The Wheel Workers Hope Beyond Hope For a Future For the Human Race Post-Authoritarian Takeover on Psychedelic Prog Pop Single “One More Thing To Say”

The Wheel Workers, photo by Chad Fontenot

“One More Thing To Say” is the title track to The Wheel Workers’ forthcoming album. Originally written in 2006 with the album essentially unfinished when the band broke up for awhile. But 20 years later with reworked and re-recorded songs it turns out the themes of authoritarianism are unfortunately even more relevant now with fascism ascendant globally. The song with its layers of atmosphere and melody around a solid rhythm and expert pacing is somehow reminiscent of a psychedelic pop band of the 90s coupled with King Crimson circa “Elephant Talk” or Hawkwind in the period represented by the album Quark, Strangeness and Charm. Spectral bell tones drift through as a melody while guitars sketch textures and Steven Higginboth sings about a world being dismantled by power mad political leaders who seem to be guided by nothing but ego and self-dealing but feigning vision except that execution of which is chaos and destruction. Higginbotham’s equally introspective and passionate vocals are reminiscent of Peter Gabriel in moments adding to the art rock feel of the song. But it is a song for the current moment sounding both on edge and clinging to the faintest of hope to navigate perilous times. The music video is part animated and collage stop motion depicting Ruben Ramires traversing the troubled earth and witnessing war erupting and perhaps the final conflict that ends everything. Surely a legitimate concern when a certain American president is talking about using nuclear weapons and the leader of a nation formerly part of the most powerful “communist” nation on earth is hinting and the same. We can only hope none of that comes to pass and that more humane heads prevail. Though the song has a touch of menace and urgency it also suggests that being aware and taking action with a little luck might get us through to better times. Watch the video for “One More Thing To Say” on YouTube and follow The Wheel Workers at the links provided.

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The Wheel Workers on Instagram

J’cuuzi’s Genre Bursting Psychedelic Post-Punk Single “Greasy Comb” Fuses the Ominous and the Otherworldly

J’cuuzi, photo courtesy the artists

When “Greasy Comb” starts you might think J’cuuzi is doing a lo-fi cover of “Edge of Seventeen” mixed with Sparks. But both impressions fade when the song picks up speed and the bass line waxes more funky and the vocals come in with ominous tones and a second set of vocals, or the first, processed as though through a vocoder. As the song progresses like a mutant post-punk song born of a mix of !!! and Black Moth Super Rainbow it swings into a nearly industrial beat with tracers of distorted, glitched out, melodic vocals as notes. Then the song’s layers of sound drop out into the creeping vocals spare percussion for a moment. The effect is psychedelic and like the band listened to a lot of Tran Am’s 2000 album Red Line. Live the band makes its own outfits and makes a performance art presentation of the music and even the recorded output is an embodiment of a willingness to push beyond genre limitations and standard music forms and structures. Listen to “Greasy Comb” on YouTube and follow J’cuuzi at the links below.

J’cuzzi on Instagram

Saint Kitten’s Moody Yet Liberating “Stay” is a Song About Casting Off the Comforts of Familiarity and Misplaced Nostalgia and Pursing the Fulfillment of Your Dreams

Saint Kitten, photo courtesy the artist

Saint Kitten’s “Stay” begins murky and creeping with a spare and resonant bass line accenting her vocal lines that seem to be about taking an assessment about a place and a life one is leaving for new opportunities and and the life you want rather than the one you have settled a bit into even when as it doesn’t serve your dreams. The song addresses the way comfort in familiarity can have a seductive effect on your mind coaxing you into a world and life you already know. The past can be a mixed influence as something that shapes us and perhaps puts a limit on our potential if we let it. The lens of nostalgia can cause us to view situations and experiences more romantically than is warranted. The song itself picks up pace and the fogginess of reverie clears and the words become simpler and repeat as though pushing through the tendrils of one’s old life to something perhaps uncertain but with more potential to fulfill dreams buried or smudged over by habit, routine and self-imposed sense of tradition. At turns minimalist and moody and orchestral the song doesn’t bear immediate comparisons to other artists but fans of late 90s Einstürzende Neubauten and Jenny Hval may appreciate the tones and moods of the song. Listen to “Stay” on YouTube and follow Saint Kitten at the links below.

saintkitten.com

Saint Kitten on Facebook

Saint Kitten on TikTok

Saint Kitten on Instagram




Hissuae’s Cinematic, Intimate and Transcendent Art Pop Single “Guilty Pleasure” Mixes the Personal With the Mythical

Hissuae, photo courtesy the artist

Hissuae breathes a sense of the intimate and cinematic into “Guilty Pleasure” with her ethereal and vulnerable vocals. The song’s arrangements are orchestral and minimal in their intertwining of sweeping piano and percussion so that the song feels like an immersive, living entity in the listening. In the background the barest touch of synth lends an otherworldly quality that puts the more human elements in the foreground and catches one’s full attention. The singer-songwriter’s singing style is reminiscent of the ways Kate Bush and Loreena McKennitt could intermingle the personal with the mythical in fine nuances of vocal expression. For a song that seems to be about transcending mundane, everyday existence that is the perfect tonal mode for the song to take. Listen to “Guilty Pleasure” on Spotify and connect with Hissuae on Bandcamp.