While wandering around Baltimore Comic Con last fall, I happened upon a large vendor table playing metal music and loaded with vivid artwork.
There I met guitarist Josh Schwartz from A Sound of Thunder, a metal band based Northern Virginia who had just released an album and accompanying comic book.
Josh is a nice dude, they’re a local band, and they’re clearly into storytelling through their music. So of course I picked up the album. And it’s fantastic.
Týr recently posted this video on their Facebook page. Considering they only post to social media once every seven months, and I only check Facebook a few times per week. it was fairly fortuitous that I saw their post. Continue reading “Quick RIp: Tyr is Back!”
Now that I’m gearing up to publish the first chapter of The Grand Mythos of Úr’Dan come January, I need to make sure my gearing-up playlist is ready.
A fantasy series of mythic proportions deserves an equally mythic playlist. That’s right — I’m taking Jessie’s corner! Onward into myth and lore!
You may remember me writing a few weeks ago about Dead Sara’s new EP, Temporary Things Taking Up Space, and about how Jessie and I went to see them in DC last month.
Well, we also saw another band that night, upon whom I am very happy I stumbled.
Continue reading “Welles and the “Silky” Sounds of Early 90s Grunge”
So I’m trying a different style for this Tennessee playlist. Consider The Civil Wars as a trailer for the rest of the CD, where all the other songs play out the story from song 2 to 14. Notes written below each video are just for amusement.
The Civil Wars
Quick Notes: Originated in Nashville, tragically disbanded in 2014. TRAGICALLY. Hopefully one day they’ll get back together and go for that fifth Grammy… Continue reading “15 on the 15th – In my Tennessee mountain home, crickets sing in the fields near by”
Jessie and I are seeing Halestorm tonight at the UMBC Event Center. I am usually far better prepared for a concert, but this one snuck up on me.
Somehow, that makes it more exciting. Continue reading “Concert Homework: Halestorm Returns with a Heavy Vengeance”
Dead Sara occupies a strange space in music right now, at least for me.
I have never heard them on the radio, and when they venture to the east coast from their L.A. home, it always seems to be in smaller venues.
But I have trouble thinking of a band that more poignantly encapsulates my general sense of the world as a 29-year-old American. Their first two albums, 2012’s Dead Sara and 2015’s Pleasure to Meet You, provide nostalgia and newness in their sounds simultaneously.
Their new EP, Temporary Things Taking Up Space, has achieved the same.
Continue reading “I Wanna Be An Alien: Finding a Place in Dead Sara’s New EP”
I blare the music
To ensnare my mind
To spare myself the memory
Of the mayhem you voiced tonight – Continue reading “Misplaced Missive #210 – Background Music”
Welp, this summer should be awesome. Dead Sara dropped this single in early May with the announcement that they’ll be releasing a new EP, Temporary Things Taking Up Space, on June 8.
There’s been a bit of a lull in Dead Sara’s music releases ever since bassist Chris Null left the band in 2017. I had assumed that their next single would feature a new bassist with largely the same overall sound.
Wrong and wrong.
“Unamerican” comes as a three-piece where the lack of a bass guitar is never felt.
Emily Armstrong’s wailing combined with Siouxsie Medley’s distortion-laden riff achieves the same overwhelming feeling as their older songs.
Sean Friday continues his run as my favorite drummer with his energetic playing.
I don’t know if Temporary Things Taking Up Space will include any bassist, even as a studio performer. I hope not. I want to see what they do with the pieces they have.
Judging from “Unamerican” and “Heaven’s Got a Back Door”, Dead Sara will get on just fine.
Steve D
Booming resonance,
like the rumble of thunder
across the night sky.
This song inspired me to explore the tones of music through this series. I don’t really know where this is going, but I hope you enjoy.
Steve D
Evening Satellite Publishing 