[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]Photo by Chantal Elise as part of the “In the Band: Michigan Music Behind a Feminist Lens.” For more of her work, head to www.chantalelise.com.
If Siouxsie Sioux and the cast of Hedwig and the Angry Inch shared a seedy punk venue greenroom where they exchanged Bowie impressions and candy necklace bites, you might have a slight grasp on what Dear Darkness sounds like. Self-described as somewhere between “kitsch and oblivion,” Detroit drama queens Stacey MacLeod and Samantha Linn released their latest pleasantly demented and perfectly untamed EP Get it Here earlier this week. This perplexing polyamorous marriage of grit, grime, glitter and gorgeously unique explorations of voice (both internal and external) revel in a self-made turbulence much like a wave pool in a motel bathtub.
Don’t mistaken aforementioned “kitsch” as a dismissal of sincerity. Although riotously playful, Get it Here provokes a teeth grinding, guttural exorcism that just happens to be covered in frosting and sprinkles. Lyrically, the EP kicks and screams but not without cracks where a beautifully strange vulnerability pushes through. The swollen, voice breaking delivery of the lyrics: “Why don’t you notice me? I’m right here” from the track “You Ain’t Tried it With Me” encompasses the tug-of-war vibe of the entire collection. The drums are scathing, the guitar restless. and the warbled and tortured ferocity of MacLeod and Linn’s harmonizing fuse to redefine punk, pop and human fragility in one fell swoop. Yes, the EP is shockingly consistent but that observation seems to belittle the entirety of what Dear Darkness is attempting to do here. More than consistency, what they’ve managed to do in five songs and under 18 minutes is, above all else, really fucking special.
Indulge in Dear Darkness’s rare breed of strange on “Get it Here” below:
In the 80s, Detroit took on Chicago House and European electronica and quickly became pioneers in the creation of techno and the myriad of sub genres that followed. As an adverse counterpart to popular music, techno challenged radio ready hits and the contradictory exclusivity of punk while maintaining a sonic political retaliation against inner-city struggle. In doing so the city created a sphere in which bass lines and drum beats invited the world to move both inward and outward.
This past weekend marked what most of Detroit consider to be more holy than Christmas. The Movement Festival honors the birthplace of techno and electronic music by throwing the most playfully outrageous three-day party where freaks can be freaks and non-freaks can unearth their spiritual resonance. Whether you’re finding yourself, losing yourself or just curious enough to feel something new, there is no better opportunity than Movement. Yes, like any festival you can anticipate $4 bottles of water and over policing and under-supplying of toilet paper, but what Movement offers the techno community is a true celebration of one of the most unexpectedly poetic musical revolutions in the history of the city and quite honestly, the world. A culture was born. People found home. And while our pillowcases may feel abandoned as we collectively remove glitter out of our tear ducts, we are still coming down from the trip. Below are some of my favorite sedated, ambient tracks for the end of the after-after party (or just as suitably for the beginning).
Stacey “Hotwaxx” Hale “The PeeKs” (2016)
[fusion_soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/255276600″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]The Godmother of Detroit House, Stacey “Hotwaxx” Hale has stood her ground and made waves with her distinct thrashing funk. But in her track “The PeeKs” she finds an ambient softness that is the ideal soundscape for post-party come down.
Jon Zott “Make Plans” ft. Yellokake (2015)
[fusion_soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/205112511″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]
Most notably one of the busiest most desirable producers in Detroit, Jon Zott has a remarkable ear for bass line heartbeats. “Make Plans” flirts with pop vocals and muffled beat subtlety that feels sexy and sad.
Carl Craig “At Les” (1997)
Carl Craig is one of the most influential producers and DJ’s in Detroit’s rich techno history. His catalog swells and deflates with a subversive consciousness that gives the aural illusion of time travel; sounds bouncing back and forth off of one another like a psychedelic paradox. “At Les” is a prime example of this restraint vs. release vibe while still remaining stoned and ambient.
4. Cybotron “Techno City” (1984)
Formed in 1980 by Juan Atkins and Richard “3070” Davis, Cybotron paved the way for the echoing, intergalactic seduction that has been a cornerstone of Techno for years. “Techno City” feels grimy and sludgy yet invites you into their underground with a sexual pulse.
5. Kevin Saunderson “E-Dancer” (1996)
One cannot mention techno without recognizing one of the most detrimental founding fathers of the genre, Kevin Saunderson. Having reshaped electronic music with his insatiable knack for channeling both the past and future through trance-like grooves and dizzying tremors, Saunderson’s “E-Dancer” is a great example of his distorted snake funk.
6. BLKSHRK “Arm Floatties (Night Swim)” (2015)
Eddie Logix and Blair French teamed up to form BLKSHRK, an underwater groove that pulses and pumps with a delicacy suited for a tangled dance of sea amoeba and space-age mer-folk.
7. Stone Owl “Chemtrails” (2013)
An elusive twosome, Stone Owl is a local techno cult favorite. Although dance-able, Stone Owl latched onto an underlying sinister playfulness that pokes and prods the darkness out of the light. “CHEMTRAILS” is calming with bursts of anxious energy that sizzles like electricity in water, creating a chasm that shakes you from your hiding place.
Dreamy, nostalgia-heavy four piece, Double Winter returns with the sugary and elusively heartbreaking track “XO, Skeleton” off their upcoming EP Watching Eye. The track sounds pleasantly unfinished, the production slightly tinny, the vocals wistful and monotone. “XO, Skeleton” doesn’t overthink and in doing so delivers a sweetly melancholic, hair-twirling, window-watching serenade. The hook “see you when you come back home” is, in context, is universally applicable. The ambiguity of the subject’s lovers distance and the duration of their stay could be as simple as hours, days or months and it could just as easily be in reference to the hypothetical never/someday. It isn’t until a little more than halfway through when the track strays from its straight line and swerves into a thrashing outburst that illustrates the inner chaos of having to wait for someone. The shift from patience to urgency is what makes “XO, Skeleton” a surprising pre-summer petit four.
If you were craving some imitation Pavement-esque languid LoFi rock, look no further than Ypsilanti-based Minihorse, who released their drowsy EP More Time earlier this month. Comprised of lead vocalist and guitarist Ben Collins, Christian Anderson on bass and John Fossum on drums, Minihorse is noticeably affected, pleasantly dehydrated college indie; nothing swells or lends catharsis, but instead encourages driving aimlessly around the same few square miles with a broken tape deck that you had installed in your new 2016 hybrid. The single, “FYEA” is a callused late-summer-of-1994 track that radiates a trippy teenage petulance worthy of a hangover. It’s catchy, yes, but hard to remember. The closing track, “Under My Head” is the most complete thought on the EP, with Jon Brion vibes paired with a whispered deprecation that sneakily depresses you with the lyrics: “The things I could be/if I could get out of bed.” More Time, at the very least, is consistent. Not meant to serve as some grand feeling-prodder, Minihorse found their sweet spot even if it does feels like buying expensive jeans with manufactured stains and holes; fashionably wearable with questionable authenticity. Having said that, I like More Time. I get it. It feels lightly stoned, slightly tipsy, peppered with a hazy self-indulgence that makes you wonder where you’ve heard this before even if you’ve never heard it before.
A gorgeously disorientating chasm of black holes and white ones, A Moon Shaped Pool is a deeply personal, impermeable eruption. Radiohead does not depart from their signature marriage of mathematical chaos and dismembered romanticism, rather expand beyond it with a new fragility that elicits life, death, and the endless versions of self trapped between the atmosphere. With their collective angst and existential inquisition still intact, Radiohead’s vulnerability takes magnetic and celestial form with A Moon Shaped Pool:Less voyeuristic, more confessional. Less teeth, more blood. A remarkable testament to the tortured beauty of Thom Yorke’s choral vocal dance paired with Jonny Greenwood’s immaculate collaboration with the London Contemporary Orchestra, their ninth studio album proves that Radiohead has successfully monopolized cohesion. They have not run out of things to say nor ways to say them – and they certainly have not exhausted ways to make us feel something. Arguably the most important collection in their nine album, 24 year career, A Moon Shaped Pool patiently pulls back the skin on love, exposing the very universe Radiohead has prepared us for all along.
The album’s opener, “Burn The Witch” is physically unsettling and darts with operatic anxiety like night rain on a moving windshield. Released just days before the album, “Burn The Witch” feels like an elusive lark in context to the complete picture. For those who assumed “Burn The Witch” would reflect how the rest of the album would sound, you were somewhat wrong. Radiohead, in true Radiohead fashion, gave us a glimpse of the ending and put it at the beginning. “This is a low flying panic attack” Thom Yorke warbles against Jonny Greenwood’s lush, jutting orchestration of strings that stab and sway with equal force. “Burn the witch/we know where you live” preys on Radiohead’s politically charged fears, addressing glaring truths with disarming poetry.
As “Burn the Witch” comes to a heart-racing halt, “Daydreaming” swoops down and induces a different breed of panicked consonance. Its shimmery underwater pulse is dizzying, though never clumsy and Yorke’s ethereal, marble-mouthed vacancy is overflowing with tender exploration. For a song so achingly devoid of hope, “Daydreaming” manages to find a divine spectral beauty that is reserved for sensations as consequential as the loss of love or even the death of a parent. Is it a break-up song? Possibly. Although it feels crude to reduce it to what seems like a tabloid buzz word. “Daydreaming” is a stumbling soundscape of time and vast archives of memory, even moving in reverse repeating the fan-speculated decoding of the lyrics “Half of my life, half of my life.”
It is after these two very different tastes of melancholy that the album swells into what could be a dystopian funeral for 2007’s In Rainbows and the estranged lover of “Codex” off of 2011’s underrated King Of Limbs. “Identikit”feels like the sequel toKid A‘s “Idioteche” where the “Women and children first” have been absorbed into “Broken hearts/Make it rain” and “Ful Stop” could be an adjacent ocean to Rainbows’ “Weird Fishes/Arpeggi” both with the rapid chit-chit sound of Philip Selway’s drums. But even with these scattered comparisons to their catalog, A Moon Shaped Pool stands completely on its own and very much alone. “Desert Island Disk” finds a unique moment of ethereal twangy mountain folk paired with a crooning Yorke anchored to a matter-of -factness through the lyrics “Different types of love” and “You know what I mean” and taps into feels Neil Young-esque territory. Whereas “The Numbers” follows a slinking, almost seductive trajectory that drifts into “Present tense” a peaceful cry of sand shifting pop. A Moon Shaped Pool’s textural landscapeis by no means indecisive rather resonates as not-of-this-world and blushes with a concrete unity.
A stirring conclusion to an emotionally taut album, “True Love Waits” is reincarnated here as a tragically serene plea in which shimmering piano and comet tail strings wrap around Yorke’s crumbling echo. For a song that has been a fan favorite for 20 years, “True Love Waits” finally finds a home with unearthed resolve. With what could be considered Radiohead’s love song (of which, in some ways, there are many, but few have found a direct line to the guttural collapse of having loved the way this song does). “I’m not living/ I’m just killing time” Yorke confesses, surrounded by a disjointed fluttering of keys and an unintelligible rolling static that imitates the distant sound of fire burning. As a final and desperate call to love, he begs “Just don’t leave/ don’t leave” in what could easily be the most delicately bruised version of Radiohead we have ever met. But it is with that plea that we are the ones who are left. A hauntingly resonant exit and acknowledgment of finality, loneliness and longing, “True Love Waits” finds a way to say so much with so little and leaves us traumatized with self reflection. A Moon Shaped Pool is a beautifully perilous journey, and even up until the very last whisper we are painfully reminded that some things are worth the wait.
Watch the Paul Thomas Anderson directed video for Daydreaming below:
Dreamy Detroit indie rock foursome FAWNN premiered their first single off of their anticipated forthcoming sophomore album Ultimate Oceans on Stereogum last week. An iridescent pop track reminiscent of Washed Out meets a sedated The New Pornographers,”Galaxies” is familiar and satisfying yet feels defeated. “Galaxies” is prom night for mid to late twenty-somethings who sway in misguided unison to the shared disenchantment of young love turned static: the death of the honeymoon phase. Listless imagery painting spacial comparisons between intimacy and celestial phenomena is nothing new, and FAWNN struggles to breathe sincerity into this very evocation. What “Galaxies” DOES provide, however, is the aural equivalent to the ambivalence of drinking overly spiked punch, texting your ex a sad version of “hey” and half-heartedly hoping you don’t end up going home alone. The bass line is lulling and instinctual and when paired with the droll delicacies of the vocal harmonies, “Galaxies” creates more distance than it fills. This is likely an intentional sensation as the stand out lyric “Now that we’re allowed to touch/it’s over/Galaxies inside” encapsulates simply the boredom and painful loss of fascination when a love/like has run its respective course. Maybe that’s what makes “Galaxies” a frustrating listen. Maybe it yanks on that dark inner mess that we have been meaning to clean up but just haven’t made time for. It’s a song about passionate indifference and although successful in its glittery tones and thoughtful production, it is almost too literal in its heartbroken lethargy to feel anything more than “meh.”
Space out with the first taste from FAWNN’s latest “Galaxies” below:
“What if I don’t feel anything?” This is the only thing on my mind when “Burn the Witch” was released Tuesday morning, the first song from Radiohead’s imminent ninth album and their first release since 2011’s King of Limbs. While Radiohead was busy meticulously erasing their website and social media presence, I wrestled the forces of expectation and the overflow of noise that filled this Radiohead-less five year gap. I have been primed by the ominously poetic gestures of the past enough times to know very well that Radiohead’s disappearing act on Sunday was not a self-indulgent white flag rather the benevolently habitual signaling of an alarm. They warned us, as they often do.
As rich in disruptive, dystopian commentary on societal atrocity and the extinction of the individual as “Burn the Witch” is, it is just as profoundly relevant in what it doesn’t address: the swollen negative space. When Thom Yorke sleepily instructs “Shoot the messenger,” I can’t help but think he has us collectively pegged as both the hunter and the hunted. This is Radiohead’s signature grandiose apocalypse reimagined.
The steady building seizure of strings dance between a sun-drenched reincarnation and a Hitchcock-ian shower stabbing, resuscitating Radiohead’s kinship with symphonic depravity. “Burn the Witch” elicits an internal strangulation that both induces a nightmare and lulls you back to sleep once you’ve stopped screaming.
There is nothing coy about Flint-based Cheerleader’s first full-length album, Bitchcraft. It is a riotous collection of defiant anti-apologies, that if delivered in any way other than Cheerleader’s impenetrable assault, would reinforce the very holding back they’re fighting against. Bitchcraft is the ultimate “fuck you” manifesto aimed to destroy, disarm, and devour the state of counterrevolution. Fully equipped with an advanced artillery of punk purism and unflinching feminism, Bitchcraft doesn’t knock. It grants itself permission.
The power of Christina “Polly” McCollum (lead vocals, guitar), Ashley MacDermaid (bass), and Nisa Seal (drums) is not contingent on image, labels or accessibility, rather their undeniable cohesion in being able to tear down the construct and crippling societal misogyny without compromising sincerity. The album opens with a shrill “WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR, HUH? WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR?” which feels more like a dare than a question. The words bleed into the opening track “Beauty Queen” where McCollum delivers the first of many deafening blows with repeating the lines “I am more than my body.” Although the album clocks in just over 23 minutes, don’t mistaken its brevity for a shortcut. Quite the contrary. Cheerleader is free of filler or watery withdrawals, saying what needs to be said without finding polite euphemisms to spare feelings. Closing out the track “Friday Night Bites” during an Addams Family worthy bass line, McCollum exclaims: “No one cared about you then/no one cares about you now,” a testament to that one thing we have always wanted to say to that person we’ve always wanted to say it to. That’s the beauty of the anti-beauty of Cheerleader’s debut album. They have found a way to inspire without the squishy connotation.
To say this is an important record for women is like saying it’s wet when it rains. The overarching message of reprisal through rebellion and tenacity channeled by audacity is what, when conjoined with their tightly woven, Bikini Kill sludge, elevates Bitchcraft from an argument to an uprising.
Listen to Bitchcraft in its entirety here and check out the track “Beauty Queen” below:
[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]Artwork was created by sculptor Clinton Snider and visual artist Tony Katai with help from Playground Detroit.
Multi-instrumentalist Alex Kaye and vocalist Lianna Vanicelli are Valley Hush, Detroit’s celestial pop duo whose flirtatious macabre swells in their latest single “Iris.” For a song that encapuslates escapism without sounding recklessness, “Iris” is a seamlessly produced mélange of jutting synths, animated chiming, and cosmic vocals that what at times feels like a marriage between Bollywood and Portishead on amphetamines.
“Iris” is a tempestuous seduction of straight lines and blurred edges that challenge the traditional trajectory of a sexy pop song. If rolling your hips in slow motion had a soundtrack, this would be it. In its provocation, “Iris” never feels cheap or expected. The track exudes an aural illusion of time being rewound and fast forwarded simultaneously, and reveals glimpses of the complete real-time picture, reminding us that the beauty of the track is in its visual symphony. Paired with the imaginative orchestration, Vanicelli’s voice quivers with a spacial lucidity through the airy phrasing of the lyrics: “I know that it can be hard to wake up/sometimes the nights are moving slow/you think you’re dying alone /and I know how the highs get low.”
There is never a moment in “Iris” that feels nostalgic. This comes as a compliment. Valley Hush found a space between the present and future, crafting a sensual purgatory that is as sincere as it is politely hedonistic.
Flint Eastwood‘s “Glitches” finds its heroine in Jax Anderson, whose battle with her mother’s death gave us the album Small Victories last fall. Small Victories was a eulogy, a cry for closure, and ultimately a poetic pop anthem for anyone who has ever suffered immeasurable loss. Don’t mistake Anderson’s confessionary vulnerability for weakness; she rises up and throws emotional punches in “Glitches” like a boxer in training in preparation for the ultimate head to head: the past v. the future.
The video is simple in its content but executed with a cinematic richness that reads as an autobiographical dream, or more so peephole into the internal mechanism required to face her own mortality. The video follows Anderson as she begins training with a coach who is also training a young boy. This paralleled shared experience between the antagonist and the child is reflective of the connectivity between our inner child and our adult self, realizing that the fight within is inherently present. There are several visceral cuts to Anderson as the only passenger on a boat speeding across the water that evokes an urgency as the viewer can only assume that she is searching for the intangible.
The video gives the illusion of slow motion and embodies a discernable hesitation. This barely palatable distortion of speed feels like a personal attempt at the grieving platitude of taking one day at a time, but in “Glitches” proves to be a poignant play on sensationalized time. The climax reveals cuts of Anderson in the ring to her feverish hunt in a sun drenched church, where she confronts a television screening real home movies of her as a little girl featuring her mother as she mouths the words “Turn it Off!” to the camera man. It is the fusion of this authentic, remarkably personal moment tied to a Anderson’s semi-fictionalized characterization that tugs on our own experiences and poses the question: “how do we move on?”
Watch Jax Anderson throw some emotional punches below:
No, you’re not crazy. It was just a few short months ago that I was praising Lunar Phases, the debut LP from the space-psych rock four piece Moonwalks. Where Lunar Phases left off, their latest track “Steam Train” picks up with a feverish sense of self, pushing further into cosmic cohesion that feels both seasoned and sensational. After headlining the Hamtramck Music Festival this past weekend (hailed Detroit’s best music mashup year after year) and an upcoming gig this month supporting Diane Coffee (members of Foxygen) the band celebrates their two year “band-iversary” by announcing yet another LP on the way, In Light (The Scales In The Frame).
“Steam Train” taps into the very things I love about Moonwalk’s reinterpretation of 60’s sedated rock, entangled with early Black Rebel Motorcycle club meets a zombie-fied The Dream Syndicate vibes. Even in its untamed composition, the lyrics compliment and combat with aching purification. The track opens with a slow build to the lyrics: “Mind is a window/mind is a window/mind is a window/every night” as the symbol crashing, bass pulse breaks through that very window. Although lyrically minimal and sonically repetitive, Moonwalks finds a sweet spot in the arrangement that is dark, subversive, and feels like fun you shouldn’t be having. It isn’t that “Steam Train” responds with a maturity that Lunar Phases lacked, rather that they root deeper into their next generation.
Catch Moonwalks playing w/Diane Coffee March 26th at Marble Bar in Detroit.
I’m not okay. I’ve said this out loud and silently in mirrors at least a three hundred times over the past week. I’m. Feeling. Mean. Winter is hovering around like an unwanted party guest and I’ve exhausted pop radio’s repetitive and empty saccharine excuses. When you feel that the world is against you and your most indestructible desire is to destruct, destroy, and stick it to the man, there will always be punk music to be the anguished devil on your shoulder telling the angel to GTFO. These feelings are necessary. Embrace them when they rear their disruptive heads and tap into that under-the-skin earthquake of whatever it is that’s pissing you off, and remember that music’s got your back. I’ve curated a soundtrack of thrashing, unsettling, and provocative punk straight from Detroit‘s veins, both past and present to amplify and detoxify.
Labeled as one of the reigning pioneers of hardcore punk in the midwest, Negative Approach formed in ’81 and had a lasting impact for the scenes to follow. They broke up in ’84 but have returned over recent years to perform some of the most amped up shows in Detroit’s history. “Nothing” encapsulates what has made Negative Approach legendary with its screeching guitar, saliva soaked screaming, and anti-conformist, nihilistic give-no-fucks attitude.
Timmy Vulgar of Third Man Record’s beloved Timmy’s Organism is considered the hardest working punk in the industry. Previously Vulgar lent his twisted visions to the late 90’s Epileptix and Clone Defects and the warped roughness of Human Eye and the prig-punk punch Reptile Forcefield. But with Organism, Timmy has gained serious momentum throwing inhibition to the wind with psychedelic riffs paired with stabbing percussions, all framed by Timmy’s own brand of in your face vocals. “Heartless Heathen” is infectious.
Protomartyr is known for their 70’s post-punk, Motor City garage rock fusion. From 2012’s No Passion All Technique, “Jumbo’s” is Protomartyr at their best. Guteral, echoed, vocals drowned out by drugged bass lines and clashing high hat heavy drums are the antithesis of pro-establishment. Protomartyr carved out their own sweet spot by making angst accessible and catchy.
Formed in 1997 by Amy Gore, Gore Gore Girls incorporate harmonizing with a surfer punk edge in “Hard Enough” off of 2007’s Get The Gore. At a time when punk in Detroit was losing its voice, these girls broke through the stagnation of the late 90’s and gave new life to garage-rock era by infusing caffeinated instrumentals and unapologetic vocals that feels like a thrasher film meshed with a break-up mix tape.
Maybe one of the most forgotten vestiges of sleazy glam-punk, Trash Brats never wanted to be taken seriously. But over time, their music still remains in the dusty attics of our collective music story. This steady and slow jam from ’90 cries “They say that Jesus saves, but tell me who?” over static punk chords that are as iconic as they are ironic.
I remember my mom blasting this as a kid. My parents were punks and The Meatmen were THE punks. From their ’95 album Pope on a Rope, “I Want Drugs” rants off names of drugs from heroin to demerol as if it were a coked out nursery rhyme. The Meatmen were raunchy, vile, and a vital piece to Detroit’s punk puzzle.
Timmy Vulgar might be considered the hardest working punk in the biz, but I know Child Bite to be the most relentless band of modern traditionalist punks around. They are seemingly always on tour and are forever pumping out unforgiving fuck-you anthems, like this track off of their 2014 release Strange Waste.
Rarely do I say this about music. Perhaps I’m a bit jaded, but while all of us lovers were kissing on Valentine’s Day, Detroit-based Earth Engine dropped their self-titled debut EP, a beautifully confused collection nearly five years in the making. Earth Engine’s EP is a spastic, satiated cluster of baroque rock that has wrangled a plethora of genres and in the process created their own. Although it sounds schizophrenic the first time around, it becomes progressively more coherent. If King Crimson collaborated with MUSE on some hyper-theatrical Jeff Buckley directed stage production of how the universe was created (and how it will subsequently be destroyed), you might be able to understand where Earth Engine is coming from. For an EP that carries a tangible weightiness and at times delves into disparity, there is an ethereal airiness to its structure and intricate layering that takes the album into cathartic flight (and the listener along with it).
“Red River” is a slinky Dead Weather-ish caffeinated jazz jam that shifts gears into “A Fever of Static,” which opens with classic piano that morphs into a jutting, metallic, percussion heavy nod to anthemic rock. And just when you thought you were getting the hang of Earth Engine’s aesthetically challenging vibe comes the closing track (and my personal favorite) “Year One” where the tension from the previous tracks finally breaks through the atmospheric barrier into masterful resolve. You hear the protagonist overcome defeatism or whatever earthly shackles were holding him to the ground. “I rather die than wait,” he repeats with whispered heroism, adding “I’ve never been one to yield to reason,” which, in context, is a beautifully understated summary of the entirety of the EP.
My dozen or so listens have not answered my original question. In fact, it has been replaced with “What. The. Hell. Was. That?” Earth Engine caught me off guard and off balance. I am completely enthralled by this unexpectedly powerful EP that carries with it a determination that I feel that rock music has been missing for the past decade. Excitedly, I am left scratching my head while making room for new feelings, genre-defying reference points, and redefined sensations of unconventional beauty. Earth Engine is on to something (and I’ll be the first to tell you as soon as I figure it out).
My favorite gush worthy trip-hop duo, Gosh Pith, returned this week with another treat from their upcoming EP, Gold Chain, due out February 26. Directed by Shane Ford and chock-full of my friends, acquaintances, and fellow kindred city spirits, “K9” is described as “a story about a young love triangle in the heart of the Detroit underground.” The video is dizzying, enchanting, and perfectly encapsulates the hazy romanticism of Detroit’s landscape.
Shot through the eyes of explorative youth who are tempted with growing up too fast, “K9” is met with a thoughtful innocence and sweetness that speaks to that nostalgic space of feeling small in a big world and the desire to be taken seriously. Each scene explores familiar rites of passage. From stealing a gold bottled beverage and gold chain candy bar from the convenience store, to becoming blood brothers and sisters on the steps of an abandoned house, to sneaking into an after hours club where they yield a gun for fun and turn down the offer to snort lines of gold glitter. As the viewer, you never fear for these kids and you don’t criticize their judgment because what “K9” does best is connect us to the restless teenager buried within our jaded adult skin.
More like a film than a video, Gosh Pith found a poetic way to capture ennui, peer pressure while still remaining “cool,” which seems to be the shared goal of our three, baby faced actors. The repeated hook, “We just don’t know nothin’ baby” is simple and telling of the human condition (and the teenage one, respectively) and reads more like a movie script line than a lyric, making “K9″ an unexpectedly evolved and evocative experience.
If you’ve seen the cover of this month’s TIME Magazine or have recently tuned into any national media outlet, you know that Detroit’s sister city, Flint, is in crisis. Due to corrupt government, dangerous mismanagement, and incompetence, thousands of Flint residences have been poisoned by lead through the water system.
Long story short, Flint was getting its water from Detroit until 2011 when Gov. Rick Snyder, due to economic disparity, decided that Flint would begin receiving water from the Flint river, despite the water’s highly corrosive makeup and the cities aging, weathered pipeline. The water itself is not poisoned with lead, but is so corrosive that it is stripping the lead pipes. Last fall, auto manufacturers refused the usage of Flint water as it was corroding the auto parts, yet it continued to pump into every household, poisoning an entire city. Despite the President issuing a state of emergency and the allocation of 80 million dollars in FEMA relief funds to assist Flint in its recovery, the damage is irreversible.
I know what you’re thinking. What does this have to do with music? Well, nothing, really. Other than the fact that I feel that I bear the shared responsibility of social consciousness as an artist and fellow human taking up space on this floating ball in space. I couldn’t help but search for some convoluted way to draw attention to this issue, while also finding personal solace through the only outlet that I knew. I’ve curated a playlist of “water songs” by Michigan artists with the hope of a healthy resolve for the millions of people around the world who do not have access to safe drinking water, which now include the thousands of children and families of Flint, Michigan. Let these tracks wash over you and extinguish any unwanted fires.
Eddie Logix and Blair French are BLKSHRK. Released last year, Jellyfish on Cassette is an ocean of temperamental pulsations. The project fuses programmed sampled, live takes and improvisation all of which swell. “Arm Floaties (Night Swim)” gives gives the aural allusion of treading deep water.
This alternate take of “Tidal” from 800beloved‘s dreamy sophomore record, Everything Purple, is a trembling and sedated beachside lullaby. Lynch’s breathy vocals paired with the distant and upbeat pop distortions forms the sensation of having a sun stained memory you wish you could return to.
A standout track off of their 2013 album Wormfood, “Water” is drowsy and pleasantly complacent, much like falling asleep in a filled-to-the-rim bathtub. It’s a smug track about the things we normally don’t have the guts to confess about the disinterest in meaningful love and sex. It’s the type of song that demands hydration; a sonic hangover.
Before they dropped the Nascar kitsch, JRJR released Patterns. “Dark Water” is reminiscent of The Shins with hints of Jon Brion, making it both sugary and brooding. The Beach Boys-esque harmonizing and piano crescendo mask the heaviness of the repeated imagery of drowning which makes this bubbly pop track ironic and bittersweet.
One of my favorite Detroit duos, Gosh Pith, channel a sleepy Animal Collective/Vampire Weekend vibe with a track off their 2015 EP, Window. “Waves” challenges the listener to let go, internalizing the symbolic properties of water via a gentle, lapping synth pop track.
The Gories: “Goin’ To The River”
[/fusion_builder_column][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]
The Gories formed back in 1986 and were fearless in welding 60’s garage rock with hyper rhythm blues. “Goin’ To The River” from I Know You Fine, but How You Doin’ released in 1990, is defiant and demands rowdiness. This track by The Gories is a perfect example of their lasting and often overlooked influence.
What I consider to be the most under appreciated album in Iggy Pop’s catalogue and one of the most important contributions to post-punk, New Values is full of songs as jutting as this one. “Endless Sea” is particularly provocative. The synth breakdown along with seductive, temperate vocals are the perfect pairing for giving the drugged sensation of literal endlessness.
The Dead Weather: “Will There Be Enough Water”[/fusion_builder_column][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]
The Dead Weather may be my favorite collaboration from the diverse repertoire of Detroit’s golden child, Jack White. White along with Alison Mosshart (of The Kills) make for a sexually hypnotic rock experience. “Will There Be Enough Water” is a smokey, blues infused anti-apology that is as thirsty as it is satiated.
The folkiest track on the playlist, “Waterfall” off of Fred Thomas’ Kuma is moody and textured like a messier, sleep deprived Elvis Perkins. The song begs “Come on everyone/it’s time to go see the waterfall” an uplifting chorus partnered with moaning string arrangements keeps “Waterfall” in the heartache category.
This track off of Don’t Wait by experimental pop duo Valley Hush could easily be a secret video game level trudging through sparkling, underwater sludge where Lana Del Rey meets St. Vincent. It’s more sensational than literal, but the ominous gurgling noise is animatedly visual.
If you would like to learn how you can help the residents of Flint, Michigan, click here.
Detroit-adopted Ann Arborite and premier Motown revivalist, Mayer Hawthorne, returned this week with another funk infused groove, “Cosmic Love” from his fourth solo studio LP (his first in three years) due out this spring. If you’re unfamiliar, you might think Hawthorne is just another white boy relying on soulful affectation. What you should know is that Hawthorne has built his reputation on authentically modernizing funk, soul and Detroit’s signature Motown sound in a way that has always felt fresh and fun but with a soothing melancholy that speaks to what Hawthorne does best: croon and groove.
This time around, however, I feel as though Hawthorne missed an opportunity. “Cosmic Love”, for me, is borderline comical. It could fit into a shaky Shaft-esque 1970’s amateur porn or a montage scene from an Anchorman movie with equal fluidity. It’s satirical in its literal interpretation using galactic twinkling synths, Hawthorne’s spacey echoed vocals, and the breathy female background chorus, all of which makes “Cosmic Love” feel more like a store-bought Halloween costume than a reinvention of your parent’s vintage wardrobe.
Am I a jerk for longing for heartbroken, lovelorn Hawthorne circa 2009’s A Strange Arrangement? Or story driven, assertively dreamy Hawthorne from 2013’s Where Does This Door Go? Considering Hawthorne is an artist who begs us to turn the clocks back, isn’t it natural for me to want to do the same? It should be said that I like “Cosmic Love.” I do. I can appreciate its playful, candied kitsch. The single opens with the lyrics “If I had a dollar/For every dream of you and me/I’d buy myself a rocket/And shoot into your galaxy” and by the end all I can think is that I wished he would have shot a little further.
[fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”]Photos by Alicia Gbur. Clockwise from top left: Christian Doble, Michael Spence, Matt Rickle, and Alicia Gbur.
Whilst record shopping, my eye caught a gig poster featuring none other than one of my longtime favorite local foursomes, FAWNN, and I thought to myself, “these assholes should take that poster down.” I figured it was old, and that the record store should be punished for getting my hopes up. To my surprise, it wasn’t old, and the show hadn’t happened yet. In fact, FAWNN joins Siamese, Odd Hours, and Tart January 30th at The Loving Touch in Ferndale.
When FAWNN formed in 2010, they were already seasoned veterans of the indie rock Detroit culture. Alicia Gbur was front woman of The Nice Device as well as a touring member of The Von Bondies. Christian Doble rocked with Child Bite and Kiddo, and later added drummer Matt Rickle of Javelins and Thunderbirds Are Now!, along with Mike Spence who was a member of the sultry pop force Those Transatlantics. With their rich musical resumes backing them and their irreverent collage of talent propelling them, FAWNN created their first LP, Coastlines, in 2012. Reminiscent of The New Pornographers’ Twin Cinema meets The Shins’ Chutes Too Narrow with a sprinkling of Surfer Blood’s Astro Coast, Coastlines fell into the category of albums that demanded an encore.Four years later, it looks as though we will finally get one.
“We’ve been recording it over the last two years and it’s finished! It’s called Ultimate Oceans and will be out on Quite Scientific in the late spring,” says friend and drummer, Matt Rickle. “We’re stoked about it. The four of us really hit a good stride.” The gap between releases was contingent on guitarist Mike Spence, who split to take a job opportunity. “We didn’t want to replace him,” Rickle said. “But now he’s back! It took a little time to get this album together. It never really felt like we stopped.”
Yes, it’s great news that FAWNN is returning. But after knowing Rickle for as long as I have and learning that he is as passionate of an admirer as I am, it was impossible for me not to mention the magnitude of our shared mourning over the loss of the incomparable David Bowie. “Ever since I discovered my dad’s copy of Young Americans 20 years ago, Bowie has been it for me. He gave me a taste of the strange early on, and my tastes went sideways ever since then,” says Rickle. “I feel like I recognize his urge to always try something different and reinvent your creativity.” I have no doubt that FAWNN’s followup will be an expression of the aforementioned reinvention of creativity, and Detroit can’t wait to hear what that sounds like.
Check out the video for “No Wave” from FAWNN’s 2012 release here:
This is not a reinvention. This is not an attempt at recreation. And this is most certainly not a desperate cry for relevancy. This is Blackstar, the latest resurrection from our fearless space age troubadour and faithful freak, David Bowie. There is simple poetry for releasing his 25th studio album on his 69th birthday. Blackstar feels like a gift and paradoxically a curse as he explores tragedy, nihilism, and dystopia — but with a hopeful tonality that makes us believe what I’ve always thought to be true: Bowie knows something we don’t. What feels like a gentle retaliation against the pressures of legacy and the acceptance of finality, Bowie filters his message through a voice that is less fictionalized character or crafted moniker but through David Bowie at 69: a man who has lived it ten times or more.
“It’s like Blackstar is his attempt at invisibility,” Michael said. We sat in the still of the closing track “I Can’t Give Everything Away.” I explain to him my elementary attempt at a scientific definition of a black star and how the way in which one is forged prevents the particles from occupying the same space at the same time. We talk about Bowie’s body of work and I remind Michael of that time three years ago when I had decided I would crash my car into a cement divider on the freeway. I was crying, it was raining, and Bowie’s “Modern Love” came over the radio as I closed my eyes and stopped tracing the lines of the road in my mind. “But I never wave bye-bye/But I try/I try.” Bowie forced my eyes open as the road curved to the right and my hands regained their grip. I didn’t die that day three years ago. Bowie made sure of it.
It is after two thorough listens of Blackstar that I go out for a cigarette. I was already procrastinating and flirting with my deadline, but a cigarette in the quiet confines of Michael’s garage seemed necessary. Michael follows behind even though he doesn’t smoke. I squat on the ground for warmth and open Facebook instinctively. I scroll through three statuses all claiming the same horrifying news. I hand Michael my phone. “Tell me it’s not real.” He takes it from my hands, scrolls, scrolls, taps and shakes his head with an open mouth. “I’m sorry.” He said. “David Bowie is dead.”
We stand several feet apart, suspended by loss and paralyzed with “What now?”
“Let’s get some air.”
I fumbled with the frozen door handle and propel myself forward, as if the house were on fire and I was fighting for smokeless air. I looked to the sky and desperately wanted to see a star or a sign of life. But the winter clouds were thick and the air was tight against my throat. “I hope he knew. He had to know that we loved him.” Michael and I shivered against each other as I covered his shoulder in tears and snot. “He knew.” Michael said. Similarly, I knew the universe continued to swell and explode from behind the Michigan clouds and out of human sight in the same way that Bowie will never truly be gone. Out of reach, maybe, but never gone.
A final act, Blackstar is not. Rather a fitting ellipsis on his countless cosmic journeys through the perils of reality and once again Bowie has invited us to take his hand and follow behind, trudging gracefully against gravity and the notion that we are more than just messy, breathing constellations of matter. This journey is different, though. In this story he lets go. He leads us to the glittering precipice and simply lets go. It’s up to us now, both alone and together, to find our way back to Earth (or wherever it is we call home).
During the track “Girl Loves Me” Bowie cries, “Who the fuck’s gonna mess with me?” I can’t help but imagine him during the moments before his earthly departure with that very question on his lips and I can’t help but silently and lovingly answer “No one.”
Watch David Bowie say goodbye in the video for “Lazarus” below.
Considering that Playing Detroit is still in its infancy at just four months old, it’s no surprise that there are a slew of notable releases I missed out on this year. While compiling my Best Of list, I found it only fair to do my research and revisit the women (and their male counterparts, respectively) who made 2015 one of Detroit’s most memorable music years to date. Here are five releases from the past year that slipped under my radar but stopped me in my tracks.
Probably my favorite local punk trio, Pretty Ghouls, taps into classic punk elements without sounding like a carbon copy of yesteryear. Their energy is unmatched and their EP Dead At The Dandy Club (released in June) is an unapologetic six minutes of angst-y bliss.
Adam Michael Lee Padden and Zee Bricker are Tart. Aptly named, Tart’s July 2015 release, These Are Not Love Songs tempts 70’s L.A. new wave with bursts of Bjork worthy howling and manages to be both cathartic yet danceable.
Cactus Demos is a conversational collection of tracks that feel like a poignant post-one night stand breakfast tied with an email entitled “I Think We Should Talk.” Best Exes channels Jonathon Richman’s banter-y cadence. It feels familiar and sometimes sad, but they found a perfect formula to provoke a sense of comfort throughout. Cactus Demos is a hug, but one with pats, not rubs.
Lianna Vanicelli and Alex Kaye make up Valley Hush. Their June 2015 release, Don’t Wait, is a vast and colorful EP that could be the love child of St. Vincent and Karen O. Vanicelli’s vocals are impressive not only in regards to range, but in its evocation. The orchestration sometimes sounds like a video game under water. Don’t Wait is from another planet and undoubtedly one of the most thoughtfully produced releases this year.
Garage punk trio Prude Boys (Sadie Slam, Caroline Myrick, and Quennton Thornbury) fuses Joan Jett with The Ramones with Hunx and His Punx to make a frantically catchy cocktail on their debut EP Family Style Glamour. It’s punk you can do the mashed potato to while still feeling enough rage to break something (which you’ll clean up, of course).
I first met Gosh Pith during their soundcheck last month at the Royal Oak Music Theatre while opening for JR JR. I remember walking across the stage and making a snap judgment on their appearance, assuming I knew what they were going to sound like (something I am guilty of time to time). I had almost made it to the stairs leading to the green room when Josh Smith released his voice into the empty theatre without music to back him. It was soulful. It was sincere. It was sensual. It was completely unexpected. “Did that sound alright?” Paralyzed with the realization that I was wrong (and happily so), the other half of the self-described “cosmic trap” duo, Josh Freed, interjected his sultry, carbonated, synth beats which moved me from my frozen stance of disbelief. Smith joined in, and I was suddenly, without wavering doubt, a Gosh Pith fan.
Last week Gosh Pith released “Gold Chain,” the first single on their independently released EP due out next year. The EP could rival The Weeknd, The Neighborhood, and likely any literal weekend or neighborhood. Freed and Smith seamlessly weave indie pop with alternative R&B with a tenderness and clarity that you’d only anticipate from seasoned multi-genre artists. “Gold Chain” is a balancing act, and Gosh Pith commits to handling the track’s softness and its expletive fervor with equal care.
“Gold Chain” shares a common thread with Gosh Pith’s overall catalogue: thoughtful and tapered production. Every element is purposeful and polished with enough room to breathe. When fusing electronic beats with guitar parts and poppy, melancholic vocals, it would be an easy out to over produce or to cram convoluted, excessive texturing into the track’s tight two minutes. The use of restraint is impressive, and allows the duo to shine in their respective lights bound by their synchronistic veil of tone, mood, and sincerity.
The most intriguing element of “Gold Chain” is also my only hangup, but because I’m so intrigued it’s more of a curiosity than criticism. The abrupt ending infuriated me at first. One second I was swaying my hips in my office chair feeling compelled to text my boyfriend something sexy and sappy (something I think Gosh Pith intended to promote) and then suddenly the song dead ends with a dreamy reverb guitar strum. I felt sort of abandoned. Upon a second and third listen I realized my anger was with wanting more. Not because they didn’t give enough, but because the story felt real enough to care. I eagerly await the second act, wondering if they’ll pick up from where they left off.
Shady Groves, a collective of singer songwriters/multi instrumentalists, is Detroit‘s newest indie pop formation. Having released their first single (ever!) earlier this week, “Plain Dreams” is an unassumingly sweeping adventure ballad. If it’s any indication to how the rest of the album, Bitzer, will sound (due to release early next year) Shady Groves could fill a long standing void in the Detroit pop patchwork. My first thought was “early Fleet Foxes b-side,” which is in no way a bad thing. I had forgotten that the ambient indie pop rock scene from seven-nine years ago fizzled out quietly and that, well, I sort of miss it. Yes, it’s easily digestible and is in no way a challenging listen. It evokes sensations of the climax scene in any Fox Searchlight indie romance film from when I was a teenager; the type of song 18-year-old me would want a boy to run across the airport to stop me from boarding a plane to. “Plain Dreams” oozes the lush harmonies and textural atmospheric tendancies of the aforementioned Fleet Foxes, and though not as elevated, sometimes reflective of Band of Horses’ Ben Bidwell’s vocals if they fused with Dan Auerbach’s solo work. The cadence in which the lyrics are presented is soft, but thoughtfully arranged in a way that gives the aural illusion of travel, which makes the track feel fully realized. It sounds strange to say that Shady Groves seems like a resurgence of a genre that has inherently had very little presence here in Detroit, but that is why something like “Plain Dreams” with its aptly titled plainness, feels new.
Think John Hughs meets Beach House topped with whipped cream, a cherry, and that mix tape your imaginary boyfriend would have made you in the early 90’s. This is the essence of “All The Outs Are Free,” the new single from Grand Rapids-based dream pop four piece, Dear Tracks. I first met Dear Tracks at an intimate outdoor shoe gaze/indie pop festival I MC’d this past summer. Though their stage presence was quiet and unassuming, their bubbling, contemplative, synth pop vibes filled the open space while I sprawled my bare legs out into the grass, taking note of the toggle of control between the setting sun and the rising moon. I remember being transported, though carefully, to what felt like a video game bonus level, but in real life and real time. Comprised of Matt Messore, Victoria Ovenden, Jacob Juodawlkis and Alex Militello, Dear Tracks are not a force as much as they are a caress (and perhaps even a productive cry behind a steering wheel).
The single from their forthcoming EP Soft Dreams (due out on vinyl and cassette February 26th, 2016) borderline exhausts lyrical platitudes by smashing a series of ambiguous, flighty phrases together: “Don’t drift away/stay if you can/come as you are/I’ll let you in.” This doesn’t come as an insult, though, quite the contrary. “All The Outs Are Free” is a hazy, minimalistic petit four. Paired with swaying synth sounds, their elementary expression of love, loss, and longing is cocooned tightly and effectively. There are no smoke and mirrors, nor any unnecessary details neither lyrically or in regards to composition; there’s no mess to sort through. With this single, Dear Tracks found a way to surprise me in not sounding like they were trying to surprise me. Floating in a sea of seasonal over-orchestrated, heavy handed production, this taste of candied candor is fresh and restorative.
Frontier Ruckus‘ Matthew Milia has a lot to be thankful for. For starters, Ryan Adams sent him an email about anticipating ”smoking a jay” and listening to the new recordings and they scored former Wilco drummer, Ken Coomer, as producer and percussionist on their 2016 release recorded in Nashville earlier this year. Formed in 2003, Frontier Ruckus has built a reputation on pairing vividly raw and pleasantly long winded imagery with lush pop arrangements. Each song paints portraits of memories, dreams, and personally important geographical landmarks. Just a year after the release of their fourth album, Sitcom Afterlife, Milia and gang — David Jones (banjo, electric banjo), Zach Nichols (musical saw, trumpet, alto horn, meodica, keys) and Anna Burch (bass, vocals) — return home to close out a short tour. They play tonight at Marble Bar in Detroit on the tail of the announcement of the completion of their fifth LP. I caught up with Milia to discuss tour, Thanksgiving, and the tao of Frasier Crane.
1. What’s the best part about touring? Any good stories from this latest trip?
I turned 30 on this last trip, in Houston, and it felt kind of heavy. Some fans made me a homemade cake and presented it to me onstage between songs with candles lit, which the rest of the band was in on, and everyone sang me “Happy Birthday.” I’ve been touring for most of my adult life so it felt natural to be away for it—if anything I just felt an immense gratitude to be able to still be doing what I want to be doing at this stage of life.
2. When you’re on the road, what do you miss most about Detroit?
There’s something comforting about geographical orientation. What I love most about Detroit is that it just happens to be the place where I’ve best memorized how all the roads map out and connect — the intricacies locked away within the metropolis. There’s kind of a thrilling novelty to the pure dislocation of tour at first. But a few weeks in, you wish you knew your surroundings more innately without consulting Yelp.
3. It’s been just over a year since the release of Sitcom Afterlife. What’s been the biggest change in Frontier Ruckus from then to now?
Anna is playing bass guitar again! For the first time since her departure, right after Deadmalls and Nightfalls came out in 2010. It creates a nice heightened energy on stage. We’re five albums in now, and with each album it just seems to crystalize the overall feeling of the band, and diminishes distracting anxiety. People at shows have this greater context to see things in. The characters in the songs all interact. The band’s narrative grounding just feels sturdier and a bit more substantial, without being too self-aggrandizing about it.
4. You’ve described yourself as a verbose lyricist. What are some of your favorite words or imageries?
Early on I really like mixing biblical or religious imagery with sexuality. I think 13 years of pent up Catholic schooling will do that. These days, in a more balanced way, I think I’m still locked into the almost obsessive and systematic image-cataloguing of banal domestic suburban household objects and scenery that I fell into during Eternity of Dimming. I love detailing the unfolding of great familial drama in front of a static backdrop of living rooms and dads’ home offices.
5. You have a background in poetry. How is the writing process different for you when writing lyrics versus poetry?
Well I rhyme in song which I never ever allow myself to do in poems. So I rhyme like hell in song. The more complex or internal or multi-word the rhyme the better. And then there’s the chordal and melodic component which inevitably influences the language and meter of lyrics. I like to juxtapose in opposites. So if the chords sound happy I’ll tend to evoke an unsettling memory or something that challenges my emotional comfort, and vice versa. With poetry it’s all about language and much more conversational.
6. Could you describe Frontier Ruckus’ aesthetic via a memory that best encapsulates it?
One time I was riding in the back seat of the car with my mother and grandmother. For some reason I was wearing roller blades. The only other thing in the back seat was my grandmother’s oxygen tank. We were stopped at a light and my curiosity led me to twist the knobs until it rattled and hissed and I got so freaked out that I swung the car door open and jumped out, slipping on my roller blade wheels in the path of oncoming traffic. My mom swung her door open which signaled to the cars to screech to a halt. That mixture of a comforting situation turning erratically panicked is what I think the band is about.
7. You just finished recording your fifth LP in Nashville, slated to release next year. What does it sound like? If it were a thanksgiving food what would it likely be?
It was the first album we’ve done outside of Michigan and our first with a producer — Ken Coomer (Wilco’s original drummer), who also drummed on the whole record. It’s definitely got more of a polished baroque pop vibe, with string parts and mellotron, etc. But where Sitcom Afterlife was sort of a one-off break-up album dealing with the bitterness of a specific situation, I think this album returns to the more universal themes of our earlier records that tried to portray the sorrow and loss inherent to notions of family, home, and memory, but through a sense of beauty and complex appreciation.
It would be a slice of pumpkin pie mingling with a bit of creamed onions from a reused plate.
8. What inevitable awkward family interaction are you dreading/looking forward to this Thanksgiving?
Just the perennial explanation of what being in a band is like, and what sort of accomplishments the band achieved since the last briefing. I’m blessed with a super supportive family though. Still one always feel obliged to qualify things in relatable terms.
9. What does the ideal 2016 look like for the band?
Our aforementioned fifth album will be coming out at some point! Lots of touring and a few trips to Europe I’m sure. Collaborating with rad artists on music videos. I’ll be compiling another collection of poems I hope, along with some short fiction.
10. What character of Frasier are you and why?
Definitely Frasier. I’d be lying if I didn’t desperately relate to his misguided narcissism colliding with crippling insecurity.
I’m finally home. After a two week stint on the road with JR JR I’m attempting to readjust and realign, and in doing so found that I was home sick all along. While traveling I was lucky to explore parts of the country I never thought I would see, and feel things yet to be categorized and safely stored. Even so, the sensation of being home is disturbingly strange. While I stumble to transition from being driven to driving myself (that’s actually pretty heavy if you think about it), I decided to channel Detroit artists singing about our beautifully complicated city. (And for the record, I really wanted to put Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” on this list, but I think you’re better off just looking up “mom’s spaghetti” memes.)
1. The White Stripes “The Big Three Killed My Baby”
My dad has worked for Ford Motor Company for 39 years. My dad also raised me single handedly. Detroit royalty, The White Stripes’ shrill and thrashing anthem, acknowledging the complexities between the city and its industry, hits home with me. While on the road, my dad called me with the news of his early retirement. I imagine on his last day we will set fire to something in a field and scream along with Jack and Meg.
Released in 2011, just two years before Detroit filed for the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history, this track about Detroit’s most desperate hour is bittersweet today in the age of the city’s rebirth. Hawthorne’s reputation for being a sincere channel between the sounds of Motown and modern swagger shines here with heart and hope.
I’m not sure how they’re perceived around the country, other than seeing shitty faux vintage t-shirts at Urban Outfitters, but in Detroit MC5 are a major thread in our rock ‘n’ roll fabric. In wake of the race riots of 1967, their 1969 debut album Kick Out The Jams included this track, a Dylan-esque retaliation and retelling of this pinnacle piece of our city’s history.
Okay, okay. Patti Smith isn’t from Detroit. But she is my favorite person and she did live in Detroit and various Michigan suburbs from 1976 to the mid 90’s after meeting and marrying the late Fred Smith (beloved guitarist of the aforementioned MC5.) Her latest book, M-Train, details this very life which was first expressed in 1978 via this purging and poetic love letter that is as gritty as the city itself.
Rodriguez has an interesting story. If you saw the Oscar winning documentary Searching for Sugar Man then you know what I’m talking about. Having made music with luke warm reception in the states in the 1970’s (with mild success in Australia) Rodrieguez’s career shaped up to be short lived. Unknowingly to him, his music found its way to South Africa where his record sales outnumbered those of Elvis Presley. Rumors of his death circulated. In attempt to find the truth (spoiler alert: he’s alive) the documentary was made and released in 2012. This song is reflective of his roots and helps illustrate the mysterious life of this local legend with sweeping simplicity.[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
Ticket Giveaways
Each week Audiofemme gives away a set of tickets to our featured shows in NYC! Scroll down to enter for the following shindigs.
