Episode 400: The Piss Tangent of It All

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In this milestone episode, Jam and Ian add the 799th (???) and 800th (!!!) songs to HARK’s massive, unruly list. Jam aims for the top of the list with a near-classic and the hosts talk about Jesus for a while, with just a liiiittle heresy (as a treat).  Then Ian uses his bottom pick to launch an exploratory mission into a new kind of bad song and raise some philosophical questions about the future of novelty Christmas music in an age of machine-generated vocals.

The ranking music in this episode is “Jesus Christ” by Big Star.

Episode 399: Chanukah, Take Me Home

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Hanukkah is fast approaching! And to celebrate, we have two songs… well, OK. We have one song about Hanukkah, and one song about Not Christmas. “Chanukah in West Virginia” by Scott Simons wraps a somewhat sad sentiment in a cheerful package (for better or worse), while “Chinese Food on Christmas” by Brandon Walker is a thoroughly silly celebration of not celebrating.

The ranking music in this episode is “No War on Xmas”, also by Scott Simons!

Episode 398: Support Your Local Ugly Sweater

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You may be wondering why this episode is going up on a Thursday instead of a Wednesday. Well, first of all, it’s technically still Wednesday in our time zone, and this episode is all about going local! And second… we are adjacent to the ball.

In this episode, we’re encouraging you to shop local, support Wikipedia, and listen along with us to two holiday-sweater-themed songs: “Ugly Xmas Sweater Party” by girlhouse and “I Wanna Take You Out In Your Holiday Sweater” by PAS/CAL.

The ranking music in this episode is “Christmas Unicorn” by Sufjan Stevens.

Episode 397: Birthday Boi’s Choose Your Own Adventure

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It’s Jam’s birthday! To find out the first song they selected, go to Paragraph 2 (P2). To skip ahead to the ranking music, go to P5.

P2: It was “Yule Shoot Your Eye Out” by Fall Out Boy! For their second selection, they give Ian two options — past or future. If you think he should choose “future”, go to P3. If you prefer “past”, go to P4.

P3: Ian chose the same thing! And the song was, unfortunately, “Feels Like Christmas” by Panic! At the Disco. All that’s left is learning the ranking music — go to P5!

P4: Oh no! Ian didn’t choose this option. Also, you slipped on an icy patch and fell down a well. Oops!!!

P5: The ranking music in this episode is “Yule Shoot Your Eye Out” as performed by Skatune Network. Yay, you did it!

Episode 396: Dr. Victor Kelce-stein

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It’s that time again! Gut that pumpkin and fill it with eggnog, because we’re listening to EVEN MORE Christmas/Halloween crossover songs. Not only have we not run out of these, we’ve still got a few that are, you know, not terrible! We start with “Spooky Halloween Chrismtas” by Giftshop and have to re-learn what psychobilly is, then get into a more familiar groove with “Halloween on Christmas” by The Walking Who. Plus: a last-minute Halloween costume idea for couples, and also a third person, preferably a sibling or in-law!

The intro sting in this episode is the theme song of “Are You Afraid of the Dark?” composed by Jeff Zahn & Jeff Fischer and the ranking music is “Psycho Killer” by Talking Heads.

Episode 395: Big Sincerity

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After a short delay, we’re back! And just in time, too. Because it’s… the time of year… well, you get it. We are, after ten years of doing this dang show, finally covering “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” by Andy Williams! And if you prefer the noodley 00s-era indie kinda bullshit we love to cover over the mid-century classics, you’ll love “It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year” by the Polyphonic Spree!

The ranking music in this episode is “When the River Meets the Sea” as performed by John Denver and Robin the Frog.

Schedule change: New episode next week

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Hello Herald Angels! Bad news/good news/more better good news for you.

The bad news is: typically, we would have a new episode going up this Wednesday, October 8th. Instead, we’re going to postpone it to next week, October 15th.

The good news: we did this so that the rest of the 2025 schedule will fall a little more nicely around the winter holidays, with our milestone episode (Episode 400) coming out on Christmas Eve!

The more better good news: while there’s no new episode this week, the long-awaited part two of the 2024 Holiday Music Release Roundup will be out on our Patreon Wednesday instead! Hurrah!!!

Join for $2 (US) a month to listen to that and all our other bonus audio here. And until next week, happy holidays!

Episode 394: One Must Imagine It’s October 3rd

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We may never run out of holiday music, but sometimes we do run low on holidays that are funny to talk about. So in this episode, we’re celebrating (by a loose definition of celebration) two holidays (by a loose definition of holiday) that fall on October 3rd, Mean Girls Day and National Boyfriend Day. First up, unpacking “Rocking Around the Pole” performed by the cast of the Mean Girls musical (Erika Henningsen, Taylor Louderman, Ashley Park and Kate Rockwell), also maybe called The Hot Elves?? Then we must confront the accidental other secret episode theme we’ve created by pairing it with “Santa’s My Boyfriend” performed by Amy Poehler, Kristin Wiig and Maya Rudolph.

The ranking music in this episode is “Big Boys” by SZA featuring Keke Palmer, Cecily Strong, Ego Nwodim, and Punkie Johnson.

Episode 393: Skanukkah Skatember

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Nah, just kidding, we’re not starting another annual month-long theme. Can you imagine? I mean, sure, yes, we can imagine. But we’ve apparently run out of ska-punk Hanukkah songs already. Until someone proves us wrong on that (email requests to harkpodcast at gmail!!), we’re making do with some ska/punk winter holiday songs that felt appropriate for the approaching Rosh Hashanah. We start off with a listener request for a song of pan-holiday celebration, “Whatever U Celebrate” by Reel Big Fish. Paired with that is a singular tune that somehow both barely qualifies for the list and also fits perfectly: “Hava Nagila (Christmas Arrangement)” by Me First and the Gimme Gimmes.

The ranking music in this episode is “Sell Out” by Reel Big Fish.

Thank you to Jo for requesting “Whatever U Celebrate”!

Episode 392: Our Podcast Got Run Over by Jesus, Who Took the Wheel

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Buckle up everyone, it’s the final AGROBAR episode of 2025, and the guy that they put at the wheel for this one most definitely does not have a license. That’s right, we’re doing two Jesus-adjacent versions of GGROBAR! “Grandma Got Won Over by a Stranger” by ApologetiX might give you whiplash with its mix of goofy parody-of-a-parody sound and its needlessly dark subject matter. And listen all y’all, it’s not sabotage, and it’s not even that bad: it’s just “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer” as performed by Family Force 5.

The ranking music in this episode, and all August Got Run Over By a Reindeer (AGROBAR) episodes, is “Everything Sucks” by Reel Big Fish.