album review: THANK GOD ITS ALMOST MONDAY

With the hectic workdays, overwhelming workloads, and strain from every which way, it is quite rare that I look forward to Mondays. At times, it is easy to fill that the monotonous course of life gets worse with every Monday that rolls around.

This narrative was flipped when the indie-pop trio almost monday released their second album THANK GOD IT’S ALMOST MONDAY on September 9th, 2026. On the surface, the album is just a trio pop rock band having some fun, but take a closer look; almost monday is creating music that can only be described as one thing: a sunny dopamine hit. Mondays are not confined to feelings of dread or anguish anymore; almost monday turns this idea into a renewed, positive experience.

This is exactly what influenced their album to skyrocket to my number one streamed album of the year at 4,700 minutes and climbing, shattering records within my personal charts and catapulting them to my 20th all time artist. Yet, not even four months ago, I had only heard whispers of their existence.

How did they get here? The trio, Dawson Daugherty (Vocals), Luke Fabry (Lead Guitar), and Cole Clisby (Rhythm Guitar & Bass), met through one of the biggest things Southern Californians¹ are known for: surfing. This mellowed out, chill, sun-kissed hobby definitely seeps into their music; their music is only inspired by good feelings and ocean vibes. They grew up playing music together and eventually released their first single parking lot view in January 2020, just before the global pandemic hit. They never let that stop them, they wanted to keep creating music without a tour and dropped 2-3 EPs over the COVID era.

Some of their hits from these days such as cool enough, broken people, and cough drops gained them major attention, and lead them to the first Lollapalooza event in 2021 post-pandemic. Since then, they have dropped their first album DIVE with hits like jupiter and can’t slow down, gaining them major appraisal. In addition, all of their music videos have been shot on 16mm film (really apparent in jupiter), allowing a unique vintage aesthetic to complementing their upbeat recordings. Before dropping AM2, they toured with major bands like The Driver Era, AJR, and most recently, The Band CAMINO on their NeverAlways Tour before TBC went on to tour with 5 Seconds of Summer, leading to me learning of almost monday’s existence².

With their drop of THANK GOD IT’s ALMOST MONDAY, the world has been graced by 13 new songs:

1. thank god it’s almost monday (instrumental intro)
2. delicate
3. class a
4. no more regrets
5. superprism
6. fade
7. losing streak
8. leaving is easy
9. buzz
10. skinny dip
11. enjoy the ride
12. french kids
13. better late than never

Thematically, the album takes a roller-coaster-dip-like nature. It starts off super high with the title track (it cannot help but make you smile), and leads into my three favorites delicate, which is the single that got me incredibly hooked, class a, and no more regrets; three tracks of which express the fleeting nature of beauty and serenity.

I can’t say, but I think that I was falling in love
I might pray, ‘cause I need it and I can’t get enough
Yeah, yeah, yeah, can’t get enough

Following those is superprism, which peculiarly, is inspired by Dawson’s vision problems and how his sight was refocused by a small element in his glasses, a prism³.

The album then takes a dive, pulling the listener from super high highs to an atmospheric and introspective feeling, but still embodying their good mood tones. Fade, losing streak, leaving is easy, and buzz are all top tier songs showing the more emotional side of almost monday. Fade, specifically, feels exactly like levitation would sound…

(I don’t care) I’d learn a language never spoken
(I want you here) Yeah, I would free-fall in slow motion
(I don’t care) I’d give you all of my devotion
(I just want you here) I’d do anything to fix whatever’s broken
Don’t walk away, don’t let it fade
My feelings, they could never change (x10)

Even with a deeper, more intimate song, they sound like they still belong on the album, a quality that is often neglected in modern pop. The album picks right back up with straight highs to the end, with skinny dip, enjoy the ride, and french kids, an album track that has become one of their favorites to play. They close the album with an extremely euphoric track better late than never, a single-released song that sets a nervous and intense tone in which every chord switch sounds like the hesitation the song speaks of, and the tempo echos like a heartbeat.

I kiss the sky, fly to the sun
I close my eyes, but I’m wide awake
She’s on the phone, she’s talking loud
Can’t hear a word, what did you say?
I call a cab, I take a drag
You wanna meet, I’ll find a place
I feel the rush and I hesitate
There’s always something in the way

Every song gives you something to unpack, providing you depth while instrumentally keeping you exhilarated. It’s a reminder that there are highs and there are lows, but it is important to always look towards the next high, the next Monday. The album specifically urges the pursuit of the highs, not just allowing them to happen. After 4,700 minutes streamed and reaching the status of #1 listener on every song, I think I am qualified to say that successfully reframed my entire week.

Footnotes

1. Cole Clisby had a friend who’s father who worked with Blink-182, and eventually, interned for a Blink-182 (also a southern California trio) studio operator, so they have been in the music scene since an extremely young age. ↩

2. originally, they aimed to be called the mondays, a band called the mondays already existed, so, playing off of that incident, they became almost monday ↩

3. behind our latest single: “superprism” ⭐️🪩🌈🕺✨💿 #almostmonday #superprism #AM2 #TGIAM ↩