Church Tongue – Heart Failure

By Ryan G

Words: Ryan Getz

In Double Happiness a year and a half ago (was it that recently? Seems like forever ago) I witnessed a set from Church Tongue with their best buds Ghost Key. This was right after their infamous “guitarist-sets-self-on-fire” stunt (Google it) and a dude in the audience yelled out “If no one lights themselves on fire I’m leaving!” A curt nod from vocalist Michael Sugars to that quip precluded the set, which ignited a sense of intrigue in me about this band.

Set after set, I have been moved by this band’s authenticity. I’ve been a Christian for most of my life, and listening to a band talk about doubt, wrestling with hopelessness and suffering again and again can be a bit jarring. It’s a healthy sort of jarring though – and the band is clear that at the end of the day, they choose to have an optimistic view of existence, holding onto the mantra “Die Wild” (there’s a really fun track of the same name on the record, in case you’ve been living under a rock).

This mantra rings true for the duration of Heart Failure, and I feel like I could write a doctoral thesis on what it means to “Die Wild.” Now that this album is out (after two years in the making) I have the rare opportunity to view a record through the lens of friendships I’ve formed along the way, and get a different perspective on this life-slogan.

“I’m a little bit sick and I think it’s time to put this ill dog down,” are some darkly honest words that come up in “Acid Jesus.” This hearkens to the past of members of the band, and likely many of the listeners as well. Similarly, the line “I seem to have a kink in my neck from looking at the past” from “Skull Kid” jumped out at me. Something I’ve struggled with a bunch is obsessive focus on things I regret, even as I have head knowledge that it does me no good to not keep my head straight. We’ve all suffered from the emotional self-inflicted “kinks in the neck” from time to time.

The actual feel of the music is fairly unique to me as well. Though at a surface level some may paint this band as straightforward hardcore, what the band has managed to capture in the tone of the guitars and just the general way the songs flow is a mixture of classic rock and roll and all-out hold-nothing-back catharsis.

In conclusion, I wanted to say that Church Tongue has an energy that sounds like what would happen if Beartooth had pivoted away from from big hooks into all out angst. That isn’t a dis on Beartooth. But it goes to show the two bands compliment each other well in a show, which I got to experience at the Newport once. They both know what to do to keep the adrenaline going.

Bottom line: get your paws on Heart Failure. This guys are all about nonstop pursuit of life, running full speed into the ups and downs. That’s how I interpret “Die Wild.”