Heavy-hearted in the Midwest since 2011
Reviews of albums, shows, songs and the like.
Ritual, according to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary, is defined as “the established form for a ceremony“; “a ceremonial act or action“. When you step into the world of Ritual, the brand new long player by Skeleton Beach, you are indeed stepping into ceremony. This album harkens back to the days of double gatefold sleeves and hanging out […]
Read More Skeleton Beach : RitualPinkish Black are a band that rose out of the ashes of another band, The Great Tyrant. Daron Beck(Keyboards, Synthesizers, Voice), Jon Teague(Drums), and Tommy Atkins(Bass) were a three piece out of Denton, TX that made music which could be called experimental. I’d call it a nightmare creation that sounded like a late-60s psych band […]
Read More Pinkish Black : Concept UnificationBill Callahan is one of America’s best modern songwriters. Like contemporaries Will Oldham, Damien Jurado, Phil Elverum, and the late Vic Chesnutt, Callahan paints pictures of modern life that feel long ago in his songs. Touching on emotions and real life so plainly and without much need for interpretation, his dark voice and acoustic-driven songs […]
Read More Bill Callahan : Shepherd in a Sheepskin VestFragile X’s The Butterfly Effect is a stunning, visceral electronic album that hits you in all the right ways. Hard electro, IDM, and all the sci fi buzzing headiness you can handle in the course of six exquisitely produced tracks. Glasgow-based record label Bricolage’s latest release is a stunning overwhelming of the senses. According to […]
Read More Fragile X : The Butterfly EffectThe Fort Wayne psychedelic collective known as Heaven’s Gateway Drugs have been honing their mix of sixties psych pop, 70s glam, and cult-y freakdom for a few years now. Despite personnel changes and the ups and downs of keeping a band up and running over their tenure, the core of Derek Mauger and Ben […]
Read More Heaven’s Gateway Drugs’ “existential crisis road trip concept album” : Slab CityOccasionally an album will get by me. I try to keep my ears to the ground and be aware of the good stuff coming my way, but there are times when there’s so much good stuff happening at the same time I or one of my many clones will miss something great. Case in point: […]
Read More Cemetery Gates : Welcome to HellIt took me a long time to find an “in” with Tim Heidecker. In-particular, the comedy he created with Eric Warheim. Watching Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job on Adult Swim was both absolute hilarity and mild-to-extreme unease. Their comedy was this weird mix of 80s cable access video effects and mild hallucinatory fever […]
Read More Tim Heidecker : What The Brokenhearted Do…I remember when I got my drivers license. I was a late bloomer and didn’t get mine till I was 17. After some shenanigans prior to being 16 and my uncle’s 1949 Chevy, I was banned from getting my license for a bit. But when I did finally get it, it was such a feeling […]
Read More Black Mountain : DestroyerSteven Ellison, aka Flying Lotus, has been on an upward swing from the moment he arrived in 2006 with his debut 1983. Falling comfortably into the shoes of producers like Madlib and J Dilla, with also element of psych, hip hop, trip hop, and jazz, each Flying Lotus record ups the one that came before. […]
Read More Flying Lotus : FlamagraSometimes things happen in life that make you re-think how you approach the world. One moment pushes you to realize there’s not much time on this earth for us after all, and if you truly want to make a mark you have to step out of your comfort zone and go for it. Something like […]
Read More Phantoms vs Fire : My Mind As Your Amusement Park