Heartbreaking Bravery

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Tag: Bathroom at the Beach

February 22, 2016

2015: A Year’s Worth of Memories (Ryan Wizniak)

meatwave

As has been mentioned, multiple times over, few bands have had as large of an impact on the past several years of my life as Meat Wave. From the hundreds of listens I’ve given to their self-titled debut to their appearance at the first Heartbreaking Bravery showcase to their continued support of this site, it’s been a genuine privilege to have them as a part of my life. Delusion Moon was one of 2015’s fiercest records and the few times I got to see the band perform, I was always left floored. A large part of their draw has always been the frantic drum work of Ryan Wizniak (pictured above, bottom left). I’m thrilled to be bringing Wizniak into the fold of A Year’s Worth of Memories and I’m equally excited that he’s chosen to focus his piece on Meklbelly. Read it all below and remember to celebrate the people who continuously make a positive impact on your life.

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Of all the fantastic music that came out in 2015, and there was a lot of it, my absolute favorite track was “Piss Wizard”, by Melkbelly.  Recorded at Public House in Chicago and released via Automatic Recordings on piss-yellow and poo-brown 7”s, “Piss Wizard” is a truly unique slab of uncategorizable noise rock.  Within its just over 7 minute running time it contains every aspect of what makes Melkbelly so great: super bizarre tones, excellent guitar interplay, a range of vocal stylings, absurd drums and dynamic bass playing that glues everything together.

One of my favorite things about Melkbelly is every song makes the listener feel like they are entering a living breathing place. “Piss Wizard” is a perfect example of this. The track starts with a vocal intro from Miranda [Winters] and as soon as the rest of the instruments join in it creates the feeling of being strapped into some deranged ride that has flown straight into a tornado. Eventually the track lets up just long enough for one to regain their senses before it blasts into an explosive ending.

My band got to play a few shows with Melkbelly at the end of our long tour this fall/winter. One of them was at this place in Ann Arbor called The Metal Frat and it turned out to be an actual fraternity focused on musicians and music lovers. It was totally surreal and a lot of fun. At one point in the night we went on a beer run and noticed the frat next door doing their initiations, which involved blindfolded people being thrown into the backs of cars and some sort of all night organ playing ritual. So wild!

The last show we played with them was our homecoming show in Chicago which also featured our good friends Sophagus and Rad Payoff at our favorite venue, the Empty Bottle. Between all four bands we managed to sell out the show. I couldn’t believe it! It was great way to close out the year.

-Ryan Wizniak

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September 3, 2015

Melkbelly – Mnt. Kool Kid (Stream)

melkbelly
Photograph by Taylor Schneider

At the midweek marker, remarkable releases have continued to be doled out at a breakneck pace. In some ways, that overwhelming magnitude contributes to a slew of smaller releases getting overlooked at their time of release. Today’s featured items was one of those- and it was strong enough to fight off this recent batch to secure the majority of the focus. That, by no means, should detract from the value of the field it’s included in, which continues to cement 2015’s status as one of the strongest years for new music in recent memory. Full streams had the quietest output for the day, yielding only La Misma’s great full-length Kanizadi. Music videos had a heavier crop, boasting strong new clips from Made Violent, Microwave, SadGirl, Little Wings, and Martin Courtney. As always, the individual streams seemed to make the most sizable dent with formidable entries from the likes of Grubs, Fern Mayo, Yung, Ex-Breathers, Midday Veil, Modern Baseball, Drug Church, Brian Carpenter & The Confessions, and Battles.

While everything in the linked above paragraph is worth a click, it’s when Melkbelly‘s latest wound up making its way here that the feature spot really clicked. The band’s not the most well-known act but has secured some high-profile support lately- most notably via this excellent Talkhouse piece from Speedy Ortiz’s Sadie Dupuis. While the piece used the band’s recent outstanding Bathroom at the Beach 7″ as its focal point, they’ve managed to quietly unveil another new standalone track on their bandcamp (a place that’s composed entirely of standalone entries). “Mnt. Kool Kid” sacrifices some of the band’s immediate melodicism in favor of emphasizing their more aggressive noise tendencies. Over four minutes, the band rides the crest of a stark, menacing bass hum and uses it as a catapult for both a brief, outsider pop section and a towering main section that manages to come off as, almost paradoxically, a more expansive and contained version of Lightning Bolt at their best.

Bruising at every turn, “Mnt. Kool Kid” is a commanding show of force that highlights all of Melkbelly’s strongest looks and continues to see the quartet tightening their craft into something that feels genuinely powerful. Unflinching, unmoored, and unforgettable “Mnt. Kool Kid” is the sound of a band continuing to lock into a groove that should set them spinning to an explosive finish. For now, be content to sit back and watch the band burn everything they pass; sometimes the passages to the climactic moments wind up carrying even more meaning than the resolution. A song this good doesn’t deserve to succumb to a fate where it largely passes by unnoticed.

Listen to “Mnt. Kool Kid” below and get lost in an exhilarating course correction. Keep an eye on this site for further Melkbelly updates.

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