Midlake : A Bridge To Far

Midlake were a much obsessed over, nearly cult-like band back in the 2000s. With singer and main songwriter Tim Smith, Midlake made two highly exalted records in Bamnan and Slivercork and The Trials of Van Occupanther. The Denton, TX-based band made an outsider art record with the former, and the latter was revered for it’s […]

Feeling Like Winter

Woke up Sunday morning to snow covering the fallen leaves and pine needles I still need to clean up off the lawn. I knew snow was a possibility, but that possibility turned into reality between Saturday night and Sunday morning. My wife and daughter stayed up pretty late Saturday night, while I fell asleep rewatching […]

Liam Kazar : Pilot Light

I came across Liam Kazar four years ago. A song of his popped up randomly while streaming music one afternoon and it made an impression. Singer/songwriter from Chicago that was a chef before concentrating on songwriting, his music is very much in the pop category. But pop like Tom Petty, Talking Heads, Wilco, and Jackson […]

Metavari : House Tetra Sessions, Vol. 1

Nate Utesch has always been about the evolution of sound and art when it comes to his long-running musical project Metavari. From the early days as a Midwestern post-rock outfit(Be One Of Us And Here No Noise) to moving into more synth-based electro pop(Moonless), to creating more ethereal/new age soundscapes(Metropolis, Absurda, Soft Continuum), Utesch is […]

Burial Grid : NORD Compendium

Adam Michael Kozak, aka Burial Grid, has always had a fascination with the dark corners of life. His modular/analog electronic music has always been more of the glitchy and nervous variety, as if manifesting darkness, anxiety, and fear through square waves and circuital curiosity. And while a lot of artists make dark and foreboding electronic […]

Antoni Maiovvi : Deathgames

When Antoni Maiovvi drops a new album people take note. Maiovvi is a staple in the electronic/imagined soundtrack world, being one of the OGs of the heavy synth scene. He combines his distinguished songwriting with his knack for propulsive electro/synth music into something that reaches back to a simpler time in music. He came up […]

Meridian Arc : Continuum

Andrew Crawshaw is the sort of creative that never shuts the machine down; whether creating beautiful, singular screenprint art as the owner of Broken Press Design in Seattle or as record label runner for SFI Recordings, Andrew is in a constant state of creative movement. With SFI Recordings Crawshaw has put out some amazing records […]

Makaya McCraven : Off The Record

For me, jazz drummer/composer/bandleader Makaya McCraven is one of the most exciting jazz artists(or any genre for that matter) making music today. Starting with his breakthrough record In The Moment from 2015, McCraven pushed jazz forward by recording improvisational live shows, then taking those recordings and cutting/pasting them into studio works. Essentially taking the raw […]

Wolfmen Of Mars : The Obsolete Illusion

I think the first time I’d ever heard Wolfmen of Mars was on a compilation called SNDTRK, which came out back in 2016 on the now long dead Disco Cinematic Recordings. There was a who’s who of heavy synth artists on that album including Slasher Film Festival Strategy, Xander Harris, Repeated Viewing and an East […]

Spook Me? Spook You!

Two days from Halloween. Seems like it was only 367 days from the last Halloween, but I guess time does fly when you’re having a stressful year, huh? What was I doing last Halloween? Well, I think we had just gone to the great BEAT Tour in Indianapolis on October 30th, and Halloween had landed […]