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Month: December 2025

  • Kneecap, Pulp, Confidence Man and More of What You Heard at Underground on 12/05/25

    Kneecap "H.O.O.D." (2025 Remix) cover
    Frankly, I’m impressed by how many of you know all the words to “H.O.O.D.”

    Thank you to everyone who made it out to Underground last night and for all the birthday wishes. I’ve always been pretty low maintenance about birthdays just because mine competes with Christmas parties (and competed with finals back when I was in school). So, I learned the best thing to do is book a DJ gig the weekend of my birthday and say, “I’m playing here, if you want to come by and say hi.” I’m always pleasantly surprised by who I see. Anyhow, outside of this playlist and one really short and shaky video for the ‘gram, I don’t have much documentation, so you’ll just have to trust me when I saw it was a vibe. 

    As usual, the set list is below. Songs released in 2025 are in bold and link back to other references to the band on Beatique. And, before I sign off, tickets for New Year’s Eve at Club Underground are already available on Dice and Eventbrite. Two floors of indie, Britpop, darkwave, post-punk dancing all night. Get your tickets asap. 

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  • Bibliomancers: Curation Through Divination

    High Crimes Cult Minds Bibliomancers 2025
    High Crimes Cult Minds is the latest release from L.A. publisher Bibliomancers

    Bibliomancers books aren’t your typical collections of retro ephemera. What began as a way for Astraleyes, aka James Weigel, co-founder of the physical media fest Analog Outlaw, to archive his voluminous collection of books. In the process, though, the L.A.-based publisher, whose recent titles include High Crimes, Cult Minds and New Age Grave, has become a conceptual, community art project where the collections of artists, mainly book covers and other ephemera, are bound in a tangible form, their pages revealing stories that go much deeper than aesthetics. 

    “It’s not a straight, this is a book about 1970s paperbacks,” says Weigel of Bibliomancers on a recent video call. “There are publishers that do that perfectly and it’s great. They’re very inspiring to me, but my hope is that what we’re doing is interjecting a piece of our creative selves into it. If you look, there are elements there that go beyond just archiving a genre and I think that is really us as artists wanting to be more creatively involved in the process of making books.”

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  • Club Underground, Analog Outlaw and More Happening in L.A. 12/05 -12/10

    Crowd shot from Depeche Mode x New Order Night at Club Underground at Grand Star Jazz Club in Los Angeles on April 18, 2025 (Photo: Liz Ohanesian)
    See you at Club Underground on Friday, December 5 (Pic: Liz O.)

    I’m back at Club Underground this Friday, December 5, and we’re going to be celebrating my birthday. Advance tickets are available now, but you can also get them at the door on Friday night at Grand Star Jazz Club inside Chinatown’s Central Plaza, right next to the Bruce Lee statue. Party starts at 9:30 p.m. and is 21+. 

    So, what’s in store for Friday? IDK, but it’s my birthday (sort of, my actual date of birth is on a weeknight this year), so I’ll probably make you dance to Fontaines D.C. And Sextile and Confidence Man and The New Eves. We’ll see what happens. 

    Anyhow, that’s not all that’s happening this weekend in Los Angeles, so keep reading for some of my recommendations. 

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  • Best of 2025: The Year in Political Songs

    Utility box in Los Angeles with graffiti that reads "Free Palestine" on top and "Fuck ICE" in the center (Photo: Liz Ohanesian)
    The vibe in downtown Los Angeles for 2025. (Pic: Liz O.)

    For the first of Beatique’s Best of 2025 lists, I wanted to highlight political songs for a very specific reason. Politics aren’t brand safe. You’ll risk alienating the people who disagree with you. You might scare off the companies who would otherwise want to work with you. Blah blah blah. But, at a certain point, if you’re someone with a platform, be it music, art, film or writing, you will need to ask yourself, “Am I a brand? Or am I a human being who actually gives a shit about what’s happening in the world?” Hopefully, the latter is the answer. 

    Particularly in this moment, we need artists who are willing to be outspoken. For every semi-anonymous person (or bot) chiding you to “stick to the music,” there will be many more motivated to say, I’m against this too. Some might go to a protest, or write their local representatives or get involved with activist group. Maybe music can’t change minds, but it can prompt the quieter people to raise their voice. And, maybe, years from now, kids listening to the 2025 throwbacks will hear that there were people against genocide and fascism and exploiting workers and everything else that’s coming to a head right now. That said, much respect to the eleven artists on this list. They are by no means the only people making political music in 2025, but they made the songs that have been in my personal rotation. In keeping with an egalitarian theme, this list is not ranked. 

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