Category: Band/Artist Profile

An in-depth look at bands and solo artists

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Band/Artist Profile

A Requiem for mewithoutYou

mewithoutYou
mewithoutYou at Codfish Hollow, in Maquoketa, Iowa on 5/24/19. Photo by Roberta, CC BY 2.0, WikiMedia Commons.

On June 18, mewithoutYou announced they were beginning their farewell tour. This tour was planned to take place through 2020, marking their final year as a band. However, the world had different plans. But now with COVID restrictions easing and cases coming down in general, the band made the decision to announce their tour with a teaser on their Instagram, announcing two Philadelphia shows – “The Beginning of the End” and “Brother, Sister 15th Anniversary Show.” Contrary to what many fans believe, these aren’t the band’s last shows. In fact, it marks the beginning of their final tour. While heartbreaking for many fans (especially newer ones, like myself), the members of the band made this decision to focus on their families and personal lives.

mewithoutYou formed in 2001, the original members being Aaron Weiss (vocals), Mike Weiss (lead guitar, background vocals, keys), Christopher Kleinberg (rhythm guitar), Daniel Pishock (bass) and Rickie Mazzotta (drums). While their style has changed greatly over their career, thematically and lyrically they’ve stayed consistent. Much of their lyrics take inspiration from Judeo-Christianity, Buddhism and Islamic philosophy, all delivered in a deeply personal spoken-word poetry style. Let’s take a deep dive into the musical world of mewithoutYou…  

"I Never Said I Was Brave" album cover by mewithoutYou

“I Never Said That I Was Brave” (2001)

This five-song EP is more of a sneak peek of what the group was capable of. Borderline “screamo” vocals, thick guitars, panic chords galore and percussion that puts many mainstream drummers to shame, this 15 minute EP leaves you almost no time to relax. Many of the tracks on here made it onto their first album a year later. This is our first look into Aaron’s deeply personal and introspective world of songwriting.

Favorite Track: “Flamethrower”

"A->B Life" album cover by mewithoutYou

“A->B Life” (2002)

“Let us die, let us die!/Then dying, we reply/Oh, don’t you tell us about your suffering…’’ are the first words we’re greeted with. This album is reminiscent of their first EP, but is a lot more polished but still as, if not more, angry. This album has a common theme of heartbreak, loneliness, and questioning one’s faith. This album doesn’t end on a pleasant note as most do. The closest form of closure we get is in the final track “The Cure For Pain,” in which Aaron belts “The cure for pain is in the pain, so it’s there that you’ll find me.” This album is a desperate diary entry of a hurt soul, looking for some sort of relief. 

Favorite Track: “Gentleman”

"Catch For Us The Foxes" album cover by mewithoutYou

“Catch For Us The Foxes” (2004)

Like their previous album, “Catch For Us The Foxes” is deeply emotional and personal, dealing with even heavier topics than before: reaching your rock bottom and having “no lower place to fall,” feelings of worthlessness and suicide. While “A->B Life” was more nihilistic and angry, this album has many semblances of hope, Aaron belting many lines praising his small triumphs in his improving mental health. This album has a more mature feel and explores many different sounds. Here, we see our first (Pt.2) song. These songs hark back to tracks on previous albums, sharing similar melodies and themes, but are typically more upbeat and hopeful. This track is “Four Word Letter (Pt.2).” While the original spoke lines of heartbreak, “(Pt. 2)” speaks of being healed, yet still skeptical of moving forward. This album ends with a poem of rebirth from a lonely self, lyrically burying this angry Aaron – “Six of my closest friends will dig up the ground, all my accomplishments gently lowered down…”

Favorite Track: “My Exit, Unfair”

"Brother, Sister" album cover by mewithoutYou

“Brother, Sister” (2006)

Arguably their best and most successful album, “Brother, Sister” is an album-long testimony of his journey of healing and self-love. As you would expect, this album isn’t sad or angry, however, it’s not 45 minutes of, “Hey everyone! Look at me, I’m happy now!” There are still a few songs that still deal with healing and questioning one’s self. You hear this as early as the third track with “Wolf Am I! (And Shadow).” We also see another (Pt. 2) song, “Nice and Blue (Pt. 2),” a song about not being completely healed, but improving nonetheless. Each stanza of “(Pt. 2)” contrasts the lines of the original, quite the departure from the angry, self-loathing lament the original track was. This album is all about contrast, songs like “The Sun and the Moon,” lyrical themes between tracks, the album art, heck, even the album name. Probably my favorite thing about this album is the interludes that are known by the fanbase as the “Spider Songs“ – “Yellow Spider,” “Orange Spider” and “Brownish Spider.” These songs (I believe) serve as a stark contrast to some of the heavier songs that come before or after them. The finale of the album, “In a Sweater Poorly Knit” shows that while Aaron is in a good place now, he knows that lows in life are inevitable and will eventually cycle back, but with that cycle, leads to more personal growth. If you listen closely to the end, you can hear rain – right where the first track begins.

Favorite Track: “O, Porcupine”

"It’s All Crazy! It’s All False! It’s All A Dream! It’s Alright" album cover by mewithoutYou

“It’s All Crazy! It’s All False! It’s All A Dream! It’s Alright” (2009)

The title being a near direct quote from the Islamic philosopher Bawa Muhaiyaddeen, this album explores many spiritual themes, not just Islam, but Christianity and Judaism, too. The sound of this album is nothing like they’ve done before – almost all the songs are folky and acoustic. Another common theme throughout the album is plants and animals, one of the tracks, “The Fox, the Crow, and the Cookie,” being a retelling of one of Aesop’s fables. Again, we see another (Pt. 2) song, “Bullet to Binary (Pt.2).” Like before, this sequel contrasts the original with a more positive and hopeful message, this time, a message about unity.

Favorite Track: “The King Beetle on a Coconut Estate”

"Ten Stories" album cover by mewithoutYou

“Ten Stories” (2012)

In my opinion, this album is their most overlooked and underrated. “Ten Stories” is a concept album about a train carrying circus animals, the elephant running herself into the side of the car she’s in, derailing the train and freeing all the circus animals. The elephant inevitably sacrifices her life for the good of others and is hanged in “Elephant on the Dock.” All of which is a metaphor for the crucifixion of Christ. Each track focuses on each of the animals’ experiences, but mainly follows the adventures of the fox and bear. Haley Williams of Paramore is featured on “Fox’s Dream of the Log Flume,” she has said in an interview that mewithoutYou is her favorite band (she has great taste!).

Favorite Track: “Fox’s Dream of the Log Flume”

"Pale Horses" album cover by mewithoutYou

“Pale Horses” (2015)

Between the release of “Ten Stories” and this album, Aaron and Mike experienced the loss of their father. Aaron’s lyrics became nihilistic and have seemed to have lost touch with his spirituality, which is mirrored in many of the tracks. Another common theme revolving around the apocalypse, referencing The Four Horsemen, The Seven Seals, divine judgment and death. Early mewithoutYou probably would have written a loud and angry album, but this more mature band wrote songs that are haunting and cold, but almost comforting. Here again, we see a very hurt Aaron, but he’s older now, and more mature. He drops the only curse in their entire discography in “Rainbow Signs.” In almost a whisper he sings, “Pale horse vows in a grave reply/Smile for the camera at the church nearby/Threw a mute curse at the Boise sky/For my f——d up Napoleon-of-St.-Helena-hairline…” The album ends with Aaron dreaming about seeing his father again, sharing an inside joke that only they understood.

Favorite Track: “Red Cow”

"[Untitled]" album cover by mewithoutYou

“[Untitled]” (2018)

”Like It’s All Crazy!..,” this album has many allusions to animals, many of the lyrics written as conversations between them. The first half is unapologetically aggressive, pushing you directly into the chaos with no warning. Lyrically and thematically, it seems that Aaron has come to terms with his father’s death and has gone back to his spiritual roots. “Another Head For Hydra” explores the worthlessness of material possessions. “[dormhouse sighs]” is a more positive look at the apocalypse – stemming from a revelation he had on a West Virginia highway. The second half, while still heavy, is more refined and not as chaotic. “2,459 Miles” is a song about being far from his home, wife and kids. “Micheal, Row Your Boat Ashore” is about the doubts and fears of being a new father. Personally, I think this album is Aaron’s best writing in a poetic sense. Each song is packed with metaphors, biblical references and clever wordplay. 

Favorite Track: “Julia (or, ‘Holy to the LORD’ on the Bells of Horses)”

Summary

I don’t think there will ever be another band that could hold a candle to the sheer complexity and beauty of mewithoutYou. Their lyrics are introspective, the instrumentals are layered and are like no other band I’ve ever heard. Their discography has a little something for everyone. Each album is a unique, near spiritual experience. If someone as iconic as Haley Williams holds them in high regard, maybe you should give them a chance. As current members Aaron, Mike, Rickie, Greg and Brandon ready themselves for one more tour, I wish them nothing but the best in their personal lives. Their music really has changed the lives of so many, including myself.

2001-2022

– T-Time

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Band/Artist Profile

Ic3peak’s Not So Subtle Rebellion

From the video for "Грустная Сука"

Russian musicians live with one eye over their shoulder. Music has provided one of the few remaining outlets for anti-government dissidence, but protest is a dangerous career, as three members of Pussy Riot found out in January. However, while many dissident bands prefer to keep a low profile, or remain entirely anonymous, the same cannot be said of Ic3peak.

Ic3peak are an experimental electronica duo consisting of Anastasia Kreslina and Nikolay Kostylev. They did not ostensibly begin with the intention of involving themselves in Russian politics. Until 2017, they sang entirely in English and toured Europe and Latin America, keeping a fairly low profile in their homeland. Their early music reflects the overall gothic and depressive state of Russian popular music and youth culture, an aesthetic sense Kreslina ascribes to economic decay, an unresponsive government and little hope for change. This attitude should be well known to anyone familiar with the myriad Russian Doomer post-punk playlists that overtook YouTube a few years back, but the rest of Ic3peak’s image might be a little more surprising.

Unlike their post-punk contemporaries, Ic3peak’s sound is brash and aggressive, formed on industrial hip-hop beats adapted from Witch House. This association with Russian hip-hop is, according to the speculation of NPR, likely what first landed them in trouble with the government, as hip-hop is seen as especially subversive and degenerate in the eyes of the President. However, it would not be Ic3peak’s music that would catapult them to fame, but their response to government pressure, particularly in the form of their absolutely insane music videos.

Music videos are a little bit of a lost art form, but Ic3peak wields them more effectively than perhaps any other indie band working today. The muted but cohesive color palates, violently macabre imagery and darkly comic political satire combine into videos that feel deeply pointed despite never making a precise political stand. Their visual art complements the dark, yet not explicitly abrasive music, using images that are too over the top and ironic to be scary, while retaining a sense of grounded seriousness.

This is the kind of video that can get you killed, but Ic3peak’s overwhelming popularity has likely helped insulate them. As Kreslina said in the video for “Death No More,” “I fill my eyes with kerosene, let it burn, the whole of Russia is watching me, let it burn” [translation from their closed captioning]. As their profile and music video budget rises, the whole of the world has started to watch as well.

The authorities have been unable to definitively silence Ic3peak, but that hasn’t stopped them from making their lives as difficult as possible. They have been caught in a wave of cancellations by local security forces, with live shows either outright banned or prevented by temporary detention. Government backlash has grown to such an extent that from the talk page of their Wikipedia article, the government appears to be paying third parties to edit in more flattering appraisals of the government reaction. This, in addition to being extremely petty, shows just how serious the threat this duo of 20-somethings poses is.

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Band/Artist Profile Playlists Short Stories

Death Grips: A Phenomenon of Embarrassment

Death Grips "Bottomless Pit" Album Cover

The label “experimental hip-hop” seems to now extend to more artists in the industry than it used to, but there’s no denying Death Grips helped found the genre and still remain at its center. Though Zach Hill is often noted as the leading creative of the group, Stefan Burnett, better known as MC Ride, is the vocal star. His punk, industrial-inspired delivery feeds on noise and electronic styles and production to create an unmatched sound. With Andy Morin also on keyboard and production, the music trio has put out six studio albums, a mixtape and six other miscellaneous projects.

Death Grips formed in 2010 and I’ve been listening since 2015. Considerably late to the show, I still found myself among very few fans in my area during high school. That being said, I spent my teen years in Wake Forest, NC. Unbeknownst to me at the time, Death Grips’ internet and streaming popularity were stronger than ever and continuously growing. I was a proud, but delusional, DG fan. 

When you find a new project as inventive as Death Grips, it feels like stumbling upon gold. I thought I was nearly alone in this discovery and it took time for me to realize they were incredibly popular. As years passed and their popularity still grew, I found myself listening to Death Grips as often as I used to, but now in private. There was a certain embarrassment of Death Grips for me, and since talking to friends, I’ve learned for others, too. The embarrassment, perhaps stemming from a sudden jump of feeling special to being just a cog in the DG machine, was polarizing. Older listeners retreated to their rooms to partake while newer listeners were outwardly experiencing their newfound feeling of uniqueness.

Death Grips, despite their ever-altering audience, continue to put out music and I’ve noticed, both in myself and the people around me, the former DG embarrassment lifting. As people come to terms with liking music simply because it’s good and putting less concern into whether or not it boosts their individuality complex, I find that Death Grips is getting more public love from their long-time listeners. 

As an ode to my lifted DG embarrassment, here’s a short list of some of my favorite Death Grips songs (in order of release):

1. “Full Moon (Death Classic)” – Full Moon (Death Classic) (2011)

2. “Guillotine” – Guillotine (2011)

3. “Lil Boy” – No Love Deep Web (2012)

4. “Deep Web” – No Love Deep Web (2012)

5. “Hacker” – The Money Store (2012)

6. “Birds” – Government Plates (2013)

7. “Feels Like a Wheel” – Government Plates (2013)

8. “I Break Mirrors With My Face In The United States” – The Powers That B (2015)

9. “Inanimate Sensation” – The Powers That B (2015)

10. “80808” – Bottomless Pit (2016)

11. “Bottomless Pit” – Bottomless Pit (2016)

12. “Hahaha” – Year Of The Snitch (2018)

Here’s to the fact that Robert Pattinson plays guitar on “Birds”,

Silya Bennai

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Band/Artist Profile Classic Album Review

Is Sheryl Crow Actually Cool?

Most people our age remember Sheryl Crow from when we were kids. She was pretty popular in the early 2000s, I was born in 2001, so that means her last hits were around five years old when I first started hearing the radio. This is the perfect interval for music to feel nostalgic, new enough that we remember it, but old enough that we had absolutely no critical eye to determine who a song was by or whether it was good. When I was old enough to think about music critically, I personally filed Sheryl Crow away in a category I now describe as “Mom Rock.” Yes, we have dad rock, and if no one else has come up with this joke yet, I know claim inventorship of mom rock. This category entails bluesy, spiritual rock music by middle aged white women that was all the rage from around 1996 to 2004, and artists like Crow, Kelly Clarkson, Nelly Furtado’s folky output, Liz Phair’s self-titled album, songs like “Bubly,” “Unwritten” and that one song about feeling the rain I can never remember because it came out when I was like two.

Now, I have personally been reevaluating a lot of mom rock. Partially because a lot of this music was dismissed specifically for appealing to middle-aged women, and I want to give it a fair chance, and partially because it’s a warm wave of nostalgia for me (and most other people our age). So, imagine my surprise when I find that Sheryl Crow was uh… actually really good? Okay, obviously Sheryl Crow was a good artist, she has plenty of classic hits, but Crow’s ’90s discography is good an entirely different dimension than I expected.

As it turns out, all of the songs I remember were from her 2002 album “C’mon C’mon,” which was something of a change in direction. That was a pop-rock album, I might call it a sell-out if it weren’t filled with front-to-back bangers. We aren’t here to discuss that today because you probably already know “Soak up the Sun,” “Picture” and maybe “Steve McQueen.” We’re here to talk about her first two albums, which were, to my eternal shock, alt-rock.

To be clear, Sheryl Crow was not making grunge. She fit in more with the rootsy acoustic side of alt-rock, with her auditory aesthetic being more akin to a pumped-up Hootie and the Blowfish or a less dense REM. Crow’s take on the genre is still recognizably her own though, mixing in her country fusion, eccentric songwriting, and an eye towards pop hits with the typical REM formula. Her first two albums had a combined 4 hits, none of which I have ever heard. Maybe I’m alone in never hearing Crow’s ’90s output, but I suspect that a number of you haven’t either, so check out her self-titled album. The music isn’t just good, as a lot of her music is, but was, as the title suggests, actually kind of edgy and out of the ordinary. She went way too hard for even the alt-iest of alt-country, but too grounded and feminine for alt-rock, so I do not know how much credibility she had at the time, but to me, it sounds pretty awesome.

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Band/Artist Profile

Jack Antonoff: Pop Music Connoisseur

Jack Antonoff performing
Image courtesy of Tyler Garcia (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

Jack Antonoff is a musician, writer and producer, who has been a part of many corners of the pop music industry. From being the guitarist and percussionist in Fun., to producing the soundtrack for the film “Love Simon”, to heading two of his own bands (Steel Train and Bleachers), to writing and producing for artists like Taylor Swift, Lorde, St. Vincent, The Chicks, Lana Del Rey: Jack Antonoff has done it all. He has done a great job of not only making a name for himself but also creating a sound for himself. So what makes his producing and writing so great? Grandiosity, honesty and a whole lot of synths.

As summed up in a review of Bleachers’ second album “Gone Now” by Pitchfork, Jack Antonoff doesn’t create the sleek and palatable pop music that is typical of the Top-40 Charts. His sound, especially in his solo projects, is chock-full of horns, bright piano, synths and samples. The grandiosity of his second album, “Gone Now,” was compared to Elton John in a Rolling Stone review. This same larger-than-life sound coupled with a good hook makes many of the songs he writes/produces addicting. Some examples of this being “Cruel Summer” and “Out of the Woods” by Taylor Swift, “Green Light” by Lorde and “Strawberries and Cigarettes.” Not everything he produces is as extravagant as those though, he also knows how to produce a down-to-earth ballad as can be seen in “Crowded Places” by Banks and much of “folklore,” Taylor Swift’s eighth album. 

There’s a certain honesty that comes with a song written by Antonoff. The best example of this radical honesty is, “I Wanna Get Better,” the hit single off of Bleachers’ first album, “Strange Desire.” Antonoff has been very open about losing his younger sister, Sarah, to cancer when he was 18. “I Wanna Get Better” is an autobiographical excerpt from that low period in his life. Many of the songs he writes and co-writes have themes of self-improvement and/or insecurity, “The Archer” by Taylor Swift and “Liability” by Lorde are great examples of this. Much of his work with Bleachers touches on themes of growing up in New Jersey, young love, childhood and heroes. It all feels very authentic, and, like the New York Times put it, sets him apart from the methodical and scientific approach to pop music others in the industry favor.

The mixture of extravagant instrumentals, authenticity in his songwriting and his love for synths is Antonoff’s signature, and his approach has been rewarded with critical acclaim. He’s won four Grammys for his work and is still actively creating. He recently released two singles at the end of last year, “45” and “chinatown (feat. Bruce Springsteen)” ahead of an album release that should be coming sometime in 2021. Until then, you can check out a playlist by Spotify user Nathaniel Cruel that has every song Antonoff has ever produced.

Until next time,

Caitlin

Image courtesy of Tyler Garcia (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

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Band/Artist Profile

Against Me! Artist Profile

I’ve got something a little different for you today, an old fashioned punk band with a storied career: from underground darlings to this week’s savior of rock and roll to pioneers of the gender dysphoria blues, there aren’t a whole lot of bands with a career quite like Against Me! (Yes, the “!” is mandatory, so get used to it).

Against Me! has an early career that makes most punk bands seem like posers. A set of high school dropouts with felony convictions since the age of 14, brutalization by the police, anarchist leanings, and strictly independent promotion, you could hardly ask for a more nailed to rights punk story. However, their initial sound wasn’t quite as hardcore as you’d assume given these stories, they were really more like The Clash than Black Flag, and their debut album “Reinventing Axl Rose” is filled with drinking songs, dad rock, and political anthems that betray a surprising amicability with the mainstream. As a result, their albums sold shockingly well for a punk band in the mid-2000s with absolutely no label support, industry connections or nepotistic advantages. The biggest rock bands of this era were children of the industry (The Strokes, The Calling), holdovers from the 90s (Modest Mouse, Foo Fighters), or just straight up industry plants (Simple Plan, Limp Biskit). So expectations were high.

Then, Against Me! did the thing that no self-respecting punk band should ever do, they signed to a major label. Surprisingly, it went pretty well. Their style was already mainstream-friendly, so besides a clean production job and marginally less swearing, the album was authentically them, and it had the benefit of major label support. Granted, it was 2007, and rock and roll was truly dead, so their new album didn’t chart that well, but they had a few rock radio hits, and all the old school magazines like The Rolling Stone gave them absolutely rave reviews. Things were looking up, there was only one problem.

In the early 2010s, Against Me! was tired of major label bureaucracy, tired of touring, and their lead singer was tired of playing “the angry white man in a punk band.” Now, this is hardly unusual, as punk kids grow up and put their lives in a wider context, the freedom of a punk lifestyle starts to feel like its own restriction. The difference for Against Me! lead singer Laura Grace was that she was transgender, and tired of playing any kind of man in any band. The reasonable thing to do here would be brake up the band and move on to a new career in business or computer science or something like that, but you don’t get mainstream play as a punk band without having an excess of balls and a deficit of brains, so Grace tried something that to my knowledge no successful band has ever done in punk rock before: She transitioned while staying in the scene.

The machismo of traditionalist punk can at times make it an unfriendly place for any woman, much less a trans woman who until now had made music explicitly employing hyper-masculine imagery and attracting the kind of audience that connects with these symbols. In 2014, Against Me! released “Transgender Dysphoria Blues,” where Grace, like many trans singers, continued singing in her original vocal range while unashamedly singing about her experiences and inner struggle. The album retains every bit of the fighting spirit of their early releases, with a new sense of vigor and direction. Their most recent album from 2017 is even better. I can recommend every album they’ve released without reservation. Whether listening to a 20-year-old punk kid reinvent Axl Rose, or a woman in her 40s fighting an entirely different kind of battle, it’s punk at its best: raw, real and ready to burn it all down to make way for something new.

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Band/Artist Profile

Artist Highlight: Shinki Chen

Something I love about the counterculture movement is how far its influence could be felt around the world. Though it’s easy to have a very Eurocentric view when looking back at 1960s and ’70s rock, artists were experimenting with the blues, psychedelia and hard rock in every corner of the globe. Some of the most notable movements include Zamrock from Zambia (which you can read more about in DJ Chippypants’ recent blog) and Tropicália in Brazil. Japan also had an incredible psychedelic rock scene, featuring bands like The Mops and Flower Travelin’ Band. But one of the most iconic cult bands to emerge from the Japanese acid rock stages were Speed, Glue & Shinki.

Led by Shinki Chen on guitar, the trio only released two albums before they went their separate ways in 1972. Before their breakup, Shinki put out a fantastic self-titled solo album. Only being 21 at the time, his guitar skills gained him comparisons to Jimi Hendrix, and with good reason. “Shinki Chen” (also known as “Shinki Chen & His Friends”) is a revolutionary album. Though only seven songs long, each one is rich with fuzzy riffs and heavy basslines. Shinki’s powerful, raspy vocals flow across the entire record like smooth butter. After starting off with glittering, ambient strangeness in “The Dark Sea Dream,” Shinki quickly shifts between Sabbath-like force and sludgy blues throughout the album. It’s a great balance between the dreamy feeling of psychedelia and the intensity of old-school metal.

Oh, how I wish it were longer! The only downside to Shinki Chen’s solo work is that it was so short-lived, but I guess that’s part of what makes him such a special artist. Give him a listen!

– DJ Butter

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Band/Artist Profile

Lucinda Williams: Country’s Goth Aunt

Credit: WFUV Public Radio License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/

I’m not trying to make any presumptions about the type of person who reads this blog, but I’m going to hazard a guess that most of you haven’t heard of Lucinda Williams. Modern Country is about as far away from the “Independent/Alternative” ethos of WKNC as you can get. The genre is, in the opinion of most outsiders, directed by radio executives, skews towards a very young audience, dumb, and not especially risky. However, it hasn’t always been this way. In fact, for most of the history of Country music, it had the reputation as the most adult of genres. And not “adult” in the sense of safe or inoffensive, but adult in the sense of emotionally complex and preoccupied with serious problems and difficult subjects. This is the domain of Lucinda Williams.

Williams was atypical even in her time. She began her career in earnest at the age of 39, which is far from unheard of in country music, but for a woman in any kind of entertainment debuting at that age is still remarkable. Prior to then, she had released a few obscure traditionalist records in the early 80s, and when I say traditionalist, I mean like country circa 1930 when the genre hadn’t yet been segregated from the blues. Her self-titled 1988 album was released on Rough Trade. If you aren’t familiar with that label, it was founded by U.K. punks in the late 70s and was most known for releasing abrasive post-punk and obscure indie bands prior to signing their flagship band, The Smiths.

By the late 80s, Country had mostly made its peace with them long-haired hippies and their rock and roll, but this ceasefire did not extend to punk. This prejudice didn’t hurt Williams too much, as her music is only punk in spirit, but it should give you an idea of where she’s coming from. She has very little reverence for good old family values, which was a barrier long since broken down by the likes of Dolly Parton and Reba McEntire, but Lucinda took this a step further by just being relentlessly sad. Country music has a long history of deeply unhappy music, but usually, it takes the form of a bad relationship or a family tragedy, Williams denies any such histrionics in her music. She just sounds depressed, to be honest. Even when she sings about love and relationships, there’s a kind of wistful yearning that doesn’t let up. She asks at one point on her debut “Am I too blue for you?” The answer was yes, evidently, as it would take a number of years before success finally chased her down. She never really had a top 40 country hit, though many people would find success covering her songs, her stature has grown in recent years, especially in the Americana and Alt-Country movements she helped pioneer.

If you’re interested in Lucinda Williams’ music, I would recommend either her 1998 masterpiece “Car Wheels on a Gravel Road,” or, if you aren’t up for a whole album, her song “The Night’s Too Long.” The song is a strange piece of songwriting. It’s in the third person, telling the story of a thinly veiled author insert named Cynthia who can’t take no more small-town living and sells all she has to move to the city. The song is honest in a lowkey way. There’s a happy ending, but there’s no closure, no grand sweeping statement on what Cindy’s story means as if a person’s life could mean anything at all. There’s just that lingering sense of wanting something more and deciding to settle for being happy anyways.

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Band/Artist Profile

Phantogram Band Profile

Created by Miranda

Phantogram was formed in 2007 by long-time friends Sarah Barthel and Josh Carter. The two met in preschool and remained friends, eventually deciding to pursue record making. Originally the band was called Charlie Everywhere, but in 2009 Carter decided on “Phantogram” as the new band name. A phantogram is an optical illusion in which a two dimensional image appears three dimensions. Though this was not Carter’s intent, it perfectly reflects that the band contains only two members but sound much more powerful together than just two people.

Phantogram released their first album, “Eyelid Movies,” in Europe and Canada in 2009 and in the United States in 2010. The album was met with great reviews, and the band continued to release singles and collaborate with artists like Big Boi and the Flaming Lips. Phantogram’s most well-known track, “When I’m Small,” was featured in numerous television shows and advertisements, another single “K.Y.S.A” was featured in Grand Theft Auto V and “Lights” appeared in The Hunger Games: Catching Fire. Their most recent album is “Ceremony” (2020) and while it did not chart as highly as previous albums, it is an amazing album that everyone should listen to. Phantogram creates enigmatic electronic pop with gorgeous vocal styles.

I recommend Phantogram to anyone who likes indie, pop, or electronic. Some of my favorites include “Saturday“, “Fall In Love,” and “Glowing.”

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Band/Artist Profile

Band of the Week: Gatecreeper

What’s going on Butcher Crew?! It’s your Master Butcher, The Saw, and I am back with another band of the week! If you like O.G. Death Metal, but also enjoy components of hardcore, then Gatecreeper is the band for you! 

This band combines death metal riffs and also hardcore riffs in order to formulate their sound. It gives their music a violent groove that you can both mosh and dance to! I first heard about Gatecreeper when they randomly started playing on my Spotify. I really like the feature that Spotify has in which it plays bands that they think you will like after listening to an album. I immediately added Gatecreeper to my library. They have that sound of death metal that I cannot get enough of. It’s so eerie but yet, so groovy! 

Gatecreeper is an American death metal band from Phoenix, Tempe, and Tuscan, Arizona that formed in 2013. They took the scene by surprise and seized the underground after their 2014 release of their self-titled EP. The band has combined the death metal style of Entombed but also added hardcore components. All the members of the band are fans of both death metal and hardcore, and listen to both genres frequently. Two members of the band are also in a hardcore band, Territory; of course, Gatecreeper will have some hardcore components. Their vocalist, Chase Mason, says that hardcore influence has always been there, and they do not use it any more or any less on their other albums. 

The lyrical content speaks about Mason’s heroin addiction, his former life before he joined Gatecreeper. Mason has been 8 years sober and will be at 9 years this coming August. I think it is great that Mason is open with his past and will talk about it within Gatecreeper songs because I’m sure people can resonate with the message. This is just another example of music being used as an outlet for not only the listener, but also the creator. 

Current Members: 

  • Chase “Hellahammer” Mason (vocals) 
  • Eric “The Dark Cowboy” Wagner (guitar)
  • Matt “Thunder Rage” Arrebollo (drums) 
  • Sean “Hell Mammoth” Mears (bass) 
  • Israel Garza (guitar) 

Discography: 

  • Gatecreeper (EP) (2014)
  • Sonoran Depravation (2016)
  • Deserted (2019)
  • An Unexpected Reality (2021) 

Stay Metal, 

THE SAW