Every Wednesday, the ugly hug shares a playlist personally curated by an artist/band that we have been enjoying. This week, we have a collection of songs put together by Philly-based artist Amelia Swain of amelia cry til i die.
Described as queer trans basement emo, amelia cry til i die have become a staple within the homegrown Philly scene and its surroundings as they have accumulated a collection of four track albums, demo compilations and live basement recordings. The sincerity of Swain’s writing puts individuality at the center of any amelia cry til i die album – where moments of absurdity and humor weigh just as heavy as love, heartbreak and promises and each story feels to come from one of our closest friends.
Swain put together a playlist of music all coming out of the West Philly area in the past few years. Enjoy!
You can also find Swain playing drums in Sadurn and bass in Ther
“I think that it is good to want to have a community get together once a week, sing some music together, read together, do all those things,” McKenna acknowledges, a type of grateful reflection across her face as she discussed her approaching EP release show. “I have just had to seek structure and community in different ways, and I think Chicago has been very open to that.”
Edie McKenna is best known for her leading role in the Chicago-based alternative group, Modern Nun, who have spent the last few years dedicated to creating spaces built on acceptance and collective experience through music and community.
With the release of her debut solo EP, For Edie, out everywhere today via Devil Town Tapes, McKenna is leaning more into her folk roots – reliving and repurposing the words she wrote almost a half decade ago. It’s an open letter to her younger self, only four songs long, as For Edie carries past trauma with such confidence – a striking invitation into the life she lived and where she has been headed ever since.
I recently got to sit down with McKenna to discuss the new EP, learning to redefine imprinted expectations and the joy found in mutual congregation.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity
Photo by Cora Kinney
Shea Roney: What was the transition like from St. Paul, Minnesota to Chicago? Where did you find yourself in the music scene here?
Edie McKenna: I graduated in high school in 2016 and moved to Chicago to go to DePaul. I really hadn’t been on my own before and it was really hard. I ended up dropping out of college because I just wasn’t doing well, but I made my core group of friends at DePaul and I fell in love with Chicago. My friend Sophie, whose brother is in the band The Slaps, saw the music that I started posting online and asked if I wanted to open for them. That’s when I had my friend Lee [Simmons], of Modern Nun, come play guitar with me. I think that the music scene was really lacking a lot of non-cis men at the time, so I think we just kept getting asked to play shows. Not to discount any of the non-cis men bands at the time, I just wasn’t aware of them because I was so new. I always was obsessed with indie and folk music, but I thought that I would be, I don’t know, a lawyer or whatever you think you’re going to be when you’re younger. I would just play music for fun, but then it kind of kept going and now I really love it, so I just kept going.
SR: In the past with Modern Nun, your recording sessions were more of what you described as ‘collective experiences of trial and error’. What was it like when you decided to take on these songs?
EM: Maybe this is just for me, but I find recording folk music just a little bit easier because it’s a little more straightforward and I don’t mind being so cheesy. Particularly with these songs, because I wrote them so long ago, the cheesiness is abundant. I don’t care if we’re just playing three chords, that’s fine with me. Whereas, with Modern Nun, it’s just different in that the music is a bit more complicated in a way.
SR: It’s funny because you said you never thought you would put these songs out, claiming that they were ‘too cheesy’ or ‘simple’. Did you find that there came either a motivation or a need for these songs to find daylight?
EM: I don’t know, I felt like I was just sitting on them. I’m lucky to have a really supportive group of friends who knew these songs, particularly “Lava Lamp”, which was one of the first songs I remember ever writing. I just had wanted to work with Seth [Beck] (Rat Future Recordings) for a minute because we were friends outside of this. When we finally got to work together I already had those songs and thought I might as well just try it. It went so well that I was like, why not make it a whole project? This whole thing has been a ‘why not’ sort of situation.
SR: Did the songs go through any changes from when you originally wrote them?
EM: They didn’t really undergo many changes, but I have been really under the influence of distortion, like Neil Young or MJ Lenderman vibe lately. I was just craving to add that to the folk music because I just think it’s so fun. We definitely tweaked them a little bit, because I’m not really a riffer and I wanted Seth, Zack [Peterson] and Eric [Beck] to be able to play off it, so we expanded some of the bridges and the intros and outros, definitely. But the lyrics stayed the same.
SR: Throughout this EP, you write from your own lens of some pretty difficult subject matters, especially on songs like “Kick in the Shin” and “Hail Mary”. What was it like to revitalize those moments and those feelings? Has revisiting these songs sharpened your understanding of your path of healing at all?
EM: I don’t know if I’m there yet, but I definitely have been feeling like I am almost ready to move on from these things. And in order to move on from them, I wanted to put these songs out. I do feel like I have processed these events and feelings and now when I write I don’t talk about them as much anymore. Like this EP was me writing about those experiences. When I named Modern Nun, that was about those experiences. But it is interesting to talk about it and I feel really proud about how far I’ve come. Songs are so specific and I think the best songs in my opinion are really specific moments or stories. It’s like time travel to those moments, but then I get to add something that I’m interested in now, like distortion, and it becomes a merging of two times in my life.
SR: “Swinging” feels like you are cutting yourself some slack, almost a brief grace period on the EP. Can you tell me about that song?
EM: That song is so gay. I’m sure it is definitely something that a lot of queer people experience, like when it’s two people not raised as men trying to make a move on each other. I remember it was impossible, the first date was like a week long and nothing happened, and I was like, ‘okay, that’s kind of the vibe.’ But it gets easier as you get older. That’s kind of what I was writing about. It’s so cute and it’s fun and I’m proud of it. I wanted to release it because I knew it is catchy, but whoa, I cringe. Just a little. Just a little.
SR: There are a lot of instances of longing in these songs – to be accepted, to be loved, etc. Do you feel like you have caught up to those feelings?
EM: No, I don’t think I’ve caught up to those feelings. I definitely think I’ve found my people and I’ve found it in other ways and in moments, but I think that it’s eternal. That feeling was so strong in high school and in early college when I wrote these songs, because, particularly being queer, it was just like, ‘I’m never going to act on these things’, or even, ‘I’m just going to pretend… ’. I also have extreme anxiety, so I get those feelings confused – excitement or yearning with like genuine fear, I get them really confused, so I think it makes the feelings stronger. But I think if you don’t have something to yearn for, what’s the point? It’s like having a crush on life, you’ve got to have something to be excited about it.
SR: While still talking about this longing, did the use of physical placeholders in your writing, such as sunglasses, a lava lamp, or even a malleable prayer make things feel more obtainable, or even just more realistic?
EM: My favorite kind of writing is just very straightforward because I really like someone who respects the intelligence of the reader and the listener. When I was first starting to write songs that I liked, the easiest way to do that is to just be observant and recognize, ‘this is my point of view’. I definitely think that it made the answers more realistic. I think using objects really just grounded me in the present moment because I felt so out of control and in the clouds in my life. They brought my answers into real life and made everything seem real at a time when I was really existing and hiding in my head.
SR: You grew up very religious, and I won’t ask you to dive back into it, but growing up in the foundations of congregation – which at its barebones is people who believe in the same thing/entity – have you found a draw to that same kind of belief when it comes to the local music community here?
EM: Totally, there are a lot of similarities. The things that I grew up doing, in theory, were amazing. Getting together once a week, singing, seeing some art, being with your family, being with other people, reading, talking about the reading, eating together – structure. I think I really struggle because a lot of things in my life I feel like I went from zero to a hundred. I went from not knowing what being gay was and going to private school where you got in trouble for doing the wrong thing always, to immediately smoking weed, etc. I just crave structure and I crave a very rigid routine and seeking that in my adult life has been really complicated. I had to seek structure in different ways through my friends here, which has been a huge learning experience because it’s like, ‘okay, I am living my truth. I am doing what I thought I would be doing just in a different way.’ That’s really nice to think about.
Written by Shea Roney | Feature Photo by Clare O’Mahony
For Edie is out every where today with a limited run of cassettes via Devil Town Tapes
I watched her brave out from under the awning of the Cyclone into a torrential downpour. As I maneuvered keeping my camera safely under an umbrella, a drenched Claire Ozmun sheepishly paused her posing to let a far away family pass by. I found it amusing that even in a massive storm, Claire’s main consideration was pulling too much focus. I wonder if her grunge forefathers would share the same anxiety in the midst of this moment.
I am a photographer and I love working with musicians and getting to know them through my work. A few months ago I reached out to Claire Ozmun about taking artist portraits. In that I stumbled into the fortunate position of becoming her friend and meeting the noble folks of COB, aka Claire Ozmun Band. Everything about her artistic perspective resonated with my desperate need for nostalgic, earnest self-reflection all mixed together with a ripping rock sensibility. I had the honor of shooting her much anticipated Dying in the Wool EP release at the Sultan Room in Brooklyn opened by Hiding Places and Adeline Hotel. They pulled a full house on a Wednesday evening so it was clear that night that we the people were watching COB launch.
I proposed to Claire that we celebrate by doing a photoshoot at Coney Island. When we first arrived at the West 8th street stop and our shoot began, so did a flash flood. Claire said her approach to the rain is to embrace and allow it to do what it will. This connected beautifully to her songwriting; a raw reflection of uncomfortable circumstances. As an artistic director my job is often to interpret the artist’s body of work into visuals that complete their message. I was keen on understanding Claire’s relationship with her visual output from a career standpoint. With a striking soft-grunge aesthetic and a drive to make memories, she aims to document her life authentically. Soaked from the flood we tucked away to a bar on the boardwalk. Claire thought back on arriving in Brooklyn and setting her sights on being a good friend first. With this Midwest sensibility towards friendships and her life-changing experience at School of Song, Claire joined a sturdy community of fellow artists who she continues to build a beautiful life with. She shared that her music, an honest recollection on growing up in Ohio, came to the forefront after she anchored her love in the people around her – the safest kind of love that brings out the best in an artist.
One question I had for Claire was, “what does your music know about you that you want visuals to capture?” She responded, “a non-sugar coated truth, discomfort and rawness. Though there is a silliness, general happiness and appreciation for my life.” We laughed about how the memory-making experience of a flash-flood photoshoot at Coney Island with a buddy embraces all of those qualities. She said, “like when we first got here I was actually so scared and I also wanted to laugh my ass off.” In that spirit, Claire and I left the bar and began hunting for lightning on the beach.
Looking down the road at such a promising career ahead can be so beautiful and daunting. The world of marketing and imagery can be a wild place for musicians. Just because someone is a performer doesn’t mean they are inherently comfortable with their photo taken. Claire is excited to continue into that world though there are reasonable fears around presenting one’s “face and human body.” However, she knows it cannot go wrong while she has her people around her. What better way to express nostalgia than to capture real memories with people you love? I have found in my own life and career that having a trusted community around you easily leads to thriving. It is a rapprochement to get to see yourself in other’s eyes, where that loving safety opens the door for the unknown ahead. Visual translation is very much a game of interpretation and a lesson in knowing. In all of life’s discomfort and hilarity, Claire Ozmun digs into her memories while we get to watch her make more.
To accompany this feature, Claire and Mara put together a supplemental playlist for our listening pleasure.
The untethered project of singer-songwriter Carolina Chauffe – who performs under the name hemlock – has shared two new singles today, “Depot Dog” and “Lake Martin”, premiering here on the ugly hug. This comes as the third group of singles released tandem from their upcoming album 444 set to be self-released on 10/11. Brought to life by the intimate and bountiful friendship of the “Chicago lineup”, composed of Andy “Red” PK, Bailey Minzenberger and Jack Henry, those that have been following the hemlock experience over the years will probably recognize these songs. Previously released within an extensive archive of song-a-day-a-month projects, 444 finds these songs now repurposed, grasping new life, grit and universality as they have grown over time.
Playing to the rush of a windowless drive, “Depot Dog” is consistent, fast and unburdened by the green lights ahead that refuse to break the pace. With a Neil Young-esque sharpness to the sticky guitar tones, the song is determined to the journey as the band falls into a groove of precision. “a throat full of skipping stones / lately lonely, but not alone / windows down cajun music / playin on the bluetooth radio”, Chauffe sings, lamenting the changing seasons and the transitions that follow, relaying to the personal implications of their own shifting surroundings. But building from the wit and charm that has since defined hemlock’s career, Chauffe writes to the peculiar moments of reliability found in the small things that keep us grounded; “unlikely truth like a hot dog from Home Depot / against all odds like a hot dog from Home Depot.”
“Lake Martin” is a rhythmic prayer, a slide show of life’s very construction, as Chauffe romanticizes a swampy south Louisiana sunset in all of its glory. Recorded in one take and putting a cap on the 444 sessions, Chauffe performs with pure sincerity in the midst of an awe inducing stillness. Like the functioning ecosystem of a swamp – “cuz everybody’s someone’s dinner here / the show isn’t for free / I pay my due, I tip my server / generosity reciprocal” – “Lake Martin” is a love letter to the communal harmony we find everywhere we look. Eluding to both our beginnings and ends, the song comes to a close as the backdrop of cars highlight the small, proud exhale from Chauffe, giving the last line the serenity it needs to continue breathing; “What a wonder to be welcomed – full belonging to the beauty of it all.”
Every Wednesday, the ugly hug shares a playlist personally curated by an artist/band that we have been enjoying. This week, we have a collection of songs put together by Toronto, Ontario based artist Kenny Boothby of Little Kid.
You don’t have to sift far in our small music world before coming across Little Kid’s latest record A Million Easy Payments. Released earlier this year – their first via Orindal Records – Payments resonate with such ease, mirroring that of which passes us by everyday and reflecting on the moments often lost and forgotten. As an interchangeable and collaborative unit, Little Kid builds out from their textured and uncompromising folk stylings, beautifully capturing that triumphant feeling of making it through another rough day while still looking forward to the next. To accompany his playlist, Kenny shared a blurb about how these songs came together;
For the past three summers, I’ve been able to spend a few days completely alone on a solo camping trip. Nothing too impressive – I set up a tent and make a fire in a provincial park, with a cooler full of beer and hot dogs in my car – but the solid dose of alone time is so healing. I’ve found camping has a therapeutic aspect for me, in the sense that my only goal each day is to think about what I want or need to do in any given moment, and then do it for myself (this is helpful because as a teacher I spend most of my days monitoring and responding to other people’s needs and wants).
I also listen to a lot of music on these trips. I thought it’d be fun to make a playlist of the stuff I have come back to the most over these past few summers. Neil Young and Florist each show up twice on the playlist because those are the two artists I tend to spend the most time with on these trips. Nothing beats Neil and a beer, and those last couple Florist albums have an unparalleled quiet to them that fits so well when you’re surrounded by forest. Hopefully these songs can help someone else find a little peace and calm during these last few weeks of summer.
Last week, Lindsay Reamer shared with us her debut LP, Natural Science via Dear Life Records; a new body of work that introduces the Philly-based artist to the forefront of conversations within the indie-folk world. “There’s a strange smell in the air / Something like spring, something rare / I’ve walked this way many times before / The houses look the same but I know my door”, she sings with vivid recognition over lightly plucked strings on the album opener, “Today”. Soon falling into a tender folk groove of sticky piano notes and driving drum fills, a collage of textured strings paint the backdrop of not just this song, but setting the scene for an entire album animated by presence, pushed by artistry and driven by sincere intention.
In the scope of traditional folk stylings, Natural Science is rooted in the day to day – what comes around goes around in the name of genuine storytelling. As a former field scientist, traveling through the cinematic landscapes of the American National Parks and the often forgotten in betweens, Reamer’s writing revels in her emotional calculations, visual observations, and understanding of the small things that make life so unique. With constant movement, the lead single “Figs and Peaches”, featuring Eliza Niemi on cello, plays to the summer romantics and pop-hook lamenters that thrive in the thick sunny air. “Gardens on the land / Castles on the beaches / I trust my hand and / Pluck my figs and peaches,” she sings with such gratification; an ode to carving your own path, picking your own fruit, defining your own beauty.
With recording help from Lucas Knapp, Reamer has come into her own sound with such open confidence; where deliverances feel rooted to her heart and the sonic branches are given space to grow where they need to go. The dilapidated lo-fi ballad of “John’s Song” or the constructed wavelengths of distorted guitars and trickling strings on “Mushroom House” progress and blend with ease when sandwiched between alt-country pop hooks and riveting folk grooves of songs like “Necessary” and “Lucky”. Even with a nod to the classics, Reamer closes the album with “Heavenly Houseboat Blues”, a cover originally written by Townes Van Zandt and Susanna Clark. Reamer’s rendition though, featuring Peter Gill (2nd Grade, Friendship) on guitar and Jon Samuels (Friendship, MJ Lenderman) on vocals, plays to the most biting elements of those traditional compositions, yet inspirited by her own stylings, before being washed into the sea with harsh natural field recordings, a body of water, and a meandering fiddle that manages to remain afloat till the very end.
Some of the most emotionally fervent moments on the album are displayed within the dualities of reflection; where Reamer simmers in the sweet spot between moments of triumph and setbacks. “Spring Song” is driven by the light and breezy chorus that is meant to be consumed on repeated listens, yet isn’t wrinkled by the defined expectations and disappointments that the song represents. “I’m standing still, I only live to fill the space between / The coming and the going,” she sings on the chorus, where the following “do do’s” hold as much weight as the looming undertones at hand. “Red Flowers” is drowned in passiveness, as Reamer’s poppy reverbed vocals feel to have their own layer of consciousness, watching and listening as life moves quickly past her. “Can you handle the bitterness / Of something real? / Or are you just running from / The scary things you feel,” she sings on the delicate track, “Sugar” – cautious, beautiful and one of the more sobering moments on the album.
Natural Science is a collection that moves at its own pace, and to its credit, the album’s greatest strengths come from those little individual blossoms of patient voicings and unconventional instrumentals that feel enticingly fresh for the genre. Playing God over model trains, eavesdropping of Days Inn gossip, waking up next to day-old take out, overly large prized vegetables, creeping on an ex – Reamer’s dedication to the mundane, brought to life within her broad depth of emotions, is richly beautiful, warmly inviting, super catchy and deeply human; a remarkable debut for an artist that is just getting started.
Every Wednesday, the ugly hug shares a playlist personally curated by an artist/band that we have been enjoying. This week, we have a collection of songs put together by Athens, Ohio based artist Ashley Rhodus of wished bone.
In the warm brushings of lo-fi recordings, broken drum tracks and hushed vocals, wished bone is a project whose sincere performances have always felt like coming home. As a songwriter, Ashley’s lyrics live in perpetual stillness – where meandering melodies leave room for inviting contemplation and her poetic verses a vivid reminder to stop and enjoy the small things in life. To accompany her playlist, Ashley shared an insightful blurb;
one pm is my favorite time because it feels like a second morning. it is the thursday of times, the early august – nothing is set in stone at one pm. even if it isn’t morning anymore, the day still has the potential to become anything.
this collection of songs is intended to give the feeling of one pm any time you listen to it. no matter what time it is, you can still write a poem, weed your garden, stare at the sky, call a friend, move your body or change your life.
Nara’s Room, the Brooklyn trio fronted by Nara Avakian, has shared two new singles “Holden” and “Waiting for the z” today as a precursor to their upcoming album, Glassy star out 10/18 via Mtn. Laurel Recording Co. Through the deliberation of sifting noise and strong lyrical intuitions, Nara’s Room has always circulated around the production of dreams and the reverie towards real life environments. With arrangement help from Ethan Nash and Brendan Jones and production by James Duncan, Nara’s Room return heavy handed, pushing the sonic boundaries of what we deem is possible while simultaneously defining their placement in an ever shifting world.
Gradually, “Holden” spirals into being through a rhythmic doom loop; constructed by the scrunchy mechanical noises and the unease that the sonic structure so easily brings out. It isn’t long before the industrial tones and gothic reverb open to a wave of jangly instrumentals, reminiscent of 80s pop and shoegaze classics, but with the trio’s own unique touches strung about. “How can we dream in a world we’re persistently being pushed out of?” Avakian asks in a statement about the song. As the chorus is emboldened by the distorted depths of the track, the band articulates every texture and sonic idea within, filling the void with individual voices as Avakian tries to define intense feelings of alienation and belonging.
In the same vein, “Waiting for the z”, lives in the balance between brutality and faith, trapped within its own confined and isolated space. With a brief spoken word piece, Avakian recites, “She led me out the door, “I can help you, it’s time to let go / Forgot what face I have on today, the clouds can tell you so,” over an eerie combination of pounding drums and a hollow bass that meanders with patience. As Avakian takes a pause, the shy words are soon succumbed to the sonic revisions of glitchy guitars and thrashing concussive drums, leaving your soul crunched and your ears tender, but in no way deterred by the experimental spirit and sincerity of the band at hand.
Each song is also accompanied by a music video made by Avakian, who has been specializing in VHS-type recordings under the project Foggy Cow. You can watch the new music videos below. Glassy star, out October 18 via Mtn. Laurel Recording Co., will have a limited tape run, which you can preorder now.
Full to the brim with brooding sonic plights and a soaring blend of alternative nostalgia, Dino Expedition share their new single, “Lose Your Mind”, as well as announce their debut album Thanks A Million. This release finds the Brooklyn-based band operating at their fullest, building from a solo project called Tahls, Dino Expedition is Tahlia Amanson (vocals/guitar), Aiden Velazquez (bass) and Frankie Adams (drums). Pushing potent orchestration to the edge of mutual discovery and reflection into moments of seismic growth, “Lose Your Mind” is a piece of the past that is meant to move forward, as Dino Expedition explode with new and dynamic life.
With a large presence from the get go, “Lose Your Mind” is heavy where it needs to be, and sincere throughout it all. With pounding percussion and conjuring low ends, the gentle, yet lush effect of Amanson’s vocals feel untethered to the weight below, while simultaneously flowing with ease to the driving rhythm. Recounting a story of watching her childhood neighbor’s house catch fire, she sings, “The glaring through the window shades / Will bring the light into the dark / Of the bedroom where you lose your mind”, recovering past memories and accepting their placement on a young mind now matured. It isn’t long until something ruptures inside, where melodic guitars and ecstatic dynamics seem to push through time itself, as “Lose Your Mind” relishes in the grandiose sounds of a band just getting started.
Dino Expedition is playing a single release show for “Lose Your Mind” at Purgatory in Brooklyn, NY on 8/14 alongside Whirlybird, Babe City and Mila Moon. Their debut record Thanks A Million is due November 15, with tapes available via TV-14 Recordings.
Through the twangy rock n’ roll and broken pop hooks that live in the heart of Chicago, Edie McKenna has had a hand in building the little congregations around town that make this music scene so special. Best known for her lead part in the band Modern Nun, who describe themselves as ‘queering their religious upbringing’, McKenna and co. have developed a type of spirituality brought out by acceptance and shared experience of music and community. Keeping to that theme, McKenna has shared her new track, “Hail Mary”, the last single off of her upcoming debut solo EP, For Edie. Written back in her teens, she revisits the trials and tribulations of growing up religious in a queer body, as she sings a prayer for who she was and who she’s become.
The song rouses to life with a fervent folk groove as an acoustic strum feels invigorated by the underlying bass and auxiliary percussion that meander along with purpose. “And underneath those stain glass windows I prayed / You’d take it away from me”, McKenna sings with ease, leaving the weight of the matter to carry itself. As the chorus reaches the holy trinity of thrice repeated ‘Hail Mary’s’, the underbelly of the groove brews with harsh distortion, letting loose a blissfully cathartic, and joyfully nostalgic release of tension and self-actualization that longs to be listened to on repeat.
Along with the song, McKenna shared in a statement;
“Hail Mary’ was written as a prayer to my younger self. I wrote these songs many years ago and while I cannot recall the writing process itself I know that it still feels, to this day, very cathartic to sing this song. When I was growing up, I could not comprehend my queerness as an actuality, more as the sin that it would eventually be to live out. So, I only acknowledged it by pleading with God to take it away before it became a more serious problem. The ‘Hail Mary’ prayer itself was always my go-to, so I thought I’d rewrite it to aid in my own healing and acceptance.”
“Hail Mary” is accompanied by a music video made with the help of Arden Lapin and Raine McKenna. McKenna’s debut EP, For Edie, is set to be released on August 23 via Devil Town Tapes, with a limited run of cassettes.
Written by Shea Roney | Album Artwork by Edie McKenna
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