But a lot of it is new to me.
So that's been cool.
And that's not new music, but there you go.
But I will mention also that sometimes you do one of those backwards deep dives.
And what I mean is a band that you've loved for a long time, but you just kind of didn't pay attention to their last few records.
Mm-hmm.
And I'm going to give you two.
One is I mentioned these guys on probably this cast and another cast, but I didn't really realize how good some of the super late era ZZ Top Records are.
There's one called Futura.
That's the last one they made before Dusty Hill died.
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