Interview: The Battlebeats

Photo by Fahmi Ramdhani

There is a rumble on the horizon. The scent of blood in the air. A piercing shriek of distortions splits the clouds, and the hammer of the gods comes crashing down- splitting the Earth. Out of this molten wound rises a man with a vision, a plan, a prerogative, and the pig-headed will to see it through. Hero to some and the bain of poseurs everywhere, Andresa Nugraha is chief warlord of the Indonesian garage rock group The Battlebeats- a brashly, unhinged rabble of sonic vandals that mostly consists of... well, Andresa and anyone who he can haul out of the local landfill or the police drunk tank with the wherewithal to hold down a tune (notably, this edgy entourage DOES NOT include a bass player... don't ask). Earlier this year, The Battlebeats redoubled their assault on the world of propriety and good taste with their second LP, Meet Your Maker, a twelve-track takedown of losers, lunkheads, and lubbers too shiftless to hail the dauntless reign of rock and/or roll! It's a tribute to a flagging legacy of international garage rock, as well as an updated reimagining and recasting of familiar idioms armored in black leather, baptized in the jungle heat, and focused through the amber shade of a modish pair of sunglasses, cracked from the relentless combination of reverberations cast off a wall of speakers and the relentless headbanging that such ruckus wavelengths inspire. Live by the axe, die by the axe- die by the axe, live forever. Get ready to meet your (music) maker!

The following interview was conducted over email. I have literally only changed one word of Andresa's responses, and it was merely to make it more grammatical. The purity of his purpose really shines through in his answers and I wouldn't want to do anything to mute the clarity with which he speaks. Enjoy! 

Who does the current Battlebeats lineup consist of?

The current lineup that backs me up for live performance are me, Andresa (guitar, vox), Obi (drums) and Dwey (guitar). I met Obi in some show where we played with our old band years before I formed this project. I really like the way he played the drums, so I asked him to be my drummer in 2021 and he’s been stuck with me ever since. He also has his own solo project, Defectum. Dwey joined the band as a guitar player in mid-2023. He’s in so many bands but currently active in a thrash metal band, Brigade of Crow and post-punk band, Succubus. I think this is the most solid lineup since Battlebeats existed. The band’s been through so many changes. The band has two drummers, and four guitar players so far.

I noticed that your sunglasses on the cover of Meet Your Maker are curved, sort of like the ones Dolflamingo wears. Was this intentional, or is it just a coincidence?

I can’t remember where I got the references for that one. But every time I draw the sunglasses are never the same from one and another. There’s a pointy one that was inspired by Kamina (Gurren Lagann) and the other one just straight from the glasses that I usually wear.

What kind of label support do you have for Meet Your Maker, and how did you work out the details for distribution?

Meet Your Maker was released on a 12” by garage punk label Sweet Time Records from Nashville, Tennessee. Ryan Sweeney, the label honcho, I knew him for the first time from the video of Jay Reatard’s last show on Youtube. Soon I learned he was Cheap Time’s drummer, too. Long story short, we got to know each other from the internet then he offered me to put something out on his label, I didn't even think twice, I accepted his offer because I really like all the music he puts out. At first, I was thinking of putting out like a 7” or something instead of a full-length. All the detail for distribution I let him do the job, he knows best what he does since I also know ST have many distributors across the continent.

You work a lot with independent international labels. What are some of the upsides and downsides or working with labels like these?

One of the upsides are you get your music out there physically and get new listeners across the country who know their stuff. These guys have been super easy to work together with. They don’t even know me in person and they’re on it 100% for the music. The only downsides are there is no money in it, they only gave me a fair share of physical stuff, but I don’t complain since most of these labels I work with are one-man operation businesses.

What is the significance of the title track off of Meet Your Maker, and why is your most recent album named after it?

I came up with a bunch of titles for the LP but ended up using Meet Your Maker. The reason is simple because I really like the song the most. It’s about telling someone I hate to fuck off and die. It sounds so medieval, and stupid. I’m just joking around. I’ve never heard any native English speaker say these words in these modern times. Can you imagine telling people to fuck off by saying “Go meet your maker, assholes!” with two middle fingers in their face. It’ll be freakin’ hilarious.

When did you start work on Meet Your Maker? Or, rather, how long has the album been in the works?

It took like a year or so. Probably it’s in the works after I recorded the series of 7” singles in 2022. I don’t remember it well because I never try to stop writing songs even after I put out something.

Your previous recordings have famously been done on the fly. Did you have a different approach to Meet Your Maker, or were you writing and recording when you had the money and/or time as you have with previous releases?

I still don’t have the money until today tho. Hahaha. The only different approach is I’ve used many different cheap gears to record things because I don’t want it to sound the same as my previous releases.

I noticed that you're going in a much more straightforward garage rock direction with Meet Your Maker and have dropped some of the blues and balladry of your past releases. Why did you decide to streamline things a bit more for this release?

Everything was probably depending on what I listened to during the making of something. I listened to a lot of Tokyo Electron and Jet Boys when I did songs on Meet Your Maker. Even each song in this record has its own references. You know, I used to listen to a lot of 60s garage music and Chuck Berry during the making of my first LP, Search And Destroy. Maybe that’s why there’s a lot of blues and balladry references on that one. I just stole their old riffs and played them faster the way 70s punk used to do.

What is the pace of your songwriting at the moment? About how many songs do you write a day/week/month/etc..?

Whenever I got the vibes, I could write more than five songs in a day, sometimes I don’t write at all for months. You what? I haven’t written any new songs for Battlebeats this year. But I’ve written like 12 new songs right after I recorded Meet Your Maker tho. I’ve been having a hard time writing songs lately. The demos are all on my computer, some have finished, and some don’t have lyrics on it. I haven’t touched it again, no energy to finish ‘em.

How many songs do you end up throwing out or not using, and what makes the difference between a keeper and one that ends up in the trash?

I guess I have a bunch of songs that ended up in the trash. Sometimes I abandon that one song that is almost 50% complete, wishing I can get inspired to finish it tomorrow and then after a 10 minutes break, I write another song and finish ‘em in 5 minutes. Everything depends on my mood at the time I wrote it. I even came up with a cool riff or a singing part which I thought it would make a great song, But I think I’ve heard the riff somewhere and then I opened the voice note recording on my phone and it was the riff I’ve written and thrown away back years ago, because I thought it sounds like shit Back then. Haha.

Photo by Ardita Putri

What is the garage rock scene like by you? Are a lot of people into Oblivians and The Gories, or what are they listening to and being inspired by?

In Indonesia specifically, there is no such thing like “garage rock” scene as far as I know, it never gets popular during its peak. Even when Battlebeats came out, everyone seemed confused because we sound different. I always feel like the music is too rock ‘n’ roll for the punk scene, but too punk for the rock ‘n’ roll scene. That’s why my main focus is to put out records overseas. I’m too tired to explain why I don’t have a bass player or why all of us wear sunglasses.

I believe most people here always rely on mainstream media when it comes to exposure to new things, especially when 2000s garage rock revival was on the surface. Some bands I know were inspired by Jack White/White Stripes, The Strokes or The Libertines. I’m not sure if those people are even listening to Oblivians, The Gories or any 90s garage rock bands. Not many people like to dig stuff deeper on the internet. It takes a special talent to even google something obscure 10 years ago.

Is there still a pretty strong Ramones cult in your part of the world? They always had a strong international following and I've always been curious how they were received in your neck of the woods.

We used to have a lot of Ramones-y punk bands but the one that’s still active and also my favorite band is The Sneakers from Bali. They are a mix between other US Ramones-influenced punk bands like The Queers and Screeching Weasel. Eko, the guitar player/singer, plays all the songs in downstrokes like Johnny Ramone. I never met any person as determined as him. Everyone should check out their Sneakers Freak EP. It’s on my top 5 best Indonesian punk EP list.

Have you been doing much touring lately, and if so, how has it been going?

I just did my first Japan tour in May this year. 5 days, 4 cities (Kyoto, Osaka, Chiba, Tokyo). I can’t bring my usual backing band due to financial issues, so I asked Greg (Supersnazz, Teengenerate) to play drums. I saw him from Teengenerate’s Get Action documentary in 2013 or 2014 on Youtube. I was in my early 20s who just got into garage rock at that time, thinking of having him in my band. I don’t know how, but we manage to get to know each other years later, fortunately he happens to like Battlebeats as well. He agreed to help me out and he told me that his old bandmate, Miyagi (Supersnazz, Texaco Leather Man) is gonna be a great addition to the band. So, we asked Miyagi to join as my guitar player. We only rehearsed two times before the tour started and we did great like we’ve been in a band for a long time.

What was the best date you had on your last tour? Who did you play with/ where was it/ what made it awesome?

The last show in Club Heavy Sick, Tokyo was the best one. I got to play with all my favorite bands like Firestarter, Jet Boys and Angel Face. The show was on Sunday, and the venue was packed with people. It’s perfect. I heard Firestarter and Jet Boys rarely play together but they were there that day. Finally witnessing Onoching (Jet Boys) get naked and shredding radish. I was crying when Firestarter played “Trashy Dreams” because it was so good live! At the end of Battlebeats set, we did an encore playing Teengenerate’s “Dressed in Black” with Fink singing. What a perfect way to end the tour.

Where are your favorite places in the world to tour?

For now, Japan. I love the food and people. I’d love to go back there. I haven’t got a chance to go on tour elsewhere, but I wish to play in the United States one day.

What are your favorite places to play at by you?

Anywhere else in a small city where sometimes only a handful of people come. Interesting and weird stories always come from this kinda place.

Do you ever have issues with people being jealous of you? How do you deal with their envy?

I don’t know for sure, but I think there are one or two or three people who seem jealous of what I achieve in life. I don’t have time to deal with these pathetic losers; I’m just gonna sit around watching ‘em fall in life. Let's see who laughs last.

What is the best compliment you've ever received about your music?

“Battlebeats are the future!” – Eric Friedl of Goner Records/Oblivians.

What is the dumbest thing anyone has said about your band?

I don’t remember if anyone ever said the dumbest thing about the band, but there’s someone who commented on my song “Killed by Boredom” in YT. He/she said it sounds like Ramones’ “Blitzkrieg Bop”. Out of 8.1 billion humans on earth, that person is the most stupid of ‘em all.

What's next for Battlebeats?

I don’t know, maybe put out another record, go on touring, or do nothing at all. Let’s see what the future holds for Battlebeats.

When are you going to open for Guitar Wolf?

Wait. I’ll send Seiji a message to invite Battlebeats to play in Shimane Jet Fest 2025.*

*Editors Comment: It's really going to be Seiji's loss if this doesn't pan out. 

These savage beats are available on vinyl thanks to Sweet Time Records. 

Album Review: Peter Manheim - In Time

It's amusing to me that Peter Manheim's debut EP features a solitary individual sitting behind a drum kit atop a mountain against the swirling, exposed background of the whirling cosmos. For one, Peter is clearly not an island, this little record is nothing if not a celebration of cooperation and teamwork, and further, I'm pretty sure the figure behind the kit in the referenced image is wearing glasses, or goggles, or some kind of reflective eye-covering, none of which are accessory that I have ever seen Peter photographed while wearing in public. So it begs the question, who is this lonely, mysterious individual, and why does Peter see him as the personification of his creative output? It's a riddle. Maybe this figure is like the Cigarette Smoking Man from the X-Files, an ominous minder directing clandestine operations from the shadows, or maybe he's more like Prismo from Adventure Time and a benign, wish-granting guardian of the universe- whatever his role, he's overseeing some real magic. As I mentioned before, the accomplished drummer's first EP, In Time (Ah... see what he did there), is carried as much by Peter's tight, seamless rhythms and as the other players who aid in implementing his vision. Every track possesses its own prism of the collective soul, beginning with the breezy Bossanova writhed zephyr of the pacifying "Peace Groove," which is brought to life by the balanced bawl of Tim Bennett's alto sax and the elegant, fluid articulations of Alex Cummings's willowy flute player. We are then met with a transition to the downtown bound, sub-tropical, crystal-incline fusion of "A Lonely Road," where Will Miller's trumpet work intersects with a stone-cold bassline courtesy of Dan Stein as the track moves through a future-haired mist of synths in a rendition of Miles Davis that would be appropriate sonic dressing for a hardboiled montage filmed for the original run of Miami Vice. Then there are the more concentrated collaborations, which ironically produce some of the most expansive tracks, like Peter's donuts ringing the ethereal strides of De'Sean Jones's sax lines on "The Gate," or the modal-Brazilian rain dance of the title track, featuring Mamadou Fantastic on a very conversation talking drum bantering with Eric Burns's silver tinted guitar chords. Surprisingly, it all culminates in the spacey, ozone-burning haze of "Faded," which gives a spotlight to Conrad Reeves's swaggering, blade-work-like guitar playing, which resembles what an '89 Firebird might compose if one had the wherewithal to pick up the axe- a surreal swirl of fiery evocation that seems to push against its confines until it punches a hole through reality and drags the listener through a wormhole and into the unknown. It's impressive that Peter could write such a diverse range of atmospheric jazz and rock numbers and even more remarkable that he could find the right team to pull it off. I guess you could say that this EP is not only In Time, but in-credible as well. 

I spy, Northern Spy.

Interview: Ensemble Tikoro

As someone who has always been intrigued by the breadth and dynamic range of variation represented by metal vocal styles, it's very rare that I ever encounter them in isolation. It's kind of like salt, or some other essential ingredient in that way, when preparing a meal- they're always there in the mix, contributing essential flavors and textures, but only rarely being recognized as the indispensable element that they are. That someone would specifically reach into the core of heavy metal and extract a singular pumping heartstring to examine in the cold light of the moon is what fascinates me most about Indonesia's Ensemble Tikoro- their mere existence gives these orations the unsung admirable attention they deserve. 

Forming in Java in 2012, Ensemble Tikoro is an evolving assemblage of regional heavy metal singers and unconventional vocalists of various backgrounds arranged in a kind of choir of the demand—a demonic glee club. They thrive in the display of their guttural vocal aesthetics without further musical accompaniment or enhancements, digital or otherwise. It's just raw, visceral humanity- uncut and unapologetic. 

While the group is primarily focused on live performances, a collection of their selected recordings is now available through Italian international folk label Artetetra Records, germanely titled Hell Chamber. 

With all the weird shit I've listened to over my lifetime, nothing has ever come close to the strangeness or jarring fascination which I encountered between the gums and tucked away around the molars of these compositions. 

I reached out to the band through their label, and they obliged me with an interview. Their responses have helped me understand the band quite a bit more, but they haven't done much to alleviate the shock of my initial confrontation with their sound. It's the kind of work that takes some getting used to—assuming that adjusting one's pallet to their specific infernal aesthetic is desirable... or even possible. 

Check out their Hell Chamber and group leader Robi Rusdiana's responses to my inquiries below:

The following responses have been edited slightly from their original text for the sake of clarity. 

1. Please introduce the project and explain what your goals for it are.

Hell Chamber is an album of archival short-form compositions alongside snippets from commissions. All works have been elaborated between 2013 and 2020. The works only include voice-only compositions, including techniques from extended vocals, extreme metal, throat singing and traditional Indonesian vocal styles. Everything was made to be a little easier for the general public to hear and enjoy.

2. Who are the players/singers on this most recent album, Hell Chamber, and how did they become involved?

Albeit open and in continuous evolution, the ensemble is currently composed of Robi Rusdiana, Mahatma Adi Hartoko, Arum Dwi Hanantoro, Ardyansah, Handriansyah Nugraha, Tandani Mutaqim, Agung Suryana, Mita Kulsum. All members come from a very united community of metal music lovers from Bandung, West Java, Indonesia. We met and joined metal gigs for a long time and in the same way, together, we learned and explored extreme metal vocal techniques until evolving into works that cover a wider range of extended vocals and do not obsess over metal per se.

3. How do you handle the musical notation of the different parts of the composition for each of the singers?
It depends on the number of vocalists needed. In some works, at least a couple of the vocalists ought to be able to execute different techniques, whereas generally, some of the members are especially focused on one technique. The compositions are written using classical notation methodologies with various indexes and captions for players so that non-tonal material like textures and elements contributing to dynamics and moods can be legible.

4. How much creative control do the singers have in their performances?

I don't know if this is an answer, but generally speaking the feeling is that discipline and a strong sense of exploration control the performer while presenting the pieces.

5. What is it about metal music that creates such fertile ground for different vocal styles?

It's definitely the fact that experimentation and new interpretations of what music can be, including metal music works that we like, are just materials we use to find ideas. These ideas are reflected by distinguishing vocal techniques. Every new idea can be interpreted by different vocal styles and the choice is really heterogeneous, so everything becomes really flexible.

6. How does metal's extremity complement and also clash with more traditional styles of performance and composition? How do you accommodate or push back against these aesthetic issues within this project?

Music is always evolving although it keeps a certain substance in regard to different needs and functions. The difference is about focusing on things that complement each other, regardless of whether the music style is traditional or not. The music we do is based on honesty and intuition during the work's development, and trying to avoid trapping ourselves into existing musical systems.

7. How does Indonesian culture and folk music guide the conception and performances of this group?

The culture of daily life lived today by normal people is the basic concept for us when starting to create and present the works we make. We are not making a reiteration for any old tradition or culture. Is not about nostalgia. Is about what people do in the streets every day: from the different accents of people from different areas you may find at a bus terminal in Cicaheum

8. What role does Indonesian puppetry have in inspiring and influencing the performances of this group?

For us it is very inspiring in terms of vocal techniques and timbres, as well as interpretation of characterization. For those who don't know, the puppet master (dalang) executes all puppet voices and thus has to learn different vocal techniques to embody the characters and express them to the public.

9. Do you hope that the music you make through this project can be enjoyed as one might enjoy other music, or do you suggest that the listener approach these performances in another way?

For us this music and concept is very liberating in terms of what we think about its fruition. It's about that feeling. Listeners can like it or not, but the important thing is that the music we present is able to make people think and enjoy sound in a different way from music in general, hopefully.

10. Is there anything else you'd like people to know about this project that hasn't been brought up yet?

Actually recording music is not our main goal. The music we collected for this album, like all of our compositions, will continue to develop and will never be finished. As for other works we didn't record, for us it's about the live thing: come to our shows and enjoy all the dimensions that no recording media or music album will ever provide.

Hatur nuhun mang!

Translation by Luigi Monteanni

All photos by Kevin Saputra (@kevinesaputra). Courtesy of Artetetra Records.

Original responses in Indonesian are below. 

1. Hell Chamber adalah sebuah album dari nomor-nomor berdurasi pendek Ensemble Tikoro. Ini dibuat agar sedikit lebih mudah didengar dan dinikmati oleh masyarakat umum.
2. Robi Rusdiana, Mahatma Adi Hartoko, Arum Dwi Hanantoro, Ardyansah, Handriansyah Nugraha, Tandani Mutaqim, Agung Suryana, Mita Kulsum. Mereka adalah komunitas pecinta musik metal di Bandung. Kami bertemu dan bergabung dalam gigs-gigs metal. Bersama-sama belajar dan mengeksplorasi teknik extreme metal vocal hingga mengolah extended vocals yang lebih luas.
3. Tergantung dari nomor karyanya. Ada yang harus bisa melakukan banyak sekali teknik, namun ada yang difokuskan ke dalam satu teknik. Komposisi ditulis dengan menggunakan classical notation dengan beragam index dan keterangan untuk pemain.
4. Disiplin dan daya eksplorasi yang kuat menjadi kontrol untuk pemain dalam menyajikan karya.
5. Eksperimentasi dan interpretasi baru dari musik atau karya metal yang kami sukai menjadi bahan untuk mencari ide yang membedakan teknik yang diolah.
6. Musik senantiasa berkembang namun dalam substansi yang hampir sama, dengan dasar kebutuhan dan fungsi yang berbeda-beda. Perbedaan justru menjadi hal yang akan saling melengkapi, terlepas gaya musik tradisional atau bukan. Peristiwa yang kami suguhkan berlandaskan dari kejujuran dan intuisi dalam berkarya, bukan menjebakan diri pada sistem-sistem musik yang ada.
7. Budaya keseharian yang dijalani hari ini menjadi konsep dasar dalam berkarya dan menyajikan karya yang kami buat, tidak harus membuat re-literasi atau bernostalgia pada tradisi atau kebudayaan lama.
8. Sangat menginspirasi dalam segi teknik dan timbre vokal, juga interpretasi pemeranan sebuah karakter.
9. Sangat dibebaskan, pendengar boleh menyukai atau tidak, yang penting musik yang kami sajikan mampu membuat orang berpikir dan menikmati musik dengan cara yang berbeda dari musik pada umumnya, semoga.
10. Sesungguhnya rekaman atau merekam musik bukan tujuan utama kami, karena karya musik yang dibuat dalam album ini akan terus berkembang dan tidak akan pernah selesai. Begitupun dengan karya-karya lainnya yang tidak kami rekam ke dalam bentuk audio, datanglah langsung ke pertunjukan kami, menikmati semua dimensi yang tidak bisa disajikan oleh media rekam atau sebuah album musik.

Interview: Tenmonthsummer

Having a summer? Yeah, same, same. But I bet your summer not as cool as mine! Sure, you're probably getting your brunch on, probably having tallboys and grilling down by the lake every weekend, maybe you've even planned a roadtrip with your SO... BUT have you gotten to hang with Chicago DIY band Tenmonthsummer? Well, there you go. Like I said, probably not as cool as mine. I have two ideas of how you can kick things up a gear: 1) listen to my conversation with Nish, Charlie, and Scumdrop of TMS, and 2) check TMS out on their summer tour! 

If you're not familiar with TMS, they're a relatively new DIY/punk band in the Chicago area with a great, unique, and ever-evolving sound. They only have a couple of singles, live takes, and other assorted recordings out right now, but they're preparing an EP that should be out soon. Details on that and everything else they have going on (it's a lot!) can be found in the latest episode of my podcast (attn. see below).  

You can keep up with TMS by following them on Twitter (or X, or whatever), and by periodically checking their Bandcamp page. 

Also, they'll be headed out on tour later this month! Be sure to stop out and say "Hi"! If you're cool, I'm sure they'd love to meet you. 

Album Review: Bermuda Squares - Outsider

Outsider is a very apropos name for a power-pop/garage punk record of the caliber that Bermuda Squares have fired off here. This kind of rough and ragged, sensible acerbic style of vicious guitar pop, in my experience, attracts a lot of people who feel like they are just sliding around in orbit around the rest of humanity, like some satellite of sanity circling the sucking black hole that is the whole homosapien situation. Maybe they're justified in their misanthropy, or maybe they are as diluted as the masses they scorn, but what's consistently true is that they've got a feeling like something's just not right about the historic hiccup that is contemporary so-called civilization. I can say all this because I was that dude once upon a time, that dude who would plug in anything Mark Ryan or Jeff Beck would toss off just to drown out the absurdity of my surroundings, and as that guy, I can say that Bermuda Squares really gets the vibe right on this debut. Mean, slicing riffs that carve and fizzle the air around you like a Pollock painted with a man's own sweat, tears, and angst. Busy, bone-dry riffs that skim the dunes of distorted waves, like desert surf barrons, kicking up enough dirt to block out the sun so that they can rule the dustbowl like vampire kings. It bursts like a radioactive AV transmission from a crashing UFO shot in bichromatic 3D that vaporizes the homecoming queen when it accidentally misses a jump between radio towers and ends up pipping through the brackets of her braces. A connived, aural mugging that sandwiches you between rough layers of harmonies on each track to make sure you're held good and tight for the knockout of each and every hook. We live in a very stupid world, but the farther you go from the blast radius that Bermuda Squares emits, the dumber it's bound to seem. Why be a stranger when you could be an Outsider instead. 

Sensation needs no elucidation, Feel It Records.   

Album Review: WiFiGawd - Chain of Command

Probably the best way I could describe WiFiGawd, in general, but particularly on his album Chain of Command, is an escape artist. He's hard to get a grip on and pin down. He's made a career of evading the chains of convention and other constraints, and CoC is no different. Scooping up drops from old heads and soulful progenitors, he slips through the vents of digitized liquid funk to pop off triplets in a setting ordered for a poet's quill but which he's commandeered for cyber-surfing, pyrotechnic piracy. What's more fantastic than his folding over, to the 7th degree, of Golden era partitions and Soundcloud era dialects is the way that he and his collaborating producers pragmatically thread and territorialize the kind of soul samples, new age aesthetics, and torqued and bent digital sampling common to vaporwave and new spiritual music within his aggressively materialistic and factually certain flows and compositions. WifiGawd is not out wandering the ether; his head is screwed onto his spine, his feet are in a good pair of kicks and firmly planted on the ground- he is locked in as they say. But the strange tug of the production on Chain of Command does manage to color his treaties, particularly when he slinks into a bobbing, laid back harmonious flow, with the soot of chaos and confusion that burns around him. WiFiGawd allows the disorder and dissociation that characterizes life in this half-feral, cyber-subordinated epoch of human history to settle on his compositions like the fog of war that it is, making what he does and says on Chain of Command that much more believable in its flirtation proximity to absolute madness. 

Get free with POWRecordings. 

Album Review: The Como Mamas - Move Upstairs

Today, on the 4th, Uncle Sam's Birthday, I'd like to present to you some genuine American music. The music of the Como Mamas arrives to your ears by way of retracing the footsteps of folklore, which just so happened to unveil a genuine emergence of folk expression as it still exists in the depths of Southern Americana. It's well established that Alan Lomax's exploration of the outlying scrub of the heartlands resulted in most of our best examples of preserved folk music from the turn of the last century. Over a hundred years later, there are still genuine fonts of spontaneous expression percolating under the hollars and lesser byways of this country's rural ramparts. The charismatic acapella style of Angela Taylor, her sister Della Daniels, and long-time friend Ester Mae Smith, of Como, Mississippi, represents only one of these forms of irrepressible, devotional, sonic countenances, as originally documented by filmmaker Michael Reill back in the late '00s. His encounter with Angela, Della, and Ester, later coined the Como Mamas, led to the trio eventually releasing two LPs with Daptone Records, of which Move Upstairs is the latest. Move Upstairs is performed in a slightly more familiar style than their first LP, Get An Understanding, replacing a raw, synchronized kitchen-table choir harmonizing style with a R'nBiefed gospel revue entwined with a wholesome catholicon of electric blues as a homage to Muddy Waters and other pioneering folk singers who inspired the Mamas in their youth. While Move Upstairs might represent a "professional" style recording effort, especially compared to their previous releases, the performances are still wholly and undeniably American, representing an expression of faith and optimism in the present makeup of the people and the communities which they depend on, as well as anticipation for a kingdom yet to come, a high place awaiting our ascension, where all thirsts are slacked and all burdens lifted. Their music represents a specific stripe of spiritual and sonic sanguinity that extends a mercifully charitable interpretation of the world as a precursor to providence, and it's certainly inspiring to witness in these trying and troubled times. I can't think of anything I'd rather be listening to today, given everything happening in the world, and this country in particular. Happy Birthday, America. I'll be keeping you in my thoughts. 

Keep it real with Daptone Records. 

Album Review: Bloodbather - Pressure

Pressure is the last will and testament of Broward County, Florida hardcore band Bloodbather. While they never really seemed to break out in the same kind of way that some of their contemporaries did, I end up thinking about this band and their EP often for two very good reasons: 1) it fucking rips, and 2) Bloodbather's Pressure (to my ears at least) embodies the era of hardcore in which it was made like few others. Prior to 2020, hardcore, internationally I would say, was undergoing a serious metalcore revival, but not just any kind of metalcore revival, the side of metalcore that transitions seamlessly into the nu-metal epoch of alternative metal- drop-tuned guitars, massive sounding drums, electronic dance music influrences, record scratches, big-ass chunky grooves- you know exactly what I'm talking about, need I go on? While I think this style of groove-core really saw its zenith with Code Orange's Underneath, Bloodbather's 2018 EP represents more of the fateful wind up to that final blow, a scrappy yet malicious and terminally ugly mental meltdown that slides comfortably between the tension-amping, Martyr AD-esque punishment of Sanction and the psycho-overclocking, human-test subject water-boarding-beat of Vein. Listening to Pressure, even now, feels like you're tempting desisater to enter your life adn mess up your whole situation. It sounds like what ever device your listening to it on has acquired some form of vicious malware and is now plotting with some decentralized, hive-ai as to the best, and most painful, way of murdering you in your sleep. The central members of BloodBather have moved on to a deathcore project they're calling Crucifiction, but the legacy of their prior efforts have left a bruised imprint on my soul that I hope never fully heals. 

Album Review: Oh Boland - Western Leisure

It flips my wig that a band like Oh Boland exists in Dublin, Ireland, of all places. Like... how? How in the world does a band that sounds like this exist outside of the American rust-belt!?! I swear they sound like a more perfect version of about half a dozen bands that I would see every summer during college when they would haul their gear and sweaty broken bodies up from St. Louis, Indianapolis, or DeKalb, to play a dive or bowling alley up in my neck of Wisconsin, celebrating with me and possible half a dozen other lushes, the decline of western civilization, one riff, and one PBR tall-boy at a time. I guess the catalogs of Neil Young and Alex Chilton really do translate into a kind of sonic esperanto, because those are the playbooks that bandleader Niall Murphy is working off of on this third LP Western Leisure, and it was more or less the script that the bands which Oh Boland reminds me of were working from as well (give or take a wink and nod to the Boss and/or Creatures of the Night). Intriguingly, an adherence to past-its-prime, country-pop, and rock Americana of the late-20s century doesn't bog the album down in the mire of nostalgia or find it tumbling into the trap of a sentimental torpor. Instead, there is a brisk and canny sense of irony about the music and its lumpenized, downwardly mobile subjects that keeps the entire affair feeling florid and rejuvenated, with a purpose of focus that conspicuously folds the past into an overpass under which one can glimpse the gleaming ray of one's fortune and future (or depending on your luck, the headlights of an onrushing semi-trailer [hey, it's still your future... but maybe just flatter than you expected]). Listening to Western Leisure produces for me the compelling stereoptical portrait of the band cruising in an open convertible down a backcountry dirt road somewhere in the American heartland, with Niall on the hood with his guitar, leaning into the wind and angling his body on the metallic buffalo's stealy bonnet like it was a surfboard cutting into curl of an approaching wave, the background reeling past them like it was rolling backdrop of a movie-set as they seek out the famed corn mazes of El Dorado, or practice auditioning for a yet to be announced sequel to David Byrne's True Stories. Oh Boland are people like us, only they picked up the phone when the American Dream called, and now they're on a debauched adventure and gratifying, suicide slide through bat country in the hopes of squeezing out all the zest that Western Leisure has to offer. 

Treat yourself with Meritorio Records. You deserve it! 

Album Review: Likane Leppäne - Psykosomaattistasaundia

Over 7.5 thousand kilometers separate Oulu, Finland from Memphis, Tennessee. Such great divides haven't impeded Likane Leppäne from making a home for himself in horrorcore's shallow and often-disturbed grave though. Psykosomaattistasaundia is Likane Leppäne's fourth LP, and doesn't see the artist fashioning a new coffin from which to shout his incredibly obscene-sounding, coarse and barking flow into the vermin-clotted earth. The space he's carved for himself in the unhospitable dirt of international underground rap seems capable of baring black-twisted fruit with a sweet, gory center- so why replant your plot when you can simply re-till and re-fertilize with fresh marrow? That's where I feel like I find Likane Leppäne on this release, living more luxuriously in his sunken, necrotic abode- his sonic sarcophagus- a fresh viscous paint on the walls, furniture refurbished with fresh skin, and a newly installed HVAC breathing a greasy miasma all over the dungeon-like interior of his wicked little keep. He's sick and slick, with a bone to pick... preferably one from your soon-to-be mangled carcass. Something that I appreciate about Likane Leppäne's tone and delivery, and the way it coasts over the burnt-out beats and phantasmic synths of his compositions, is that the macabre weight of his words as they settle into the ugly atmosphere of each song produces an inescapably ominous simulation of a world that is sinking away from the light of reason and into a bed of chaos. His work presents a vantage point from below, a bedrock of madness where he already resides and where the rest of reality appears in a rush to meet him. A logical future destination for our civilization that would make even the nightmares depicted in such survival horror classics as Cry of Fear or Silent Hill appear acceptably mundane. Likane Leppäne is the corrupted protagonist in this future landscape of woe, a man already conditioned to its harsh and surreal demands, willing to spare you a shred of his heathen wisdom so that you might stand a chance at surviving until daybreak. 

Reign in blood... Solium Records

Album Review: Blue Bendy - So Medieval

At any given time in a year, there are a handful of vain and tedious, yet critically lauded, post-punk acts making the rounds in (primarily) the British press. I do my best to avoid them as I would incoming seagull guano, but every once in a while, I do get nailed. As I'm scraping the skat off my jacket, I realize that the experience could have been worse and that whatever stain is left on my poor, discolored garment will likely be unnoticeable by the general public after a few cycles through the wash... no one will know how many times I listened to a particular Sprints single, and it will always remain my private shame... As much as it might seem like I'm implying London's Blue Bendy is one of these scatological assailants, they're not... at least not to me. After initially hearing their debut LP, So Medieval, I came away with the impression of a group that knows how to write a simple hook and deliver it with an ironic amount of emphasis that overemphasizes its import in amusing ways. More than that, the group felt grounded and approachable, fun and deftly warm. I wouldn't have put them in the same basket as say... Yard Act or Black Country, New Road... at least not until I started reading the press that surrounds them, that is...  I'm sure vocalist Arthur Nolan et alia have nothing but kind feelings towards these other groups, however, I think it's somewhat reductive to lump them all together, and I'm slightly glad that I simply listened to and grew to appreciate Arthur's wispy, drawling delivery, and the band's ability to balm and smooth out a sparse and weedy groove, without having encountered anyone else's opinion on what sort of impression these aesthetic turns should leave on me. There is something more honest and less witty (although Arthur does have acuity for amusing character profiles) about Blue Bendy on So Medieval that one could miss if they were subsumed in the hype around their work. For me, it's the bare, unobscured disposition of their organically unaligned poetic temperaments that give a playful push to their polished-down Baroque antics, nudging them into the realm of comedic misrule, without sacrificing attention to melody or the everpresent grain of lucid sincerity, that I've grown to appreciate the most with the time that I've spent with So Medieval. I may be forever undermining my own position as a writer when I say this, but don't let anyone else tell you how to feel about an act until you've heard them for yourself. It's always more fulfilling to experience what a piece of music can gift to you when you encounter it with no pretense than if you hop into its weft loaded down with another's baggage. 

The state51 Conspiracy was an inside job. 

Album Review: Bill Baird - Astral Suitcase

There is just something that tickles my brain about the phrase Astral Suitcase. Like is it the preferred luggage you take with you while exploring the cosmos on the Galaxy Express, or is it more like a mobile biodome that you deploy to keep you safe while researching a heretofore undiscovered planet with a potential hostel atmosphere? Or is the Astral Suitcase something inside of you, a space of unlimited imaginative potential inturned in your own psyche, which, once unlocked, expands the realm of epiphany in all directions, flooding over the horizon and into infinity? I think if you asked Bill Baird, he'd probably say that all of the above would be applicable, but that his favorite, and closest to his heart,  is his latest LP. Astral Suitcase (the record) doesn't have any clear boundaries to its sound or themes, but still manages to have a concrete sense of personality, a spacy folk record characterized by crisp, brushy guitar work and glacial-hued harmonics; it is both briskly subdued and monumental, open and reserved, gradual and quicksilver, like floating down the milky way on an iceberg made of squid ink colored ice cream. A heavenly breeze that shakes the stars like windchimes in the dead of night, their quiet echos felt in your bone before they reverberate in your ears. A river that flows over the edge of a Saturnine ring to fill the goblet of a visiting astronomic heir as he whizzes by on a golden asteroid. The final symphony of a lonely planet trapped in a drop of due gliding along the lip of a tulip petal towards an uncertain end. A ripple in an uncertain sky as it fluctuates from a clear blue patina to that of a milky periwinkle punch. A popped thought bubble that stains the air with an oily reflective resin and the smell of fear and moral clarity. Astral Suitcase is an unassuming record, that is much bigger on the inside than it appears from the vantage point of its exterior. 

Album Review: Teens in Trouble - What's Mine

Teens in Trouble's debut LP What's Mine may be the first album to ever feature an authentic punk rock love song. And by authentic, I mean believable because the second to last track "Playlist" is all about acquiring a customized compilation of songs from the object of your affection. The exchanging of "mix tapes" has been a time-honored tradition amongst twitterpated punks since the invention of the dual tape deck in an attempt to crack the code of their paramore's love language (or at least get a sense for what kind of stuff they listen to while high). I guess asking someone for a Spotify playlist is the 2024 version of this diminished but steadily observed custom. That's just the first example of vocalist and guitarist Lizzie Killian's approach to these songs. More so than most, the subject matter on What's Mine tends towards the baldly biographical, often leaving me with the impression that I'm literally seeing scenes from her life illuminated through song. Now, most people's lives are tedious, and it would be highly embarrassing for nearly anyone to expose their innermost thoughts to any degree of depth, but most people also don't have the guitar chops that Lizzie does either. This brings us to what is easily the most excellent aspect of this album: Lizzie's guitar work and ability to write some enthralling hooks. Even when the lyrics can be a little cringe, the hooks that accompany them absolutely absolve the whole affair of its perceived sins. The prickly warning of the opening track, "You Don't Want To Mess With Me," is wound around a razory crock-crew-shaped groove that collects emotional tension like a lint trap balling up flammable debris until it's ready to ignite in a blaze of vibrant glory- a blowup that is equally matched by the slinky desert riffs that erupt into full-blown static sandstorms on the off-kilter, heart-stroke  hallucination "In My Dreams." Then there are the more unexpected turns, such as the alternating country-surf riff spindrift of "Brave" and the gritty skate-punk strut of "Sick" with its bunchy, coiled chord combinations that snake around a brightly textured groove like venomous jewelry. It's Lizzie's world, and you're just lucky to share it with her and her guitar. 

Always the best from Asian Man Records. 

Album: Aluminum - Fully Beat

Aluminum is kind of a heavy metal, isn't it? And I don't mean in terms of its actual weight as compared to other materials, and I'm certainly not implying a connection to any variety of extreme alternative music. What I mean is that aluminum is an industrial product that is laden with meaning despite its ubiquity (or maybe because of it). It's a flexible material, with a fair amount of versatility in its application in industry and the arts alike, and while it bends easily, it's also very considered quite dependable... if disposable due to its cheapness and availability. Sounds sort of familiar? What does this also sound like? If you said your average shlub, working a job and trying to have a life on the side, then we're on the same wavelength. Like most other things fed into the machine of this society, in order to be worthy of such a fate, one has to be not only shiny, dependable, flexible, and also, ultimately, easy to discard. The long, glossy garbage chute of contemporary life is the backdrop of San Francisco band Aluminum's debut LP, Fully Beat- an endeavor that translates the symbolic potential of man as raw material for commodification and exploitation into a focused statement of rhythm-captured lament. It's not so surprising, then, that the group's sound on this record is heavily reminiscent of the sonic escapism of a famously industrial and de-personalized landscape, that of 1980s Manchester, England. Tracks like the dazed, slow-motion dash, new-wave, jangle-hop pounce, and Remain in Light inspired percussion of "Beat" overlay to evince a brightly anguished puckering rhythmic bliss, through which the soul may sink farther with every striving grasp for daybreak. The carbonated boil of "Always Here, Never There" rebounds on downy waves of bittersweet synth buckles, tethering resignedly melancholic vocal tresses to a tugging lure which pulls it through a quicksand bass groove in a befuddlingly blue depiction of one's experience of life as a telescoping series of empty frames. Both "Haha" and "Pulp" make some of the more direct callbacks to the sophisticated sadness of acts that characterized the British underground many decades past, with the former resembling a pensive clasping of Happy Monday grooves to Cocteau Twins's lost, daydreaming ambiance, while the latter is a wailing wall of kicking, shoegazing, hot-foot maneuvers, which fizzles like someone lit a Slowdive track like a fuse and let it burn into an angry, bubbling puree- a blood-tinted valentine to the reality that no matter where you attempt to hide, your failures will always hunt you down. Then there is the sharp and slinky, dark and sticky, candy-flavored-tar-pull of "Behind My Mouth," which is towed along by a tenacious, plaintively and coercive beat in the company of a tyrannically groovy rhythm, creating a constantly shifting stage upon which a lightly chewy melody chides, "Do you ever see behind my mouth?," an ominously innocuous phrase that feels like the utterance of one of the inhabitants of the Red Room in Twin Peaks, an eerie summons prompting you to find the true orator of who conveyed some key piece of information, an entity hidden behind the teeth of the one who presumably spoke. Fully Beat is a shiny, brightly bemusing ode to the trash that even the best of us are slowly fashioned into with time and pressure. 

Feel more with Felte Records.

Album Review: Killer Hill - Frozen Hill

It's a shame that Killer Hill's Frozen Head seemed to fly under so many radars when it dropped back in 2022. It has the kind of lineup you'd expect to generate a suitable quotient of hype as far as trios go, comprised of Dan Beeman and Dave Case of Helmet, as well as Pete Beeman of noise-knaves Guzzard. You'd think that would be the case, at least. But, it's not really like Frozen Head exists to break any new ground, turn heads, or impress the uninitiated- at least not in the same way that their other groups have, or rather, continue to do. It feels like this record exists because the guys involved just wanted to make a really kick-ass rock record, and I'll allow myself to be thrown from a moving car before I look down on someone with such a gracious ambition as that. As far as their sound, it's somewhat comparable to Red Fang, where they're kind of doing several genres of hard rock and heavy metal all at once, sort of a diagonal of gambit that draws together and stitches into embrace the eyes, ears, and other orifices of boiling, heat-stroke-inducing sludge, kick-draw thunder-thrash, back-yard-brawling soundtracking grunge, and a mirage-inducing wave of dessert rock. They bring all of these elements together into a massive, head-banging sound that will knock you flat out like you've been stomped by a disgruntled sasquatch in a tie-dye shirt who just lept from an Apache helicopter whirring overhead just to show you the business. It's militantly groovy while remaining dreamy and strangely exotic, focusing its sight through the channel of its ajna chakra as if its sound could acquire the intensity of a Lazor beam aimed through a glassy aperture to cut an "S" pattern into your forehead like you're a wooden desk in an unsupervised detention hall. Frozen Head is a crudely radiant and nonchalantly lysergic little spectacle that is hotter than it appears and cooler than even its pedigree would indicate. Kick off your summer with a cold one like this and you can't go wrong! 

Album Review: Full Body 2 - Infinity Signature

Are sequels ever as good as the original? We all have our favorite answers to this question,* but I think what most responses have in common is that sequels live up to (or even exceed) the hype when they add something unexpected or take the concept of the original in a radical new direction. This is certainly the case for Jack Chaffer and Dylan Vaisey's second go-round with a band called "Fully Body." Completing the lineup with bassist and vocalist Cassidy Rose Hammond, Fully Body 2 has, in many ways, streamlined the eclectic indie rock of their prior incarnation to its most rhythmically sparse and cogent core while synthesizing a strikingly supple, crystal-fused physique to animate the sturdy architecture of its bones. After two demos, I think their style has finally fully bloomed on their EP Infinity Signature, where new-agey incantations of distortion are cast against concrete, quartz-hardened chords in an assured display of geologically resplendent geometry, like the spire of a crystal-plated castle emerging above the horizon of a cloud. It's effortlessly weighty without sacrificing any swiftness in its dynamics and feels uncannily transportive in a manner similar to that hybridized sonic chimera, Fire-Toolz. In fact, the album often gives me the impression that the group had heard Rainbow Bridge or Eternal Home and thought, "Ok, this is pretty good, but what if we threw in a whole of MBV?" Whatever the inspiration, Infinity Signature demonstrates no hesitation in confidently extending itself into the universe in a vindication of pure, imaginary forms. 

* Most people's answer is either Terminator 2 or Aliens, but mine is Halloween 3: Season of the Witch... and, yes, I will go to the mat for that piece of garbage because I think it is such good, goofy fun.   

Interview: Superdestroyer, Topiary Creatures, Mt. Oriander, & Hey, ily! on the JEFF split

If you can believe it, there was a time when I thought emo had more or less run out of steam after the 4th Wave. Dumb, hopeless, out-of-touch, other pejoratives, that's me and more. I certainly know better now. And what helped me get my head back on straight was a split released on Open Door Records with Arcadia Grey, Oolong, Guitar Fight From Fooly Cooly, and dannythestreet. The energy on that release is absolutely infectious, and each of the bands are in top form in terms of their performance and songwriting. Fatal 4 Way is easily one of my favorite splits of the past decade, of any genre, style, subcultural milieu, etc... but if there is another split that could muscle in on the space I've made in my heart for it, that release might have to be JEFF, released this past May on Lonely Ghost Records. It's another super team-up, although decidedly less fatal and generally more advantageous- aligning the powers of Superdestroyer, Topiary Creatures, Mt. Oriander, and Hey, ily! in something like the Planeteers of Weird Emo. Together, through their shared determination and a display of acumen and dazzling eccentricities, the four groups have managed to call forth a lean extravaganza of electric audio and friendship that is both seamless and satisfying. Beginning with the gentle, weighty ploy of one of Mt. Oriander's strummy, star-gazing melodies, the scene then shifts to a dark theater to witness one of Topiary Creatures's electric-monster staring, deep-space soap-operas in its full, sugar-laced bloom. Coming out the other end of the wormhole we get to hang out with Superdestroyer as he unleashes one of his super-tasty, extra-feedback-fried, punk-power jams, which should amp you up just enough to keep pace with the speed-run of the first half of Hey, ily!'s track, an explosive fire-flower powered case of Game Boy Color skramz that (astonishingly!) resolves peacefully into a contemplative tail of delicately laid chords which will guide you away from the chaos of the track's foyer into the calming horizon that lays beyond. It's still a little hard for me to wrap my head around so many talented people working on a single record, so I got up the nerve to ask them a couple of questions about how it all came together. Thankfully (maybe foolishly) they agreed and you can discover the contours of their revealed wisdom, the gore details of their cutting floors, as well as various shades of history-emulsifying nostalgia and heartening, emotional dialogue below: 

The following interview was conducted via email between May 22 and June 1. The responses have been edited only slightly for the sake of punctuation and consistency.

Interviewees: John of Superdestroyer, Bryson of Topiary Creatures, Keith of Mt. Oriander, and Caleb of Hey, ily! 

1. Whose idea was the split? 

John: In a way, it was everyone's idea. At different times over the past couple of years we had mentioned being interested in doing a split together. So one day about a year and a half ago I threw the idea out to Caleb and Bryson and they said, "yes." It just so happens around that same time Keith mentioned to me that he'd be really interested in doing a split with Hey, ily. We all love Mt. Oriander so I asked if he wanted to jump onto the split we had started planning. It just kinda worked out. 

Bryson: The initial light bulb came from Lonely Ghost Records / Superdestroyer. They threw us in a group chat and was basically like, “I love all y’all tunes, wanna make something together?”

Keith: Like John said, this was kind of already a thing in process and I am a split junkie so I wanted in. I also have admired Lonely Ghost Records and I was a fan of all the bands involved, so it was a no-brainer for me. I currently have like 10 (splits) in various processes and no, that is not a joke, lol. I have a problem.

The discography of my previous band, Empire! Empire! (I Was a Lonely Estate) was probably a third from splits. We did 12 of them. TWELVE!

Caleb: I think we have Mr. Superdestroyer to thank for this split! 

2. How did the split come together, and how long did it take to coordinate? 

John: This split took a year and a half to put out. There were a lot of different (but very valid) reasons for everything to get delayed. Life just beat our asses for a while in various ways. We kept checking in and moving stuff around though and eventually we got it all to fall into place.

Bryson: Longer than you’d think. I just went back and found the original message and it was in November of 2022. We all had our songs written and selected for it pretty early on as well, but lining up a split schedule in between four band’s release and recording schedules is always gonna be a bit of a juggling act. 

Keith: It took a long time for all of us. For me, my long time recording engineer and good friend Mat Halliday passed away suddenly less than a month before we were supposed to record a batch of songs that included this one. We had been working together for over a decade, so it was a hard blow. We were close. On top of that, when my headspace was in a good enough place to want to get back to it, I had to find someone new and that took the better part of a year to get going again.

I wasn’t worried though, we all have a Twitter group and we kept in good communication, so it was a matter of when more than anything else.

Caleb: I could be completely wrong because it was initiated so long ago, but I think John initially sent the idea over to me, and from there we brainstormed on who we wanted on the silly little split! I’m pretty sure the idea first formed in 2022? So it took a LONG ass time.

3. Did you all select/record songs that you thought would go well together, or was the process more independent? 

John: We all made songs for the split. Initially, Caleb and Bryson shared demos that were pretty far along that they thought they might use. I ended up recording a song I thought could fit well with those. Keith sent his song earlier this year and Caleb ended up recording a different song a couple months back. We definitely all had a similar idea of the sound we were going for on the split I think. 

Bryson: A bit of both. I had a couple fully-demoed songs that I loved but couldn’t find a place for on our album, so I showed them to the other bands and let them pick which one they thought best fit the vibe. 

Keith: This was originally going to be on vinyl and when I’m writing for a split, I know from experience the time limitations so I wanted to make sure it wasn’t too long. Besides that, I didn’t really write anything to try and blend with anything anyone else was doing. But it really did come together so perfectly. I think the secret sauce of how this ended up being so good is the track order of it all. Each song seems to be the perfect bridge to the next track and it just worked out perfectly. It starts soft and slowly turns heavier and more chaotic.

Caleb: I had a really hard time figuring out what I wanted to do on this split. Initially, the track was going to be completely different and would’ve had the full band involved. We actually even got the whole thing recorded! We decided we were unhappy with the final version and scrapped it, then we started writing a record which took a lot of our headspace, so I ended up just writing a goofy lil’ tune on my own! 

4. Was there any point where you thought this record wouldn't happen? If so, what/who do you credit with your success? 

John: I would say that right up until the Monday of the release I wasn't 100% sure it was gonna come out lol. We all were doing our best but I think it's always hard to coordinate a 4 band split, especially when 2 of the 4 are running labels. Keith and I both also had to work around our own release schedules for the labels also. But we pulled it off because we communicated frequently and were willing to be flexible and change the plan. 

Bryson: I never lost hope! But I was saying, “the split is happening in the next month or two” for nearly a whole year. Plenty of collaborations fizzle out when delays happen, but I think the fact that we did eventually find time for it is a testament to how much each of us genuinely enjoys the other band’s music. At least for us, it was way too cool of an opportunity to forget about.

Keith: For myself, I never worried about it not being released because everyone was invested. 4-way splits take a long time, it’s like herding cats. It felt like it came together when it needed to and then it was out in the world.

Caleb: I definitely thought at some point it wasn’t going to happen. I can kind of be a dork sometimes and put WAY too much on my plate, so there were several times when I had to forego process on my song for this split in favor of other (way less cool but necessary) things. I really have to give credit to John, though. He’s one of the most determined guys I’ve ever met and I’m lucky to have him in my corner, and to be in his!

5. Were there any technical challenges? Did you have any concerns about levels and mixing between tracks? How did you handle things on that end? 

John: I wasn't too concerned because I think everyone knows their sound. When we all discussed this initially, I thought we'd all be a good fit together. We also all agreed to have Kris master the split which helped to create consistency across the songs. He did a really good job. 

Bryson: Surprisingly, we didn’t sweat that side of it too much. Living in a playlist era, and especially on a split that’s themed after the eclecticism of growing up online, it would have felt weird to round all the corners and make everything uniform. I like that the split sounds like you’re clicking between your friend’s Myspace profiles and listening to their various profile songs. 

Keith: I didn’t foresee any technical challenges and since we moved to cassette, any concerns for time went out the window. We all just had our own studio people handle the recording/mixing and Kris mastered the whole thing so it felt like one cohesive release. John was the mastermind behind this whole thing, so I trusted everything to work out and just had to send my song over. That was nice and John did a good job.

Caleb: Other than starting from scratch a few different times on my end, I don’t think there were any technical difficulties! Kris (who mastered the split!) is a literal god-genius who could make anything we gave him sound good, so there were no problems there!

6. How did the cover art for this split come to be? Where did the concept come from? 

John: We had been brainstorming potential acronyms using the 4 band names which led us to the name Tom, which led to MySpace. Most of the graphic artists we spoke with don't really do that sort of art, so I ended up giving it a shot. I think it's a cool nod to the MySpace music days.

Bryson: That was all Superdestroyer as well. We had been casually tossing around names and concepts in the group chat for a while, but when they sent the initial mockup that looked like a MySpace page, we were all like “hell yeah, that’s it.” And of course, that prompted the fun assignment of filling out our respective mock bio’s and top 8’s for the single covers. 

Keith: Somewhere in our Twitter group chat, just through natural conversation (the group is called ‘The Split Pit’, by the way) MySpace came up and we all waxed poetic about its glory days. The ball just kind of kept rolling from there and then John took on the art duties too. AND KILLED THAT TOO! There are also individual profiles for each band and we got to choose all the information for it. It felt like a blast from the past, haha. 

Caleb: That was ALL John! 

7.Who is Jeff, and how did he get a split named after him? 

John: Jeff is just a dude. Just a guy, you know? 

Keith: It’s Jeff from EarthBound! Sure, I just made that up, but also it could be true!

Caleb: Jeff is not a man, Jeff is the EVERY man. Every single one of us has a little bit of Jeff in us, keeping us going every day. Even you, reading this, have Jeff to thank for all of your accomplishments. 

8. Were any of you big MySpace users back in the day? Did you deck out your page, or did you go the minimalist route? 

John: I was! MySpace peaked while I was in high school. I loved the music aspect. It made finding independent bands much easier. It also was the first time I remember thinking I could release music on my own and find an audience without needing to be on a label. My page was decked out. I even made custom images for my background. It was a real assault to the eyes.  

Bryson: Big Myspace guy over here. I was in middle school during its peak, so not all of my friends were allowed to have profiles (especially growing up in church as a homeschooler); I felt so cool. And you’d better believe I decked my page out. I loved making HTML sites and Flash games at the time, so the more ways I could alter the layout and embed obnoxious games onto my profile, the better. 

Keith: I’m a bit older than everyone else so I was already in college when I got MySpace and felt super cool because I was a pretty early adaptor. Back in the day before they added the ‘Top 8’ feature, it was chronological from join date, so I made the top lists for a lot of profiles.

My band in college had a page before they had band profiles, haha. I was super into editing everything, we had the custom header and background, the whole nine yards.

Empire! Empire! started in 2006, and that was our main platform for years. We were kind of big on MySpace, we have over 40,000 fans. We spent hours and hours messaging people and networking. We booked a lot of tours through it, made a lot of friends and connections. I maintain it is still the best site that existed for bands because it had everything you needed in one place- music, tour dates, blogs, messaging, comments, pictures and bulletins.

Caleb: You know, I kind of missed out on MySpace, I think by the time I started using social media (I definitely was already online but I just didn’t have any accounts), MySpace was gone, although it sounded like a really badass time! I wish we could go back to MySpace. 

9. Did any drama ever ignite over your top 8?

John: No, but I remember being excited when ppl would put me in their top 8. Ideally, it would be a reciprocal sort of thing, otherwise it would be kinda weird to put someone in your top 8 who didn't place you in their Top 8. It was an odd social hierarchy thing--at least where I lived at the time. When you had each other in there, it provided a level of validation that you had social cache. If people didn't reciprocate your Top 8 placements, it could be weirdly alienating. A lot of people would take it as a sort of rejection of their close friendship. Some people would change it every week with different people. It was a weird place. I think most of us recognized it was just goofy fun and didn't take it seriously. Even so, you could probably write a dissertation about the psychological damage of MySpace's Top 8.

Bryson: I do remember one of my friends being annoyed that I put A Skylit Drive above him on my Top 8.

Keith: YES! It wasn’t as bad as my LiveJournal drama days (I am old as hell, lol), but it was definitely a thing. I tried to be political about it, but I am sure I slighted some friends (some intentional, some not). What a weird feature, in retrospect.

10. Did you have any songs on your page? If so, what were some of them? What did you hope these songs informed people about your personality at the time? 

John: Oh yeah, a lot were probably from bands that have been canceled bc that era was rampant with abuse that has since come out, but some of the cringe-ier songs I remember are "Until the Day I Die" by Story of the Year (it's unfortunate to admit that) and "here in your arms" by hellogoodbye. I was obsessed with Holding A Wolf By The Ears by From Autumn To Ashes, so I'm sure "Pioneers" was on there. My choices were eclectic. I had a lot of punk and hardcore bands, some grind-- stuff like The number 12 looks like you, Dr. Acula, Bane, Cruel Hand, Stretch Arm Strong, etc. But, I'd put pop and rap on there too. I know I had a lot of pop punk like Motion City on there. I updated it a lot because MySpace felt like social media tailor made for me. It was music-centric and I very much expressed myself through my music taste. Your choices said a lot about you on Myspace.

Bryson: Oh, I scrutinized my profile songs more than I’ve ever scrutinized anything. Making sure everyone on my soccer team knew that I was an edgy skater kid was a full time job. To rattle off a few: Billy Talent, Saosin, Secret and Whisper, Paxtin, Edison Glass, Anberlin, Deas Vail, The Mars Volta, Circa Survive, Homestar Runner (the Irish pop-punk band, not the cartoon [which I also loved]).

Keith: Absolutely! Songs from Death Cab, Mineral, Jimmy Eat World, Penfold, American Football, the Get Up Kids. The list goes on.

11. Did you use MySpace for music discovery? Who were some of the artists/albums you learned about from that site? 

John: Idk that I can name specific bands but I found a lot of music on MySpace through profile songs. It kinda worked like seeing a friend tweet about a band 10 times now or something, but it would start playing when you visited the page. Also similar to now, a lot of the bands never really got traction. There was this band called The Trend that had this amazing song and I looked for it everywhere and never found it again. There's probably a lot of really cool stuff that never made it past self-uploading to a MySpace band profile. You could also find great bands through people's top 8 because people in the scene who were tapped in would usually put a few bands they liked in there. 

Bryson: Not as much as other people seemed to. I mostly discovered things from the iTunes’ “related artists” section and random music forums. 

Keith: I did, yeah. It’s how we met all the early bands for the label I run, Count Your Lucky Stars. If MySpace didn’t exist, there is no way CYLS would either. It was the connective tissue for the whole DIY scene. I’d say at least chunks of the first 20 or 30 releases stemmed from connections and communications over MySpace.

12. Do you still use social media as a music discovery method? If so, what does your strategy look like? 

John: DIY twitter is a huge source of my music discovery. I listen to a lot of the bands that follow the label or interact with us, I check out bands I see other ppl talking about, and I follow a lot of writers that I think have good taste. That's probably my number 1 source. 

Bryson: Unless you count Bandcamp and Spotify as social media, I honestly don’t. When I was younger, music was inseparable from my social life—finding and broadcasting the songs I connected with helped me contextualize who I was and wanted to be. Nowadays, it’s more internal. 

Keith: I do, yes. I think just the bands that are in our scene’s orbit end up finding each other, one way or another. The same names just sort of start showing up again and again and eventually I give them a listen.

Caleb: I sure do! Sometimes, people will posts songs that I checkout and get really into, sometimes I hear songs in videos, most of the time I just see bands promoting themselves and I discover them that way! 

13. How did you feel when the company decided to wipe the site and everyone's pages? 

John:  I had long since abandoned and been locked out of MySpace but I was kinda sad because that is so much lost media. Some of my first songs were shared to MySpace and I don't have the files even. Their music feature was so cool.

Bryson: Luckily, I had transitioned to FB and IG at the time, so I was pretty unaffected at first. It’s only recently that I’ve been frustrated by it. I think the fact that we can’t see our old profiles is part of what makes the MySpace nostalgia so magnetic. I’m always ranting about how you can only “cash in” on nostalgia so many times before the memory starts to blend with the present—it’s really impactful at first and then it starts to fade. None of us have “cashed in” on seeing our MySpace pages. If we were able to scratch that itch, even once, I think it would feel like much less of a big deal. 

Keith: IT WAS ONE OF THE SADDEST DAYS EVER! Empire! had every single show logged into it meticulously. We were stupid and never had a complete back up and one day, it was just all gone. I’ve been able to collect a lot of that data, but it isn’t complete and it never will be, What a loss.

Caleb: I dunno, I didn’t have a functioning brain yet. (That’s a lie, I kind of had a brain)

14. Why do you think there is so much nostalgia for the MySpace era, especially in emo/emo adjacent circles? 

John: It was a golden age for emo music and the alternative rock/punk adjacent scenes at the time. A lot of important and influential sounds came from that era. It's iconic and showcased a wave of innovation that paved the way for a lot of the popular alt bands people like now. At the very least, it brought emo into the mainstream more. 

Bryson: Emo music is inherently reflective, so a ton of it is inevitable. But there was a long stretch of time (and maybe this was just the nature of being around college hipsters) where it felt like there were certain kinds of music you weren’t supposed to like. It was cool to be calculated and emotionless about your taste. Thankfully, that’s not the case anymore. (Thank you Jeff Rosenstock? Maybe 100 Gecs?) The newest wave of (both real and fake) emo has a refreshingly playful, passionate and genre-irreverent sound, which feels like it harkens back to the MySpace era. Not all of us contributing to it necessarily had MySpaces, but it feels nostalgic to me. It’s like we’re finally allowed to admit that there was something cool going on there. 

Keith: I think it either was the first social media platform a lot of people used from that era used and so there is always going to be nostalgia for it. LiveJournal was that for me.

But the other part is how MySpace is the key ingredient that let the entire scene function. It wasn’t just the music on profiles or the fans, it was also the way we all met and talked. Like I mentioned, I booked so many tours through MySpace, signed so many bands, met so many friends. It was the glue for all of that.

In the end, it was honestly an inoperable mess and filled with way too many ads and spam, so I get why people were ready to move on. But for that moment in time, it was king and it changed so many lives.

Caleb: That’s a good question, one that I can’t really answer because I missed out, but if I had to guess, I think it could potentially have something to do with the way the current DIY scene acts/sounds being kind of reminiscent of those days just by nature? I dunno though I’m just a dumb guy. 

15. What is your favorite track on the split? Why?

John: That's hard to say tbh. I think it depends on my mood. I think they all turned out sounding great and I think they sound even better together.

Keith: I CAN’T CHOOSE A FAVORITE, WHAT AM I, A MONSTER?!

It all feels like one piece to me now, they belong together. 

Caleb: The secret fifth song, the Skibidi-Toilet remix of "Hotel California." No but seriously I love all of these songs so much, everyone on this split is so talented and incredible, I am very lucky to have been involved!

 Who needs a Top 8 when there is only one Lonely Ghost Records?