Queen City Sounds and Art

The Deep Layers of Progressive Drone and Abstract Melody in YULYSEUS’ “In the Dark Palaces of Both Our Hearts” is Like a Shared Journey Through the Chambers of the Subconscious

For a full minute of YULYSEUS’ “In the Dark Palaces of Both Our Hearts” it sounds like you’ve woken up in an immense indoor space with the sounds of motion and life in the distance. But as the track progresses, abstract melodic drones ease in and more concrete if difficult to identify sounds that reveal themselves to perhaps be the squealing of a train on a track at a station, some steam letting out now and then. Like the vehicle just pulled in and waiting on you to stir from barely conscious quiescence to wakefulness. And the roiling arc of drones is on a slow ascent as though tracing the sunrise. Distant sounds and those more up close incandesce with a hazy resolve that recedes as the sound of the track takes on more clarity and a simple synth progression glimmers toward the end, traveling back and forth with a gently panning effect like the sensation of your brain emerging from the ethereal energy of dreams into a wakeful silence. It feels like a journey but one of subtle states of consciousness more so than any actual or symbolic and one that feels born of the mind incorporating physical sonic stimuli into the experience of the subconscious. Listen to “In the Dark Palaces of Both Our Hearts” on Spotify and follow YULYSEUS on Instagram.

Queen City Sounds Podcast S2E31: Mike Baggetta

Jim Keltner, Mike Baggetta and Mike Watt, photo by Devin O’Brien

The trio of Mike Baggetta / Jim Keltner / Mike Watt released its second album Everywhen We Go on November 18, 2022 via BIG EGO Records. The record represents a further development of the project with its master players having come to a new level of comfort and one might say intuitive interplay. Most of the songs were at their core written by guitarist Baggetta with one by Watt and two by the collective and one hears in the results a flow of musical ideas that contains elements of jazz and surf rock but which evolves in unpredictable and fascinating ways for an eclectic album that bears the hallmarks of the trio’s collective roots in punk, art rock and the avant-garde. There is an intimacy in the recorded sounds even in its more rocking moments that draws you into its spontaneous energy. Keltner’s resume reads like a who’s who of rock music from the 1970s onward but his early interest in jazz coincides well with Baggetta’s free jazz chops and Watt’s own diverse and dynamic musicianship beyond his time in Minutemen, fIREHOSE, Stooges and numerous other projects. Everywhen We Go is an energetic yet relaxing listen that showcases the ability of three veteran musicians to play expertly to the song in a way both focused and free form.

Listen to our interview with Mike Baggetta on Bandcamp and listen to the new record for yourself and for more information on Baggetta and the trio please visit the links below.

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SOMOH Helps to Untangle the Emotional Mess We All Often Find Ourselves Within on the Poignantly Heartfelt “I Know You Care”

With spare guitar work and introspective, up close vocals and minimal drums SOMOH starts off “I Know You Care” on a particularly vulnerable footing. But as the song progresses the musical elements swell up, joined by a wash of synth as the emotional arc of the song intensifies before dropping back to a quieter moment and building again. It’s an elegant song about heartbreak and compassionate frustration with great nuance in its simplicity. It expresses how when you’re hurt initially it’s hard to know what to say sometimes so it’s best to just feel and sort out the words as you go. The line “I know you care/But you don’t show it well” in the last half of the song encapsulates so poignantly and succinctly an emotional complexity and nuance that goes beyond the typical love song and heartbreak tropes and gets to the reality of what it can often be like to be in a real relationship with an actual human being who may not be equipped with all the emotional intelligence to react or behave in the ways one would hope with the typically limited set of personal skills we are encouraged to learn in many cultures. SOMOH singer and songwriter Sophia Mohan’s breathy vocals and way of diving deep into that tangle of feelings with a clarity of feeling truly helps to clarify what could otherwise be purely messy. Listen to “I Know You Care” on Spotify and follow SOMOH at the links provided.

SOMOH on TikTok

SOMOH on YouTube

SOMOH on Instagram

Abby T. Imbues “I Want It All” With a Sense of Mystery and Swagger

Abby T. accomplishes the rare union of mystique and swagger on her track “I Want It All.” The almost classical music structure of the songs and the plucked string sounds that mark the bars and sync well with the finely syncopated percussion help to give the vocal delivery a sense of the personal confessional, the aspirational and the dismissal of the ill intent of others with great finesse. She warns all comers to talk to her nice and not to talk with their eyes, advising them to look into some kind of therapy to get over hating what they like. Sounds like a more kind and clever addressing of misogyny than you typically hear in any song. But the core idea of the song is not being ashamed to want the good things in life:“I don’t want the fame, I wanna get paid, I’m not ashamed, I want everyhing.” In that line Abby T. speaks for many of us in articulating the fact that sometimes everything in that essential and meaningful sense is pretty realistic and not the mere survival we’ve all come to accept unless we were born to wealth. Fan’s of the imaginative beats and poetic imaginations of Doja Cat and Kari Faux will appreciate what Abby T. is putting out with this track. Listen to “I Want It All” on Spotify and follow Abby T. at the links below.

Abby T. on TikTok

Abby T. on Instagram

Heradel’s Intimate and Otherworldly “Mother” is the Pop Equivalent of a Space Rock Song

Heradel taps into multiple sonic and emotional resonances with her single “Mother.” The treatment on her vocals brings together a feeling of intimacy and the otherworldly. The rhythmic line, the bass, is like something out of a Fad Gadget song but the organic, percussive background sounds give the song a gently tactile feel that grounds its more ethereal drift and bursts of sounds that rise up to accompany the singing as it floats into luminous fades. In moments it’s reminiscent of Sinead O’Connor circa “I Am Stretched on Your Grave” but with the earthy alien vibe of late 90s Björk. It’s an enveloping piece of work like the experimental pop equivalent of a space rock song and not the kind of music one would expect from an artist with cultural roots in Cuba. Listen to “Mother” on Spotify and follow the Los Angeles and Havana-based Heradel at the links below.

Antics & Collectables’ Debut Single “Breaking Point” is an IDM Infused Downtempo Catharsis of Ambient Anxiety

“Breaking Point” is the debut single by the Antics & Collectables collective based out of London. With the collage of imagery in the music video the downtempo IDM flavor of the track hits like something that emerged out of late 90s alternative hip-hop, Warp Records releases, Air’s abstract downtempo jazz funk pop and Dilla’s most haunted left field experiments in pure mood sculpting. There is a great use of tension building and release and informal rhythm and structure that really works for a song that seems to be about someone who feels like they’ve been on this ascent of building anxiety and anticipation for some relief from that swell of energy, like being on a constant simmer and not quite a boil in the psyche. The dark melodies, the rising arpeggios of tone, the sweeps of white noise and low end pulse, the soft yet jittery percussion have a textural as well as musical quality that the abstract and dreamlike imagery of the video somehow captures perfectly. Like you’re stuck in a quietly menacing dream waiting to wake up but not quite being able to reach into the light of consciousness. There’s something beautiful about this sustained feeling as that prolonged wait finds some release as the song ascends and descends in the roller coaster of its tonal and emotional progression to the end. Watch the video for “Breaking Point” on YouTube and follow Antics & Collectables on Instagram.

Dre Ishmail’s “Lost In My Thoughts” is a Harrowing Depiction of Being Trapped In One’s Own Emotional Labyrinth

Dre Ishmail’s “Lost In My Thoughts” begins with the sound of reaching a voice mail prompt and haunting tones that border on atonal but are really disorienting and out of step with any melody. Dark, shimmering, icy anti-melodies cast in slow spirals almost anchored by a loping bass line is not at all the typical sound you’re expecting on a hip-hop track. But Ishmail’s lyrics about being trapped in the recursive patterns of mind and getting stuck re-litigating your thoughts and feelings and overthinking even overthinking itself captures perfectly that feeling of emotional paralysis in the form of one’s mind going over the same thoughts ad infinitum that can happen when you’re undergoing a variety of mental health episodes without any clear path out of that pattern that maybe at one point served to keep one from dipping further down the levels of psychological trauma response. But the behavior has become a rut so deep that it can seem almost comfortable simply due to the fact that it has become your new normal. The unsettling and nightmarish nature of the music sets a tone that while not aberrant, getting lost in one’s own personal labyrinth is unhealthy but that the expression of that discomfort can be a signal of an awareness that leads to acting to making the changes necessary to move on from the psychological stagnation. The song is pure hip-hop but it eschews all the musical tropes that have become rote production styles in the past decade and Ishmail’s gift for creating such an original soundscape is a real achievement for the art form. Watch the video for “Lost In My Thoughts” on YouTube and follow Dre Ishmail at the links provided.

Dre Ismail on Facebook

Dre Ismail on Twitter

Dre Ismail on Instagram

Clouds in a Headlock Deliver Downtempo, Cosmic, Psychedelic Hip-Hop With “Phantasia”

Clouds in a Headlock, photo courtesy the artists

The psychedelic and downtempo chillout beats for “Phantasia” by Clouds in a Headlock with its imaginative stream of consciousness lyrics with the project’s various MCs delivering bars as the song sits back into a transporting passages between blocks of words like getting otherworldly, free verse meditations on organic spiritual observations born of navigating a confusing world as a thoughtful person. The music video coupled with the song with a cast of characters like street mystics wandering a large urban park relocated to the edge of town is reminiscent of a fan video for a Boards of Canada song. The first rapper presented projects his face beyond his immediate body in one of the most beautifully visually disorienting parts of a particularly colorful video treatment like a long lost cable access video from a time when you could find some of the strangest and most original examples of home grown cinema around before it became accessible to anyone with a smart phone. This lends the whole experience of seeing and listening to the song an air of mystery that is often missing in modern media. But that mystery comes with an inviting energy that emanates from the figures we see and the music that’s lush and easy on the brain and gently transporting. It’s a remarkable piece of work that recalls the IDM-esque, ambient flavored works of other practitioners of psychedelic hip-hop like A Tribe Called Quest and Digable Planets. Witness the wondrous strangeness of “Phantasia” on YouTube and follow Clouds in a Headlock, flagship artists of the ŌFFKILTR circle at the links below.

Clouds in a Headlock on Instagram

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1st Base Runner’s Video for “Dark Drive Through The Canyon” is Like a Deep Mood Michael Mann Film in Miniature

1st Base Runner, photo courtesy the artist

1st Base Runner’s “Dark Drive Through The Canyon” is perhaps best experienced by watching the music video directed by Dilly Gent. In the video Tim Husmann from the project sits high on a box inside a convertible while driving around Long Beach told to remain absolutely still despite the cold and having just filmed the underwater music video for “Man Overboard” earlier the same day. It suits the lush and dramatic ambiance of the song and we see Husmann in focus as a nightscape and evening lights and daytime views stream by behind him out of focus and mixing up our own sense of time. Like a short Michael Mann film with the industrial part of Long Beach and its harbor and highways as the backdrop. The cascading, bright tones fading out in sequence swimming in a breeze of dim light drone are cinematic in quality themselves but in context of the video it creates a meaning and a mood we recognize in taking a moment to contemplate a peaceful core of our mind even as events and a dystopian state of the world streams by that we can and will have to engage with at some point but from which we can take a break now and then for moments of Zen. Watch the video on YouTube and follow 1st Base Runner at the links below.

1st Base Runner on TikTok

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1st Base Runner on Instagram

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Snailbones’ Caustic and Jagged “Dead Inside” Has the Same Scrappy and Irreverent Spirit of Classic Chicago Noise Rock

Snailbones is from Portland, Oregon but from jump “Dead Inside” sounds like the trio has been steeped in Chicago noise rock and early post-punk hardcore. Think Shellac (and of course Big Black), Articles of Faith, Naked Raygun and more recently Meat Wave. That angular, caustic guitar sound and scrappy spirit that made a lot of the aforementioned so compelling. And yes, the group has had some of its music mastered at Electrical Audio in Chicago with some tracks done by Bob Weston and Snailbones plans to record with Steve Albini in March 2023. So those bonafides check out. But none of that wouldn’t matter if music didn’t measure up. “Dead Inside” is almost accusatory in tone regarding the source of what leads to feeling dead inside and the song dynamics go beyond choppy, cutting, mutant punk aggression. The lyric lines and the music paired with it sound like they’ve been rough cut and stretched out with the jagged places left in place so that the potential danger hangs in every moment. Listen to “Dead Inside” on Spotify and follow Snailbones at the links below.

Snailbones on Instagram

Snailbones on YouTube

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