Ghost mountain is opening for them in Chicago. I’m not a fan of that type of modern rap. Really wish Chicago got bar Italia or her new knife. Idk if I want to go or not :/

Chicago. What are your thoughts on ghost mountain?

Was scrolling through the VV YouTube page and noticed it. I could be wrong but I’m pretty sure it got taken down when the Burger Records stuff happened.

hey, i’m wondering if anyone knows more about where the samples in bootleg came from. i’d love to look more into them. thanks. both are very very cool to me

So yeah, you guys probably saw that I recently posted my thoughts on Bootleg, and after thinking about it more, I think I finally understand what my actual problem with this album is.

First of all, I genuinely like Bootleg. I don’t think it’s a bad album at all. Actually, I think it’s really well made. You can clearly hear how much The Garden have matured as musicians. The songwriting is more structured, the production feels more intentional, and everything sounds much more controlled.
And that’s exactly what makes me sad.

I discovered The Garden back in 2017, but I didn’t really get deep into their whole universe until around 2021. That’s when I started getting into everything: The Garden, Enjoy, Puzzle, Vada Vada, the whole aesthetic, their side projects, etc. So even though I wasn’t there for their early years as a fan, I became really attached to that particular version of their music.
What I loved about The Garden was the weirdness.
The goofy lyrics, the punk energy, the experimental electronics, the feeling that a song could suddenly go somewhere completely unexpected. Tracks like Banana Peel are obviously goofy as hell, but that’s part of what made them so charming to me. It didn’t feel like they were trying to make everything perfect. It felt spontaneous, strange and unpredictable.
And looking back, I think Horseshit on Route 66 was probably the last time I really felt that old identity strongly.
Even then, you could already hear them changing. There was still a lot of that experimental electronic side, but the music was becoming more structured and mature. At the time I didn’t think much about it, but now, listening to Bootleg, I can hear the progression.
It’s like Horseshit on Route 66 was the beginning of the transition and Bootleg is the full realization of it.
And honestly, I think that’s where my disconnect comes from.
Their music isn’t necessarily worse. It’s just becoming more “adult”, more polished, more conventional, and personally I miss the messiness. I miss when The Garden sounded like The Garden could do literally anything.
There’s also something else that makes this hit harder for me.
I finally saw them live in 2024, and if I’m being completely honest, I was a little disappointed. Not because they were bad live, but because I think I had this very specific image of what seeing The Garden live would feel like. I had discovered them through all these older songs, performances and videos, and I think I was unconsciously expecting to experience that version of the band.
But obviously, I couldn’t.
I was born in 2006. I literally couldn’t have been there during the period I’m nostalgic for. 😭
So there’s this really weird feeling of grieving something I never actually experienced.
I can watch old live performances and think, “God, I wish I could have seen them like this.” But I’ll never be able to. That version of The Garden is already in the past.
And now with Bootleg, I feel like I’m watching the distance between the band I fell in love with and the band they are becoming get even bigger.
I also can’t help but feel like some of the direction on Bootleg would have made more sense to me coming from Enjoy. It reminds me a lot of The Sound of Deceit. That more mature, melodic, structured sound feels very natural to me when I associate it with Enjoy.
And this is where I want to be careful, because I obviously don’t know how Wyatt and Fletcher divide their songwriting or composition. This is purely how I interpret the music. But I feel like I hear less of the Fletcher side that I personally loved in The Garden, especially because I really love the more melodic qualities he explores through Puzzle.
Maybe that’s completely subjective, and that’s fine.
The weirdest part is that I think they actually matured at the same time I did.
When I discovered them, I was obviously a different person. Their music was part of a certain period of my life, and now I’m growing up while they’re growing up too. The problem is that I’m extremely nostalgic. I have a really hard time accepting that people, artists and things I love are allowed to change.
Sometimes I think I want The Garden to stay exactly like the version of them I fell in love with, even though that’s obviously impossible.
So I don’t think I’m “quitting” The Garden because I suddenly think they’re bad. I don’t.
I think I’m just realizing that the direction they’re going in isn’t necessarily what I was looking for from them anymore.
I’ll always love their older music. I’ll always love Enjoy and Puzzle. I’ll always have a huge amount of affection for Vada Vada and everything they’ve created.
But I think Bootleg made me realize that I might not be as invested in The Garden’s future releases as I used to be.
And honestly, that’s kind of heartbreaking.
Because I don’t think I’m mourning a bad album.
I’m mourning the fact that the version of The Garden I wanted to experience live probably doesn’t exist anymore, and never will again.
Maybe that’s just what happens when you grow up alongside an artist.

Mines is def bootleg and white cadilac they are just sooo good but tbh the whole album is geniunely no skips

It’s kind of the best song ever when you think about it… I feel like the Garden don’t have a lot of songs where Fletcher plays the drums half time like he does in the chorus… idk I could be wrong but it just tickles my brain so good.