Chicago is on fire right now. From indie rock, to art pop, to jazz, the Windy City’s scenes detail its rich musical history. As of late, a lo-fi wave of straight-to-tape projects championing DIY and punk ethics has cropped up on the west and south sides. Answering Machines is one of many of those bands.
In the leadup to Ugly Hug and Post-Trash’s benefit fest this Sunday at the Empty Bottle, both sites are featuring each project on their respective sites. Answering Machines is our leadoff hitter this Sunday, and their twitchy, melodic punk will kick off the night. The band’s very own Jackieboy chats with Pat Pilch about the band’s origins, playing in bands with your friends, and making art accessible.
How did Answering Machines start?
In high school I was in bands with some of my friends. I wanted to write my own music and not stress out about it. So I started recording songs on my phone on GarageBand. I kept doing it and then I moved to Chicago. I met Adelaide, who plays drums. We started playing shows here. The first show in Chicago was at The Empty Bottle with Silicone Prairie.
Where are you from originally?
DFW Texas. I grew up going to shows in Denton.
What kind of bands were you in in high school?
I was in this noise pop band. That’s what we called it. But… It was like… It started off as like a noise rock thing. Then we got really into Deerhoof.
Sweet. Who are your influences? And what are you into right now?
For Answering Machines the main ones are The Zeroes, The Ramones, Television Personalities and Beat Happening.
Your tapes and downloads are pretty cheap. Tell me about that. Is accessibility and affordability important to you?
With punk music, it comes with the territory. Making it accessible, plus I want it to sound accessible to make. The songs are simple and something any ordinary person could do. I like that rather than something complicated or overproduced.
How do you record?
I record with a four track. It’s called a Korg CR4 but I just broke it, so i’m using a Tascam Portastudio. We just recorded vocals yesterday. On track one we recorded all the instruments live and overdubbed the other stuff. Second guitar and two vocals.
What kind of Tascam do you have?
I forgot what it’s called. It’s that gray one. You can only record one track at a time. It’s like… It might be a Portastudio MS-T01. But… I could be wrong.
You’re in a couple different bands. How does your community support one another’s creativity?
I just met a bunch of people on the shows here. And my roommate Saskia. We started a band called Bungie Jumpers together. Then she started writing her own songs for a band called P. Noid. So, we’re just like, “If you play in my band, I’ll play in your band.” Type of thing.
Are you in school right now? What do you do?
Yeah. I’m in my last year of school. And I’m studying printmaking and drawing. I’m also a dog walker.
How does your non-musical art influence your music, if at all?
I feel like one of the big reasons why I like starting a million bands is you get to make art for it. I love making flyers and all that. The accessibility thing definitely carries over for me. For most of my print and drawings, I primarily use a photocopier to make all my collages and I don’t use computers. So it kind of carries over.
Do you make zines?
I don’t think I’ve made a zine before. No.
Is that something you’re interested in?
Yeah. A little bit, but I feel like there’s other people who are doing good things with that. And I’d rather just focus on being in and starting a bunch of bands. I just started two new bands. One of them is a hardcore band. We’re called Mr. Crazy.
I started another band with my friends called Autofill, and another called The Experience. I only have like three songs each for each band.
What is lyrically driving Answering Machines songs?
Mainly what’s going on in my life. Trying to convert that into something more universal that people can relate to. But I also keep it like teenager-y and silly. I love Beat Happenings lyrics. Cool. They’re not thinking too much. It’s not like trying to tell some epic story or anything. I just like something that’s relatable, especially to young people.
You can listen to the self-titled debut EP from Answering Machines now.
Ugly Trash Fest will be held on December 7th at the Empty Bottle in Chicago. All proceeds from tickets and raffle will be donated to Organized Communities Against Deportation. Get tickets HERE.
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 Albany-based band Bruiser and Bicycle.
I feel an advisory is required before peering into the world of Bruiser and Bicycle, an Albany, New York-based progressive folk ensemble. On October 8th, 2025, the band released an experimental approach to the traditional rural tunes of Americana, Deep Country. Their pastoral themes, intermingled with pop and rock, inform a new method of songwriting and production. A completely unique medley, belonging only to their name.
Flying freely in their whimsically constructed, musical plane, is “O’ There’s a Sign.” Gliding swiftly from start to finish, it lands in the third slot of the record, with a fast and abrupt arrival. The interior of the third track moves with fervor, featuring soft vocables that, unknowingly and excitingly, jump to overpowering proclamations and unheard-of questions like, “Who can flip a bottle on its side?” Bruiser and Bicycle never allow for comfort. There are too many moving parts to just idly sit by and passively consume their sound. To listen to the four-part ensemble, one should be keen and observant, on the lookout for the next unexpected, jerking turn.
With their closing track and record title, Deep Country, they continue to use whimsy to build their distinct image. Theatrical voices sporadically holler in the background of the melody, chiming in to spackle any holes of silence. But, one voice drives the album’s bucolic theme by slowly chewing through the lines: I’ve been out, in the fiery heat of the desert / There’s a peculiar rhythm / Arcadian or wisdom. Glistening at the tail end of the track: rapid strums and feathery adlibs to lighten its hefty precursor.
As a result of these humorous voices, the album gives the impression of a score. Playfully sounding over transient bits that feel awkward in the moment, but funny upon reflection. Films such as Juno or Little Miss Sunshine come to mind.
Proliferating from characteristics of the south, Bruiser and Bicycle portray themselves as a woven tapestry—a traditional practice blended with different materials. Their rustic-indie folk feel leans into a familiar sound, yet offers an exciting jumble of eccentric voices, introspective repetition, and jabbing humor. The unpredictability of the group amplifies any intrigue going into a listen. The chase of pinning down a meaning or general idea of the band will never tire you. Be aware, be alert, and be on the lookout for what’s to come from Bruiser and Bicycle.
You can listen to Bruiser and Bicycle’s playlist HERE!
You can find Deep Country and the rest of their discography below.
Music holds the power to wake us up, lull us to sleep, or transport us to dreamlike realities – Adeline Hotel’s new record Watch the Sunflowers unwraps a unique culmination of all three. In a long string of critically acclaimed releases out of Ruination Records, Dan Knishkowy is no stranger to the quiet spell it takes to create a record that feels dense yet holds the ability to float on air like this. Here, he’s less concerned with revelation than presence – the slow, patient art of noticing.
Where earlier Adeline Hotel albums drifted in the gentle haze of folk minimalism, Watch the Sunflowers feels almost meditative. Knishkowy sits somewhere between the fragile intimacy of Sufjan Stevens and the pastoral melancholy of Nick Drake. His voice, both literal and compositional, feels steadier, communal in spirit – like a speaker straight from the soul.
The opening track “Dreaming” sets the pace – as Knishkowy speaks directly to the listener: “some things take a little while”. A slow-building lattice of fingerpicked guitars that seem to shimmer in and out of sync. While Whodunnit’s openers were tentative, this one feels confident – an invitation that is reflective and authentic.
Stretching out the stillness, “Nothing” layers brushed drums and soft synth into something reminiscent of early Iron and Wine, yet with a maturity in the arrangement that hints at the slow and steady growth over the past few albums. The refrain feels like a heartbeat: steady and unhurried. While his voice blurs at the edges, a reminder that vulnerability can live in conjunction with strength.
“Swimming” catches you mid-current, tumbling you into its stream. Guitar fragments appear like sunspots, somewhere between longing and amusement. At the center of the record, it’s a track that could feel heavy handed. Instead, its light – buoyant in its sadness, as if noticing the color of the leaves as the storm passes through them.
“Ego” strikes differently. Accompanied by the sly tension of the piano, Knishkowy begs the looming questions of the human experience: “Do I need to be kind?”. It pulses, even slightly ironically – as if he’s testing whether or not you’re paying attention. The track introduces a shift, with hidden twang and undercover woes – it exemplifies a willingness to deconstruct and rebuild. The shift continues into “Just Like You”, which reimagines sound into the nostalgic experimentation of the early 2010s. You feel transported to somewhere serene, familiar, comfortable. It’s a kaleidoscopic experience that melts together into something nearly indescribable.
“Spaces” returns to the album’s homebody heartbeat, offering reflection on the gaps between moments and people. The instrumentation is sparse, allowing the space to resonate deeply. The final title track “Watch the Sunflowers” closes the album with a gentle crescendo, leaving a lingering sense of warmth and resolution – the perfect ending to a record that moves carefully between reflection and the light.
William Blake quotes “As a man is, so he sees. As the eye is formed, such are its powers.” Knishkowy understands this intimately; Watch the Sunflowers isn’t about what’s seen, but how it’s seen. Stillness can sharpen sight, and the smallest moments can open to infinity.
You can listen to Watch the Sunflowers out now as well as order it on vinyl via Ruination Records.
Indie-folk band Florist captures the heartbreaking magic of being alive in their newest album Jellywish; ten soothing, ambient tracks that act as a friend who shares a moment of understanding for listeners. While comforting, the album reminds people to remember that so much of the suffering in the world is created by humans, and that there is a constant, desperate need for change.
Florist is a friendship project based in Brooklyn, New York, made up of four members: Emily Sprague, Rick Spataro, Felix Walworth, and Jonnie Baker. Jellywish was released on April 4, 2025 under the record label Double Double Whammy. It was engineered by Rick Spataro, mixed by Alex P. Wernquest and Rick Spataro at Basement Floods, and mastered by Josh Bonat. The beautiful album artwork was created by Vera Haddad.
All songs are composed by Sprague, who described the album as “different from past Florist releases in that it does not offer the solution of inner peace or beautiful conclusions.” Many of the songs make this clear in a simple way, such as the line “should anything be pleasure when suffering is everywhere” in the first track “Levitate.” Sprague manages to blend hope and pain in a way that creates an immersive experience in empathy and humanity.
The album flows very intentionally, beginning with the quiet, acoustic song “Levitate” and ending similarly with “Gloom Designs,” accompanied by soft guitar and rain noises. The instrumentation ebbs and flows throughout, ranging from clear vocals, fingerpicking, and soft piano, to gritty guitar solos, light percussion, glitching background noises and distorted vocals. While the accompaniment remains minimal throughout, it is never too simple. Both the instrumentation and stylistic choices shift between hope and sadness in a way that mirrors the real world. The meditative songs resemble poetry, often lacking choruses but containing repeated lyrics to get lost in. The lack of structure is reminiscent of the societal topics and themes of the album.
Turning intimate moments into something relatable, Sprague tackles how much love and hope can be found in the world, without shying away from the many harsh realities. They write about love in a poignant way, with the lyrics “there’s no evil in your eyes” in “Sparkle Song” and “it’s been a long time since we laughed until we cried / it’s been a short time in the entirety of life” in “Gloom Designs.” “You cut your hair off and started to glow” captures the feeling of watching someone become themself and loving them more for it in the track “Started to Glow.” Death remains a steady theme, reminding us that everything is temporary, but that there is so much to love in the meantime. The album invites listeners to accept their emotions without shame.
Lyrics about the natural world add vivid imagery to the listening experience, with descriptions of rivers and waterfalls, red sunrises, the desert sky, and morning dirt. While Jellywish is lovely at any point of the year, it provides a comfort to the winter months, with descriptions of gardens dying in the freezing cold and ice. In addition, the song “Jellyfish” asks the question “will there still be winter in a year?”
On the surface it seems like Florist has created a new, magical reality to escape to with this album, until you realize these slices of life portrayed can be found just outside the window. A reminder that you can be small and important at the same time.
You can listen to Jellywish out now as well as on vinyl and cd.
This past summer, Chicago’s own Girly Pants and Rain Garden went on a 9 date Midwest to East Coast run which they called the Girl of the Garden Tour. We gave them a camera to take on the road and document their first big tour. This is what we got back.
Girly Pants, fronted by songwriter Sabreen Alfadel, is a project that has become interchangeable with both her growth as a musician and as an individual. Girly Pants as a band, consisting of friends Luigi De Col [drums], Drew Emerson [bass] and Carter Ward [guitar], craft steady tracks amongst swooning guitar lines and invigorating rhythms, where Sabreen’s vocals become a point of reflection, wielding both strength and tenderness with each melody and line she performs.
Rain Garden’s instinctive and dynamic sound is one that lingers with every performance. Fronted by Miranda Dianovsky [guitar, vox], whose vocals conduct each track with such power and sincerity, Rain Garden finds its special place due to each member’s unique style. Consisting of Harley Reid [bass], Maya Halko [guitar] and Vincent Byas [drums], Rain Garden lives for their pacing, one behind the gives and takes of our day-to-day actions, throwing caution to the wind as we relish in that invincibility we feel in the moment.
The tour was part of a 6-month logistics amalgamation, spearheaded by Sabreen and Miranda. With some inspiration from their collective band names, Girl of the Garden was in reference to the cult classic TV show King of the Hill, which was a theme throughout the tour, including the limited-edition shirt of the two bands drawn in the cartoon’s likeness, as well as the theme song interluding some Girly Pants sets.
As memorable as a first big tour can be, Girl of the Garden did not follow typical touring guidelines. “Every show was unique,” Sabreen shares. “Some of the venues included a festival in the woods, a vintage clothing store, a basement, a record store and a Mexican restaurant. Very DIY and awesome.” At the end, “Becoming closer as friends and collaborators with girly pants was one of the most rewarding aspects of this tour,” Miranda says. “I think we all feel truly grateful that we embarked on this together”
Rain Garden recently released their latest EP Aconite which you can listen to now.
Girly Pants is currently working on new music, but in the meantime, you can listen to their debut EP Nurture now.
Laveda’s Love, Darla opens in a haze – distortion pushing against reality, vocals in between presence and distance. A feeling only capable in the fading summer hours of this early autumn album. The Albany group is no stranger to working in pieces, creating records that stand on a strong hill of no resolution. For duo Ali Genevich and Jake Brooks, instability is not a flaw so much as it is a pedestal – shaping every note, every pause, every moment that pushes against the noise.
The record unfolds starting with “Care” – which doesn’t provide so much as the title may suggest. The guitars are ragged, distortion pulled nearly threatening collapse, with vocals sounding half-dubbed from an alternate tape. It sets the stage as a mosaic of disorder and shoegaze revivalism. Not unlike the rawer moments of their influences like Paper Lady and Holding Hour, Laveda chases the sensation of the unsteady. The impulse extends with high velocity into “Cellphone” and “Strawberry”. These songs feel made for the VFW Hall, the local house show, the dusty dive bar where the PA system will blow out.
It’s the quiet moments, however, that complicate and bring a certain fragile depth to the album. Songs like “Dig Me Out” slow the frame, with admissions like “I know you’re gonna kill me / I need your love it’s endless” cracking the worship of volume with matter-of-fact clarity. It’s not a plea, but a Didion-like observation. It’s one of the only times we find comfort in the record, in a bizarre way – as the honesty feels buried within us, too. The almost hushed nature reappears in the closing track, asking “when you come around, will you think of me?”. Beneath a rock hard surface, the album ultimately serves as a love letter.
Yet, lyrically, Laveda avoids the temptation towards confessional sprawl. The words arrive clipped, anchoring the sound rather than explaining it. Self doubt, dislocation, the struggle to inhabit one’s own life; they’re all present themes, but rendered bluntly, almost sparsely, while the guitar does the emotive work. In this way, this record is separated from the melodrama of its peers: the restraint is sharp and cutting.
Laveda’s Love, Darla feels like the kind of record you stumble into sideways: half-buried on Bandcamp, just caught on your college radio that still gets it right now and then. This record belongs to the East Coast DIY circuit, where distortion is structural and vocals barely cling to the surface. Give it a listen on Bandcamp and check out their current tour dates!
You can listen to Love, Darla out now as well as get it on vinyl and CD.
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 Texas/New York-based artist Lefty Parker.
Last month, Lefty Parker shared Ark via Airloom Records. The album was recorded in October of 2023 with Buck Meek – of whom Lefty has built a hearty collaborative and personal relationship upon the foundation of a shared love for songwriting, surfing, and tender creativity. The record’s live band also features Adam Brisbin and Jesse Turley, with additional contributions from Adrianne Lenker, Germaine Dunes, James Krivchenia, Michael Sachs, Mat Davidson of Twain and Michael Bushais.
Recently, I spoke with Lefty about seeking the same impact from music as the one experienced during one’s teenage years. It was a notion that resonated with me heavily, despite the fact that neither of us could quite articulate it in a way that surpassed the complexity of feelings that “music hit harder” amidst a more youthful time. Whenever I find myself enamored and vigorously moved by music, I notice that it’s a feeling I associate with being eighteen and “discovering” music for the first time. Perhaps there are nostalgia factors at play, but I also think it marks a time where one simultaneously develops in identity, and (at least in my experience), discovers music outside the realm of what is merely fed to you. Music that is not on the radio, perhaps music hatched from a slimmer budget, music that is not perfect and music that does not boast dozens of names credited behind it. Music that is complex, personal, interesting, humble. Music that makes you fall in love with music.
We were not doing an interview, this was merely a fleeting conversational moment I pocketed in between visits to the heaps of overstimulating dollar stores on Broadway, but when I sat down to write about Lefty’s latest record, I found myself returning to my own conclusions about music’s potency and adolescence. Ark is an album that sneaks up on you; it’s warm and grounded, it’s raw, but approachable. You do not quite notice the ways it burrows further upon each listen until it’s too late. Until you feel completely ambushed by the intense emotional weight within Lefty’s unfettered vocals, and their subtle but profound shifts. Until you find yourself entirely enamored by the airy strings and stunning woodwind accents. Until the vulnerable vignettes of Ark feel like your own.
Ark is the kind of album that turns straw to gold. It’s a familiar twangy silhouette, relying on organic instrumentation and mosaics of heartache you have likely heard before. And yet, it manages to strike in a way that feels almost foreign, in the way that powerful art can elicit a feeling of hearing music for the first time. It’s a meandering tale of the diligence of experiencing life, of the never ending cycle of getting lost and finding yourself, of seeking guidance in things that feel larger than us. It’s a beautiful and comforting and human listen, and it’s one that can touch you regardless of the chapter of life you are currently amidst.
“If it meant that much to you, would you say it, would you shy away?” Carolina Chauffe asks this not as a challenge, but as a kind of prayer. Their voice doesn’t seek an answer; it simply opens a clearing for one. This is an invitation anyone who has spent time with hemlock knows well. There is no backing away—only a breath reaching towards you, hands grabbing the warm fabric draped across their body to wipe the fog from your glasses, so you can see how delicate yet beautiful things are when you allow someone else to see you, too. And then, when a hemlock song ends, the wires are tucked behind your ears again. The world feels a little nearer, like you’ve been returned to it. This is the gift they give: revealing precision, refusing possession.
The five songs that make up Orange Streak Glow appear as bursts of light. Sometimes brief, sometimes steady. One may be the extra birthday candle, wedged into the layered sponge. Proof that the laces stayed tied for another lap. The next, a bulb that flickers back on, revived when you jostle the shade. And then it’s a color stretched across the sky, or smeared like a melted popsicle on hot pavement. Or perhaps you’ll see it as the kind of light that lives in storage: a tangled string collecting cobwebs, placed in a box beneath the stairs, until December arrives and the glow is asked to return. And what a miracle it is when you plug that string in, and each tiny spark strikes—ready to be temporarily wrapped and tucked around a tree standing straight and tall. Already dying, but displayed and danced around for a moment, as if it could not be more alive.
There is a glow, too, that arrives in the middle of the night and lights up a screen. A notification that makes you sit up, unplug, and walk over to the fire, letting the flame catch in the corners of your teary eyes. This is how I was introduced to “In That Number,” a song that mixes the familiar, “When The Saints Go Marching In,” with a feeling that pours out like smoke from a chimney. Now awake in a pitch black room, I removed myself from a twin-sized bed that was not mine, scared to be the stranger leaving stains on white pillowcases. Before I knew it I was curled up on the floor with my hands cupped beneath my face, rerouting the tears through the creases so I could watch them disappear down my sleeves. In the background, whistling like a teakettle, I could hear Maya Bon (of Babehoven) confidently coo: “I’m not scared of the water / I’m here comin’ back down / Feel the burn, face the fire,” and every word rang true. I was not scared of the stream coursing through me. Nor was I scared to realize I wanted something to reach out and touch me, unafraid to squeeze my soaked palm.
What does it mean to ask for that contact? What does it mean to offer it? Nestled in the center of the EP, I hear Carolina circle the same sentence, ink digging deeper into the page, “I am a clothespin and you are the laundry line,” and like playing musical chairs, I start looking for my line, wondering if I’ll find it before the music stops. I ask myself: What spool can I wrap around? What ear will hold my voice when I cannot listen anymore? I send a signal (a burst of light) to someone I’ve begun stacking piles of laundry beside: ‘What do you make of this lyric?’ They respond and talk about what provides structure and what provides support. I propose that maybe it’s about how we view our purpose. I am gently reminded that there are clothes involved too and someone must be mindful of the weight as they are hanging them. The spring between my two fragile limbs decides it wants to hold on tighter and longer. Binding is less daunting when you are choosing to endure and weather the same storms together, finding there is light in the shared strain. Or sometimes, there’s no strain at all. Just light.
The songs on Orange Streak Glow echo both the pain and the pleasure that come with admitting you have been altered by something—by someone. They are songs that understand that all communication is an act of faith. That to name something is to risk misnaming it. That in the end, the words that slice us open might also stitch us back together. That we hold the same power that someone holds over us. Because the truth is the safety we find in honesty might someday become the thing that tells us we need to pack up and leave. Taking what is now unburied with us, along with a basket of our deconstructed fragments, eager to hold onto something again.
In the days before hemlock’s latest EP landed like a feather in my lap, I was hiding away in a town near Hudson, NY, not far from 12lb Genius, where it was recorded. I was stumbling and circling the same sentence, tracing the thin lines between my teeth with my tongue. I was looking at a faded ‘You Are Here’ mark on a map, not really sure where ‘here’ was, or where ‘there’ was either, for that matter. The rain followed me and sometimes I was too slow to outrun it. Wet leaves stuck to my socks and became the inner linings of my boots. I found a frozen blue raindrop one morning, after the storms passed, and put it in my pocket. Something told me that even if I were to hang my jacket on the line, that one drop—if it ever thawed and pooled—would not dry. It would stain, it would burn a hole, it would leave a mark. And I wanted nothing more.
So what does it truly mean, to look at something you long to care for and reflect it back, offering structure and support? To say you will choose something even if it doesn’t choose you back? The first time I held the title track in my ear, in those final moments before the engine turns off in the driveway, I thought: This is the hemlock I know. A season returned, a holiday, a solid oak. There are some people who don’t just reach out for you, but remind you that it is possible to place your own finger on the map. They show you that what surrounds you has a pulse—hums—and you are welcome to join its choir, as both a listener and participant. It’s there, somewhere between the glow and the dark, as something you cannot see chirps, that you realize you were never outside of the equation at all. To choose nothing is not an option when every rustle has its own weight. What better choice is there than to take the thing you long for and turn it into a melody of your own? While there’s no knowing, you might just find that someone will push past the branches, look right at you, and sing it back.
The members of ira glass do not agree on everything. They have varying music backgrounds, varying listening tastes, varying stances on the accordion. They are four different people, after all – simply being in an experimental noise rock band together is not going to file down their differences and turn them into one homogenous organism. Nor should it, I cannot imagine the music would be nearly as enticing if it were produced by an army of clones. However, if there’s one thing the Chicago-based four piece can agree on, it’s webcore. They love ARGs and “low-res digital stuff”. They enjoy grueling scavenger hunts on archive.com, sifting through mounds of digital muck for something that resonates with them. They have created projections that collage videos sourced from Youtube rabbit holes. ira glass like making their own sense of the vastness of the web – spinning the overwhelming mounds of data it holds into a narrative of sorts, whether or not it’s decipherable to anyone else. Whether or not it’s even decipherable to them. “It’s like a willed, forced synthesis,” drummer Landon Kerouac notes amidst the webcore portion of our call. “A montage that doesn’t make sense but kind of works.”
ira glass’ approach to music is not too different from their mutually savored internet practices. In fact it’s essentially the exact same – though they would probably never say that, because they are not really the type of band to overly anatomize and delineate their own creative process. If anything, they are allergic to approaching music with too much cogitation, telling me that the act of intentionally striving to create something acutely new and never done before is a “nebulous, almost flawed way to go about art.” ira glass is not trying to forge some cunning new genre, in the same sense that they have no interest in tethering themselves to one that already exists. They just want to make music that they like. Music that resonates with them. Music that feels genuine.
The result is some sort of epic auditory Frankenstein; its appendages pulling both from the band’s external inspirations and “the id”. Out today, their caustic sophomore EP, joy is no knocking nation, is a sensical quilt that honors fragments and facets of their life at the time it was created. Some are discernible, like post-hardcore and jazz influences, wrath induced by infestations of faux-alternative characters, ambitions to experiment with unorthodox instruments, etc. Others cannot be outlined as easily, yet manage the same authentic impact. It’s an abrasive and charged listen, but never in a way that feels forced. The emotions are real, finding themselves in a sometimes crooked composition that winds up and down and adjourns when it needs to. It’s intense in a human way, and it’s honest without overly earnest lyricism.
“I just don’t like relying on the same old tropes, old school screamo doesn’t appeal to me,” vocalist Lise Ivanova tells me about her thoughts on lyrics. “It’s all very misanthropic or self-hating and I don’t feel that.” Instead of honing this sort of cynical pity-party poetry or accumulating shreds of intense vulnerability from their own lives, ira glass’ lyrics are detached and labyrinthine-like. They can be funny and intense and idiosyncratic, they can mean something to you if you’d like or they can just exist as another enigmatic component of the EP’s experience. It doesn’t really matter, the point is they exist in the same way as everything else ira glass creates; free from functional pressures and dilettante natures. It’s an ethos that glues together the eccentricity of their latest EP, and it’s contagious within the listen. Even in joy is no knocking nation’s harshest moments, characterized by discordant clamors of noise and shrill screaming, there is a lingering sense of comfort – perhaps even a certain catharsis, chipping away at the weight of various pressures and demands and self-inflicted factors that prevent you from just being your fucking self.
We recently spoke to ira glass about curating discomfort, “lame fake-alt people”, and joy is no knocking nation, out today via Angel Tapes.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Manon: I’d love to hear how you guys just started playing music together. How did you meet and when did you start ira glass?
Lise: I moved to Chicago in October of 2022, I had lived in LA prior and had been trying to start a band there, but LA was not really fertile for bands. So when I moved to Chicago, I was dead set on starting a band, and I put up a bunch of flyers within a week of moving here, recruiting for a noise rock project and Landon was among the first to respond. We met at Whirl Away Lounge on Fullers End and talked about our influences and then we later recruited Jill – Jill and Landon know each other.
Jill: We used to work together at this french cafe.
Landon: Basically, Lise and I met in this almost romantic way – like a flyer, but then our two other members we know from day to day life.
Lise: Kaleb and I go way back. We lived in Albuquerque and were in a band called Thrush, it was a fake band because we only played one show, but it was still a good band. Even though it was a Big Black rip off. That’s how I know Kaleb.
Manon: It was fake because you only played one show?
Lise: Yeah. We practiced so much more than we played.
Manon: You mentioned that LA was not very fertile for bands. How does Chicago compare, and how would you say the scene there in general has impacted Ira Glass over the years?
Lise: I think there are more normal people here that aren’t, like, evil. So it feels better playing here.
Jill: There is a lot of collaboration, everyone is really friendly and they want to play a lot of shows with you and help each other out.
Lise: People are very sincere and driven. I feel like LA is very isolating and everybody is on a solo venture but there are a lot of bands in Chicago and people want to get together and play music with others.
Manon: You mentioned this idea of sincere and “normal people”. I feel like there is a presence of that on this new EP – maybe some exasperations about not normal people, or specifically, “freakos with hand tattoos”. How would you describe your relationship to sincerity?
Lise: Disingenuous people upset me deeply. Yeah. There are social climbers everywhere and there are lame, fake alt people everywhere. I don’t think that is exclusive to Chicago.
Manon: It’s definitely not.
Lise: But, I think there is more of a working class here. I guess that has something to do with it.
Landon: I can’t speak on it lyrically, but with our music and the composition, I think we are not necessarily striving for something new because that’s a really nebulous, almost flawed way to go about art. But also wanting to create something that comes from deep down.
Lise: Something from the id.
Landon: Yeah. [Our composition] is both really innate and also meticulous and thought out. I think that sort of synthesis gives us a sense of sincerity. I feel like we just go, “what feels right?”, and then meticulously work with and edit that material once it has come out of the depths. Would you agree with that?
Lise: Um, I don’t know.
Landon: Okay. Disregard what I just said.
Manon: I can also ask a more specific question about composition. I feel like when you make noise music, the ‘noise’ part is often rather defining, but you have a lot of interesting complementing instrumentals, and I really like a lot of the jazz elements within this EP – especially in the end of “fritz all over you”… that song is stunning. I would love to hear about your general music inspirations, and the kind of sound you were hoping to cultivate in joy is no knocking nation?
Lise: When we first started, I was super influenced by nineties Chicago noise, like classic noise rock, Albini, the Albini scene. And then, I was simultaneously also getting super influenced by mid-late nineties, early two thousands screamo, like Drones, Dream, and Orchid. So I think our first EP, compound turbulence, was definitely more influenced by those things. This EP feels a bit more post-rock, experimental, and post-hardcore. I think we are getting more into the jazz influence. Jill is a jazz head.
Jill: Yeah.
Lise: Jill, go ahead. Jill did jazz band.
Jill: Yeah. Jazz band. Throughout college.
Lise: You come from a jazz lineage.
Jill: Yeah, a lineage of jazz musicians.
Lise: And we all like jazz. I actually wanted a horn because of Brain Bombs, the way they use horns is so different. It’s not influenced by jazz at all. But Jill brings a very melodic kind of influence that I appreciate. Anything else about our influences?
Jill: We all come from relatively different backgrounds.
Lise: Landon, you like a lot of modern and contemporary noise rock.
Landon: Yeah, I definitely admire a lot of the nineties stuff, and I think what is happening with noise right rock right now is super interesting. Bands like Sprain and Shearling. Also Chat Pile. Then bands like Spirit of the Beehive.
Lise: Prostitute.
Landon: Yeah, Prostitute as well. I don’t want to keep listing band names, but I think Spirit of the Beehive is a huge influence compositionally because they don’t really have verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge – you know, it’s not a very orthodox song structure, but it flows really seamlessly. I think for us, maybe instead of seamless, perhaps our song composition is a bit more stitched together.
Lise: Contrived.
Landon: Not contrived.
Lise: Difficult.
Landon: It’s more stitched.
Lise: It’s a laborious taste
Jill: We figure out how to mesh different pieces together.
Lise: We are kind of math influenced in that way. Yeah math rock is also an influence.
Landon: Yeah, it’s this combination of “how can we do upside down music?” and the crazy math stuff and also stay true to the ethos of noise rock?
Lise: The banging rock and roll of it all. Kaleb, what do you like? Kaleb likes dark wave.
Kaleb: I’m more into industrial and German wave stuff. My stint with noise rock is more like Birthday Party and Scratch Acid.
Lise: Aw those are great bands.
Landon: I think some of that comes in with our experimentation with instruments. I think my symbol stacks can definitely be in the industrial realm. I think our horns too, and there is an accordion on the EP.
Lise: Which you hated. And didn’t want to use.
Manon: Anti-accordion?
Jill: He doesn’t like Organs.
Lise: He doesn’t like accordions or organs.
Jill: It’s the harmonics, right?
Landon: No, no. For the accordion…it was simply… I was fine with the accordion…
Lise: He has a fear of sounding goofy.
Landon: It’s a bit of a goofy instrument…
Jill: And the whistle…
Lise: The coaches whistle. He didn’t like that either.
Landon: It’s a bit on the nose.
Lise: Whatever, no big deal.
Landon: I think that the willingness to experiment with instrumentals, like real, storied instruments, is very seventies industrial. Instead of saying “what plug in can we use”, it’s using a kazoo, or a whistle, or something like that.
Lise: We haven’t used a kazoo yet, but it’s in our future. Our near future. Or a harmonica.
Landon: I don’t like the harmonica either.
Lise: You don’t like the harmonica either? Damn Dude.
Landon: No, I’m just joking.
Manon: Did you use the whistle? Or is that also in the near future?
Jill: There’s whistles. One coach whistle, two little whistles.
Lise: There are buried straggler whistles towards the end of the big whistle.
Manon: There’s obviously a level of discomfort to noise music, is that something you enjoy?
Lise: Yeah, we are all generally kind of awkward and uncomfortable people.
Landon: I don’t like music that sounds too pleasant or harmonic. I think the dissonance is really pleasing when it comes to melodies or chords. A word that is used a lot is angular.
Lise: Do you like that word?
Landon: Yeah.
Lise: Landon likes the word angular.
Landon: Angular is cool. There are different flavors of discomfort and dissonance, and I think angular paints a very particular picture to the sort of dissonance that we like. It’s a more intentional discomfort.
Lise: Yeah that’s true, we like dynamics. Contrast. We live for the contrast.
Jill: It can’t all be uncomfortable. You have to lure them in.
Manon: What do you hope to achieve when you play these tracks in a live setting?
Lise: We don’t like banter.
Jill: We don’t talk. We don’t smile.
Lise: Yeah I feel pretty distant from the audience, or I shut the audience out. I don’t even see them, my eyes are closed most of the time. I feel like it’s purely a live display of our music.
Landon: We’re obviously doing this for a love of music. But as we love music in theory, I think sometimes being on stage is like a compulsion. I feel like when I am up there, I’m just reacting to things, and trying my best to keep up with it.
Lise: Yeah, it’s like we’re floating. It feels so dissociative.
Landon: Which is a very unique experience. It’s not the most pleasant, but it can also be crazy rewarding if it feels right.
Lise: We’re playing aggressive and sometimes difficult music. It’s not like the songs come from this place of deep, dark self-loathing, but it still is very emotionally taxing and cathartic.
Manon: So the actual nature of the music is more taxing than the lyrics. Your lyricism is awesome though, very eccentric and a bit convoluted. Can you tell me a bit more about that?
Landon: That’s all Lise, it’s a black box to the rest of us.
Lise: Shit, I don’t know either. I do a lot of unconscious, ‘spitting it out on a page’ writing, or I have done the classic cut-up thing where I try to take lyrics from elsewhere. I like the Melvins’ way of writing, just nonsense that is still really evocative. I think you can use words that do not really make sense and they can still evoke a really strong image, and I think that’s what I am trying to do with my lyrics most of the time.
Landon: As an observer and not necessarily the author, I think it’s sort of like vignettes in a way. Would you say that?
Lise: Sometimes. I’ve been known to write a vignette from time to time. I like to think about strange situations that I haven’t experienced myself and try to describe them. I think about other people’s stories a lot.
Landon: There’s a depravity to it in a way.
Lise: People have said that. I guess it’s depraved.
Written by Manon Bushong | Photo by Derrick Alexander
the ugly hug 