A Very Sufjan Christmas is Back For Another Year!

The following is a post from our sister site A Very Sufjan Christmas.
Follow us on Twitter at @SufjanChristmas or on Instagram at @SufjanChristmas to enjoy daily song write-ups this December!

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I’m not going to sugar-coat it, this year has been rough. So much so that I debated whether or not I even wanted to do A Very Sufjan Christmas this year. After all, how much do you feel like celebrating? Because I certainly don’t. 

Between the ongoing global pandemic, a demoralizing election cycle, and a fascist government that’s systematically brutalizing and murdering its own citizens, most days it feels like there isn’t much to look forward to. That said, time is indifferent and marches onward regardless of how we feel or what we think. Once the leaves began to change this fall and December crept over the horizon of my calendar I realized we could use some holiday cheer this year more than ever.

I’m going to level with you guys, running this blog is a lot of work. Even though I’m not personally writing every post, I’m still just one man wrangling 25 writers, editing 25 pieces, publishing 25 articles, and scheduling 25 days of social media. This is all on top of my day job and my other music blog over at Swim Into The Sound. 

I say this not to earn pity points, but because I know every one of you reading this is probably in a similar position. You might be better off than me, hell you might be worse off than me, but we’re all living through the same thing, and it brings me great joy to see how much cheer this blog spreads each year. 

That sense of tangible holiday cheer is worth all the countless hours and late nights I spend throughout these last two months of the year. I get to revel in the stories of other people’s Christmases past and help share them with the world. They’re not always wholesome, but neither is life. Either way, I love being at the epicenter of this communal outpouring of Christmas spirit. The fact that it’s themed around an artist I love is just a bonus. 

Speaking of which, 2020 has been a banner year for Sufjan. We received not only the first studio album of his in five years, but a groovy electronic record on top of that. If you’re still hungry for more Sufjan-related content to tide you over till December, I published a retrospective on Carrie & Lowell earlier this year that I’m quite proud of. 

Personal plugs, Sufjan-related updates, and global temperature checks aside, I hope you’re all doing okay. This blog will run on the same schedule as years past; starting December 1st, you’ll see a new post from a different writer every day until Christmas. I encourage you to bookmark this page, follow us on Twitter, Instagram, and even reddit to keep up with the posts. You can also visit the archive to read the previous year’s posts if you’re already feeling the Christmas spirit. 

If you’re interested in participating in the blog this year or next, please reach out to us on any of those platforms linked above or via our email sufjanchristmas@gmail.com.  

Other than that, all I can ask is that you share this website with someone you think you might enjoy it. If you find an article that really connects with you, share it, text someone about it, post it on your story, that means the world. Even reach out to the writer, each author’s social media accounts are (almost always) linked at the bottom of each write-up, and there’s nothing quite like random words of affirmation from a stranger, especially around the holidays. 
With all that said, I hope you are all doing okay. I love you all, and I’m beyond excited to share another 25 fantastic write-ups with you this year. 

Happy holidays, Merry Christmas, stay safe. 

Sinai Vessel – Ground Aswim | Album Review

Preciousness has become a lost art form. Everything in 2020 has been BIG and loud and important. That’s why when I heard “Guest In Your Life,” the first single off Sinai Vessel’s sophomore album Ground Aswim, it felt like the breath of fresh air I’d been gasping for all year. Relaxing, measured, and unhurried, “Guest In Your Life” provided some sense of pause in a year that has been nothing but acceleration. Over the course of its three minutes, the song wraps itself around the listener and convinces them that maybe, just maybe, things are going to be okay. This sense of calm is continued throughout the rest of the album, cementing it as an infinitely renewable source of comfort, a sacred and invaluable resource in the scatterbrained always-on world in which we currently exist. 

Now, this is not to say there weren’t plenty of things this year that required urgency, but it’s more that taking the time for subtlety, careful consideration, or simply a moment of pause went out the window in favor of immediacy. Sometimes impassioned frenzy works, but it cannot be your default state. After all, if you live life with your hair on fire, how much can you realistically expect to get done? 

Album opener “Where Did You Go?” begins not with a rallying call to arms, but a single meditative electronic note and spaced-out drumline. Eventually, buttery a smooth bass and gorgeous cascading guitar join the fray, slowly and carefully crafting a melody that flows like a brook. Two minutes into the track, lead singer Caleb Cordes makes his presence known with a voice that never rises above a friendly conversation. With a charming twang, he walks us through scenes of childhood memories that build to the loss of a friend. Gentle keys carry us out of the track for the last two minutes as Cordes sings the song’s namesake several more times, leaving us to ruminate on the importance of life and innocence, two things we can never get back. A heavy opener, to be sure, but still a sonically-laid back introduction to the grounds of the album on which you’ve just arrived. 

Track two, “Shameplant,” also served as the album’s second single. Maybe it’s the ‘plant’ tie-in or the guitar line, but this song sounds downright Oso Oso-esque in the best way possible. Despite the sunny and upbeat instrumental, this song finds Cordes questioning whether or not he can care for himself, let alone anyone (or anything) else. “Can’t expect to grow a garden and expect on only rain,” he sings over a brustling emo riff, articulating a beautifully poetic notion on self-sustainability (or lack thereof) that evokes the same sentiments as early Wonder Years songs.

Other tracks like “Fragile” and “George” weave personal tales of relationships and life experiences around instrumental beds that all glisten and shimmer in unique ways. Some tracks like “All Days Just End” feel like hyper-poignant reflections on life in quarantine, meanwhile “Tunneling” addresses general anxieties in a digestible way that feels both accurate yet approachable.

Aside from beautiful writing that effortlessly rises to your level and connects with you upon first listen, almost all of the tracks on Ground Aswim feel unique and contain moments that make them feel distinct from the songs that came before or after. There’s a far-off tunnel-vision projection effect on “Fragile,” a biting hypnotic drumbeat on “Birdseye,” and a wonderfully dynamic build on “Tunneling.” There’s a weird Peaer-esque mathy breakdown on “A Must While So Near” and a lavish steel guitar alongside discretely double-tracked vocals on “Guest In Your Life.” There’s a wealth of sounds to feast upon in this record, and the best part is they’re all still cohesive and fit within the world of the album

What strikes me most about Ground Awsim is the level of restraint deployed on these songs. “Ringing” features only Cordes, his guitar, and a little bit of reverb, yet he’s able to create a piece that’s emotionally-resonant where his words are first and forefront, emotions laid bare before the listener. It’s downright Julien Baker-esque in its economy of instrumentation, and that makes the whole song more memorable and heavy-hitting as a result.

This restraint pays off fully in “Antechamber,” the precious and aching album closer that begins as a slow build but gradually simmers into an affirming meditative repetition over the course of its six winding minutes. Recorded in a single take, “Antechamber” feels ornate and detailed, yet lived-in and authentic. It’s a pitch-perfect note to end the album on and leaves the listener continuing to feel its effects hours later. 

Ground Aswim is the antidote to 2020: it’s precious, careful, empathetic, thoughtful, and sensitive. At times it’s mournful and sentimental, but those are not necessarily bad things to lose touch of either. As the world outside turns colder, more bitter, and continues to tear itself apart, it’s a relief to have the shores of Ground Aswim to point ourselves to as we paddle toward calmer waters. 

Arlen Gun Club – Kickflip | Single Review

One of my favorite songs of all time is “Little Acorns” by The White Stripes. When I first heard Elephant I was only ten years old, and that record quickly became the foundation for my pre-teen musical taste. Elephant provided me a foray into blues, garage rock, folk, country, and complicated in-law relationships, among other things. Still, amongst the 50-minutes of this near-perfect alternative rock record, one of the moments I remember responding to most viscerally as a ten-year-old was the spoken-word intro to “Little Acorns.”

Sure, the song itself shreds and is packed with punchy, fuzzed-out guitar, but in 2003 I’d never ever heard spoken word used on a record in this way, and it blew my ten-year-old mind. It has to have a deeper meaning, right? I read so deeply into that short story of a woman persevering through strife that I ended up internalizing it more than I probably even realize. The fact that this story was followed by a heavy-as-shit riff was just a bonus.

This idolization of persistence is why I’ve found Arlen Gun Club to be such a compelling project. Formed from the ashes of the recently-dissolved emo project Vermont, Arlen Gun Club rapidly transformed from a one-off side project with “Rosary” to a full-time creative outlet with Fresh Face earlier this year. Now the group has released “Kickflip,” the first song they penned after the release of that debut EP.

I’ll admit the novelty of “quarantine song” has worn off quite quickly and never seemed that appealing in the first place. Still, some artists like Charli XCX have managed to tackle the subject of quarantine both tactfully and artfully. Ultimately, songs about feeling lonely and disconnected a dime a dozen, but there’s no denying that’s an accurate reflection of where we are as a society right now.

Arlen Gun Club seems to be adding their name to this list, creating the elusive “quarantine song that’s actually interesting.” While it still touches on the topics of community and missing your friends, what makes “Kickflip” unique from other quarantine songs is that it manages to capture the sense of restlessness and pent-up energy that’s a byproduct of being sequestered inside for so long. It’s about being lonely and stir-crazy, which resonates with me way more than “I miss my friends” because, honestly, all my friends live in other cities right now anyway. 

While loneliness is an undeniable factor of our lives right now, my biggest takeaway from the last eight months has been frustration. Frustration at our government for failing us so spectacularly. Frustration at my fellow countryman for selfishly choosing their own pleasure over the greater good. Frustration at how blatantly the ruling class is willing to use and discard workers that they as deem “essential.”

That sense of rage and frustration only goes so far. Some days I do feel lonely or lost and try my best to distract my brain from the looming sense of existential dread. Other days, I drink too much coffee, spend too much time on Twitter, and end up getting a weird, uncontrollable burst of energy that I can’t safely expend on anything. I can’t go out with friends, I can’t go to shows, I can’t even work out (never thought I’d miss that one, to be honest). 

I guess if anything, it’s nice to have “Kickflip” here to remind us that there are some hobbies out there we can still pour this energy into. It’s both a reflection and an affirmation that quarantine isn’t just about feeling sad, beat-down, and dejected, but sometimes it is just this weird burst of mental or physical energy that needs to come out in one way or another. It’s a reminder that sometimes the weather outside is beautiful, and that’s enough because that’s all we have.

Fleet Foxes – Shore | Album Review

I hate to start a review off with an “I told you so,” but… I called it. Back in 2017, I wrote about Fleet Foxes’ then-recent album Crack-up and awarded it the accolade of “Album I Feel Like I Will Adore In A Few Years.” At that time, even after dozens of listens, I was still lukewarm on the band’s third album, but I could tell there was something about the collection of songs that hadn’t yet revealed itself to me. Now, three years later, I can unequivocally say that I was correct, and Crack-Up sits alongside the band’s first two records for me as part of a pristine trifecta of classic folk albums. 

Back in 2017, just two months after the release of Crack-up, Fleet Foxes lead singer Robin Pecknold posted a photo of a mic along with the cryptic caption of “IV x 'XX,” implying their fourth release was already in the works. While I (and many other indieheads) hypothesized the band would pull a Future / Hndrxx on us, that quick succession of releases never came to fruition back in 2017. 

I tucked that Instagram post away in my brain, and that’s partially why the surprise announcement of an imminent Fleet Foxes album back in September wasn’t too shocking for me. While I love a good surprise release, I’d been waiting for (and anticipating) this record for nearly three years, so in a way, this was the one thing in 2020 I have actually been prepared for. While Shore is a fantastic collection of more autumnal-flavored Fleet Foxes songs, I left my first listen (and second listen, and almost every subsequent listen) severely underwhelmed. 

There are a few possible culprits for this disappointment (one of them surely being three years of build-up and anticipation), but I’m genuinely hoping this isn’t just an “okay” album. I’m writing this as a way of grappling with my thoughts and criticisms because Fleet Foxes are very near and dear to me, yet this album feels distant and emotionally unattainable. I’m hoping this is just a case of history repeating itself the same way that I came around Crack-up, but some glaring holes on this record lead me to believe it will have a more challenging time growing on me. 

Once again, don’t get me wrong, I like Shore quite a bit; there are some all-time great Fleet Foxes tracks in here, however, the first word that comes to mind when describing the album would be “flavorless.” When I finish the record, I find myself having quite enjoyed it, but I also couldn’t tell you more than any two specific moments from the 54 minutes of music I had just taken in. This is hard as a long-time fan, and (from my perspective) negatively impacts the band’s legacy only because their discography to this point was near-perfect. So as of right now, Shore feels more like a fresh bruise that’s tarnishing a once-pristine record. 

Part of this comes down to seasonality. I’m someone who already tends to project ancillary layers onto an album’s release: the time of year, my mental state, my recent experiences, random information about the band, etc. So when a band like Fleet Foxes goes out of their way to put out an album on the first day of autumn, I’d naturally assume that it’s their “fall” album with a big capital F and a trail of vibrant, crunchy leaves in-tow. 

While Fleet Foxes felt like a mossy (and occasionally snow-covered) post-winter campground, Helplessness Blues felt like an energetic hike under blue skies on the first day of spring. Meanwhile, Crack-up felt very much like a “peak summer” album, a record that encapsulates the sweltering days, the scattered feelings, and the rust-covered death rattles of August. While the band’s other albums evoke such strong seasonal feelings in me (both projected and intended), Shore is just… there.

The funny thing is, for the most part, the release dates of these albums line up with those feelings I just described. And the band made such a big presentation out of Shore premiering on the autumnal equinox (down to the minute), I expected this record would have been a bit more… cozy? Ultimately, Shore is about as cozy and welcoming as any other Fleet Foxes record, but it does not feel particularly ~fall~ to me. 

The second (and bigger) issue with Shore is the songs. The album opens fantastically with “Wading In Waist-High Water,” a brilliant and picturesque welcome party helmed by a guest singer Uwade Akhere. From there, the band transitions seamlessly into “Sunblind,” a fast-paced piano-adorned track with some attention-grabbing builds and swirling, ethereal background vocals. The band then hits us with “Can I Believe You,” a towering anthem with a chorus that makes you wanna belt and a melody that becomes catchy within a matter of seconds. The decision to launch straight into the chorus on this song is not lost on me because it might be the best the band has ever written. 

Everything is trending upward at this point in the tracklist; three songs deep, and they’ve all been hits that sound unlike anything the band has done before. On my first listen, I found myself thinking, ‘this might be the best Fleet Foxes record of all time,’ then the whole thing comes crashing down. I’ll admit I’m being overly-dramatic because the record never really dips below a “pleasant listen,” but the problem is that it also never reaches the peaks of these early songs ever again. 

“Jara” is “Helplessness Blues”-light, and it’s here where the record begins to feel like Fleet Foxes merely going through the motions. “Featherweight” finds Pecknold stuck in his high register as Moon Shaped Pool keys dance and twinkle around him… though not to a particularly compelling end. Frustratingly, “A Long Way To The Past” has an almost identical chord progression to “Can I Believe You,” which, coming only three tracks later, just makes me want to rewind to that song so I can hear a better version of this instrumental. I am literally able to sing “can I believe you” over the first few seconds of this song, and it fits perfectly. It’s bizarre. 

Aside from these by-the-numbers tracks, there are too many slow songs that don’t arrive at a satisfying emotional payoff. “For A Week or Two” is a slow, plodding piano ballad, and “I’m Not My Season” just kind of unfurls and lays there. Again, neither of these songs bad, they just don’t grab me like any other Fleet Foxes ballad ever has. I feel no connection to the lyrics, the instrumentals are bare, and they don’t even end in a cool way; they just kind of slowly stop as if the band is putting themselves to sleep. 

Fleet Foxes also echo some of their folky indie rock contemporaries later in the tracklist. “Going-to-the-sun Road” has some incredible 22, A Million-like hornwork and an instrumental where restraint pays off because the group finally lets another instrument shine. Meanwhile, “Cradling Mother, Cradling Woman” is cool and should appeal to me because it sounds exactly like something off Sufjan Stevens’ Illinois, but ends up feeling not very Fleet Foxes because of it. 

The band undeniably sticks the landing on “Shore,” an ultimate slow build a-la “Blue Spotted Tail” or even “Innocent Son,” where Pecknold gently guides the listener with the softest, most precious singing he can muster. Accompanied by a piano, Pecknold is eventually joined by other instruments as the track builds to one bright and uplifting swell as if forming a heavenly procession. It’s stark, it’s haunting, and it’s beautiful, but aside from sending us off on a lovely note, this song doesn’t pull enough weight to persuade me that the album as a whole is complete. 

So Shore starts strong and ends strong, but maaaan those songs in the middle drag. They blur together, they plod along, and they leave me wanting anything else. By the time the album wraps up, I’m left remembering two things: the chorus to“Can I Believe You” and the subversion of expectations opening with a guest vocalist. Shore is Fleet Foxes, that’s for sure; it’s laid-back, choral, and woody… but it almost feels as if it’s only those things. I see none of the innovative, jaw-dropping arrangements found on Fleet Foxes, I see none of the conceptuality or ambition deployed on Helplessness Blues, and I see none of the experimentation or subtlety used on Crack-up. 

Shore is inoffensive; it could soundtrack afternoon book readings, long drives through the mountains, and Instagram-ready millennial brunches. Shore does not command attention, it does not linger with you, and it does not breakthrough. Perhaps most disappointing of all, unlike Crack-up, I feel as if there’s not nearly as much to dig into on this record, so I don’t even have the same confidence or optimism that Shore will “reveal itself” to me in time.

Shore is a Fleet Foxes album, which means it’s a solid listen and a compelling folk album at the very least. But Shore is also a Fleet Foxes album, which means I come into it expecting nothing less than the stellar songwriting and instrumentation found up to this point throughout their decade-plus career. This record isn’t bad, it’s just disappointing and straightforward. It’s only bad in the context of Fleet Foxes, and that makes me disappointed. Shore feels like Fleet Foxes for the sake of Fleet Foxes, and sadly, that’s not reason enough to exist.

SESPOOL Walks Us Through 'before the fog covers me' Track by Track

Not to get all “90’s Kid” on you guys, but I’m about to reminisce. Being born in the era before hyper-pervasive internet meant you had one foot in everything, whether you liked it or not. It meant you grew up listening to pop-punk on CDs and RnB on the radio. It meant you had the “good” Star Wars movies on VHS and questionable ones in movie theaters. It meant you were growing up in one of the last ever truly messy offline eras and witnessed the world transform before your very eyes. 

Growing up in the 90s and early 2000s also meant you were coming of age right as things like Myspace, Limewire, and Napster were gaining mass traction, and what that meant was that the shackles were finally coming off. You could dig into any specific hyper-fandom you wanted. Hot Topic Mallcore? Done. Weird Al phase? Achieved. Mainstream pop from 2006 to 2007? Completely memorized. The internet gave us the power to become the masters of our own pop culture domain, and for many of us, it meant we could spread our tendrils wider and deeper than any generation before us. Today this is evidenced by artists like 100 gecs and Lil Aaron who have made a name for themselves by combining previously-disparate genres, sounds, and ideas into something that feels at once new and fresh yet familiar and comforting. 

With before the fog covers me, San Francisco-based musician Sean E (aka SESPOOL) is adding his name to the list of artists above, creating a genre-agnostic mashup of trap, rock, metal, and psychedelia into a potent blend that’s uniquely his own. There are auto-tuned hip-hop bars, head-banging metalcore breakdowns, and ear-wormy pop melodies. It’s a barrage of two-plus decades of omnivorous music and pop-culture consumption, as seen through the lens of Sean E. I sat down with SESPOOL to talk through each track on his upcoming sophomore album and the music, events, and thoughts that inspired the songs on this collection of tracks. 

1. before the fog covers me

This song was started before the COVID-19 outbreak and really set the tone for how I wanted my sound to progress. Once I got deeper into it, I decided this would be the title track since it embodied the various styles and themes that I was combining on the album. At its core, I wanted to make a song that started as an ambient ode to “Shine On You Crazy Diamond” by Pink Floyd, building an atmosphere that erupts into a modern trap banger. I knew I wanted to integrate heavy guitars in a way that wasn’t present on my debut album, and that led to the heavy chorus part, which always reminded me of a funeral procession. Ironically, in the following months, that marching-to-our-end aesthetic would become all too real and wind up defining most of 2020.

Lyrically the song is about the fog that blankets us as we get older. Personally, I’ve felt my memory going and my mind becoming less sharp, especially as I work a 9-5 job and get sucked into a “wage slave” mentality. It feels as if things become less vivid and more dull as time goes on. I’ve also had flashes of intense anxiety and other physical ailments that doctors tend to ignore, and often felt like I’m being consumed by something beyond my control. When I wrote the chorus, I was waking up early to practice stream of consciousness writing before my day job, and “morning clarity before the fog covers me” just organically came out. I would wake up full of emotions and ideas that would gradually fade as the day went on, and thus it was the “light of my life” that kept me inspired and pushing forward to make new art.

2. newsflash

This is one of those songs that just “happened” - it came together very quickly, and I remember the exact moment the chorus just poured out seamlessly. This was the first song I wrote in quarantine, and I thought it was so interesting that California went on a state-wide lockdown on the first day of spring. Here in San Francisco, we locked down two days before (on March 17), but the big news didn’t come until March 19, which lined up perfectly with the spring equinox. It’s such an interesting and darkly poetic juxtaposition to have the first day of the season, which is usually associated with rebirth and new life to land on the day the world as we knew it stopped and changed so dramatically in a negative and frightening way. 

At its core, “newsflash” is a very straightforward emo-pop song with 3 choruses, which is something I rarely do. Despite its melancholic lyrics, this track has one of the most feel-good “bop” type energies on the album, which makes it pretty infectious. The lyrics are a visceral reaction to being in quarantine and asking yourself, 'what really matters?’ When everything stops, and we’re left with just our thoughts and ambitions, how do we react? For me, the answer was clearly music, and I spent all of that time and pent up energy/anxiety making this album.

3. meet ecstasy 

This was the last song I finished for the album. Musically, I felt like I needed a counterpart to “newsflash,” which, prior to this song, was in its own lane. “meet ecstasy” is still more experimental and off-kilter than “newsflash,” but none of the other songs had that same bounce that it did, so I finished this one in lieu of a bunch of other songs I was working on to include in the final release.

Lyrically, the song goes back and forth between my current state and my inner voice. The choruses sung in higher falsetto range are my inner self; “walk from the past and I can be the one to hold you” is quite literally about moving on from things that have held you back. Whether it be a negative mental space, or addiction, or not believing you can do something, my inner self wants to affirm to my living physical being that we have the ability to change - if we want to. Like most people who have been around the block a few times, I’ve had lots of ups and downs with physical and mental health. This song really came to me when the initial wave of the 2020 shitshow came down, and I realized that no matter what is happening outside, I have to take care of myself, and hopefully when it’s all through, meet ecstasy.

4. buried beneath the sickness is sweetness

This is the most experimental, weird, and heavy song on the album. I actually started this song over a year ago, long before the heavy guitars and dark vocals, and something about it kept bringing me back. I tend to write pop songs with a verse-chorus-verse-bridge type of structure, but for this one, I said fuck it all. It’s dark, it’s heavy, it’s spacey, and it took a lot to wrangle it in to make it what it became.

The lyrics are predominately about the “wage slave” mentality I referenced in the title track, as I tried to make very obvious in the spoken-word intro. In the United States, we put so much emphasis on work, work, work, money, money, money that I can’t help but feel like it’s all going to erupt… and in some ways, it already has. Our trickle-down economics don’t work, and a lot of us work 40+ hours a week and still end up living paycheck to paycheck. It’s increasingly common for millennials like myself to have little to no savings, no property, and no children. We more or less work our asses off and have nothing to show for it. The lyric the title was pulled from “open your thighs and give me your heart - buried beneath the sickness is sweetness, if you let me pull you apart” is about the false promise of giving yourself to employers and corporations who don’t give a shit about your well-being. This ladders up to tackling the overall failures of modern capitalism and neoliberalism. 

5. lost waves crash

I tend to write from places of darkness or sadness, but “lost waves crash” is a rare love song. It’s a love song through the lens of quarantine when suddenly the person you live with is now one of the only people you’ll see. It worked out really well for me since my girlfriend and I both understand when we need space or support (like working on music alone for 6-8 hours a day), but being in quarantine, even if there’s love involved, still conjures up feelings of sadness. I don’t really tend to connect with “happy” music, so this is sort of my best attempt to speak on something positive while still being true to myself.

The lyrics reflect more on the themes of the album - “can you see the hypocrisy in how we breathe? We live to leave to fall asleep and then repeat”, highlighting the monotony of wage-based living. In this song though, I reveal that the way out of that is through love, both of yourself and for someone else. So many days in quarantine I would have gone totally insane without someone to bullshit or take a walk with, and for that, I am immensely grateful. The chorus ruminates on how in the end, we’re all lost (“like crying eyes, two hearts’ allure”), and being able to share experiences and emotions with someone we care about brings us solace. Even if those feelings can be fleeting, they’re important and necessary for happiness, especially now.

6. twilight plight

When I originally made this instrumental, I said to myself, “I want to make a really hard piano beat,” - and I did! I let the loud, distorted 808 really lead the way, and quickly found myself reaching for the electric guitar. When it came to the vocals I wanted it to feel aggressive, but in a spooky, almost dissonant way. I was trying to evoke “off” feelings while still being melodic and slightly disorienting in the contrast between the verses and chorus, playing into the lyrical themes.

The song is about systemic oppression, the United States’ current erosion into authoritarianism, and white supremacy’s reemergence caught between dark and light in an ongoing struggle for liberty. Thus, an eternal state of twilight. Like many people, I was disgusted by the murder of George Floyd and the blatant disparity it brought to the surface. I hate racists, and at times am ashamed by people that look like me who think they’re superior to someone who looks different than them. It felt irresponsible to not speak on the issue, as the last 4 years, our country has spiraled further and further into accepted hate. It’s not only unacceptable, but that type of rhetoric could lead to a really disastrous outcome - “you don’t decide who’s equal, we are all one people in a world oppressed.”

7. can we heal?

This song was written as a direct response to climate change. I wrote the lyrics before the pandemic broke out, and it’s one of those songs that carries so much more weight after what we’ve all gone through the last 7 months. It’s the only song without 808’s driving the bass, which gives it a completely different feel. It’s a somber track, and it felt like the perfect ending to an album with pretty dark undertones. 

It’s the only song besides “newsflash” that doesn’t have any “surprises” thrown in, but I find comfort in simple things. Despite its simplicity and bleak tones, I really love how this song makes me feel and the relevance of the dire problem that will become an uninhabitable planet if we don’t change our ways. Even though we’ve done so much to fuck things up, as a species, as a race, or as individuals if we take a step back and modify our behavior, can we heal?

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before the fog covers me drops on all streaming platforms on October 9th and is available in limited cassette and CD on Bandcamp now.

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