Michael Hyland – Stay there until you’re gone
Genre: Bedroom / Lo-fi Pop, Indie Pop
Most of us like to think of the music that we enjoy, or of the art that we create ourselves as something potent, revolutionary, and potentially life-changing. No artists, except for the ones that are jaded by decades of work, like to think of their efforts as just another day at the office.
Still, let’s face it, the majority of people just want a song or two to lift them out of the gloom once in a while. This includes ourselves. I woke up wanting to listen to The Cars. I did. It made the morning better. And, I have no grand statement to make about The Cars or their influence on my life. Their work demands little of me, and I of it.
We all need a good tune to get us through the drudgery of life with which we are oftentimes confronted. There’s a lack of new material that will satisfy this. Michael Hyland’s Stay there until you’re gone with its breezy arrangement, pleasant melodies, and confident vocal performance manages to do just this. It’s indie-pop to listen to before, or after work. This is pop music to let you know that all will be alright.
Ugly Mothers – Garden of Eden
Genre: Garage Rock, Alternative Rock
If there is one modern genre that I hate, it’s rock. Well, at least the thing that streaming services and radios dub as modern rock. It has barely any redeemable qualities about it. The worst trait, however, is its insistence on promoting these parodies of tough gals and guys as somehow approximating the spirit of rock music. Utter garbage!
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not above it. Like most people that got into music, I did so because of other people’s record collections. Most of them were older. All of them lived in Eastern Europe, not exactly the world capital of cool music. And, almost universally, these collections included a sizable helping of classic rock. I still listen to those occasionally.
Ugly Mothers’ Garden of Eden sounds like music made by a group of people that utterly want to see the world burn. For no reason. Without apologizing for it. I don’t know if that’s rock n’ roll, but it sure beats the would-be delinquent image that record labels try to push on poor saps that just want to hear some loud guitars and drink a few beers.
The guitar howl like a beast that’s been stabbed, against a rhythm section that sounds like they’ve just got out of session for an Italian Western. Then there’s the singing. I wouldn’t take investment advice for this guy. However, I would pack my stuff and get the hell out of Dodge if he told me he was about to burn the whole place down.
