MARCH '24

What came first—the run or the reward you're running toward? I've been thinking about this playlist all week. "Primer for the pint." Three words that explain everything about why we lace up our shoes. We're not training for marathons. We're not chasing personal bests. We're earning that beer.

Here's what I know: March '24 wasn't gentle. The playlist opens with "Teenage Heart" and immediately you're in that sweet spot where pop punk and emo blur together. Alkaline Trio knows how to write heartbreak that moves at 160 BPM. Then Spiritual Cramp shows up twice in the first half—first on "Shimmy" as a feature, then probably lurking in the credits elsewhere—and you realize this isn't just nostalgia. This is what happens when garage rock and post-punk have a kid who grew up on Tony Hawk's Pro Skater soundtracks.

The first mile is always a liar. Your legs feel heavy, your breathing's wrong, and you're wondering why you're not already at the finish line. But "Antidote" hits around track five and suddenly you remember: you're not running away from anything. You're running toward that pint glass, condensation dripping down the side, the bartender who knows your order. The reward isn't the run. The reward is what comes after.

Top 5 things this playlist taught me about delayed gratification:

1. Alkaline Trio opens this because Matt Skiba understands longing better than anyone in pop punk—every song is about wanting something just out of reach, which is basically what running is.

2. The garage rock-to-skate-punk evolution (tracks 2-6) mirrors that first-mile slog where you hate everything, then suddenly your stride finds the pocket.

3. "Blood, Hair, And Eyeballs" at track seven is the exact moment you stop thinking about quitting—mid-playlist, mid-run, when your body finally shuts up and lets you think.

4. Death Lens appears multiple times because repetition is the point—you run the same loop, you drink at the same bar, you play the same three chords until they mean something.

5. "Girl From The Record Shop" at track fourteen is the perfect penultimate song because by mile 2.5 you're already tasting that first sip, already imagining who might be there.

The sequence matters here. Early tracks are scrappy—egg punk, noise rock, that raw Hellcat Records-era energy where everything sounds like it was recorded in someone's garage because it probably was. But as you move deeper, the production tightens. Not smoother, just more focused. Like your breathing around mile two when you stop fighting your lungs and just let them work.

I had a customer come into Championship Vinyl last week, kid maybe 22, asking where to start with riot grrrl. I wanted to tell him it's not about starting, it's about stumbling into it mid-run when you're already committed and can't turn back. That's how Bikini Kill works. That's how this playlist works. You don't ease in. You're already moving.

The punk-to-post-punk progression is the story here. Skate punk gives you that propulsive energy, the kind that makes you forget you hate running. Then post-punk shows up with its angular guitars and you remember why you're actually doing this: because sitting still is worse. Because your head won't shut up unless your legs are moving. Because that pint tastes better when you've earned it.

Barry would argue this playlist is too scattered—pop punk and egg punk don't belong together. But Barry's wrong. They belong together the same way running and drinking belong together. Contradictions that make perfect sense when you're the one doing both.

"Fill In The Blanks" hits around track eleven and I realized something: this whole playlist is about filling in blanks. The space between leaving your apartment and arriving at the bar. The gap between "I should go for a run" and "I'm glad I went for a run." We're just filling in the blanks with power chords and bad decisions that feel like good ones.

The beauty of running three miles for a beer is that it's honest. You're not pretending this is about health. You're not lying about personal growth. You're running because you want that pint and you want to feel like you earned it. The music just makes the earning part bearable.