the ugly hug

A Conversation With Yours Are The Only Ears

September 7th, 2023

Written by Shea Roney

Under the name of Yours Are the Only Ears, Susannah Cutler released her first single “Fire In My Eyes” in 2014. It’s a warm folk song where Cutler’s caring and whispery vocals are edged out with a heavy and sodden synth. On the track, Cutler expresses some distrust in herself. “Am I a good person?”, she recites, until the question becomes a heavy handed measurement. Cutler, as an artist, is something special. Hailing from upstate New York, she has made a name for herself with her whimsical aesthetic and soft approach to trauma and rage. On her latest album, We Know the Sky, Cutler embarks on an uphill hike to answer that question she asked 9 years ago, opening up about uncharted inspiration, navigating musical barriers and learning to trust herself again.

Growing up in a musical household, Cutler was environmentally disciplined in a specific lane of musical thought. With both her brother and dad as full time session musicians, Cutler described their influence on her as imposter syndrome; watching them destined to musical technique where she didn’t see herself fit. “It just didn’t fully dawn on me that you could be a musician in a different way” Cutler admits, “so I didn’t really feel like I was one until I started writing songs” in a way that felt comfortable and personally impactful.

Where did the name Yours Are the Only Ears Come From? It’s a really intimate name when you think about it.
It’s actually from an of Montreal song on this album called The Early Four Track Recordings. All of the songs are named after Dustin Hoffman doing various things. The Song is called, ‘‘Dustin Hoffman Scrubs Too Hard and Loses Soap’’. I was so obsessed with that album around the time when I decided to give my project a name, and I just liked that line a lot because it conveyed how I wanted my music to feel.

Before she was a musician, Cutler was an artist studying both visual art and textile design at New York’s FIT. Being a skilled visual artist, she developed a style of quaint and organic folkish art that you can find on her album covers. But between visual art and music, Cutler told me that her creative thought processes are completely different. While visual art is purely aesthetic and driven with precision from her thoughts, with song writing, she says, to an extent, there is trust in not knowing where her inner sentiments will take thematically. “I have to let my emotions lead and take hold of the song. It just becomes what it’s going to be”, Cutler conveys.

This unknown is where Cutler thrives as a songwriter. Allowing herself to sit in her conscious and let it speak for itself is the most honest an artist can allow themselves to be. But it is not an easy task. “It can feel really scary when you want to control how something sounds or is presented to the world,” Cutler tells me. “I guess it’s also kind of cool that you can’t always do that. You just have to trust that something valuable and aligned will surface”.

I feel like you and I share a similar respect for nihilism in the world.
I definitely feel like nihilism helped me so much with playing shows in the beginning. I used to have really bad stage fright, but thinking to myself ‘well we are all just going to die, so does it even matter if I completely embarrass myself?’. I feel like there’s some aspect of nihilism that is really freeing.

Sitting on songs for years, Cutler released her first full length project Knock Hard in 2018 off of Team Love Records. “I feel like I was ready to release music before I ever did”, Cutler says as she discloses the discouraging logistics of making and releasing an album. On top of the financial barriers of producing music, Cutler also went through the tedious process of teaching herself how to record and produce herself from scratch while still in school. “In terms of recording and releasing music it can feel like there are so many barriers to entry, which can be frustrating,” Cutler says.

But her most recent release, We Know the Sky, sonically speaking, was an ambitious project. Focusing on the minute details to make her most extensive landscape yet, Cutler created an album littered with guitar fills, wind instruments, resonated harmonies, and subtle percussion that paints a fairytale-perfect natural world tampered with stories of abuse and distrust. Although proud with how it sounds, “it was a little too much to be so perfectionistic about everything and I dont think it’s always helpful for the creative process,” Cutler admits. “I think for the next record I will probably try to be somewhere in the middle”

A lot of your themes are driven through your connection with nature and animals. What are some personal connections to the natural world around you that have inspired you the most?
I’ve gotten really into medicinal herbs. Right now I work at an herb farm/shop, and I’ve been learning about common plants that grow all around us. Some of them are considered weeds, but all plants have healing properties. I feel like this also helped ease my nihilism, because especially when I was younger, I felt like everything was chaotic and meaningless. But just knowing that there are all these plants growing everywhere in abundance that can heal us, it’s wild. I think just having that pillar of faith in something bigger than me, even if it is just a plant or the intelligence of plants, is helpful for me to stay grounded and have faith that there is meaning. I can often feel ungrounded, but just knowing that nature is all around us and we are a part of it is calming.

In a sense, We Know the Sky is a love letter to Cutler herself. Although there is no denying that there is hurt behind these songs, the hurt is used more to push Cutler’s own personal understanding. After removing herself from a painful relationship, Cutler was faced with the undeniable reality of starting over. Relearning to love yourself is an uphill battle, full of doubt and a brandishing identity eager to be whole again. “I think the songs are kind of about that, ” Cutler recounts. “You can have so many layers that make it hard to fully access how you actually feel” that can come out when you begin to piece yourself together again. Although she can’t admit she is fully there, she tells me the biggest thing is to “put in the time and effort to show up and be there for yourself”.

Support Yours Are The Only Ears HERE: bandcamp

I Keep My Feet on the Fragile Plane

August 10th, 2023

Allegra Krieger

Genre: Folk Label: Double Double Whammy

When structure is lost and life seems to forgo desire, it becomes easy to sit within observations. Like the simple pleasures from a smoke break in the middle of a brutal shift at a dead-end job, calamity slows down to personal silence. This personal silence can be just what you need to understand your place in the world. Told through whirling, soft folk songs, Allegra Krieger uses her winding words to do the heavy lifting on her new album, I Keep My Feet on the Fragile Plane, as she sits still in a superficial passage.

Hailing from New York, but having lived all over the country, Krieger has been a part of many people’s storylines. On her fourth full length release, and her debut from Brooklyn label Double Double Whammy, Krieger stays grounded in her own storyline, giving emphasis to the album’s title and the world in which she visualizes around her. There is no time wasted in getting to memorialization, and in ten tracks, Krieger muddies the concept of past and present that perpetuates the timeless struggles of young adulthood.

In a rhythm like waltz, Krieger opens the album with an apologetic line of, “I’m so sorry to say/I think you’re walking the wrong way”. “Making Sense Of”, the opening track, is a dance of sorts towards the unknown. With the simplicity of guitar strumming, Krieger’s vocal points are accented by orchestral string arrangements that create a whimsical atmosphere, yet remain receptive to the light thumping of stand up bass that steadies at the bottom of the sound. The uneasiness that comes hand-in-hand with unexplored territory is stagnant in Krieger’s songs, but in no way does it become overbearing.

Krieger’s strengths come from intersecting lines of grace and delicacy with grittiness and violence. These contradictions, so specific in their recollection, must come from personal observations that Krieger has deemed resourceful. “After work I have a drink/and walk to Matthew’s down the street/I love the way I don’t think/when he’s fucking me” Krieger sings as guitar distortion seeps in, fighting off the acoustic groove. Seeing things not just primarily good or bad, but complex to the human experience, Krieger allows many layers of consciousness to mature within her words.

There is an unconventional pull to Krieger’s song production that pushes I Keep My Feet on the Fragile Plane to stand out amongst standard folk works. With implements of French and English horns, there is a florid softness to a song of heartbreak like the track “A Place For It To Land” while the use of heavy static hums hold a layer of tension. “I Want To Be” frills out into a guitar battle of pounding strings and amp feedback, coming to an abrupt conclusion on a rather mellow track. “Terribly Free” utilizes a simple piano sound while Krieger’s vocal phrasings fizzle out into scrapes of static as she sings “fire and fog/sparkling stars/slow heavy sex/fast moving cars”. The contradictions in her lyrics reverberate within the sweet tones of the extended outro.

The stand out track, “Lingering”, is a cyclical story of doing everything and nothing at all. Beginning and ending in Krieger’s room described as having “pictures on the white walls/black mold on the ceiling”, she goes about her day as normal, but calling out the mundane that would normally go right past us. It’s a slow methodical groove that allows the listener to walk with her through Fifth and Avenue A that “smells like piss and garbage”, or sit and people watch through her bedroom window that separates her from the outside world.

Passive listening to Krieger’s words is, often, not possible. At heart she is a storyteller. And like any skilled storyteller, she warrants all ears. Her voice is both comforting, in delivery and in spirit to the subject matter. The atypical orchestration below her never feels abrasive, but more of an emphasis of priority to her soft and skillful vocal approach. There is no structured path for Krieger, instead she wonders on her own terms. This fragile plane wavers underneath her feet, cracking into noticeable gafs, as she dances around them. “I keep my feet on the ground/and my expectations low” she sings on the formidable track “Low”. Broken down into individual stories, Krieger can’t seem to stop writing. Each song on I Keep My Feet on the Fragile Plane, with its poetic and winding verses, establishes beauty in the context of observation and comfort in the context of learning.

Written by Shea Roney

Allegra Krieger bandcamp

A Conversation with Annie Blackman

July 25th, 2023

Written by Shea Roney

Earlier this month, Rolling Stone Magazine published a shorthand list of artists that represent the future of music. The print, with a glamorous photo on the cover of Bad Bunny with a polished look and chains dangling from his neck, stands as a typical Rolling Stone write up. But once you get to page 73 (the meat and potatoes of the issue) in the midst of the “Rolling Stone Future 25” you will come across a warm toned photo of Annie Blackman. Wearing a butterfly patterned skirt, she looks at ease with her back resting on a subtle floral print wall. Within the first sentence of Blackman’s feature, Taylor Swift is name dropped. This can cast a giant shadow that covers anyone compared to Swift these days. It recalls the time in 2011 when Blackman, at the age of 13, got to meet the pop star and Swift empowered her to keep writing music. Whether or not that experience has helped Blackman reach this point (who’s to say?) her writing speaks for itself.

Annie Blackman is a Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter from Montclair, New Jersey. Her most recent release off of Father/Daughter Records, an EP titled Bug, traps words of friction, justifiable nerves and love butterflies that exude from the walls of her safe space. But in a rare case, Blackman is an artist who has been sharing personal music since a young age. With documentation of life stuck in time, anyone can see the lengths at which Blackman has grown both personally and musically, proving herself through the years to be an instinctive storyteller. “What are the things it feels like I am the only person in the world experiencing even though I’m obviously not” she says when discussing writing decisions. And to the relation of which specificity in her work holds, we as listeners are given the opportunity to hear our common and complex feelings broken down into digestible and natural stories through her personal accounts.

Learning guitar around the 5th grade, Annie Blackman began her public musical endeavors in 2016 when she released her first album titled, Blue Green, a collection of songs she wrote throughout her high school years. This was a fully acoustic venture representing the turmoil of young love that was recorded within the walls of her childhood bedroom . “I was in love with my best friend for quite a while and I never tried anything with him”, Blackman recalls when I asked about muses, in hindsight, she finds funny with age. Instead of telling him, she wrote songs and wouldn’t release them until it was all completely platonic. “Looking back on it, I honor and love the girl who had a crush on him, but it is funny to think of the gravity of the whole thing”, Blackman jokes.

As a songwriter who writes with the acute details in mind, I asked Blackman how she feels her storytelling has grown with her since the lovesick songs from high school. “I have become more observant, more attuned to my feelings and also I think more selective”, as she recalls the harshness of some of her earlier songs. “I feel like now I understand that in order to pack a punch or tell a story of woundedness I don’t need to bring anyone down in such an obvious way” as comes with maturity she hopes.

Blackman started receiving a lot of attention on TikTok from posting snippets of songs like “Seeds” and “Glitch” during the pandemic. Stranded in a time that was dedicated to stillness, Blackman’s words became something that sat comfortably with listeners. As videos started to see viral attention, Blackman tells me “it gave [her] the confidence boost to make a really proper demo and collaborate with some friends who know how to produce”. For the first time she saw that her songs could go beyond an intermediate circle of support.

I read a cool story in your Rolling Stone write up that when you were studying abroad in Paris, and some TikTok fans of yours from Berlin reached out to you?

So it was actually pre-TikTok. It was the winter of 2019, so TikTok hadn’t even blown up yet. But I had actually had a high school friend run an online zine who’d done a little interview with me when my first album [Blue Green] came out on bandcamp. Somehow this friend group of German teenagers had found me through this zine and I was sort of a favorite in their friend group which is totally crazy and random. We sort of became internet friends and then when I was in Paris, I was going to Berlin to visit a friend in another program, and I reached out to these girls and said I would love to meet you guys. And it’s funny because I was 20 and these girls were like 15, so it was definitely a sweet little age gap. A couple of my friends and I went to a party that these girls were having and it just turned into an impromptu house show, which was really cool. The first time that has ever happened to me, and the last.

Blackman soon sent professional demos all over, but landed on San Francisco indie label Father/Daughter Records. Blackman was familiar with this label because the bands Remember Sports and Forth Wanderers, Father/Daughter staples, came from her hometown. “These people seem cool and legit and down to earth so I emailed them and three weeks later I was in there”, Blackman recalls.

In 2022 you put out your first album off of Father/Daughter Records called All Of It, where you recorded in a makeshift tent studio inside of your childhood home in New Jersey. Can you tell me about that process?

I mean, it was hard. It was deep pandemic and I was living at home. My dad and I built this PVC pipe sound blanket little hut thing and I would just go in there for hours and hours and hours. And because we made the whole thing remotely it was definitely difficult. I’d never actually recorded myself before, so you know, I had a little interface, I had a little mic, but it was a lot of trial and error. But I was also out of college, unemployed, and you know, COVID, so you can’t really do anything, so I’m glad it happened when it did because it gave me a sense of purpose for sure.

Earlier this year, Blackman helped represent Father/Daughter records at SXSW in Austin, Texas. When I asked her the peaks and pits of a week-long festival life, Blackman had nothing bad to say about the festival itself. “Everything just feels so fun and wholesome. You get to see people that you only get to see there”. But Blackman then brought up a point that is often glossed over and that being the financial struggles of a life in music. “I think the pits are that you don’t make any money and if you don’t have a car, which I don’t, the transportation costs really add up. So I think that was definitely the most painful part”.

Right before Blackman jumped on my call, she was in the midst of a job search. “Everybody has a day job of varying time commitment, but it’s definitely important to strike that balance [with a career in music]. It’s a necessity”. Unless artists are reaching millions and millions of streams or constantly touring, there is no money in music and this is often a point that is not widely known by non-musicians. Blackman still considers it to be one of her two careers and “it is a job, but it’s really not”. Making music is expensive. Unless playing a solo show, Blackman tells me she just gives all the earnings to her bandmates because rehearsal rates can add up too.

As time came to chat about the attractive title given by Rolling Stone, there were mixed feelings of course.” On one hand, I’m like, ‘Oh that’s fake!’. And on the other hand, I’m like, ‘do I need to now be the future of music?’”. The future of music is quite the title. It can sit heavy on one’s shoulders. When asked if this label was burdensome at all, Blackman responded with “I don’t know if it’s too burdensome, but I also can’t just rest on my laurels. Everything just sort of needs to be better than the last thing”.

With print readers on the decline, there wasn’t much of a translation to a rise in listeners for Blackman. Considering it as street cred within her scene and hopes it will open the door for more opportunities in the industry, there is no denying that Blackman is still grateful for the honor. “Whether it’s sort of an accolade, or a duty I now need to carry out I’m not sure, but it mostly feels really cool and sort of surreal.”

As for her most recent work, Blackman sings on her EP, “Like a play within a play within a play within a scene” on the title track “Bug”, to decompartmentalize the rough goings in her life in palatable and frivolous chunks that she keeps in her pocket for keeping’s sake. This EP, and works prior, have shown that Blackman consistently makes concise pieces of work that have established her as a new voice worth listening to.

For the remainder of the summer, Annie Blackman has a show at the Knitting Factory on August 26 in Brooklyn, New York opening for Beau. She is excited for more things in the works for the Fall.

For more info on Annie Blackman: bandcamp, TikTok, Instagram

Laundromat

June 22nd, 2023

Pickle Darling

GENRE: folk/dream-pop LABLE: Father/Daughter Records

In a bedroom somewhere in Christchurch, New Zealand (the largest city in the South Island), sits multi-instrumentalist and producer, Lukas Mayo, known as their musical project Pickle Darling. New Zealand, a country that frequently pumps out alternative innovators, such as The Clean, Tall Dwarfs and Aldous Harding, also finds that Pickle Darling fits neatly into this estranged group. After years of formidable DIY sustenance, Mayo finds comfort again in making lo-fi bedroom pop songs from the comfort of their own home.

Finding success amongst EPs and two full length albums, Bigness (2019) and Cosmonaut (2021), Mayo felt the extension of pressure that comes from the public eye. Pickle Darling has been a bandcamp favorite for years now, having both full length releases being labeled as ‘Album of the Day’. Also having toured with acts such as The Beths, Fontaines DC and Lucy Dacus while gaining a lot of attention to their homemade pop songs, Mayo began to feel lost. The release of Cosmonaut in 2021 brought Pickle Darling to large production heights, fitting for the theme of the outer spaces, but with intricate composition and the expectation of perfection, Mayo no longer felt like they were making music for themselves anymore. Feeling worn down, Mayo retreated back to the bedroom to record their newest album, Laundromat.

Laundromat, Pickle Darling’s first release off the San Francisco label Father/Daughter Records, is Mayo’s journey back to finding comfort in art. Still creating lighthearted songs embellished with several finger-picked instruments, the dreaminess of synths and drum tracks and coyish autotune has shown that Mayo has perfected the clean and sweet bedroom pop tune. Graduating with a degree in audio production, there is no denying the quality that a Pickle Darling album sounds like. Writing, recording and producing each song on their own, these songs live in Mayo’s personal world, crafted and mastered within the walls of their home; sometimes reluctantly released out into the world. Laundromat finds Mayo in their first comfortable living situation; sans problematic roommates and peevish landlords, offering a place for Mayo to fully thrive in the writing process.

The first single for Laundromat that Pickle Darling let sit in the world was the brief “King of Joy”. Scraping over a minute long, “King of Joy” dangles in its simplicity; running low tones with driving percussion that resolves in the lightness of synthesizer melodies. There is undoubtedly a sweetness that it leaves behind; a smile on your face or a daydream to a more honeyed time. This single acts as a reminder to Mayo to not overcomplicate art. Pushing themselves to utilize ideas in the moment relieves the pressure of making something overworked in the name of perfection.

There is a large amount of Nostalgia that Mayo paints within their tunes. Considering the lengths that Mayo takes to ‘homemade’, I am taken back to the extent of childlike imagination. Laying on the floor with a box of broken crayons, no care as to what is produced, resting on the expected approval from adults and the confidence in what our little minds can make. Mayo litters Laundromat with songs that soundtrack this homemade and pressure free artistic exposure. With folk tunes built in dreamy atmospheres, Pickle Darling brings the listener back to the bedroom; our own space of solitude and comfort, decorated without the pressures of the outside world.

The music video for “Head Terrarium” is built within its own DIY world with paper mache hilly landscapes, cardboard trees, cotton ball clouds and dancing plastic creatures. Overlooking this dream world is Mayo, whose face rests amongst the clouds, taking pride in all the self-constructed beauty. As the song shifts into the chorus, the video takes a turn to the real outside world, much darker in its aesthetics, where a malformed mannequin is made out to be Mayo. The only resemblance to Mayo’s humanity is the lower half of their face on a screen attached to the body, singing along to the song. This shell of Mayo repeatedly sings “I’m not as brilliant as I like”, an acknowledgement to the feeling of despondence from the art they are creating.

Mayo’s electronica intuition has been a signifier through all the music they have released into the real world. The song “Invercargill Angel”, beginning with folky string instruments housing Mayo’s whispery autotune, is a beautiful reminder of the sonic instincts that prop up a Pickle Darling song. Two different sonic styles that gracefully blend together to create a unique and playful sound that is reminiscent of early Sufjan Stevens or a late career Wes Anderson soundtrack. “I hope he makes you feel at home” Mayo repeatedly insists before the song breaks off into an electronic setting of retro synthesizers and drums tracks that build upon each other until there is a harmonious chorus of arcade nostalgia and internal comfort.

Pickle Darling sings about finding art in the mundane; having an open mind to the beauty when you don’t over complicate things. It’s this simplification to the writing process that fills Laundromat with so much charm and affability. Caked in sunny major intonations and culminating melodies sets Pickle Darling light on the chest. It’s a meaningful listen that flows from track to track with the hope that it doesn’t end.

Written by Shea Roney

Pickle Darling bandcamp
Big Picture

April 26th, 2023

Fenne Lily

GENRE: Folk/Rock LABEL: Dead Oceans

There is an aspect of growing up when love becomes a step-by-step process rather than starry-eyed, on-and-off episodic moments of life we see in movies. Bristol artist Fenne Lily allures her newly determined definition of love through charming and light-hearted folk songs on her new album, Big Picture.

Fenne Lily’s overall themes are no stranger to the overstimulated idea of love. Lily’s previous release, BREACH, a collection of songs entrapped by heartbreak, was released in 2020 during the pandemic, squashing her ability to tour and share what she worked so hard on. This induced severe writer’s block, that Lily discussed, took a long time to shake. What makes Big Picture different from other Fenne Lily releases is that all ten songs were written and cultivated within the bookends of a relationship. Lily goes through stories and phases of new love, branded ideals of giving yourself up to someone else, and then the final fall out to make an entire album something familiar and truly convoluted.

One thing that Lily wants to be clear on is that Big Picture is not a sad album. Lily has talked about the oversimplification that has branded so many artists into a new and now popular sub-genre; sad girl indie music. Although Lily has always been boxed into this corner with artists like Phoebe Bridgers, Mitski and Lucy Dacus, she wants to be clear that slow music does not equal sad music. It takes personal growth and emotional maturity to come to this conclusion not only as a listener, but as an artist too. The ability and confidence to blend songs of hopeful intuition with a soft and slow burned sound creates an active voice to relate to life’s more complex feelings honestly and candidly. That brings us to Lily’s overall point on her new album; emotionally honest music can be a muse for self-soothing and the reintegration of joy back into life.

How does Fenne Lily make a collection of songs entirely about a failed relationship into an album of reassurance and self-fulfillment? Lily states, “these songs express worry and doubt and letting go, but those themes are framed brightly”. What it comes down to was refusing to fixate on the overripe feelings’ leftover from an expired love and to take away what felt needed. That being either memories or lessons learned to carry on. “So it’s alright/if you don’t want a shoulder/If you don’t wanna get over it all”, Lily sings on the song “Dawncolored Horse”.

The album begins with a subtle pop bass line that molds into a soft and playful track titled “Map of Japan”. Lily sings about the hindsight’s of a relationship with an airy vocal approach and electric guitar that grounds the lightness of the tune into the reality of the tough situation. What follows track after track is a beautiful, warm expression of Lily’s understanding and self-acceptance of where her life was currently at and displays it within lighthearted folk songs with mature melodies and conscious instrumentations. “Lights Light Up” is sung as a hardening conversation between two lovers who are not on the same page, but surrounded by bright and static guitar work that embodies both restlessness and independence. The dilemma of wasting time and the time it takes to heal is calmly addressed on “In My Own Time” where Lily sings “In my own time/I’ll brighten up the corners/Temporarily”. A nod to the impatience of healing and the universal fear of a wasted life.

Big Picture is also a demonstration of Lily’s creative growth from her first two albums in that she took on a collaborative approach with people that she trusts and loves. As past projects go, Lily has been very adamant about doing everything herself. But in the case of these 10 songs, Lily wrote and demoed each track herself and then brought them to her live band to flesh out together. The entire album was recorded live in Brad Cook’s North Carolina studio with special help from artists like Katy Kirby, Melina Duterte (Jay Som), and Christian Lee Hutson. In the case of the track “Red Deer Day”, Lily wrote the song after the rest of the album was finished and her relationship was over. All-in-all, what Lily offers is the clearest analysis of a breakup that she has, yet it is the most confident and self-projecting song on the album. “I’m alright or I will be in time” sums up the cleverness behind Lily’s pre-determined ambition to a hope-filled album. It is such a perfect conclusion to Lily’s Big Picture, that friend and musical contemporary, Christian Lee Hutson, helped record the whole song in one day to assure its inclusion to the project.

Big Picture is flushed with love songs that are emblematic of what it really is; confusing, vulnerable, arduous, fragile, blissful, affectionate and desirable. There is no complete linear story starting at the initial crush to the inevitable breakup that Lily experienced in the process of writing the album, but more of a stream of consciousness that occurs when a relationship isn’t working. The back and forth between passion and doubt leads to more complex feelings of guilt and personal endowment that is truer to a love story than what is usually glossed over. “I tell you I don’t know but sometimes I can’t help but picture a whole different life” Lily sings on the album’s closing track “Half Finished”, barely wincing at this decree.

It’s refreshing to hear an artist rework the social constructs that surround the slow song. Even upon a passive first listen of Big Picture, there is no hiding the subtle expressions of joy and contentment that poke their head out often. No drama is white knuckled and no names are dropped, provoking an album of soft contemplation and euphonic understanding. The contrast between these beautiful and laid-back instrumentations and the cut-throat lyrical persuasion that Lily embodies aren’t there for contrast’s sake; but for a deeper and more mature way to accept a failed love.

Written by Shea Roney

Fenne Lily bandcamp
Crispy Crunchy Nothing

April 19th, 2023

PACKS

GENRE: rock/folk LABEL: Fire Talk

An apple with a rotten core can have beauty on the outside, giving off the falsehood of a pristine piece of fruit. This doesn’t mean that there can be no joy from this apple but a balance between the beauty and the crumbling core within. Canada’s own, PACKS, have returned to the scene with their sophomore album, Crispy Crunchy Nothing, setting boundaries between vulnerability and understanding while all having a good laugh about it in the end.

Returning from her soft solo acoustic project, WOAH, Madeline Link found herself in a confusing state of will-they-won’t-they until she reunited her band mates to return to the muddy and gritty groove that defined PACKS since their 2021 debut album, Take the Cake. In the meantime, what came about was 18 months of sending demos back and forth until the fourteen songs were fleshed out in one week of friendship and creative endurance. What emerged was Crispy Crunchy Nothing and a nod to the crummiest of situations while still grasping on to optimism, certainty and laughter from our day-to-day surroundings.

Elevated by drowsy melodies and the fuss of electric guitars, in a way, Crispy Crunchy Nothing is a return to the basics for PACKS, but it shows that the band is reaching for more. The new sonic sketches that the band indulges in help build a fitting home for Link’s sincerely humorous yet frank lyrics and mumbly double-tracked vocal approach. With no song surpassing the three-minute mark, Link’s offbeat imagination and select attention to detail, combined with loads of dry wit, produces songs that drown reality in plump bar chords and minor lo-fi garage rock-band instrumentations to create something from nothing. The stand-alone singles “Abalone” and “Brown Eyes” follow the band’s moody takeover of slacker-rock and the good-humored attitude that comes with it. Dexter Nash’s harsh yet calculated guitar riffs add a layer of boldness in the same fashion that Joey Santiago brings to the Pixies. Noah O’Neil’s bass hides within Link’s fat chords while also bringing new melodies to the songs. Shane Hooper’s punctual and tireless drumming acts as a steady hand while maintaining the sloppy sound of garage rock. The loose song structures only illuminate the hidden melodies that Link sneaks into the shortly lived songs. From the “lalalala’s” on “Dishwasher” to the soft choruses in “Cheese” and “Rag Doll” showcase a collection of warm lo-fi songs that represent the small and buried bliss that comes out when least expected.

Within these tender lo-fi songs, though, there is no hiding the loss and discomfort that is brewed on the surface of Crispy Crunchy Nothing. “EC” takes a song about the death of a coworker and masks it with a soft, twangy folk song that resides in the warmness of our hearts. With emotionally exhausted vocals, Link sings about a failed long-distance romance and the feeling of complete loneliness on “Say My Name”. The song barely scrapes over a minute long but still manages to come off as heart-breaking and sincere when you hear Link plead “Never thought I’d say I just wanna hear your voice say my name”. “Smallest One” plays into frustratingly taking apart nesting dolls in the hopes for a obtained sense of closure when holding the smallest one in your hand.

Slumping through songs about loneliness, frustration, loss and the tumultuous feelings of being stuck, the band’s moody disguise doesn’t completely mask the moments of confidence and ambition that Link has hidden throughout the album. Link’s knack for humor in lyrics that are derived from the mundane world around her make a PACKS song stick out when you hear one. “Fourth of July/fireworks and fountains/Shattered dreams and cotton candy”. As funny as a Canadian singing about a sacred American holiday, the song “4^th of July” tells of feelings of loneliness derived from holidays and festivities mixed with an already present internal sadness that feels oh too familiar. Even on the minute-long track “Late to the Festivities” shares the line, “cause’ like an apiary in a cemetery/I was fooled by the flowers”, which in and of itself induces a nervous laugh to the situation.

Crispy Crunchy Nothing is less about purposely seeking out joy from life, but letting the joy sneak out from where we least expect it. There is a mutual understanding between Link and her bandmates that these collections of songs are not an appropriation of bad feelings, but more of a celebration of the small things in life. Even through topics of loneliness, heartbreak, loss, wasting life and unfortunate fixations, there is a warm feeling that Link and company coat over each song. Whether that be the charmingly unpolished sound of the band or the allurement of sincere anecdotes, there is a sense of hope categorized finely by Link’s imagination of her banal existence that when she sings “Laughin’ till I cry/Sometimes it feels like life is on my side”, you can’t help but to feel it too.

Written by Shea Roney

PACKS bandcamp
Ike Reilly Assassination Sell Out Schubas Tavern for St. Patrick’s Day Matinee

March 20th, 2023

In the early afternoons of the St. Patrick’s day hangovers, a group of working class self profiteers, Irish delights, the poorly destitute and blatant rock n rollers crowded into a sold out Schubas Tavern in Chicago for a matinee to see one man; Ike Reilly. What Ike and the rest of his band, the Ike Reilly Assassnation (IRA) deliver is nothing short of back pocket magic that they seem to master with every performance.

The opener “My Wasted Friends” invites what being at an Ike Reilly show is; a brooding sense of comradery tapered with washed up friends, intoxicated singalongs, and the holy belief in the importance of sharing stories.

With little time in between songs besides for talent or instrument switch outs, Ike performed a setlist that collected songs from his entire catalog, but still holding tight to the latest LP titled, Because the Angels, with the songs “Ashes to Ashes” and the fabled “Racquel Blue”. Ike even played some long-time-fan pleasers, such as the deep cut “Falling Into Happiness” from the 1992 release of Community #9. And because it was the day after St. Patrick’s Day, Ike and the band couldn’t help but pay homage to “one of the greatest songwriters of all time who drinks a lot and has no teeth”, Shane MacGowan (as described in a story about his oldest son for which he is named after). Covering both “Rainy Night in Soho” and “Dirty Old Town” accompanied by the Irish tin whistle, Ike’s long time friend Frank Quinn joined the band for a handful of songs to ring in the Irish holiday tradition.

Since the faulty days of quarantine, Ike has been performing with his three boys, Shane, Kevin, and Mickey in what were live stream videos as a source of income; or just an attempt at family bonding. But since then, the boys have been touring with their dad and the IRA family, and now are a pleasurable staple to the shows. Shane performed an original song, “Who’s Been Hurting’” from his anticipated album. Implementing Dylan undertones, (but catchier), he showcases his own writing ability next to his established father. The Reilly family also pulled out the new crowd favorite, “Trick of the Light”, in which every boy gets to sing memorable lines of messed up families, greed, internal mutiny and the common backhand to those around you.

After seeing Ike and the IRA a dozen times, it’s striking how the band can make each show unique. Ike Reilly, as the front man, is no more fierce as he is endearing. Taking a hold of the stage with what is years of experience and a powerful message to be told, Ike will always give a nod and smile to familiar faces in the crowd and tell personal stories that ground him as a humble yet sometimes flawed human. The band behind him is just as important as Ike himself to the unforgettable IRA shows. Whether that be Phil Karnat’s ability to emulate overarching tones with atmospheric guitar playing, Dave Cottini’s taut style of drumming, Pete Cimbalo’s strict bass lines and iconic bass-face, or Adam Krier’s ability to blend any instrument into the song, Ike Reilly uses this high-class talent for his benefit. A benefit, that no matter the venue, the band has the ability to own it.

To capsize the show with IRA traditions, the show ended with “Put A Little Love In It”, where the stage was filled to its brim for this holistic sing along about death, weed, and a gravedigger. For as intense and heartbreaking the original story behind that song is, it means something different to everyone, and I think Ike understands that. “This is a song for the people that we have lost and the people that we miss”, Ike says before brandishing the song that closes so many IRA shows.

Ike Reilly is often referred to as a renegade, a poet, a storyteller and a rebel, but what I think deviates Ike Reilly from other singer songwriters today, and the novel past, is his humility. Throughout his career he has experienced critical acclaim and critical neglect, but has learned to become something more important to his fans; an escape from life’s shitty doings. He is a man who understands hardship, religious turmoil, soul-sucking suits, the towny drunk, and the lost familyman; but in the end that makes him no different than anyone else in that crowd who gathered into Schubas at 2pm on Saturday to listen to the most experienced folk singer that no one has heard of.

Written by Shea Roney

Ike Reilly Information: https://www.ikereilly.com/
A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing

February 23rd, 2023

Tenci

Zac Belcher, Rachel Lessing, Paul Santiago

GENRE: folk/alternative LABEL: Keeled Scales 2022

Blackberry Farm; a farm turned family center in Aurora, Illinois, was a place of early childhood development for me. In our matching overalls and denim baseball caps, there are an abundance of pictures of my little brother and I with our mom at this farm. We often indulged in the attractions of miniature pony rides, the anticlimactically slow carousel, and the steam engine train that was conducted by a likely alcoholic. But at that age, bubbles and chalk were all we cared about. In the back of the farm, next to the, now questionable, “settler” house and period-actor with the weaving loom, was an old well. It was too dark to see how far it went down and the top was barred off to prevent fidgety kids from finding out. But it was wide enough for us to wish on a penny and drop it in with every visit.

            On their sophomore album, A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing, Chicago’s own, Tenci, create a space of empathy and self-rejuvenation to find understanding in what it means to be human. Jess Shoman, the primary songwriter of Tenci, expands on their 2020 release My Heart is an Open Field, which focuses on themes of loss and loneliness. On A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing, Shoman returns to these themes, but with the perspective of mature growth and understanding.

            Tenci has always built instrumentations around the use of Shoman’s unique voice, which is often used as an instrument itself. On this album, Shoman uses influences of psychedelic folk artists such as Jessica Pratt and Michael Hurley to create a fit-for-a-movie landscape of sparse and airy folk tunes. But like Shoman’s voice, the band comes in and out with a method of accent points. The rest of Tenci consists of Izzy Reidy, Curtis Oren, and Joseph Farago, who all have respective musical projects of their own. The band’s use of instruments all play a part in the compositions and are strategically picked to tell the story. On songs such as “Be”, it begins with a simple and synchronized guitar riff. Just as Shoman growls the word “be”, the band erupts into a controlled burn of a screeching saxophone solo by Curtis Oren while maintaining the subtleness of the song underneath. This song early in the album showcases Shoman’s new complex approach to songwriting that goes beyond the illustrated emptiness that was My Heart Is An Open Field. This new conflicting orchestration is then showcased in “Sour Cherries”, where Shoman’s folky stylings are challenged by a subtle growing amplification of the band until chaos unfolds of squealing saxophone and swoops and howls of Shoman’s voice.

            As mentioned in the bio of A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing on Bandcamp, there are multiple meanings of the word “well” that could be considered in Shoman’s storytelling. The most obvious form of “well” is the old fashion way of getting water and making wishes. “Well” is also the most benign way of answering small talk questions about how you are doing. It is also the easiest way to kill further questions about how you are actually doing.

            A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing does the small talk for Shoman. This project has many instances that showcase Shoman’s personal growth since My Heart Is An Open Field. “Climb to the top of the magic tree, I’ll show you how I’m changing”, is how Shoman starts off on “Shapeshifter”, laying out what is to be the rest of the album. On the track “Vanishing Coin”, Shoman sings about the odd disappearances of friendships as they get older. With an accompanying music video of Shoman as a party magician, adult relationships can often vanish with no reason like a magic trick. In the almost fully acoustic “Great Big Elephant”, Shoman sings “we should just throw it down the well”. A simple and old-fashioned way to get rid of something. In this case it’s something that Shoman has been holding on to for too long and needs to accept that it is gone.

            As a kid, I can’t remember if I believed that tossing a coin down a well would make my wish come true. Although it’s probably a front for well owners to profit off the moldable minds of the youth, it is a nice sentiment. Even if the forces of the world don’t work directly with the coinage-to-well business, there is an idea that whatever you wish for on that coin is a small representation of who you are at that time. With Shoman’s notion of moving on and growing up from past experiences and relationships, there is a well overflowing of small representations ranging from their entire life. In the second to last song, and one of Tenci’s best, “Two Cups”, Shoman repeatedly sings “I won’t wait to fill my cup”. A realization that self-inflicted progression is the only way to accept the past and that filling your well with pieces of past experiences is never a bad thing. With a playful sing along chorus, it is almost a direct feeling of surrendering to your past and allowing that to shape who you are.

The legacy of family is a consistent point of topic throughout the album as well. With nursery-rhyme like songs of animals and clowns, Shoman brings up integral childhood emotions that still follow them to this day. In “Sharp Wheel ”, Shoman sings about being scared in their bedroom, but from fear that they deserve it, won’t seek the comfort of their parents. “Swallow Me Whole, Blue ” is a traumatic story about some neighborhood kids poisoning Shoman’s mom’s childhood dog. “I want to pet you from the inside ”, is Shoman’s way of wishing Blue was still here in order to protect their mother’s bad memories. The album’s closer, “Memories” utilizes audio from recovered home video of Shoman’s childhood, including conversations with their grandmother in Spanish and the screams of fear from encounters with bugs. “Memories” is pretty on-the-button, but it is still impossible not to feel a sense of nostalgia while closing out the album.

            Thinking back to my own memories of dropping coins in the well at Blackberry Farm can also be considered extremely on-the-button, but is there anything wrong with that? These memories bring me back to early childhood development of relationships with my family as well as with nature and wildlife. There are parts of me from that time that have remained, while there are parts that I have gotten rid of since. What Tenci does is create an album around a celebration of self-rejuvenation from your past. Especially after an album focused on grief, this new focus on A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing creates a relatable feeling of nostalgia, both through trauma and gratitude.

By Shea Roney

Tenci Information:

https://tenci.bandcamp.com/album/a-swollen-river-a-well-overflowing-2
Love the Stranger

February 15th, 2023

Friendship

GENRE: folk/country LABLE: MERGE Records

Oliver Wasow, Palo Alto, California, 1998

I live on the fourth floor of a brownstone in the middle of Madison, Wisconsin. This particular apartment, with its aged wood trim and random nail heads protruding from the floorboards, gets unbearably hot in the midst of the summer days. I have resorted to a system of carrying a box fan around with me room to room, powered with a humorously long extension cord. I would spend these days sitting on my soup stained, thrifted plaid couch and patiently wait for the day to end. Whatever problems I had in my life at that time were further provoked with the heat. The tools of successfully navigating a healthy lifestyle are weakened and I can’t help but watch the world around me as I sweat into it.

Philly based alt-country group, Friendship, released their album Love the Stranger in late July of 2022. I first listened to this album on a two-hour drive from a cabin where I shared an entire week with extended family. The week was spent reading Pearl S. Buck’s, The Good Earth, and the danger of always having a beer within arm’s length. Coming off this uneventful week, the car ride was endured by listening to Love the Stranger fully in two rotations and it just made sense.

Dan Wriggins and company began Friendship in 2015 with their debut album, Shock out of Season, from Chicago’s Orindal Records. The group was built around Wriggins and members from another Philly-based band, 2nd Grade. Their songwriting was consistent through two albums of subtle instrumentations and loosely constructed melodies. Since then, they have signed to Merge Records and now have the pressure to prove themselves as a potential indie powerhouse, alongside other Merge artists such as the Mountain Goats, Destroyer, and The New Pornographers. Instead of putting out something like the next Arcade Fire album, Dan stuck to what he knows best, sitting still.

There is a loose misconception that the most powerful and meaningful songs are thunderous music festival anthems that inspire thousands of people. But in retrospect, the majority of life is spent waiting in traffic, melting into your couch watching the History Channel, staring at articles about deconstructed churches on your phone, or doing the dishes. “Waiting on the fan with a slow rotation” from the song “Hank” was the first phrase that intrigued me on Love the Stranger. This line in and of itself sums up Dan’s writing as looking around and taking inspiration from everything and nothing at all. What Dan accomplishes in this single line is an illustration of someone who finds themselves caught in the in-betweens of life. Someone who is broiling in their home and counting the time for the rotating fan to come back to them with its blessings. This fixation on the mundane is relatable to anything, which makes Dan’s writing that much more endearing.

Love the Stranger is filled with frustration as well as a particular fixation on sitting still. Dan sings about the struggles of cleaning the grape-jelly remnants from a ramekin and being humored to a metaphor of the struggles of a relationship in turmoil. Jess Shoman from Chicago’s Tenci, makes an appearance on “What’s the Move”, singing about a faceless relationship. Even regional highway stops are given a nod of attention in the handful of minute long instrumentals spread throughout the album. “Kum & Go”, “QuickChek”, “Love’s”, and “UDF” are all regional convenience stores crossing the US, creating distance in the album and offering distinction to places that can blend together.

The Americana sound that the group emits has developed over time since their debut album. Approaching territory beyond the simple instrumentations, the group has embraced a larger sound that still holds true to rotating behind steel guitar drones and folk guitars. Dan’s voice, with its subtle grit, helps add frustration and emotion to the prosaic observations he’s singing about. Embracing the alt-country Americana sound is both charming as well as a callback to the classics where songs tell stories about the working man and the troubles of simple life.

I have had my fair share of dirty and laborious jobs growing up, enough to understand how disingenuous people can be. Learning how far the developing psyche of a teenager can be pushed. Being harassed by strangers because their table is too wobbly or their French dip isn’t warm enough for the complex palate can stain a world view. There comes a point when you get numb to the fact that people could care less about you, so you are given the opportunity to experience your surroundings undetected. You develop different meanings to the feelings you get from drinking alone as opposed to drinking with a friend. “I can tell you’re stuck. I can’t tell anyone else, cause you don’t threaten to help” is how Dan finishes “Mr. Chill”, a song about finding the right drinking buddy that won’t pity you for a bumpy existence. On the second to last track, Ugly Little Victory, Dan sings “it sucks when it ends and it sucks when it has no end”. An exhausting thought, but Friendship’s driving drums and dueling guitars approach make this the most inspiring (music festival anthem) line from Love the Stranger. “Only a nose hair away from inner peace today”, Dan sings on the album’s closer, “Smooth Pursuit”. An image of personal success of finding pleasure in your own place.

What Love the Stranger accomplishes is the ability to be okay with the idea of not seizing the day. Carpe diem, a cheap slogan branded into our personal motifs from movies and crappy kitchen signs, places a lot of pressure on an individual who is tired of their surroundings and the world around them. It’s not that Dan is singing about running away, altering his life or anything serious like that, but rather gives comfort in the thoughts that come to you when you take a moment to sit still.

On those hot summer days in my Madison apartment, I don’t panic anymore when I’m stuck on my couch with my box fan. I let it drown out the city noise and my shitty neighbors. Finding inspiration in an old couch, an unusable fireplace, or a rickety box fan can be just as inspiring as telling someone to be “Brave” or to “Shake It Off”. Love the Stranger offers new perspectives and a bit of hope in a place that I often find cruel and aging.

By: Shea Roney

Friendship information:

https://friendshipphl.bandcamp.com/album/love-the-stranger

https://www.mergerecords.com/artist/friendship
I Just Want to be Wild For You

February 7th, 2023

Tristan Paiige

MAITA

GENRE: rock/folk LABEL: Kill Rock Stars

Dear Portland, Oregon… you are no stranger to lyrically cutting and icon allotted artists at your disposal. But as of 2017, you have a new artist making a name for herself while keeping the dream of Portland music trapped within her big comforting hug. MAITA, with core member and songwriter Maria Maita-Keppeler, first released an EP in 2017 titled, Waterbearer. After that, she was quickly picked up by Portland profit makers, Kill Rock Stars. Her first full length album, Best Wishes, was one of my personal favorite albums from 2020. As an artist who started in indie folk roots, she was used to playing as a solo artist. But the more she wrote, MAITA morphed into a high dynamic and cathartic sounding group, adding Mathew Zeltzer, Cooper Trail, and Nevada Sowle. I Just Want To Be Wild For You, MAITA’s second full length release from Kill Rock Stars, continues on the path of personal storytelling of regretful disappointments and unmatched love in the eyes of someone who feels lonely.

The opening track “Loneliness” starts the album on a self-reflective and exhausted story of time spent in Kyoto, Japan. Having Japanese roots, Maria finished college with a degree in traditional Japanese woodblock printmaking. In 2013, she spent 6 weeks alone in Kyoto receiving private woodblock printmaking classes. In that time of solitude, Maria learned first hand what it means to be lonely in another country (only depicted up to this point by Scarlett Johansson and Bill Murray). “Loneliness” perfectly describes the feeling of catching your reflection in a shop window and seeing how pissed you look at the fact that you feel lonely in such a beautiful city. As the closest thing that MAITA has released that could be considered dream pop, “Loneliness” starts the album with an atmospheric daydream sound that strays from the normal sound of the group.

“Pastel Concrete” showcases what makes MAITA’s songwriting so absorbing. With her long winded and melodic phrases leading to short, catchy choruses bathed in 90’s crunch guitar style chords, poignant and rhythmic drumming, and fingerpicking electric guitar, MAITA can sing a song about a broken heart caused by a distant romance and make you want to dance to it.

There are a lot more tracks that use thrashing guitars than the previous album; asking the question who does MAITA want to be wild for? Tracks like “You Sure Can Kill a Sunday Part I” have the flashing guitar work right out of the gate, with fuzz filled bar chords and dueling staccato guitar notes. Songs like “Road Song” and “Honey, Have I Lost It All” save the loudness for the end, almost in a strategic and manipulative way to keep listeners emotionally overwhelmed that they feel the sudden need to punch dance out all of their pent up feelings. So who is going wild at these points in time? Is it the band, the listener, or does it go deeper into the world of Maria?

Closing off the album, the song “Wild For You” is a look at the role of women in a marriage, especially in the modern day concept of a legally binding relationship. Maria takes reference from her life to try to piece together a tale of a loveless marriage. She sings “And when I am gone you stray/And when you are here you are nothing”. Going wild can mean a number of things. It can be a reactionary to what can be seen as oppressive, or it can be finding youthfulness again when there is nothing left. With dynamic swells of strings and the driving rhythm of the drums and Maria’s words, “Wild For You”, pushes us to think about who makes us feel like going wild, and, to that point, is it worth it?

When listening to Maria’s lyrics, it is hard to imagine how she can make this beautiful cluster of elongated phrases into a melody that is enjoyable to listen to. But Maria is well versed in making the words work for her. Her intimate lyrics are chalked up with specific and intricate details that can only come from her personalized artistic thought process. Coming from indie-folk roots, Maria is duty-bound by her need to tell a story. Whether these are stories of love in turmoil or the mundane feeling of killing a Sunday with someone other than your own thoughts, MAITA’s charm of narrating is key to their draw. Stories are only as good as the one acting as the storyteller. In her own style of playing, MAITA proves time and time again that she is one hell of a storyteller with a lot left to be said.

By: Shea Roney

MAITA information:

https://maita.bandcamp.com/merch

MAITA