by Austin Harrington | Sep 9, 2023 | Album Reviews
Debut. Sophomore. Comeback. A tidy taxonomy to help index a band’s body of work, each entry carrying its own baggage of meaning and expectation. But there is no good name for a “second post-reunion album,” a shame when you consider how tricky it is to get this one...
by Austin Harrington | May 24, 2023 | Lists!
One of the many astounding facts often forgotten about the great city of Detroit is its status as the birthplace of techno music. Pioneering Black artists from the Motor City and its suburbs welded synths and rhythm into one unstoppable machine, doing for Woodward and...
by Austin Harrington | Feb 27, 2023 | Album Reviews
After 26 studio albums, surrealist rock outfit The Church have earned the right to release a low-stakes victory lap full of crowd-pleasers and lazy lyrics. Instead, they’ve given us The Hypnogogue. This multi-layered wonder doesn’t linger on the band’s past—it...
by Austin Harrington | Oct 25, 2022 | Album Reviews
The changing of the seasons is a magical characteristic of life in the Midwest. Each of those four liminal periods contains its own intoxicating blend of charm and anxiety, and most folks have a favorite — my partner loves spring-to-summer and the rejuvenation that...
by Austin Harrington | Jan 24, 2022 | Album Reviews
There’s a certain mood that descends in the midwest around the middle of February. Both holiday revelry and the subsequent January stoicism have fizzled, leaving in their wake a simmering resentment—and often outright anger—at the layers of deadly ice coating...