Heavy-hearted in the Midwest since 2011
Reviews of albums, shows, songs and the like.
There’s something ethereal and free-spirited about Gyan Rosling’s Burning Witches Records debut Embrace. The neon-eighties tilt, the airy synths, and the ‘Dance Party USA’-like percussive hits all come together like a swath of nostalgia that hit you direct in the face. Embrace is a time machine of an album that drops us right into 1986, […]
Read More Gyan Rosling : EmbraceThere’s a mysticism about southern California; from the sun-soaked surfer souls that haunt its coastline, to the teenage loners writing the DNA of what would become modern skateboarding in abandoned backyard swimming pools, to the music scene that blossomed amongst all of it. Southern California was the mecca for true freedom in artistry and rebellion, […]
Read More Ellis Munk Ensemble : San Diego SessionsSometimes all the day requires is a little shot of music sunshine. A bright spot to lighten up what feels like a perpetually dark day, and unfortunately those darker moments tend to pop up more than usual as of late. So if you need to shine a little light on your grimly shaded frame of […]
Read More Nevergrand : Things That We Should FearWhen Martin Rude and Jakob Skøtt got together to make their collaborative LP the two Danish musicians could have gone in any direction. They worked together in the band Sun River(along with Jonas Munk), and both have established themselves as versatile players. What they came up with is an album filled with subtle sonic manipulations […]
Read More Martin Rude & Jakob Skøtt Duo : The Discipline of AssentShortwave Broadcaster is the experimental/ambient music project of Keith Canisius Baerken. Baerken works in the realm of electronic music in the duo Astral TV, as well as in Rumskib and has released music with Darla Records as Keith Canisius. With Shortwave Broadcaster Baerken is deep diving into serious ambient vibes courtesy of heavily effected guitar. […]
Read More Shortwave Broadcaster : Afraid of AiThe latest from Alexander Leonard Donat sees him pushing his post-punk project Vlimmer into even brighter and darker realms. His varied sonic worlds seem to keep colliding together, grabbing bits of both his Fir Cone Children and Vlimmer projects, turning the darker realms lighter, and the lighter a bit darker. With XIIIIII/XIIIIIII(16 & 17) the […]
Read More Vlimmer : XIIIIII/XIIIIIII (16 & 17)Bradford Trojan makes the kind of music that feels both sun-kissed and world-weary. Weather worn pop songs that fall into the category of DIY, but not lo-fi. His tunes are like finding a cassette underneath your car seat that’s been there years, maybe even decades. Unmarked you put it in the deck and find this […]
Read More Bradford Trojan : MeanwhileLet us rejoice, for Protomartyr have returned from the Motor City to deliver unto us another sermon of epic proportions. Their rapturous mix of post-punk and art rock combined with front man Joe Casey’s pulpit tirades and apocalyptic urban decay manifestos are the kind of serious talk we all need to hear right now. In […]
Read More Protomartyr : Ultimate Success Todayfeatured photo by Marcus Fisher It’s hard to describe Secret Drum Band’s Chuva, the Portland music collective’s second full-length album and first with the great Moon Glyph Records. It’s nothing like anything Moon Glyph has dabbled in before, with the focus here on rhythm and powerful soundscapes created with intricately orchestrated percussion, ambient electronics, and […]
Read More Secret Drum Band : ChuvaIt’s been over five years since My Morning Jacket have released an album. That album was The Waterfall, a solid set of pop and rock tunes that followed in the footsteps 2011s Circuital. Circuital seemed to be looking for a middle ground musically between the shoot-for-the-moon audacity of Evil Urges and the band’s earlier, more […]
Read More My Morning Jacket : The Waterfall II