August 2018: Album Review Roundup

August was an utterly absurd month for new music. As the sun crests over the horizon and we enjoy our final moments of warm weather, it seemed as if every major artist was pushing themselves to get their records out before the season’s end. From long-awaited debuts to big-name collabs, there’s a lot to write home about now that the summer has entered its death throes, so let’s reflect on the greatness we’ve been lucky enough to receive over the past month.

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Travis Scott - Astroworld

While it’s clear that Travis Scott will never again attain the bombastic attention-seeking highs of his early days or the conceptual glitz of his creative peak, Astroworld at least restores hope that he can get close. After the half-effort Birds In The Trap Sing Mcknight, and the aggressively-middling Huncho Jack, Jack Huncho it seemed as if Travis Scott was on an irreversible downward trend. While these are harsh words, they’re only because I know Travis has it in him to make another classic. In fact, I’m such a fan of Travis Scott, last year I wrote nearly 7,000 words lamenting the fact that both he and Drake were so successful they didn’t have to try anymore. Now one year after airing those concerns we have our hands on Trav’s newest project, and it’s… better.

Astroworld is far from perfect, but it at least signals that Travis Scott is taking a bit of a more holistic approach to his music again. Opening track “STARGAZING” is an excellent mood-setter featuring tight bars, a cascading instrumental, and multiple beat switches. It’s a fantastic introduction that leads to the crowd-pleasing “CAROUSEL” where a surprise Frank Ocean feature leads to an unexpected Drake introduction. Similarly, “STOP TRYING TO BE GOD” packs Kid Cudi, James Blake, and Stevie Wonder into one of this year’s most heavenly and star-studded five and a half minutes. While this is all impressive, by the end of the record it becomes clear how much Astroworld has been propped up by features. From “NC-17” onward it’s essentially a plummet straight down into dregs of meandering trap. The album’s back half of barely-conceived hip-hop is punctuated by the album’s final three songs which all feature Travis Scott solo. While “COFFEE BEAN” is a compelling album closer, this ending stretch of songs only highlights the fact that Travis Scott probably couldn’t hold an entire album on his own. Even though Astroworld is a bit of a mixed bag, the loaded front half is so undeniable it ends up elevating the entire thing above some of his more recent offerings. A solid, but lopsided album with scattered glimpses of greatness.

Tides of Man - Every Nothing

Tides of Man went through a bit of an identity crisis in the early 2010’s. After releasing two landmark post-hardcore records on Rise Records, lead singer Tilian Pearson left the group to join Dance Gavin Dance. Rather than embark on a search for a new vocalist, the band decided to move forward without one entirely and threw themselves headlong into the world of post-rock. Having proven their chops on 2014’s Young and Courageous, the group is back with their second instrumental release and defacto sophomore album in their current incarnation. From its first seconds, Every Nothing sparkles and shines with the polish equal to the post-rock greats. Evoking Explosions In the Sky, God Is An Astronaut, and Caspian, this album proves that there’s life after loss. A recovery after an identity crisis. This is the sound of a band sticking the landing after a seismic change that would have dissolved any lesser group. 

Foxing - Nearer My God

Having raved about Smidley’s album last year, I might have entered this album with higher expectations than usual. I’ve never been an enormous Foxing fan, but the singles leading up to Nearer My God all hit home for me. “Slapstick” was fun, “Nearer My God” was a multicultural revelation, and “Gameshark” was a proggy Mars Volta-esque jaunt that felt out-of-the-box. This string of singles combined with the well-thought-out visuals seemed to imply a Foxing album that would finally land with me. While Nearer My God kicks off with the jaw-dropping “Grand Paradise,” the record then quickly devolves into Foxing’s usual brand of “acceptable” emo. Singles and opener aside, there’s nothing else in the album that truly resonated with me. I don’t know if I could tell you one other moment that stuck with me outside of these four songs. Nearer My God would have been a great EP, but maybe this band simply isn’t for me. 

Jesus Piece - Only Self

Sometimes you don’t need beauty. Sometimes you don’t need happiness. Sometimes all you need is destruction, and that’s exactly what Jesus Piece offers on Only Self. The album is a debut long in the making that finds the Philadelphia band blending metalcore and doom for a particularly potent and exponentially-heavy effect. Bearing propulsive drumming, low-swinging riffs, and vitriolic lyrics, Jesus Piece has created something entirely their own and more intense than anything I’ve heard from the genre in years. It’s fighting music. Music that makes you angry. Music you want to lift heavy things and punch back. It’s not an everyday emotion, but when the mood does strike, I can’t think of a single band doing it better than Jesus Piece. Phenomenal.

Young Thug - Slime Language

Young Thug is the rap game’s Joker. Unpredictable, animated, and reveling in his audience’s utter confusion. And this isn’t a role that comes easily; Thug has spent the last few years cultivating his absurdist image while simultaneously upending all of hip-hop’s traditions in the process. From taunting the greats, and rocking dresses to performing the bare minimum required to qualify as enunciation, Young Thug seems to have cemented himself as something that’s sorely needed in hip-hop today: an unknown. 

On Slime Language Young Thug offers up nearly one hour of outsider hip-hop from someone who’s spent years rising through the ranks yet still remembers who he is. Even when the words themselves are covering well-trodden hip-hop topics, the way he says them is never the same. You will find yourself listening closely just to see what Thug will do next, and I think that’s exactly what he wants. From a scratchy velcro octet of tire onomatopoeia on “Ardemaur” to a dexterous chorus on “STS,” everything on Slime Language feels fresh in a way that only Young Thug can do. Within any one song his inflection, voice, and flow can change from one word to the next, and it’s absolutely enchanting. Infectious and enigmatic. A hip-hop cult of personality. 

IDLES - Joy as an Act of Resistance

Having produced one of last year’s best punk albums (and one of the decade’s best debuts), IDLES have returned with a follow-up that’s equal parts gnashing and emotional. After losing his daughter last year, lead singer Joe Talbot publicly grappled with what that meant on both a cosmic and personal level. Joy as an Act of Resistance is the outcome of this meditation. Slow-building tracks that mount with dread until they erupt into thrashy punk explosions. Tonally different than last year’s Brutalism, but just as hard-hitting. A sonic reckoning in the aftermath of a sudden car crash of an event. The ebbs and flows of grief and loss. Sound and fury that lead to eventual recovery. 

Justin Vernon & Aaron Dessner - Big Red Machine

Helmed by Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon and The National’s Aaron Dessner, Big Red Machine represents a meeting of the indie minds the likes of which we rarely see anymore. With both artists coming off award-worthy, career-defining albums, the two find themselves collaborating at the perfect intersection as they find mutual ground in downbeat electronic soundscapes. From unexpected vocal deliveries that border on rapping (“Lyla”) to haunting, gospel soul-searches (“Forest Green”) every song on Big Red Machine hits just as hard as you would imagine. Turns out combining the wine-drunk sadness of The National with the snow-covered sadness of Bon Iver is a recipe for something even more emotional than the sum of its parts.

Mitski - Be the Cowboy

Existence is tiring. Other people are frustrating, relationships are messy, and even your own thoughts can be confusing. This sort of millennial malaise and caustic confusion is exactly what Mitski is capturing with Be The Cowboy. Like a diary transposed to music, the album traps Mitski at its center, shines a blinding spotlight on her, and then lets her writhe in agony for 32-minutes until both she and the listener collapse from exhaustion. It’s humanizing, flawed, messy, and isolating, just like all of us. Be The Cowboy is the exact kind of consolation you need after a breakup, hookup, or whatever falls between. An entire existence recorded to music.  

Quick Hits

• Mac Miller - Swimming: The the continuing story of the Pennsylvanian teen who has moved out, broken out, broken up, and grown up before our eyes.

• YG - Stay Dangerous: Flashy gangster bangers and not much else.

• Trophy Eyes - The American Dream: Effortlessly-catchy pop-punk that’s forward-moving, deeply-comforting, and soul-affirming.

• The Ocean Party - I.B.O.: Six musicians. Two songs apiece. One minute per song. A musical sketchpad of flexible artistry.

• Choker - Honeybloom: Emotionally-devastating post-Blonde RnB.

• Shy Boys - Bell House: Hard-cutting instrumentals that fall away for moments of stark honesty that shimmer like a lost Beach Boys song.

• Iggy Azalea - Survive The Summer: Remember “Fancy,” guys?

• Bad Bad Hats - Lightning Round: Songs about being a deeply-flawed and inherently-fucked up human. A therapeutic soundtrack to life.

• Moses Sumney - Black In Deep Red, 2014: A three-pack of groovy left-field RnB tracks with masterful multi-layered instrumentation and rich vocalization.

• Erra - Neon: Progressive and mathematical metalcore that rapidly alternates from airing saccharine sentiments to violently lashing out.

• Nicki Minaj - Queen: An album who’s messy rollout, subsequent controversy, and surrounding beef is more entertaining than the music itself.

• Trippie Redd - Life’s A Trip: At least it’s got a cool cover.

• Beach Bunny - Prom Queen: Charming and compulsive indie rock that’s not afraid to be emotionally-bare.

• El Ten Eleven - Banker's Hill: Engaging post-rock that occasionally explodes into math, metal, and electronic diversions.

• Aminé - ONEPOINTFIVE: Jokingly labeled as an “EP/LP/Mixtape/Album,” the newest release from Aminé finds him mixing humor, trap, and personal experiences to a great effect.

• Death Cab for Cutie - Thank You for Today: Ethereal, moody, and mature indie rock from the group that seems to have become masters of those feelings.

• Animal Collective - Tangerine Reef: A psychedelic audiovisual album about the havoc we have wreaked on the environment and the damage still to come.

• The Oh Sees - Smote Reverser: One of the last bastions of jammy, proggy, nerdy rock music. As dexterous and eclectic as it is complete and exhaustive.

• Ariana Grande - Sweetener: It’s pop music.

• Fredo Disco - Very Cool Music for Very Cool People: Say Anything-esque tales of charging headlong into personal relationships, getting too high, and inheriting jeans.

• mewithoutYou - [untitled] e.p.: Slow-building orchestral emo that imparts the feeling of floating through a dream world that barely resembles our own.

• Field Medic - boy from my dream: Four hazy, sleepy, and slightly-out-of-focus folk songs from an artist that I love dearly.

• Rubblebucket - Sun Machine: A surprisingly-dancy indie record that’s packed with confessional slice-of-life dioramas all backed by lavish beds of woodwinds and brass contributions.

• Lemon Twigs - Go To School: The Lemon Twigs’ sophomore record is a concept album about a monkey that is raised by humans, goes to school, and discovers himself along the way. A whimsical reverse-Tarzan of a musical that commandeers your attention and charms your pants off.

• White Denim - Performance: Fuzzy T.Rex-inspired throwback tunes send in from a parallel funk dimension.

• Whitney Ballen - You’re A Shooting Star, I’m A Sinking Ship: Heartfelt songs of precious relationships, emotional turmoil, and the inescapable feeling that you’re less than everyone else around you.

• Blood Orange - Negro Swan: Pensive RnB that revels in sexuality, race, self-doubt, and anguish.

• WSTR - Identity Crisis: Defiant fist-clenching pop-punk.

• The Kooks - Let’s Go Sunshine: No longer Naive, The Kooks navigate the lovesick waters of adulthood in an hour-long Britpop expedition.

• Wild Nothing - Indigo: Dream pop with a retro 80’s twist.

• Troye Sivan - Bloom: Immaculately-produced pop that seems chemically-engineered to burrow its way into your brain.

• Iron & Wine - Weed Garden: Sleepytime music for sad hipsters.

• Mogwai - Kin: It’s not technically a new Mogwai album, but I’ll take their brilliance wherever I can get it.

• SahBabii - Squidtastic: Low-gravity RnB beamed in from another planet.

• Eminem - Kamikaze: After stumbling a bit with Revival, Eminem seems to have broken his downward trend of pop-hop and snapped back into full-on rapping for this surprise release.

In August we also heard new singles from This Will Destroy You, J Cole, Father John Misty, Saves The Day, Joyce Manor, Mick Jenkins, Courtney Barnett, DRAM, Mac Demarco, Logic, Soccer Mommy, Boygenius, Lil Yachty, Mr. Sister, 6Lack, Toto, FIDLAR, Kurt Vile, Bryson Tiller, Gucci Mane, Empress Of, and Kanye West.

Rewind

Finally, here are a handful of albums from earlier this year that it took me until this month to discover.

• The Growlers - Casual Acquaintances: Laid-back yet precise indie rock produced by Julian Casablancas. Created for late-night leather-clad bar hopping followed by ungracefully stumbling home.

• Stella Donnelly - Thrush Metal: Hard-hitting and intimate songs of Donnelly’s innermost thoughts and conflicts. Confessional and confrontational, “Boys Will Be Boys” may be one of the most important songs of the year.

• Knuckle Puck - Shifted: The melders of pop-punk/hardcore rework five songs from 2017’s Shapeshifter into pensive electronic-infused ballads with the same level of heart.

• Indigo De Souza - I Love My Mom: From forecasting your eventual demise to the social bartering surrounding ghosting, I Love My Mom is a journey of exploring your own emotions like a pioneer.

• Retirement Party - Somewhat Literate: Punchy and meaningful pop-punk that’s hit me harder on first listen than anything else this year.

HOFFEY – Love Is Wild | Single Review

At some point, everyone has experienced the same type of relationship. The one that changes you. The one that alters your brain chemistry. The one that rises so high above everything else that it eclipses your sense of self. That sort of passion is the fuel burning at the center of HOFFEY’s new single “Love Is Wild.”

Based out of Vancouver, Canada, Jordan and Erika Toohey met when they were studying music abroad in Sydney, Australia. While their relationship initially centered around writing and performing songs together, the two soon found that their bond went far beyond music. Now married and releasing songs together as HOFFEY, the duo’s debut single “Love Is Wild” was released on July 27th.

Just in time for your mid-summer playlist, “Love Is Wild” is a dynamic song that captures the feeling of infatuation that comes with a new relationship. Beginning with a scrambled version of the instrumental, the track quickly warms up to a boiling point within seconds as the drums kick in and Erika starts singing words of commitment and love. With Jordan placed just under her in the mix singing the exact same lyrics, it gives the song a borderline pitch-shift effect that makes it feel as if the words are simultaneously being sung from both the male and female perspective. 

As they mirror each other’s words of devotion the rhythm warbles beneath the duo until they reach the chorus. Suddenly Erika takes the spotlight and the beat reduces to its most minimal components. As she sings the track’s namesake, the song explodes into a vibrant explosion of light and color that's both dancy and engaging. Evoking the best parts of MØ, Diplo, and Banks, “Love Is Wild” is an exciting electronic single that bottles up the feeling of intoxication into an exotic and affectionate three minutes.

Stream “Love Is Wild” on your platform of choice here.

July 2018: Album Review Roundup

Overall, July turned out to be a fairly light month for new releases, but even with a lesser quantity of music, we had no shortage of quality tunes. With a few long-awaited follow-ups, a wondrous live album, and some brand new discoveries (as always), the peak of Summer still gave us plenty of new music worth raving about.

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Mom Jeans. - Puppy Love

If you, like me, find it hilarious that a band would price their albums at $4.20 and $6.66 on Bandcamp, then Puppy Love is an album for you. With song titles like “Jon bong Jovi” and “now THIS is podracing” it should be immediately clear that Mom Jeans are going for a very specific brand of self-aware pop-culturally-obsessed millennial humor. Picking up where bands like Modern Baseball and Dads left off, Mom Jeans are four awkward 20-something white dudes writing hyper-realist slice-of-life songs that remain as cutting and confessional as they are affable and goofy. Some bands write songs about love, and others write songs about death, but even the most romantic among us recognize that in the grand scheme of things, those emotional highs and lows are few and far between. Mom Jeans make music about what happens outside of those extremes, the unexciting and unglamorous (but very real) moments that make up a majority of life. The space where you’re killing time, eating Cheetos, and talking to your dog. Puppy Love is an album of songs about the moments that happen while waiting, and, in a way, isn’t that more true to life than anything?

Future - Beast Mode II

At some point, everyone must question why they like Future. While most of us can’t claim the same level of drug use, money, or extravagance, Future exists to show us that these (supposed) benefits of fame come at the price of one’s happiness. Catchy phrases aside, Future’s portrayal of excess in the face of obliteration is both haunting and engaging. Like a car crash you can’t look away from, his escape into women, drugs, and money feels like something more than the typical rapper’s playbook, if only because these topics are undertaken while on the precipice of oblivion. This dichotomy makes him relatable and enigmatic, even when rapping objectively-despicable bars like “I left her sitting at the Loews, oh / 'Cause she wasn't touching her toes, no.” Lines like these are not necessarily something the listener identifies with, but serve as more of a cold and unforgiving vignette carried out by Future’s persona. Plus, it doesn’t hurt that no matter what he’s rapping, Future is always accompanied by a beat that’s hard as bricks. 

Bongripper - Terminal

If you’re an outsider to the genre, your reaction to finding out there’s a Stoner Rock band called “Bongripper” might be one of disbelief. While I’ll admit that their name seems painfully-on brand, there is also a band called Weedeater, so I’ve found that it’s best not to judge a book by its cover. Bongripper’s Terminal is a 43-minute album cut into two pieces “SLOW” and “DEATH,” two arcs that sway with heavy guitar, crashing cymbals, and enough bass to rattle the fillings from your molars. It’s slow-moving, dark, and sludgy instrumental metal at its best. 

Deafheaven - Ordinary Corrupt Human Love

It begins with a piano. Soon a lone guitar seeps into the mix, accompanied by the sound of waves. A cymbal is brushed, and the keyboard warms itself way up to a melody. Finally, a bass enters the fray, synchronizing all of the instruments into one swirling and kaleidoscopic soundscape as a female voice begins to read a passage from some unknown text. As that reading comes to a close, a wall of screamed vocals are telecast from some distant satellite, freezing the listener in their tracks with a spine-chilling pang of haunting beauty. This is the first track of Deafhaven’s Ordinary Corrupt Human Love. Taking the familiar style of black metal shoegaze the band has become known for, Deafhaven’s newest album adds on a bewitching mix of post-rock and dream pop to the proceedings, resulting in something that’s entirely unique and unlike anything they’ve ever done before. Utterly enchanting and possibly one of their best.

The National - Boxer Live in Brussels

When I first tried to get into The National years ago, the group’s 2007 album Boxer was often cited as the best entry point into their vast, decades-long discography. While I gave the album a handful of spins on a few separate occasions, it never grabbed me in the way it seemed to resonate with most fans. It wasn’t until a fateful meeting soundtracked by 2017’s Sleep Well Beast that the band finally clicked for me. I’d later go on to find out that I’m more of an Aligator man, but I can see now that Boxer is a much more reserved, complicated, and poetic album than I initially gave it credit for. The National’s live re-recording of the album breathes new life into these classic alternative songs, adding lush instrumental flourishes, raucous solos, and unexpected vocal deliveries, all of which make the songs feel brand new yet still familiar. Truly a testament to how well this album has aged and how, much like a fine bourbon, The National only get better with time. 

Denzel Curry - TA13OO

Despite being one of the most commercially-successful genres in 2018, the hip-hop landscape has never been more volatile than it is right now. Phases, idioms, and styles change overnight, and (consequently) the artists that chase these fleeting trends often make a big splash, then fade away into obscurity just as soon as they were found. With trap falling out of favor and SoundCloud rap on the rise, Denzel Curry sits at an interesting intersection between the blown-out Floridian style of hype rap and something much more special. I guess you could call it “conscious” even though that too has fallen out of favor, but Denzel Curry’s long-awaited TA13OO speaks for itself. Unlike anything else in the genre, TA13OO is an absolute achievement and the sort of release that some artists spend their entire career chasing. Released as three EPs over the course of three days, TA13OO is a three-act decent into darkness that integrates genres, topics, and styles rarely ever touched upon in hip-hop. There are chilled-out Outkast-esque tracks like “BLACK BALLOONS” as well as unimaginably-hype songs like “SUMO,” all of which have impeccable flows, engaging beats, and well-conceived messages. The fact that Curry can handle such a wide variety of sounds with such proficiency and artistry is a testament to his skill as a creator.

Wild Pink - Yolk In The Fur

As is a recurring theme with these monthly reviews, one of my favorite albums of July was given to us courtesy of a band that I’d never heard of until the day their album came out. I entered Yolk In The Fur with zero expectations, and once I hit play on the dreamy “Burger Hill” I was instantly mystified by the track’s otherworldly moodiness. Every element of the song takes it’s time to enter, leading to a song that journeys at its own pace in a sort of spiritual quest for metaphysical connection. Walking the listener from hazy emo to colorful heartland rock, Wild Pink shows absolute mastery on every front. A considerate, reserved, and well-thought-out world-building release that swirls into your ears and works its way down to your soul.

Quick Hits

• Meek Mill - Legends of the Summer: The recently-released rapper completes a celebratory victory lap of four hard-hitting gym-playlist-ready rap songs.

• Dirty Projectors - Lamp Lit Prose: Post-post-breakup tunes that trade the behavior of a vindictive ex for a wide-ranging swath of collaborators and guest features.

• Wet - Still Run: Beautiful, heartfelt, and deeply-human rock made for ordinary people experiencing abnormal feelings.

• Between the Buried and Me - Automata II: The sequel to an album of the same name from earlier this year bearing similarly-proggy metal, but in more digestible chunks than usual.

• Wiz Khalifa - Rolling Papers 2: Wiz Khalifa used to smoke weed. He still smokes weed, but he used to, too.

• Real Friends - Composure: Scrappy and happy pop-punk from the fearless Illinoisans.

• DRAM - That’s A Girl’s Name: A surprise-released three-track of breezy summer tunes courtesy of hip-hop’s most adorable frontman.

• Chance The Rapper - Four Singles: Chance The Rapper doesn’t release singles, he releases enough songs to constitute an EP, all of which are just as wholesome, fun-loving, and vibrant as we’ve come to expect.

• The Internet - Hive Mind: An hour of bumpin’ funk and vibin’ bops to lose yourself in.

• Ty Segall & White Fence - Joy: Expansive guitar-based throwback tunes that hop from one idea to the next with wild abandon.

• Trash Boat - Crown Shyness: Equal parts melodic and hard-edged, Crown Shyness is a hardcore album with pop-punk sensibilities that bleeds emotion like a fresh wound.

• Frontierer - Unloved: Bombastic and technical metalcore that attacks the listener with explosive ferocity, firey aggression, and destructive anger.

• Like Pacific - In Spite of Me: An unfaltering sophomore album bearing heart-on-sleeve pop-punk made for screaming out the windows of cars at night while doing 60+ on the highway.

• Phantastic Ferniture - Phantastic Ferniture: Effortlessly-charming and charmingly-effortless indie tunes made for slackers and chillers alike.

• No Better - It Felt Like Glass: A pop-punk debut album that scratches vocal chords, strains emotions, and swings wildly as sentiments escape from its soul and work their way up its diaphragm.

• Clearance - At Your Leisure: Fittingly titled, this sophomore album revels in 90’s influence, latent malaise, and sunny post-punk.

• The Coup - Sorry To Bother You: The Soundtrack: The absurdist, political, bizarre, unexpected, and unapologetic soundtrack to the most-needed film of 2018.

We also saw singles from Lil Pump, Childish Gambino, Minus The Bear, Joyce Manor, Death Cab For Cutie, Asking Alexandria, Foxing, The Story So Far, IDLES, Charli XCX, Animal Collective, Mac Miller, Interpol, Dj Khaled, The 1975, Tyler, The Creator x A$AP Rocky,  Blood Orange, Pond, BROCKHAMPTON, Yoko Ono, Nicki Minaj, Foxing, Metric, Smokepurpp, Yves Tumor, Guided By Voices, and Waxahatchee. 

Rewind

Finally, here are a handful of albums that came out earlier this year that I missed until this month.

• Let’s Eat Grandma - I’m All Ears: Mind-expanding, soul-searching, and heart-crushing electronic indie that wanders from room to room of your consciousness.

• Barely March - Marely Barch: Much like Mom Jeans, Barely March offers self-deprecating and hyper-personal tales of breakup, recovery, and nerdy faults.

• 03 Greedo - God Level: Releasing as much music as possible before a 20-year prison sentence, 03 Greedo is crafting extremely-proficient rap songs that are sharp as a bowie knife.

• Naked Giants - SLUFF: Unapologetic rock music that explodes to life in concert.

• Just Friends - Nothing But Love: Remember ska? It’s back in Pog form.

• Dream Wife: Dream Wife: Middle fingers extended and sex drives turned all the way up, Dream Wife delivers unabashedly-wild and in-your-face rock from down-under.

• Gladie - Everyone Is Talking About You: Lovely heartbreak and beautiful self-destruction recorded to emo-tinged indie.

Small Town Junkies – The Music Industry Is Dead. | Album Review

Schools play a vital role in our culture. Sure, they teach basic skills like reading, writing, math, and science, but they also serve an important function as the first line of defense in our society’s moral compass. School is the first time most children figure out who they are, how to interact with others, and what’s right and wrong. While most kids learn by doing, there are also a certain number of platitudes everyone has instilled in them from an early age. Treat others the way you want to be treated. Sharing is caring. And, of course, “don’t judge a book by its cover.”

While these principles serve as revelatory words of wisdom in our youth, they sort of just fade into the background once we reach adulthood. Call it jaded, or heartless, or just chalk it up to a sad by-product of caring less, but these tenants that seemed so important in childhood quickly become eclipsed with different concerns like fitting in, making money, and capitalistic self-worth. 

And I’m not just pointing fingers here; I’ll be the first to admit I wish I considered these phrases and their implications more often. I’ve recently caught myself judging a book by its cover not only in life, but in my hobbies too. From music and video games to TV and movies, sometimes I’m just looking for an excuse not to like something. Whether its a TV show with an impenetrable mountain of episodes, a viral video that’s a few minutes too long, or an album with a cover I don’t like, sometimes it’s easier to just write some off before committing to it. This is all to say that I judged Small Town Junkies before I’d heard even one song, and now I wish I hadn’t. 

Hailing from Streetsboro Ohio, Small Town Junkies is a multi-faceted music project helmed by David Stump creating emphatic alternative rock that’s so steeped in 90’s Love it would make J Mascis blush. After making waves in his local scene with “Vampire Summer” off Small Town Junkies’ first EP, Stump segued this newfound visibility into multiple projects including the group’s debut full-length, an acoustic album, a stoner rock album, and a highly-collaborative internet-fueled record. Now ready to drop his newest LP as Small Town Junkies, Stump’s 12-song The Music Industry is Dead. is set to release September 28th.

While Stump’s blown-out HDR-abusing aesthetic is consistent across his Bandcamp page, album art, and music videos, I jumped into The Music Industry is Dead. expecting something completely different than what I got. The record’s titular opening track wades the listener into the album with a self-deprecating, tongue-in-cheek sentiment as Stump sings “The Music Industry is Dead / I’d rather read a book instead” over a jangly guitar. Shifting from a low vibrato into a bright chorus, the song opens up like a county road in a moment that sets both the tone and mission statement for the remainder of the album. Content to spread ideas and connect with an audience, Small Town Junkies admit that there’s no money in what they’re doing, but that’s why they’re doing it. Stump and his band are chasing something ephemeral, something soul-affirming, something more. 

Third track “Never Enough” serves as the album’s lead single, a distorted and funky cut with a rhythm that sways back and forth at an extremely-headbangable pace. Alternating between chest-inflating southern rock verses and high-rising choruses, “Never Enough” centers around a groovy riff that leads to both an early-album highlight and an absolutely killer single. 

Once I’d made it even a few tracks in, I was able to see the brilliance that lied in wait behind the album’s multi-colored cover. Actually a wonderfully-apt indicator of the record’s vibrancy and maximalism, I quickly found myself regretting my initial judgment. 

After that early trio of songs, the album takes the listener on a voyage of childhood memories, long-lost love, and newfound hope. Both “The Haymaker” and “I Feel Fine” revel in memories of recess, cafeterias, and schoolyard fights, meanwhile “We Just Met” is an earnest recount of love on first (or second) sight that’s at once hilarious and heartfelt. From getting lost in the minutiae of caller ID and living room dates to the double-edged sword of being unemployed (which means having all the time in the world, but none of the money), the album is packed with clever observations and catchy choruses. 

The style and texture of Music Industry also change as the album ventures forward. “Not Alone” is one of the record’s most slow-moving tracks with a spaced-out and airy guitar that quickly ratchets up the distortion on the choruses for a borderline stoner rock effect. Much like Bush’s “Bomb,” the track builds beautifully into explosions of love and regret that swirl together into a void of nostalgia.

Album closer “We Made It” centers around an earnest slice of life tale about busking for ice cream. The song builds up to a gummy Weezer-esque chorus that’s guaranteed to get stuck in your head for hours. But it’s not over there, the secret song “Mean Pitbull” makes its entrance after several minutes of silence with a pang of blown-out guitar. Sending the listener off on a reminder of the joy that can be found in the simple things, the final song bears an endearing message of happiness wrapped around one of the album’s most well-crafted choruses. 

The Music Industry is Dead. has more cards up its sleeve than you might initially expect. Despite how harshly I judged the album based on its cover, I found myself emerging from the LP having enjoyed every second of it. Deeply personal, sometimes troubled, but incredibly well-put-together, The Music Industry is Dead. is an alternative rock release that’s guaranteed to take you back to the amber-coated memories of your 90’s childhood.

The Elephant Visual Album

When I trace my musical history back to its origins, there are four or five key discoveries from my childhood that have gone on to become foundational cornerstones of my taste. I’ve written about many of them here from my first iPod and 2006 pop music to entire genres that I stumbled into by accident all thanks to people with better taste than me. I measure my life with music, and these events have all become part of my personal mythology; milestones that have gone on to inform not only my taste, but who I am as a person.

I was fortunate enough to grow up with a dad who cared about music. While that mostly relegated itself to me raiding his CD collection to rip classic rock albums onto my iPod, there were also a small handful of (then) modern bands that we bonded over as I began to show an interest in music. The shared section of our musical Venn Diagram has expanded over the years as my taste has continued to mature, grow, and spiral in unexpected ways, but the first “new” band my Dad and I found common ground with was none other than The White Stripes. 

Luckily, because my dad loved The White Stripes, this meant I had the band’s entire discography at my fingertips. He owned their studio albums, B-sides, singles, live albums, demos, side projects, you name it. As a result, I have a worryingly-deep connection to (and knowledge of) Jack White’s musical catalog.

Around this same time, I was also taking guitar lessons. Aside from the standard “starter” songs like “Smoke On The Water” and “Pipeline,” The White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” proved to be low-hanging, easy-playing fruit for a 10-year-old Taylor. Between borrowing the CDs and playing the songs, I showed enough of an interest that my dad decided to take me to see the group on tour in 2003 for my second concert ever. 

While I’ll admit that the 1.5-decade marination time of nostalgia plays a huge part in it, Elephant remains one of my favorite albums of that genre, this era, and my entire life. Hits and overplayed singles aside, there’s a lot to love about Elephant, and there’s a reason it remains the band’s most enduring release this many years later. 

Literally every track on Elephant hits. “Seven Nation Army” is an unparalleled anthem of the early-2000’s. “Hardest Button to Button” bears one of the best drumlines of the decade. “Ball and Biscuit” is one of my favorite songs of all time with its lumbering blues riff that slowly erupts into blistering guitar solos. There isn’t a wasted moment or an unpolished idea. Elephant is rock in its purest form. A feeling that can’t quite be put into words made by two people with two instruments. Perfect.

As eye-opening as Elephant was, sometimes your favorite albums can slide into the background of your life without you ever noticing. New music, other mediums, or life events can keep you from venturing back, and as embarrassing as it is to admit, this had absolutely happened to me with The White Stripes. It’s almost like taking art for granted. I’d listened to Elephant so many times, heard “Seven Nation Army” in so many different movies and TV shows and commercials that at a certain point it just kind of feels like “well, yeah, everyone knows this album is great, so what’s the point?” 

While my relationship with Elephant is ongoing, a chance encounter with a designer completely renewed my love for the record with a project that was crafted as lovingly as the album itself. Sometimes the classics are not only worth revisiting, but worth diving into on a microscopic level, and that’s exactly what Chandler Cort did with this beloved album. 

Creating what he calls a “visual album” Chandler transposed Elephant onto a 9-foot scroll that tracks the entire record second-by-second. Interpreting each instrument’s volume and the exact starting point for every word sung, Chandler’s creation is one-of-a-kind and unlike anything I’ve ever seen before in my life. There’s something to be said for standing face-to-face with one of your favorite records and taking in the entire thing as it towers above you.

While it’s impossible to translate the feeling of interacting with the scroll itself, I wanted to share this beautiful and original piece of art with as many people as possible. Not only was Chandler kind enough to let me share his incredible work on Swim Into The Sound, but he also sat down with me to talk about the process that went into making it as well as his personal background with the band. So without further adieu, I’m excited to present The Elephant Visual Album. 

Full-resolution PDF version of the Elephant Visual Album at the end of the article.
 

The Visual Album and Its Creator: An Interview With Chandler Cort

Much like Taylor, I have a very distinct memory of my introduction to the White Stripes. I came to the party very late, as my parents found it borderline impossible to break away from anything outside of the typical 60’s - 80’s hits they grew up with.

There aren’t many specific events in my life that I would refer to as “life-changing,” but hearing “Rag and Bone” for the first time in my high school art class was absolutely one of them. My obsession with the White Stripes began with Icky Thump and worked its way back to the very beginning of the group’s discography until I had completely immersed myself in everything they had ever produced. The White Stripes were something I listened to exclusively for months. When I wasn’t listening to them, I found myself watching interviews with the members, reading about their history, and completely immersing myself in the group’s mythology. I had never quite felt myself become so taken by a band before.

Six years later, the White Stripes are still one of my favorite bands, if not my all-time favorite. Jack and Meg White have taken hold of a very big piece of my heart, and I don’t know if that will ever be able to be eclipsed.

The way the project really came about was kind of funny. I was in my first infographics class at Portland State University, and we were told to make a timeline for our first project. The professor made sure he kept things very open-ended, so we had the choice to do an incredibly accurate historical timeline, or we could do something more whimsical like a timeline of the Harry Potter Universe.

I remember going on break one day listening to Elephant, and thinking “it would be funny to do an infographic on the number of times Jack White goes, ‘WOO!’ in one album.” So that’s where it really kinda started. I refined my guidelines a little bit further and decided that I would track the main instruments: guitar, drums, and piano, as well as the vocals. 

The process for this piece is something I feel just as proud of as the actual work itself. All of my research for this project was done entirely audibly. I printed all of the lyrics to every song, and I would sit down at my desk every day, listen to the song, and get the second-by-second timestamps for every lyric, and then go back through, and repeat the same process for the guitar, drums, and piano. This means I listened to every song at least three or four times in full, not counting pausing, rewinding, and playing again to make sure the time signatures were as accurate as possible.

In addition to the individual instrument timelines, each song also got a “genre gauge” that I had designed too. Because Elephant is such a diverse album, I feel like it was very important to describe how each song was different in comparison to the others. Every song was ranked on a scale of punk, blues, folk, and pop, with the end result being a circular graph that represented the track’s sonic texture. 

This was then translated into a second graph that I constructed to help best visualize the album in its entirety. I’d guess this project took somewhere between 40-45 hours total. It was truly a monster, which can be seen in the final 9-inch by 9-foot print. I remember people telling me in class that I was doing was ridiculous, and that I was crazy for even attempting something like this, which honestly just kind of pushed me to do it even more.

A lot of my design work has been very music-focused, and I have done very intense pieces about other albums I love, but I feel like this one is probably the most accessible, and the most interesting. I describe this piece as a visual album because I feel like it is the most literal visual translation of an auditory piece. I’m so happy that this piece has received the reaction it has, and I’m incredibly thankful that Taylor was moved enough to offer me this opportunity, and I hope to be here again someday. 

Until then everyone, be good, and love what you listen to.

To see the Elephant Visual Album in its full hi-res glory click here.