The State of Durango Arts

art entertainment food drink music nightlife Thursday, August 17, 2017

DGO

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We ask local leaders in theater, dance, visual arts, performance space, and the literary scene what’s working, what could be improved, and what their big dreams are

THE STATE OF

DURANGO

ARTS dgomag.com

Also: The surprising life of a brewer, LAN parties, Husky Burnette, and Robert Randolph

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DGO Magazine

STAFF

What’s inside Volume 2 Number 43

August 17, 2017

Chief Executive Officer

10 The life of a brewer

Douglas Bennett

If you’re a brewer at a large brewery, your day might start at 5 a.m. by saying hello to the overnight brewer, being careful not to make too much noise as you approach, lest he mistake you for a ghost in the cavernous recesses of the brewing floor.

V.P. of Advertising David Habrat V.P. of Marketing Kricket Lewis Founding Editors Amy Maestas David Holub Editor/ creative director David Holub 375-4551

17 The DEA in charge of

the federal cannabis

program? Ha!

Staff writer Patty Templeton ptempleton@bcimedia.com Contributors Christopher Gallagher

Courtesy of huskyburnette.net

»» Husky Burnette

Alexi Grojean Meggie J

From the Editor

4

Love it or Hate it

6

Street Style

8

Sound

Downtown Lowdown

8

Album Reviews 9 10 Beer

dholub@bcimedia.com

Katie Cahill

4

5

Bryant Liggett

Durango’s LAN parties At a LAN (local area network) party, people gather together with their computers and all other necessities for sustained gaming in the company of others. To see venues packed to the gills with people sitting side by side can only be likened to a viking feast where PCs are the main course.

Jon E. Lynch Brett Massé Lucy Schaefer Cooper Stapleton Cyle Talley Robert Alan Wendeborn Advertising 247-3504

It’s a Catch-222222, where the foxen are guarding the henhice (I believe those are the correct plurals): The federal agency responsible for upholding the laws that establish cannabis as a Schedule I substance is also the federal agency responsible for overseeing research on said substance. It might just be me, but I see some problems here.

11 Get Outta Town 16 Pages 16 Weed

Seeing Through 16 the Smoke

18 Savage Love 19 Happening 20 DGO Deals 22 Horoscope/ puzzles 23 First Person

Reader Services

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@dg

375-4570

8

DGO is a free weekly publication distributed by Ballantine Communications Inc., and is available for one copy per person. Taking more than five copies of an edition from a distribution location is illegal and is punishable by law according to Colorado Revised Statute 18-9-314.

Interview with a bluesman Husky Burnette’s (above) hill country growl is a greasy cast iron pan of a voice. One minute it’s cooking a sweet, slow meal and the next it’s throttling through the kitchen at you.

Tell us what you think!

Got something on your mind? Have a joke or a story idea or just something that the world needs to know?

Send everything to editor@dgomag.com

/dgomag

@dgo_mag

ON THE COVER Durango artist Woodman “Woody” Forester poses for a portrait inside DGO headquarters sometime last week.

David Holub/DGO

DGO Magazine is published by Ballantine Communications Inc., P.O. Drawer A, Durango, CO 81302

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dg

[CTRL-A]

[ love it or hate it ]

Car-eating David Holub |DGO editor

Love it

More questions I always wanted to ask an actor (like, um, do cast members hook up?)

P

icking up where we left off last week, with my interview of local actor and Durango High School theater teacher Ben Mattson. (To read Part I of the interview, go to DGOmag.com.): What’s the most positive thing about acting for you?

I don’t know how to describe it, exactly. I can feel really strongly about a performance, but there’s another level beyond that when you can literally feel that you have the audience in your hand. When that clicks in, it’s a pretty amazing feeling, that everyone is right here and you can manipulate that and control it.

What’s the worst part about doing theater?

Theater’s very emotionally, energetically, physically taxing – and all of that is actually great. It’s why I love theater. But because it’s so collaborative and collective, you don’t get to do it just when you want to. Like, if there’s a show and you just don’t feel like doing a show today, you still have to do the show and do it like you really want to do it ... that ... day.

What does everyone think about actors/theater that is either true or not true?

I feel like I live in such a theater bubble that I don’t know if I have a real concept of what people think.

I think there’s a pretty strong perception that people who perform are naturally extroverted. There’s a lot – and I would count myself in this group – of really dynamic performers onstage who tend to be quite shy and introverted and socially awkward in real life ... I think it would be surprising to people how many actors that they see onstage that are big and alive and dynamic, how small and quiet they might be in real life.

What else is true or not true about theater?

I think the iceberg metaphor is really appropriate. You see this little tip of it that’s really put-together and very polished and (a show) seems almost easy. But there’s so much work and energy and failed attempts at things that go into a production. The coordination of so many elements coming together to show this tiny tip of the iceberg.

Like what?

so much of your time and energy and focus, especially if you’re doing summer theater. The people you work with are the people you see every day for countless hours, and it’s hard to get outside that bubble. So it does become hard to find connections outside of that. So if you’re someone who’s looking to hook up, it’s hard to look outside of that bubble when you’re in it.

It’s every facet of it. You see a set: Someone could think, “Oh, I could build that.” But it’s so much more than that. It’s someone reading through and analyzing a script, not only for its function but also what can you artistically bring to the table. How can the set tell the story, too? And there’s renderings and drawings and draftings and models that are built, and all of those have a rough draft, then several revisions, and a final draft to build. That’s the same with the lighting and how that unifies with the set. That’s a gap that has to be bridged. Same with costumes. It starts with analyzing the play, analyzing the characters. And what is the world of the director’s vision and how is that incorporated into the set, and the lighting; how does that affect the costumes? How do we fill the world with props? So when it all comes together, it seems so unified and easy.

It makes sense. But it starts [makes shape of an iceberg with his hands] – I keep making icebergs [laughs].

Other perceptions: There are no inhibitions backstage. Everyone’s in a state of undress. Everyone’s seen each other naked.

What else about theater is true or not true?

Which is why I like directing, because it’s all process. Once it’s open, my job as a director is over, that moment to really see the performers take it as their own and really take ownership of the production. It’s that moment of letting the wounded bird fly. Not that they’re wounded birds ... but kind of [laughs]. Just like something you’re trying to care for and nurture and build into something that can stand on its own to let it flourish and let go of it is a really beautiful feeling to sort of sit back and watch it fly.

I’m at a loss. What are some perceptions that you have?

Cast members hook up.

I think it’s like anything. There are a lot of people in theater that are very interested in hooking up. I think it’s dependent on the person. I think there are a lot of bank tellers interested in hooking up. Humans, on a spectrum, are interested in hooking up. I think the thing about theater that makes that stereotype seem true ... it takes

To varying levels, that’s sort of true.

Because you have to change backstage; there’s quick changes that have to happen like in tight corners and stuff. It does sort of warrant a loss of those inhibitions. I would say there’s some truth to that, but it’s not every show, every cast.

What’s your favorite job in theater, whether it’s acting, directing ...

They all have their perks. I think my favorite, favorite place in the process of theater is when I’m an actor in the rehearsal process ... I like performing for audiences as well, but there’s something really magical about the process of putting it all together that really feeds me. The performance doesn’t feed me as much as the process of building it.

It all comes down to transitional periods, those times where you are between destinations or activities, where one activity has stopped and another has yet to begin, a no man’s land of lost time.

I like work and I like home, but the 15 minutes in between I could do without. I like Durango and I like Santa Fe, but the 3.5 hours in between is a hassle, no matter the scenery or the podcast I have playing.

Enter food, the easiest way to pass time since sleeping. When I’m eating something delicious, time ceases to exist. I’m in a state of flow, a trancelike disposition that I emerge from only when my stomach tells my brain to stop. Once, I was at a crawfish boil and stood at a troth-like table and ate shellfish, sausage, okra, and corn until I could eat no longer, or about 15 minutes. Or maybe it was 45, I lost count.

This is why food in the car is so satisfying. It satiates us physiologically and hijacks our perception of time. And the saltier, sweeter, and fattier the food, the more a boring, passive experience disappears into the ether.

—— David Holub

Hate it Here are the things that happen when I eat in the car: I will drop half a blue raspberry Airhead, and because I smash Airheads in my palm and form them into a ball, it will roll under my car seat and become under-ass auto grime because I will forget to retrieve it when I get to my destination.

I will spill fries. I will think I have found all of these fries, but inevitably, there will be one on the ceiling or in the seat-back pocket. Fry smell will not leave the car for months.

I will spill coffee. There will be a pool of caffeine in the cup holder and no napkins to clean it, not because of me dropping the coffee but because the lid popped off as I picked it up.

Here are things that happen when other people eat in my car: I end up wanting to kill friends because are you kidding me? WHO BRINGS BBQ IN A CAR? And no, you may not eat your Burger King bullshit in my backseat. Oh, it’s only chips? Great. There’s potato dust all over the passenger seat and you left trash in the door. Not cool.

—— Patty Templeton

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[gaming]

Extra Life | Brett Massé

Welcome to the beautiful, surreal world of LAN parties

T

he sun was setting, casting linear shadows on the floor of the conference room. The failing light gave way to the ambient glow of monitors, blinking routers, computer towers, and the open fridge.

A din of restrained enthusiasm permeated the air as people danced around tables, caught in a bizarre waltz with cables and wires. Hands rested over mice and keyboards.

Eyes fluttered and stared. More people gathered as the light kept fading from the sky and kept growing from the room. At some point, people started shouting and cheering, leaping from their chairs, propelled by a skyward fist. Sometimes they’d be celebrating, sometimes they wouldn’t be. Most times they were smiling.

These eyes, this attention, this enthusiasm, was not for this reality.

Everyone was sitting together in this huge room and sidestepping with each other into a different world, their computers participating as the vehicle. Everyone was joining together to re-meet as someone else, somewhere else. We’ve all seen a couple people standing side by side at an arcade cabinet, or sitting in front of the TV on the couch with controllers in hand.

You may even see a few people standing together outside, attention drawn to the world through their phones.

This isn’t that, though.

A LAN (local area network) party is quite a different beast. People gather together with their computers and all other necessities for sustained gaming in the company of others. To see rooms, garages, conference halls, or event centers packed to the gills with people sitting side by side is a scene I can only liken to some sort of viking feast where PCs are the main course and everyone is eagerly dining on a reality just next to ours.

Moments in these spaces can become totally surreal. When the context of the world around you changes,

suddenly, you’re not caring about getting the laundry done, mowing the lawn, or that stressful class you have to go to. Suddenly, you’re deeply concerned about how your teammate is going to rescue the hostages without your covering fire, who is going to make the game point by successfully capturing the enemy’s’ top secret documents, or how you could possibly operate this towering machine of horrors deftly enough to toss a basketball. History is made each night with instant celebrities in a brand new scene.

How is this a thing? Why do LAN parties continue to happen in an age where the internet has connected and networked people across the globe, where you can enjoy the fruits of accomplishment and glory in the safety of your living room? There’s a million ways out there now to play games with other people without the need to be anywhere near them. We hear about it, even participate in such things from time to time. But having people together, that many, with that kind of care and intention, is beautiful. It’s rare.

It’s special when you can separate yourself from the rocky landscape of humanity a bit and settle into a world of your own, a persona of your own. It’s special to find people who will accept you for those things you can’t normally be in everyday life.

It’s special to be around people who understand so well because they’re so similar in some ways, but also pleasantly different in most. It is undoubtedly special that this kind of thing can happen in a small town like Durango on a regular basis.

There is always going to be work, or kids, or school, health problems, financial problems, obligations, and so on, to take up our time and our lives.

There’s always going to be something else to do. Perhaps sometimes that something should be getting together with friends in the dying light and playing games for hours, refusing the

Courtesy of Brette Massé

»» A Durango LAN party in recent years. daily routine, stepping off the conveyor belt of procedure so that you end up wondering where you are a couple times through the night. Leap into that other reality, waltz with network cables, shout until your voice is raspy, cheer when we accidentally trip the

circuit breaker, sweep up the crumbs, and shamble home in the rising sun.

Do not stop until you have saved the world and fallen in love.

Brett Massé is currently playing “We Walk the Dirt Sea” by Ciara Burkett

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Patty Templeton/DGO

»» Katie Chicklinski-Cahill: Pin-wearer.

DURANGO STREET STYLE:

ENAMEL PINS Sometimes you’re bopping along minding your own business when WAPOW! Coolness splatters across your path. This week, that raditude came in the form of Katie Chicklinski-Cahill, the Arts and Entertainment editor of the Durango Herald. Ms. Katie sports fantabulous 1950s-style glasses and a collection of enamel pins.

The pin theme of the day was horror. DGO asked her what was up with that.

“I like horror movies. I think it’s because I’m an anxious person. No, seriously. There was this article that said that anxious people tend to gravitate toward horror movies because it is a nice, contained anxiety. Do you know what I mean? If you’re nervous, you have a reason to be nervous and it takes away some of the anxiety or gives it a healthier outlet. For an hour and a half, I can be nervous about Freddy (Krueger) and not bills or that lump or the scabs or ya know [laughs]?

[When asked if Chicklinkski-Cahill often had lumps or scabs, she said] I haven’t checked today. Why? Do you see any?! [laughs] My Eraserhead pin is really cool. What else do I have? Eraserhead is good. Marge (Simpson) is pretty awesome. If Eraserhead and Marge fought, who do you think would win? Look at her. [growls and shakes pin] I think pins are cool because it’s not a big commitment and they’re under the radar. I can still have my work outfit on and accessorize, jazz it up, ya know?”

—— Patty Templeton 264429

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[sound]

HUSKY BURNETTE TALKS

DEEP BLUES AND DIRTY ROCK »» An interview

A backyard BBQ chock full of funeral potatoes and PBR, in a tent in a Tennessee field with the sweltering sun fighting a with a modern monsoon for attention, or in a basement bar lit exclusively bluesman

by Christmas lights, or tumbling from a chopper sitting next to you in traffic – they’re all the natural habitats for hearing Husky Burnette’s thunder-go-boom boogie and blues.

Burnette’s hill country growl is a greasy cast iron pan of a voice. One minute it’s cooking a sweet, slow meal and the next it’s throttling through the kitchen at you. He’ll slide guitar your hips to a sway and make them hard days shuffle past faster.

The Durango Blues Train will host Husky Burnette and Caroline Crews, but sorry, dudes, if you didn’t snag tickets early, you’re outta luck. The Blues Train is sold out.

DGO spoke to Burnette about deep blues, influences, and what’s coming up next.

Deep blues. What is it?

One word: Real.

We just got back from Clarksdale, Mississippi, today, been there all weekend. That’s deep blues. Deep blues is a feeling. Last night we went into a place called Red’s in Clarksdale, old-school juke joint. Still the same as ever, there’s tarps tied up to the ceiling so it doesn’t leak and man, the music that was playing in there last night. You walk in and everything is dimly lit. There’s no lights on but red rope lighting and, man, that’s it. Deep blues, music like you hear at Red’s, it’s where rock ’n’ roll and everything came from.

Cats like R.L. Burnside, Junior Kimbrough, and the likes, that’s deep blues. The roots of it all. Trance blues. Trance music.

Is the blues quintessentially working-class music?

Yes and no. Everybody comes to a blues festival.

Everyone shows up. People that live there and walked from a couple streets down. People that flew in from outta the country.

But, in its roots, the blues is definitely a working-class kinda thing. It started with people working on the farm and sitting around on the porch, so yeah, it definitely stems from that.

Do hard political times make the blues more important to folks?

I think so. There’s a lot of people pissed off right now and music is definitely a release, whether you are writing it or performing it or listening to it.

I think music right now is important, period. What’s going on out there in the world is not cool. I look to music for everything. It’s my daily vitamin.

What’s a song that inspires the hell outta you?

There’s a song called “Who Knows,” by Jimi Hendrix on “Band of Gypsies.” That album is very special to me.

That album, I would say it’s in my top three. I don’t know what the other two albums would be, but that’s in there.

That first track, “Who Knows,” it’s a really, really good song for me. I love that song so much and I want to play it so badly and we’ve done it a couple of times, not all the way through and not really singing on it, just jamming, but that’s as far as I’ll go on it because it’s such a good song. Even if I had fun playing it, it wouldn’t sound like it does on that album, which is amazing.

What’s influenced you that most folks wouldn’t suspect?

There’s a lot of heavy metal bands that influence me on the same level as Hendrix or R.L. Burnside. Buzzov•en and Black Sabbath. Black Sabbath may be an obvious choice, but for me, that gets it. Heavier stuff like Entombed. They were ’90s death metal and I started off playing that stuff.

What dead musician would you want to come haunt one of your shows?

Hendrix would be cool. That would be it.

What do you think he’d say after he saw you play?

Pittsburgh. We got four songs apiece on the split, and one of the songs on my side is a collaboration with Six Speed Kill. We’re really excited about it.

You tour everywhere. What’s your tour philosophy?

We moved to Colorado at the end of last year. It’s a more central point so we can go more places. We can go to the West Coast a lot easier and Tennessee without trouble.

Oh, man. I don’t know how to answer that. [Laughs] Hopefully, it would be something cool, but I have no idea.

This year, the schedule, we had some making up to do.

I took over the booking myself at the end of last year. So this year, I put my nose down and filled up the year.

What about a living musician you’d want to hang with and see you play?

You gotta keep doing it, keep doing it, keep doing it to make ends meet. We try to stay on the road.

Lee Michaels. He’s this guy from back in the ’70s who was a singer, songwriter, vocalist, organ player.

He used to do just him and a drummer and that was it. My uncle turned me on to him and his self-titled album called “Lee Michaels.” It has some heavy stuff on it. I really got into him when I was younger.

Whatchya got in the works?

We just got done recording in Pittsburgh while on this tour. It’s my favorite stuff, right now. We had Joe Bent on drums. He used to play in Left Lane Cruiser and White Trash Blues Revival. He’s on tour with us. What we’re doing is recording a split 12-inch with Six Speed Kill for Rusty Knuckles. They’re thrash speed rock from

You’re about to play on a steam engine train. Ever play anywhere weirder than that?

It’s probably the most unique setting I’ve ever played. [Laughs] I’ve played some weird places like some pretty rough biker clubhouses and those have been some strange nights, but the steam train is probably the most unique so far. Playing on a moving vehicle is gonna be up there.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

— Patty Templeton DGO Staff Writer

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[sound]

Downtown Lowdown | Bryant Liggett

Robert Randolph and the church of rock ’n’ roll

T

he music of Robert Randolph began in a church.

But your stance on the god, and heaven and hell thing won’t infringe on your inclusion in this fan club. Worship who or what you want, read the Bible from cover to cover or ignore the whole thing altogether. As a music lover, you’re welcome into Randolph’s church.

It’s a place with a gospel and rock ’n’ roll soundtrack where pedal steel is the instrument of choice and high energy blues and funk ring from the stage. If you can’t find your way to liking his sound, then perhaps you do need a prayer, some salvation, a little help or perhaps a trip to the record store.

Robert Randolph & the Family Band will perform at the Animas City Theatre on Saturday.

Randolph’s career as a musician started as a player in “The Church of the Living God,” a nationwide Pentecostal branch found throughout the Northeast and into the Midwest. It was this church that made Sunday Mass musically interesting, ditching the traditional organ for the pedal steel guitar, and elevator-music-style hymns for high-energy gospel tunes.

Music is a major factor in these services, a mix of traditional gospel and high-energy blues. The world may be a better place if all churches put music at the forefront.

“Growing up in my church, (pedal steel’s) the main instrument. I grew up watching the older guys playing pedal steel, and I always wanted to be like those guys and wanted to develop my own style like Stevie Ray Vaughn; I wanted to play like that on the pedal steel,” said Randolph. “It was always this high-energy style of music that a lot of people compare it to blues, and the early days of Elvis, rock ’n’ roll, Chuck Berry and all of that. That’s how we grew up. It’s a cool thing, you know?”

The music has become so ingrained with the church, its been given its own name; “Sacred Steel” is

Bryant’s best Thursday: Missy and the Bluetones host The Blues Jam, 7 p.m. No cover.

Moe’s, 937 Main Ave. Information: 2599018.

Saturday: Robert Randolph and the Family Band, 9 p.m. $35/$40. Animas City Theatre, 128 E. College Drive. Information: 799-2281.

the genre classification for the gospel music played in these churches, and Randolph was a prodigy and young contributor to the albums the Arhoolie record label released 20 years ago that showcased this style. It’s what got him noticed by Luther Dickinson of the North Mississippi All Stars; Dickinson was putting together a project that recorded under the name “The Word” with John Medeski and they needed a pedal steel player. That was the start that pulled Randolph from his day job and into various clubs in New York City.

The Family Band came soon after, which is now a six-piece funk, rock, and blues powerhouse, featuring multiple members that share the name Randolph.

Your church can be wherever you need it to be. While Randolph’s church, the actual building he first began playing pedal steel in back in Newark, New Jersey, may not have him attending like he had in the past, he’s still a member and gets there when he can. He hasn’t turned his back on those early days; he’s just found his church now can exist where he plays.

“Getting out and playing for the world, playing all over the place, now that’s my church. We travel to various cities, rock concerts, festivals and all that, and bring forth this rock ’n’ roll, bluesy, and spiritual experience,” said Randolph. “It’s a wonderful thing.”

Courtesy of Red Light Management

»» Robert Randolph

Bryant Liggett is a freelance writer and KDUR station manager. liggett_b@fortlewis.edu.

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[sound] What’s new

The Yawpers, hailing from Denver/ Colorado’s Front Range, return with a doozy of a follow-up to their 2015, Johnny Hickman (Cracker)-produced Bloodshot debut. I’m guessing the majority of their fans would have

New at

Aug. 18 Grizzly Bear,“Painted Ruins” What is left behind after we crumble, and what masks do we don when we are nothing but rubble? These are the questions central to “Painted Ruins,” Grizzly Bear’s subdued new record out on RCA. This is their first album since 2012’s “Shields,” and while it doesn’t feel completely removed from the prior sounds of their discography, “Painted Ruins” definitely stands on its own. The prominent vocal melodies of previous records are still there, but utilized sparsely, lending more gravitas to the emotional peaks that these harmonies represent. The instruments are lush, but also subdued in the same way the vocals are, with a generous amount of reverb, giving even flashy brass some wavy lines. 2017 has been a banner year for indie, and “Painted Ruins” lands far on the positive side of the spectrum of releases.

Thy Art Is Murder,“Dear Desolation” I went to a show a few years ago in Farmington for which Thy Art Is Murder came all the way from Australia to pummel our faces in, and it was one of the best shows I have ever been to.

On this go-around, the trio of Nate Cook, Jesse Parmet, and Noah Shomberg were produced by The Replacements’ Tommy Stinson (who also contributes 12-string guitar on “Reunion” and “piano freakout” on “Face to Face to Face”) and Alex Hall (Robbie Fulks, J.D. McPherson, Pokey LaFarge, JC Brooks). “Boy in a Well is a

That was right when their last album, “Holy War,” came out, and since that moment, I have been looking forward to their new record. Lo and behold, it pummeled my face in. The band has been trying to avoid its typical categorization of deathcore, and that is immediately apparent with the album opener “Slaves Beyond Death.” The whole record is wonderful if you are still lamenting what happened with that last Suicide Silence album. Though the album does have brief moments of quiet, for the majority, subtlety is not a word that crossed the songwriters’ minds. And sometimes that isn’t a bad thing.

ambitious tale is told both through twelve muscular, unpredictable rockabilly tracks,” wrote Ben Kaye on the website Consequence of Sound. Album cover art and the accompanying comic book feature the artwork of Legendary Shack Shakers frontman J.D. Wilkes.

“American Man” made many critics’ Best of 2015 lists and it would be of little surprise should “Boy in a Well” do the same.

concept record about just what its title suggests. Set in WWI-era France, the story follows a mother who abandons her child down a well, where he grows up alone and afraid. The complex and

bands that still revel in the electronic body music scenes of some of the smokier cities. The digitized guitars, triggered drum samples, and movie soundbites have consistently been co-opted by top 40 music for years

Recommended for fans of Deer Tick, William Elliott Whitmore, and The Replacements, or at-times, label mates Scott H. Biram, Banditos, Legendary Shack Shakers, or Ha Ha Tonka.

—— Jon E. Lynch KDUR_PD@fortlewis.edu

now. This new KMFDM will not bring them into the limelight unfortunately.

But those that still share the desire for boot-stomping hard dance beats will find plenty to genuinely love here.

—— Cooper Stapleton

DURANGO’S LARGEST PREMIUM CANNABIS DISPENSARY

Jerry Douglas,“What If” If Bela Fleck is the god emperor of bluegrass, Jerry Douglas easily has a spot on the council of high lords, and he may be attempting to overthrow Fleck. After winning 14 Grammys and performing on over 2,000 releases, Douglas presents a new album of his own design, melding local genre faves bluegrass and jam bands (it’s a genre). Some of the tracks straddle that line between jam band and freeform jazz in a really stellar way, with “Cavebop” a highlight in that sense.

KMFDM,“Hell Yeah” This is the 20th album from industrial warheads KMFDM, and it is probably their most essential one in almost 20 years. Industrial music has a strange relationship with the mainstream, wherein success eludes even the biggest

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Available: Friday Aug. 18, via Chicago’s Bloodshot Records on compact disc and standard black vinyl. Be one of the first 500 to pre-order the vinyl for a shot at the deluxe version on Transparent Blue & Black Swirl Vinyl. All vinyl orders come with a digital download in various formats. All pre-orders, regardless of format, include a copy of the “Boy in the Well” companion comic book.

been just fine had they stayed the course of their unique brand of heavy slide-guitar-infused-psychobilly-headband-soaked Americana rock ’n’ roll.

Sonically, the record doesn’t stray too terribly far, if at all, from that. Thematically, the band jukes left while crafting a brilliant concept record that still flexes the muscle of a straight-forward ripper.

E 8th St

The Yawpers,“Boy in a Well”

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