Camp Trash – The Long Way, The Slow Way | Album Review

I love deceptive music. More specifically, I love pop music that is so bubblegum it becomes saccharine. Those types of songs where the more that sickly sweet flavor sits on your tongue, you begin to realize how dark and upsetting it is. You can spit out the gum if you want to, but you can’t get rid of the taste it left in your mouth. No, it’s gonna stay there. It’s gonna remind you of the decision you made to ingest this seemingly delightful candy. You’ve been duped, and now you have to see the song for its true colors. 

Third Eye Blind’s “Semi-Charmed Life” comes to mind. Filled with blaring guitar chords and “doo-doo-doo, doo-doo-doo’s,” the song deftly slides into your subconscious. You’re singing along, and you don’t even realize it. Maybe you’re starting to get a sense of what lies beneath the surface, but when Stephan Jenkins finally utters the words “crystal meth,” the glass breaks, and it is now all too clear that you’ve been singing along to a stark drug ballad. There is no coming back from this; it’s the “Ring Around The Rosie” effect. You can keep shouting the lyrics, but you will always know what the song is about.

Florida’s Camp Trash practices this sort of arcane magic. Their debut album, The Long Way, The Slow Way, is filled with songs like “Semi-Charmed Life.” The tracks come across as summery indie rock loaded with massive hooks and slick melodies. You know where I’m going with this. The lyrics are not in line with the instruments. They’re pained and anxious self-assessments that are harsh but honest. 

“When did I get so hard to love?” muses Bryan Gorman over a punchy drum beat on “Soft.” Early single “Weird Florida” is a high-energy pop rock song that begs to be blasted from a boombox while you cannonball into the pool with your boys but acts as a facade for the story of a summer relationship that was doomed from the start. The penultimate track, “Riley,” digs into the apathy of knowing you need to end a relationship but wanting the other person to call it off because you can’t do it yourself. 

Many songs have that cool, breezy tone mastered by bands like Built to Spill, but in no way are they derivative. Camp Trash can write one hell of a hook, but they are more than just a pop rock band. On my favorite track, “Another Harsh Toyotathon,” they step outside of the radio hit structure to deliver something that falls somewhere between Pavement and Jesu. Behind the heavily distended bass, Gorman delivers one of the more savage burns I’ve heard in years as he shouts, “You’re an only child: what do you know about being replaced?” Album closer “Feel Something” even hints at the possibility that, in spite of all of the anxiety and self-doubt that’s expressed throughout the album, meaningful change can be achieved.

So maybe not all of the songs on The Long Way, The Slow Way fit my bubblegum analogy, but a lot of them do, so I’m sticking to it. But don’t let my willingness to die on this self-constructed hill deter you from Camp Trash’s achievement because this is one of the most well-crafted debuts to come along in a long while. 

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Connor lives in Emeryville with his partner and their cat and dog, Toni and Hachi. Connor is a student at San Francisco State University and is working toward becoming a community college professor. When he isn’t listening to music or writing about killer riffs, Connor is obsessing over coffee and sandwiches.

Follow him on Twitter.

HTML – Righteousness Endures Forever | Album Review & Interview

I’ve been thinking about death a lot lately. My own death, the death of my parents, the deaths of my friends and the people I love. When I really get thinking about it, the totality of death just feels so all-consuming. It's endless and inevitable. It’s a heavy thing to have on your mind, but sometimes sitting in those thoughts is the only way through. 

As long as I can remember, I’ve also always enjoyed albums about death; Carrie & Lowell, Psychopomp, Tunnel Blanket, Springtime and Blind, just to name a few. I think it’s fascinating to hear someone articulate their personal understanding of grief in such a public forum. 

There’s something beautiful in hearing an artist you admire grappling with their own version of the same things that are weighing heavy on your mind. There’s something comforting in hearing that journey and those learnings summarized in a condensed album-length format. There’s also a strange peace of mind in knowing that something so gorgeous as any of those records can come from the loss of a loved one.

I don’t want to romanticize death, but it is a fact of life. It’s something we all brush up against at some point, and it’s a topic that people shouldn’t shy away from. HTML’s Righteousness Endures Forever is the latest in a long line of death albums in which I have found refuge. Pitched by lead singer Travis Verbil as “a dad-rock record about my dead dad (but chill though),” the release is heavily inspired by 70s singer-songwriter fare but also acts as a clear continuation of the emotional indie rock sound found on 2018’s Topmost Grief.

Album opener “How to Grow Muscle” begins with far-off bird chirps and a Jeff Tweedy-indebted acoustic guitar riff. Much like the opener from last year’s Unmake Me, this song grounds the listener in the physical space where our narrator is about to lose their loved one. With a first line of “outside the room you died / there were gold sunbeams and gardens green,” HTML waste no time jumping straight into the topic, immediately letting the listener know what type of album this is. The song describes the horror of walking in on your father having collapsed on the floor and the frantic thoughts and actions that go into the following minutes. It’s harrowing and morbid but also beautiful. 

Knowing that Verbil has made it through this experience, processed it, and turned it into the beautiful piece of music you are now consuming gives a sense of relief that makes the recounting palatable. Rather than let this loss render him inconsolable, Verbil uses it to make a statement about impermanence–eventually arriving at the ironic conclusion that there’s a serene finality to be found in this kind of loss. 

After something as heavy as this opener, “Queens Blvd (Drunk Moonlight)” adds some unexpected (but much-needed) levity to the affair with a cocky instrumental fit for strutting around Queens wrapped in your favorite jean jacket. After some good-natured borough-on-borough shit talk, initially-innocuous lyrics like “I will never let your buds die” begin to shine through and take on a whole new death-tinted double-meaning upon repeat listens.

The album’s upbeat streak continues with both “Reservation Cigarettes” and ​​“Reapin’,” the former of which has a boppy acoustic groove and bouncy drum pattern while the latter bears the album’s most distorted guitar lick and catchiest chorus. Perfectly-placed bells give “Reapin’” a sun-soaked Sam’s Town-era Killers feel. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say Springsteen, but the two might as well be used interchangeably here. Evoking a religious-flavored viral tweet, Verbil outlines, “Reapin’ / I don’t like reapin’ / I much prefer sowing / So I sow” in one of the album's most singable moments. 

Throughout the final three songs, HTML flips back into a more somber and introspective tone as Verbil shifts perspective to focus on his relationship with his mother, his late father, and eventually himself. 

Album closer “Light Hypertrophy” ends the release on an overtly happy note as Verbil sings, “I’m glad I’m alive / Oh, I’m glad I never died / I’m glad, I’m glad I’m alive.” Hearing these words as the period mark on the end of an otherwise grief-filled album only reinforces that good can be pulled out of the depths, making the journey worth it. 

After reiterating this affirmation of life, Verbil shares a condensed version of the process that led him to this optimism in the wake of his loss. In his most heartfelt delivery, he sings, “Lately I’ve been thinking / The hole that you left / could be where the light comes back.” He then pauses for a beat, letting the sentiment soak into the air before adding, “into my life.” 

As these words wash over the listener, the release ends with more bird chirps, a lovely full-circle moment that acts as a reminder that life keeps moving. Much like those first chirps of birds in the morning, the record stands as a testament to beauty coming after darkness.

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I sat down with HTML vocalist/guitarist Travis Verbil and lead guitarist Brian Mazeski to discuss their artistic process, death, and the creation of the band’s stellar sophomore record.

Photo by Hannah D’Arcy

SWIM: You describe the album as having a 70s-era singer-songwriter “dad rock” vibe first and foremost. What artists or albums most directly inspired this sound?

BRIAN MAZESKI: Travis had the idea to put together a sort of “inspiration” playlist while we were writing/ideating the album, and it was filled with both actual 70s music (Van Morrison, Dylan, Dr. John, Paul Simon) but also more modern singer-songwriter tunes. A lot of these artists and albums I had only heard in passing, but I started to listen to them more and more, just to have it all rolling around in my head while we were writing the album. I’m not sure any of that influence comes through explicitly on the album we actually wrote, but I do think that influence helped inform our decision-making, in sort of a “what kind of lead would Van Morrison want on this track” sense. And Travis would also use some of these influences for direction on certain instrumentation; if I were stuck writing a lead guitar part, he’d say, “think Van Morrison hazy seventh chords,” and somehow that would help. 

SWIM: Righteousness Endures Forever represents a bit of a genre pivot for HTML. How do you view this record in relation to your previous work?

BRIAN MAZESKI: I think a big aspect of the genre/tone shift for me is that I think about music and writing music much differently now than I did when we wrote our first album. Back then, I wanted our songs to stand out for their complexity and technicality (which I still admire in artists/music), whereas writing this new album, my sensibilities aligned much more with Travis’s, and we both sort of locked into this goal of writing a free-wheelin', groove-oriented album of songs that all hit the ground running and could be arranged/played a number of ways and all sound good. That being said, I think we have a certain style (guitar tone sensibility, for instance) that is common to both albums, which is really cool given how different both projects are.

TRAVIS VERBIL: Going into this record, both writing and recording, I was on a really sprawling Dylan kick and tried my best to divorce my thoughts on production and genre from songwriting. It was extremely freeing. We were able to tear down a lot of walls we built for ourselves. I think our best work comes when we tend to think of genre as window-dressing. 

SWIM: Given that the album is about your late father, the songs get into heavy topics and imagery. How do you go about writing and recounting things like this through your lyrics?

TRAVIS VERBIL: It didn’t feel particularly hard or uncomfortable to recall those moments to write; I already had gone through them a million times in my head. Between the living and the writing, the writing was certainly easier.

SWIM: You’ve tweeted before about being your own audience which is the creative philosophy I most respect at this point. How did you arrive here? Similarly, given that this record is so personal to you, who do you think this record is for?

BRIAN MAZESKI: One of the things I love about being in a duo with Travis is that we have a kind of litmus test method between the two of us such that, if we’re playing around with a song or an idea, if we both love it then we love it and the seal of approval ends there, and if one of us is lukewarm on it, we can usually play around with it more until we fix it or scrap it. But at the end of the day, we both want to make music we love, and we rarely make decisions based on how we think something is going to be perceived (I've definitely been guilty of that in the past, though). Nowadays, I think we both share the view that if you make art for and from yourself, you’ll find your tribe out there who dig it. 

TRAVIS VERBIL: It’s been a long road, but I’m glad we arrived here. I feel like people get in your head at a young age and will try to be the arbiters, the proprietors of capital-c Cool or capital-s Style. Brian and I have been playing in bands together, playing a lot of different genres, since we were literal children. And in that time, the only times I have ever felt fulfilled or spiritually nourished, whatever you might call it, is when I feel like we’ve been true to ourselves and our shared sensibilities. In that vein, I feel like this record is for anyone that enjoys it, hopefully as much as we do. 

SWIM: I love the cover art and feel like it perfectly captures the feeling of the record. Who took this photo, and why did it feel right to use it as the cover?

TRAVIS VERBIL: Thank you! I took the photo— it’s actually the view from my childhood bedroom window. And before you ask, yes, I grew up in front of a cemetery; that’s an extremely Queens thing. This photo was taken in 2017, I would guess. It’s the spot where my dad began planting a vegetable garden just weeks before he died.

SWIM: Between the title of the album and Reapin’, you evoke quite a bit of religious language throughout this record. What's your background with religion, and how does it factor into this collection of songs?

TRAVIS VERBIL: I had a Catholic upbringing, and a lot of that stuff just lingers in my head— especially when I think about death. There’s no real rhyme or reason to it. It’s always there, though.

SWIM: Sonically, it feels like the record has two modes: quiet, subdued folk tunes and explosive full-band bombast. Was this a conscious decision or just a byproduct of your songwriting process?

BRIAN MAZESKI: That’s a really good question, and I think you nailed it with the second bit about the songwriting process. Every track on the album came directly from an initial rough demo Travis sent via voice note, usually just him playing an acoustic guitar. For some of those tunes, we knew that “the song,” meaning the essence of what made it good or unique, was that it was loud and distorted and driving and quick, whereas for other tunes, we felt that “the song” was just Travis and the guitar, with maybe some ambient piano, and nothing else was needed. For the more subdued songs, I think we took our cue from classic songs we loved that are relatively minimal (either overall or maybe in the sense that they are drumless or more open rhythmically) and tried to be conscious of realizing/acknowledging what makes a song complete and what it actually needs versus what we can pile on in the studio. 

Photo by Hannah D’Arcy

SWIM: I love the little ways you chose to round some of these songs out (the bells on Reapin’, the harmonica on NY Cowboy, even the bird chirps that appear throughout). I’d love to hear about the decisions that went into these little flourishes that appear across the album.

BRIAN MAZESKI: I am so glad to hear you dig those little details! I think we’ve always been interested in auxiliary percussion/instrumentation, dating way back to the first album Travis and I made years ago (we used bells and a ukulele and even some of Travis’s theater group members as a backing choir), but for whatever reason, I personally felt inspired to explore auxiliary percussion much more for this album. I really wanted these songs to groove and for people to feel the groove and bop their heads. I found myself thinking about being back in the high school percussion ensemble, playing all these shakers and guiros and bongos, and thinking about how so much of the music I love (both older and modern) takes full advantage of these tools (“Do It Again” by Steely Dan, for example, or the congas on “Patience” by Tame Impala) and that we should do the same if we want to make music that really grooves and makes people feel the rhythm. 

As for the bird sounds, I was inspired by Travis’s vision for the album and wanted to go all-in on it; when we would talk about the sequence of songs on the album, he said the first track, “How to Grow Muscle,” is like the sun rising on the first day of summer, everything is lush and growing, and so I decided to throw some bird sounds at the beginning of one of the later demos and fortunately, we both liked it and decided to keep it for the final mix. Many of the songs on the album (as I understand them, and what I admire about them) are about a specific moment and feeling, and I felt like a small detail like bird sounds would go a long way toward transporting a listener (I hope!). There are dark moments and aspects to some of the songs and the album in general, but at the beginning of “How to Grow Muscle,” we want the listener to feel like they’re listening to the beginning of a new summer day. 

SWIM: You haven’t released any music since 2018’s Topmost Grief, and death isn’t exactly something you can plan for in advance. When were these songs written, and how did this album come together?

TRAVIS VERBIL:  It all came together very organically. In December 2020, just about six months after the Father’s Day when I discovered my father had passed away in the night, I broke three different bones in my foot in a freak accident. I ended up going on worker’s comp, and my boss (​​a songwriter himself) called me and told me to write an album to pass the time. I ended up staying with my sister for a few weeks since my apartment was a walk-up, and I started messing around with her acoustic guitar–the same one I taught myself on when we were kids. 

I started writing one song a day and sending them to Brian. I started on New Year’s Day; I think that’s when I recorded the first demo for “How to Grow Muscle,” and by the end of the month all of the songs were written. Brian created arrangements for all the songs on the GarageBand app on his phone in the Winter, and he would send them to me, and we would talk about leads, drum parts, you name it. 

There was an issue though— we had, essentially, already written most of the follow-up to Topmost Grief, an album we were calling Heaven II. We had to make a creative decision based on the moment, and, for a lot of different reasons, we decided to shelve Heaven II and go full-speed ahead with Righteousness. 

It was the right call. We were in the studio that spring, started recording on weekends, and were finished by late July. We decided to sit on the record because we both envisioned it coming out at the beginning of the summer and decided that a Spring 2022 release date was best.

SWIM: Twenty minutes is pretty lightweight for an LP, but Righteousness feels like it has enough time to tell a complete story. How was it to assemble this collection of songs? I’m curious if there was any whittling down on your part, or did these seven songs just make sense?

TRAVIS VERBIL: We had some songs that didn’t make the cut for us. There were songs called stuff like “Rosemary,” “My Cup Runneth Over With Junk,” “Death House,” one called “The Last of the Coffee Grounds,” and a handful more that didn’t do it for us. Some of them we really liked and some of them we liked less. Brian and I came to the consensus we’d rather have a very tight set of seven than release a record with songs we didn’t think were our absolute best. I was also very inspired by summer 2018 when Kanye put out a new seven-track record he produced every Friday. I really dug some of those records, mostly Pusha T’s DAYTONA, and thought that we could similarly get away with a seven-song tracklist.

SWIM: Were there any other albums or pieces of media (about death or otherwise) that helped you through your personal experience with loss?

TRAVIS VERBIL: I kept going back to “Real Death” by Mount Eerie. I have this very funny memory of making my girlfriend and sister listen to it in a hotel room before going out on the town in South Beach, Miami. Talk about a pre-game!

SWIM: Queens, NY plays a central part in the identity of this record and your band. How do you see that physical space coming through in these songs, and why is that important?

TRAVIS VERBIL: I feel like I spent some of my earlier years wishing I had a Brooklyn demeanor, Brooklyn sensibilities, all that. I wasn’t being true to myself. I’m a Queens guy;  I’m a 7 Train guy, a chicken-over-rice guy, a white sauce and hot sauce guy, a Let’s Go Mets guy. We wrote these songs during the one year of my life I lived in Brooklyn, and as much fun as I was having, I definitely missed Queens. And the more I wrote about my dad, the more I missed Queens. Just like the genre stuff I said earlier, I really felt like making this album so unapologetically Queens was fundamentally important in Brian and I being true to ourselves.

SWIM: The final song speaks for itself and ends the album on a bright, optimistic note. What’s one thing you hope people take away from this album as a whole?

TRAVIS VERBIL: The response to this record from our friends and contemporaries has been unreal. All I could hope is that people are excited for what’s next. 

The Best of Q2 2022

We’re halfway through the year, and, well, lots has happened. As always, music has been a guiding light in my life, offering both something to hold onto and something to look forward to. If you’re reading this, you probably feel the same way and have just as many albums that have helped keep you grounded over the last [insert number of bad months here].

What follows is a collection of ten albums released over the last three months that have connected with me. If you want to read about my favorite albums from the first three months of the year, click here. Other than that, read on for the tunes that have helped keep me sane throughout the spring and early summer of 2022. 

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Angel Olsen - Big Time

Jagjaguwar

If I were to describe the new Angel Olsen album in one word, it would be “breathtaking.” I’ll be the first to admit that–aside from last year’s phenomenal one-off Sharon Van Etten collab– I haven’t been the biggest fan of Olsen’s output as of late. That waning interest is less about declining artistry and more because 2016’s My Woman is one of my favorite records of the entire decade, and that’s a tall order to surpass. This all said, Big Time has been a fast love and now feels like the closest she’s gotten to the sublime energy captured on that seminal record. The approach taken on her fifth album ends up fitting Olsen perfectly; twangy and honest country-light is a great backdrop that allows our heroine to unleash the full power of her voice and emotions. The instrumentals are aching and meticulously crafted, gently guiding the songs forward while also being beautiful in their own right. After making one of the best indie rock records of the decade, getting orchestral-gothic, and taking a vibrant 80s detour, Big Time proves the only place left to go is back home. 

Ben Quad - I’m Scared That’s All There Is

Chillwavve Records

I feel like every couple of months I extol the virtues of some emo band with a variation of “I love that tappy shit,” but it’s true, dammit. My desire for noodly riffs is insatiable, and luckily emo is a genre where bands can crank that shit out in abundance. Ben Quad, however, is better than all of those mid-ass midwest bands, as they prove throughout their debut full-length I’m Scared That’s All There Is. Evoking equally punctual emo greats like Oliver Houston, Ben Quad pack relatable lyrics, dizzying riffs, and hypnotic chants into a compact and fulfilling 23 minutes, resulting in what’s already one of the best emo albums of the year.

Heart To Gold - Tom

Memory Music

There he is, peering out at you, all freckled and wide-eyed. Who is that on the cover of the second full-length from Heart to Gold? Is it a member of the band? Is it the titular Tom? You’ll have to press play to find out. In one of my biggest surprises so far this year, Heart to Gold utilize an intoxicating mixture of emo, pop-punk, and just a dash of hardcore, bending the best (and least-embarrassing) aspects of these genres to their will. The songs on this record are boisterous, energetic, emphatic, and every other descriptor you’d want to hear while packed into a sweaty Minneapolis basement. There are hilarious samples, touches of tappy midwest emo instrumentation, cathartic group chants, and even some killer Title Fight-esque screams. As with most records of this genre, the theme of Tom seems to be a general sense of maturation. Whether they’re grappling with the weight of existence or riding the waves of tumultuous relationships, the band maintains an open-hearted approach that keeps the release grounded and relatable. Much like the first dude at the show who opens up the pit, Heart to Gold do an excellent job of inviting you into their world and encouraging you to scream along. 

HTML - Righteousness Endures Forever

Self-released

Death is real. That’s far from an original insight, but HTML manage to put a revelatory spin on loss throughout their sophomore record, Righteousness Endures Forever. Pitched by lead singer Travis Verbil as “a dad rock record about my dead dad (but chill though),” the release is heavily inspired by 70s singer-songwriter fare but also acts as a clear continuation of the dynamic indie rock sound found on 2018’s Topmost Grief. Just seven songs clocking in at a lightweight 20 minutes and 20 seconds, Righteousness explores what it means to lose someone, love someone, and honor their life through your own. A stunning and touching collection of songs that have spoken to me on an intimate level.

PUP - THE UNRAVELING OF PUPTHEBAND

Rise Records

On some level, the fourth studio album from PUP just feels like “More PUP.” It’s not a massive departure from the music they’ve been making their whole career, but when you can crank out anthemic shout-along punk by the albumload, why not go back for another helping, right? A lightly conceptual album depicting the Toronto punks as a floundering business, THE UNRAVELING OF PUPTHEBAND sees the band fraying at the seams attempting to turn their musical passions into a sustainable career. The group experiments with new elements like pianos, synths, trumpets, trombones, saxophones, guest features, and more. Perhaps most noticeably, the album is loud and not just in a thrashy punk way, but in a blown-out, bit-crushed way. It’s a stylistic choice that allows everything to hang together nicely and makes this album feel distinct from prior PUP releases.

Even with a relatively unique wholistic sound, there is some retreaded material here. As much as they shred, both “Robot Writes A Love Song” and “Matilda” are love songs projected onto non-human objects, a previously-winning formula for the band. Even my favorite song, “Waiting,” evokes the angry “Full Blown Meltdown” but differentiates itself by launching into a stellar two-syllable single-word chorus that is a marvel of songwriting and economy of words. At worst, these redundancies come across as a kind of steadfast artistic consistency that can only be achieved by a punk band who have somehow managed to claw their way to a decade-plus career. UNRAVELING is a stellar record that proves more PUP is never a bad thing.

Sadurn - Radiator

Run For Cover Records

I will always give at least one listen to everything that Run For Cover puts out. After building up a decade of goodwill with releases that have become lifelong loves, this trustworthiness has paid off in spades, leading to some of my favorite records of recent years, like Springtime and Blind and Animal Companionship. When the Boston-based label announced they were signing Sadurn earlier this year, I did the same thing I always do and listened to the first single. Also doubling as the album opener, “Snake” hits a sweet spot between Ratboys-style indie rock twang and DIY heart-on-sleeve sensibilities. Perhaps most importantly, the track is topped off with a lovely dollop of slide guitar, an instrument that has become a light obsession for me over the last few years. After letting it marinate for about a month, Sadurn followed that first single up with “Golden Arm” and then “Icepick,” each song quickly cornering a different fold of my heart. 

The full Radiator experience isn’t too far off from those singles. Defaulting to the pace of a lazy porch swing on a hot summer's day, these songs ache with longing, love, and adolescent confusion. The perfect record to throw on early morning with a cup of coffee, mid-afternoon with a beer, or late at night in the throes of yearning. Another in the long line of records that proves Run For Cover runs in my blood. 

Short Fictions - Every Moment Of Every Day

Lauren Records

What if an emo fell in love? And what if said emo fell in love while the world was falling apart? Oh, wait… that’s lots of us. And given the contents of Every Moment Of Every Day, it’s safe to say that Short Fictions vocalist/guitarist Sam Treber is among them. Throughout the phenomenal sophomore album from the Pittsburg emo revivalists, we hear beautiful, loving sentiments nestled between anxiety-riddled observations about the ever-crumbling world in which we live. 

Both “Heather” and “You Will Never Be the Best at Anything You Try (Surely Not)” are adoring love songs that also acknowledge the realities of the failing capitalistic system most 20-somethings begrudgingly find ourselves in the middle of. What do you do when you feel the most powerful force on earth while the world around you is falling apart? When the climate crisis has already arrived, when your partner is 100 miles away, when everything is changing and it’s freaking you out? It’s a wildly conflicting feeling to hold such positive and negative things in your heart at once, but that space is where Short Fictions thrive. 

Aside from these overarching throughlines of connection and distress, other highlights include when the group gives a realistic view of tour life on “Don’t Start a Band” and express their frustrations with capitalism on the hardcore rager “The Great Unwashed.” Album closer “Don’t Pinch Me I’m Dreaming” lands the record on a hopeful reminder that love can be a powerful motivator despite all the strife that precedes and surrounds it. Much like their phenomenal debut, Every Moment of Every Day is a 30-minute 8-track LP that proves the emo genre still has much more to give as long as you’re willing to listen.

The Smile - A Light For Attracting Attention

XL Recordings

As an artist, sometimes all you need to do is give your audience a different angle–a simple reframing that can shift an ordinary object into an extraordinary new light. After being a band for nigh-on 40 years, it’s understandable why the members of Radiohead would find fulfillment in other artistic ventures that don’t carry the same pressure or expectations as a prestige-level alternative rock band. While The Smile counts two vital members of the English rock band amongst its ranks, the addition of jazz drummer Tom Skinner plus the name change forces the listener to conceive of this album as something aside from the Big Band whose shadow it can sometimes fall under.

There is the occasional moment, like a tappy Greenwood guitar solo or an arrant Yorke moan, which sound downright Radiohead, but those are more baked-in flourishes of their respective creators than anything intentional. Artistically, it feels as if this trio approached songwriting from a very different place than they usually do. Songs are wandering, loopy, and almost improvised at points. Lyrics are recursive and often see Yorke repeating the same thing over and over again to a hypnotic effect. A Light For Attracting Attention is a groovy big-budget alternative record packed with a surprising breadth of ideas for a bunch of dudes who are now solidly middle aged. If anything, The Smile proves that, even with a legendary history and larger-than-life expectations, sometimes all you need to innovate is a different perspective.

Soccer Mommy - Sometimes, Forever

Loma Vista Recordings

Sophie Allison is a fantastic musician with terrible luck. I’ve been looking forward to Sometimes, Forever since it was unveiled back in March alongside the stellar lead single “Shotgun.” Not only was one of my favorite artists releasing a new album this year, but she was releasing it on my birthday. It felt like a little gift from Allison just to me. After a string of incredible singles, the album arrived on the same day the Supreme Court announced it was overturning Roe v Wade. I’m not trying to say this record was the worst casualty of the day, but it’s easy to see how the excitement of a new album can shrink infinitesimally in the shadow of such an appalling and upsetting decision. Much like 2020’s Color Theory which was released just weeks before the world went into shutdown for the COVID-19 pandemic, it felt like Soccer Mommy was once again releasing an album at the worst possible time. Still, I was grateful to have a collection of new music from an artist I’ve loved for years during an incredibly hard day. 

Not only is Sometimes, Forever another fantastic album from Soccer Mommy, but it might also be one of her best. Aside from the aforementioned singles that make up the first half of the album, songs like “With U” and “Feel It All The Time” are downright stunners. My personal favorite, “Darkness Forever,” begins with a sinister Portishead-style trip-hop beat and mounts into a lumbering oppressive riff. That darkness is immediately contrasted with “Don’t Ask Me,” which drops the listener into a rip-roaring 90s-style shoegaze lick and builds to the most “fun” guitar solos Soccer Mommy has ever put to music. Allison caps the record off with “Still,” an excruciating closer in the vein of “Wildflowers” or “Gray Light,” where she rips your heart out, holds it up to your face, and leaves you utterly devastated in the album’s final moments. Sometimes, Forever may have arrived at a bad time in the world, but it’s coming at the perfect time for me. 

Summerbruise - The View Never Changes

Old Press Records

I listen to lots of “sad” music, but no band writes about sadness quite like Summerbruise. Outside of maybe Greet Death, I don’t think I’ve ever found a group with the ability to capture the particular brand of numbness and apathy that I identify with. Luckily, the members of Summerbruise recognize how heavy their lyrics are and expertly counter-balance these borderline-crushing song topics with peppy pop-punk instrumentals that are vivacious, musically diverse, and surprisingly danceable. A couple of choice lyric pulls include, “Well I know it’s not that easy, but I owe you all a try / I’m not that used to trying, but I think it might feel nice” and “so I’m sorry if I seem zoned out, it’s probably cause I am as fuck.” Whew. With song titles like “Kayfabing the Boys” and “Happy Hour 2,” it’s clear Summerbruise only take themselves so seriously–a relief that underscores the otherwise serious subject matter and help makes everything a little more bearable. Much like 2019’s Always Something, the latest from Summerbruise speaks to me on an almost-worrying level. At least the dope riffs make it easier to swallow.

The Brian Jonestown Massacre – Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees | Album Review

I’m a firm believer in not engaging with art until the time is right. I didn’t see Goodfellas until I was twenty-three; the movie had somehow fallen through the cracks for me, but once I felt like an embarrassing amount of time had passed, I finally gave it a watch, and it changed my life. Sure, if I had seen it earlier in my life, it still might have left a sizable impact on me, but I don’t think I would have appreciated it to the level I did at twenty-three. There’s something cosmically gratifying in allowing yourself to engage with a piece of art when the time is right. 

This approach also goes for things that don’t click right away. Sometimes I will listen to a band and find something interesting in their music, but we just aren’t syncing together. It’s like when you’re listening to the radio in your car and you spin the dial just a bit off the station–you can still hear the song, but there’s this fuzzy distortion that prevents you from fully experiencing it.

For years, this was my relationship with The Brian Jonestown Massacre. In hindsight, I judged the band without really knowing much about them. What I knew about the group was that they made spacey garage rock that rested in the middle of a Venn diagram containing 60s psychedelia and shoegaze. Music like this is very much my kinda thing, but in a stroke of sophomoric arrogance, I thought, “I have My Bloody Valentine and Spiritualized; what do I need this band for?” I lived in this ignorance for over a decade until earlier this year when a friend gave me an extra ticket to their show at The Fillmore in San Francisco.

I’m not one to turn down a free ticket, plus the show was on 4/20, so I figured it was a sign from above. Stoned, I packed into the back of the crowd with my friend and his buddies and proceeded to have one of the most entertaining live experiences ever. Having little frame of reference for Brian Jonestown Massacre, I was tickled by frontman Anton Newcombe’s primadonna behavior as he complained to the sound tech that his vocals sounded too much like opener Mercury Rev’s, scolded the drummer for not playing the parts correctly, and argued with the keyboardist about whether or not he was being too much of a dick to the band. To some, this might have been off-putting, but I found it hilarious and even charming because, despite all of the potentially staged antics, the band sounded great. I left the show a convert.

The following day I waded deep into the internet as I tried to learn as much as possible about The Brian Jonestown Massacre. I watched videos containing literal fights on stage and an appearance Newcombe made on Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown, but when it came time to dive into the actual music, I found myself overwhelmed. This band embodies what it means to be prolific, having released nineteen albums, not counting compilations, live albums, EPs, and singles. There’s just so much. Should I start from the beginning, or would I be better off listening to landmark albums that stand as pillars in their discography? I still don’t know the right answer.

My path toward unraveling the group’s history has been fittingly tumultuous. I tried variations of these methods which left my brain in knots, but then I was given a promo of their nineteenth album, Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees, to review. To say that this album unlocked what BJM is all about for me is wrong, but I feel like it grounded me as I listened to it day in and day out for almost a month. 

The album opens with “The Real,” which sets the tone for the next thirty-eight minutes with its trancelike guitars and drums that repeat without relent. Like any intense high, Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees is riddled with euphoria, paranoia, and melancholy. “It’s About Being Free Really” is a blissful psychpop ditty soaked in warm fuzz and upbeat rhythms. Disguised as an infectious, warm worm, “Silenced” sees ​​Newcombe almost rapping as he rapidly rattles off thoughts about hearing gossip and feelings of isolation. The low and hazy lullaby, “Before And Afterland,” appears halfway through the album, climaxing with a glimpse of clarity as Newcombe sings, “I was born in this world to lose / My destiny’s not for you to choose” before slipping back into its stupor. The remaining songs are well-constructed garage rock fare that maintain the feeling of stoned relaxation rather than continue the wild excitement of the first half. Ultimately, Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees goes down smooth as the record’s constant buzzing of distortion locks you into a singular headspace. You’ll get close to a full panic, but in the end, that feeling subsides in favor of tranquility.

After emerging from my den, I began to hopscotch through BJM’s discography. I checked out a few albums that preceded Fire Doesn’t Grow On Trees to see if maybe they spoke to one another. Maybe they did, but who can really say? It’s certainly far removed from the shoegaze of their debut Methodrone. I guess that’s where the beauty lies when an artist is genuinely prolific. When scrutinized under a microscope, you can see the individual strokes and discern the differences, but when you take a few steps back, you begin to see how it all blends together, creating a cohesive body of work.

If I could see into the future, I would be able to tell you if my relationship with The Brian Jonestown Massacre deepens and flourishes to the point that I become a real head, but I can’t. It’s not about that; it’s about appreciating the music for what it is when it’s clicking. And right now, I'm deep in the groove.

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Connor lives in Emeryville with his partner and their cat and dog, Toni and Hachi. Connor is a student at San Francisco State University and is working toward becoming a community college professor. When he isn’t listening to music or writing about killer riffs, Connor is obsessing over coffee and sandwiches.

Follow him on Twitter.

Bartees Strange – Farm to Table | Album Review

I’ve never been as excited to see the opener for one of my favorite bands as I was when I saw Bartees Strange supporting Car Seat Headrest. I showed up early enough to hear the blaring horns of “Heavy Heart” during soundcheck, the explosiveness of Farm To Table’s fiery, brass-backed lead single palpable even through Brooklyn Steel’s cinder block walls. I loved “Heavy Heart” just as much then, but now having heard it in the context of his sophomore album, it’s proven to be the perfect opener for a record that begs the question: once our blessings finally come, how should we receive them? 

The couplet that opens the song (and the album itself)-- “there’s reasons for heavy hearts/this past year I thought I was broken” –lets us in on the often destabilizing feeling of getting a long-awaited win after a series of losses. Though Strange takes pride in his accomplishments, he’s wary that such acclaim could compromise his values or make him lose sight of what’s been motivating him in the first place:

I never want to miss you this bad
I never want to run out like that
Sometimes I feel just like my dad, rushing around
I never saw the God in that
Why work so hard if you can’t fall back?
Then I remember I rely too much upon my heavy heart

Strange’s path to success has been a long and unconventional one, to say the least. Born Bartees Cox Jr. in Ipswich, England, the eldest son of an Air Force engineer father and an opera singer mother, he had a transient, international childhood before settling in Mustang, Oklahoma at age 12. Much of his early musical education came in the form of church choir performances and piano and vocal lessons from his mom. During high school and his first year of college, he played football and had hopes of making it to the NFL, but soon realized that it wasn’t a viable enough option, and that the exploitation and lack of support he experienced as a Black student-athlete weren’t worth the risk. After transferring schools and getting his degree from Oklahoma University, he moved to Washington DC to work as an FCC press secretary under the Obama administration. Following this position, he bounced between DC and Brooklyn, producing for various artists, playing in the post-hardcore band Stay Inside, and releasing two solo EPs– a 2017 collection of folk songs titled Magic Boy under the name Bartees & the Strange Fruit, and 2020’s Say Goodbye To Pretty Boy in which he covered five songs by The National, a band he cites as one of his biggest influences (and who he’ll be supporting on an upcoming tour). Just months after releasing SGTBP, he dropped his breakout debut album, Live Forever, a transformative anti-genre behemoth that skyrocketed him to indie fame. 

Flash forward to late 2021, and it seemed like all the big-name indie rock artists were lining up to take Strange on tour. He sounded almost timid introducing himself to the crowd when I saw him open for Car Seat Headrest at their 3-night Brooklyn Steel run in March, but when he launched into a rousing performance of “Mustang,” it was as though a switch had flipped. Whatever shyness I’d seen moments earlier melted away entirely as he tore into the Live Forever single with the force of the titular horses that gallop through the track’s second verse– “I just wait for my horses now.” It’s been a slow climb, and he’s been patient, but Strange isn’t waiting anymore. Everything he’s been working toward is here for the taking. As brilliant as he was as a first act, and as deserving as he is of all the exposure he’s gotten from supporting more established artists, I saw someone who’d outgrown his indie rock opener status. His sound felt too big. His name was worthy of stadium marquees and the largest font on festival flyers. I have very little doubt that the next time I see Strange, he’ll be the one headlining. He’s more than ready for it, and Farm To Table proves that a million times over. 

It’s an album that feels present in every sense of the word, despite its watchful eye on the past. Many of these songs see Strange reflecting on his upbringing, his current perspective both illuminated and disrupted by physical and temporal distance from childhood. On the quiet, acoustic closer “Hennessy,” he examines the racist stereotypes that he was inundated with during his formative years in Mustang, Oklahoma, a city whose near-90% white population often made Strange– a Black kid who’d spent his early years living all over the world –feel like an outsider. The line “sometimes I don’t feel like I’m the man” is both a humble admission of self-doubt and a solemn contrast from the opening bars of his 2020 breakout single “Boomer,” in which he boasts, “aye bruh, aye bruh, aye bruh/look I’m the man.” Before launching into a dissolving, multilayered outro, Strange attempts to find solace through love and community: “Hold you in my arms, remind you that you’re gold/Can’t feel the pain if I’m holding onto you.” He doesn’t sound entirely sure of himself but nonetheless clings to whatever semblance of hope he has left.

“Black Gold” and “Tours” also focus on Strange’s childhood memories. On the former, he alternates from a gravelly baritone to a shimmering falsetto as he attempts to reconcile past mistakes with current wisdom:

I was way too rough with how I left my town
Now it’s big city lights for a country mouse
I can recall waiting for you
I feel you now, with every move

The lyrics are interspersed with what sounds like audio from a home video, fuzzy recordings of people singing and chattering over a delicate string arrangement that evokes the flickering of fireflies on a summer evening.

On “Tours,” Strange draws thematic parallels between the demands of his father’s military job and those of his current-day career as a touring musician. Much like in “Heavy Heart,” he finds himself considering the toll his father’s distance took on his family and suggesting that his own tours might have similar effects on his loved ones in the present day. Throughout this reckoning, he maintains a deep sense of gratitude toward both of his parents, which comes in the form of memory preservation. The nature of memory is fragmented in and of itself, and like many of us, Strange feels obligated to retain as much as he can so as not to lose crucial chapters of his– and his family’s –personal history. He becomes his parents’ archivist, weaving their shared experiences into a musical narrative to overcome the risk of losing these precious stories. Even the ones that are painful to look back on are worth holding on to:

Wipe the tears from her face
Mom would break down once a day
Looking back, I know that she tried so hard
When I’d hide from thunder, scared that I’d wake my mother
If I were my father I’d wonder who’s checking for monsters

The childlike confusion and melancholia of “Tours” leads beautifully into “Hold The Line,” the album’s third single, dedicated to Gianna Floyd. In a statement released along with the single, Strange said that the song was inspired by “watching George Floyd’s daughter talk about the death of her father and thinking wow– what a sad introduction to Black American life for this young person.” Then-six-year-old Gianna not only experienced the unimaginable loss of her father but was also forced to grieve for an international audience. You’d see photos of her visiting the White House and video footage of her testifying for her father and think, she shouldn’t have to do this. It’s unfathomable to think of how a child might even begin to make sense of such horrendous violence– violence that, sadly, is nothing out of the ordinary. Having explored his own firsthand experiences with anti-Black racism through songwriting, Strange mourns for the Black kids whose childhoods are tainted with the same hatred. He eulogizes George Floyd– “the man with that big ol’ smile” –with grief for those that he alone cannot protect. 

Strange has an innate ability to tap into the surreal powerlessness that can make being alive right now feel so paralyzing. Alt-country banger “Escape This Circus” opens with a reference to Gil Scott-Heron’s 1970 spoken-word poem “Whitey’s On The Moon”-- just as relevant now as it was then, if not more. One percent of Americans own nearly a third of the nation’s wealth, and instead of using it to feed and house those living in poverty, they’re building cars that spontaneously combust– we call this progress. Few lyrics this year have sounded quite as timely as, “I’m in a fancy place/paid too much for the room/The clerk he says to buy some crypto/he’s got holes in his shoes.” Capitalism’s a sick game that we’re all forced to play, and almost no one wins. You can hear the exhaustion in Strange’s voice as he sings, “we’re all part of this circus/we’re all on our own horses''-- once again calling to mind the horses in 2020’s “Mustang.” He’d tossed the line “I hate America” into that track with a similar sense of resignation, beaten down by a neverending dystopian carnival whose games are rigged by design. “Escape This Circus”’s true catharsis comes in its erratic, reverb-drenched outro, with Strange wailing, “that’s why I really can’t fuck with y’all,” in a desperate attempt to pull the carousel’s emergency brake and free himself.

Back in April when Strange announced that he’d signed to 4AD for his sophomore album, he made his grand entrance to the historic London record label with “Cosigns,” a sleek and celebratory trap-rock banger in which he exercises his well-earned bragging rights. In his cleverest and cockiest bars, he shouts out the big dogs that he’s playing with, including 2/3s of Boygenius, idiosyncratic Australian rocker Courtney Barnett, Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon, new labelmates Big Thief, and 4AD founder Martin Mill:

I’m in LA, I’m with Phoebe, I’m a genius, damn
I’m in Chi-Town, I’m with Lucy, I just got the stamp
Hit up Courtney, that’s my Aussie, I already stan
I’m on FaceTime, I’m with Justin, we already friends
We already friends, we already friends
I’m on FaceTime, I’m with Justin, we already friends
I’m a thief when things get big, look Imma steal your fans
I’m with Martin in the mill, we grindin’, makin’ bread

The stunning music video directed by Pooneh Ghana shows Strange at the head of a stylishly set outdoor table (seemingly not far from the farm). As his impeccably dressed guests tear savagely into their meals at the song’s bridge, Strange takes off running and hides in a mystical, flower-covered cave. The braggadociousness that characterized the first half of the track is contrasted with an ambivalence about his newfound fame, and his ambition is once again at odds with the precariousness of success: “How to be full, it’s the hardest to know/I keep consuming, I can’t give it up/Hungry as ever, it’s never enough.” 

Listening to Farm To Table feels like watching an artist self-actualize in real-time. When Strange sings, “I was trying to be something wretched/Something I saw on TV,” on the album’s fourth and final single, “Wretched,” we see him fulfilling his own potential, becoming a version of himself that he both feared and aspired to. It’s yet another track in which he artfully folds these contradictions into catchy, danceable hooks. He’s cautious of the blessings he receives, wanting to celebrate them but still wondering if there’s a catch. 

Much like it was on Live Forever, his art is a struggle against mortality, a fleeting chance to create something that will transcend and outlive him. On “Mulholland Dr.”— a track rife with influence from longtime Strange favorites The National and TV On The Radio —he grapples with the ephemerality of both the sweet and the bitter, and of life itself, striving to make good use of the time he has:

I don’t believe in the bullshit
Of wondering when we die
I’ve seen the ending
It’s all in your face and your eyes
I’ve seen how we die
I know how to lose

If Live Forever earned Bartees Strange a seat at the titular table, Farm to Table not only sees him sitting at its head, but telling the story of how he got there. In the end, it’s Strange’s gratitude that keeps him– and his art –grounded. Everything he creates is imbued with a deep respect for his craft and for  those who’ve supported him. Even through the fear and anguish and regret, he shows his appreciation every step of the way. The (strange) fruits of his labor are served, and the rest of us are lucky enough to enjoy the bountiful harvest he’s provided. So say thanks, because it’s time to eat. 

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Grace Robins-Somerville is a writer from Brooklyn, New York. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter at @grace_roso.