Midwest Action – 7th Level Music

Live: Leones, Diagonal, Necromoon – The Brass Rail – February 08, 2020

For a small place, Ft. Wayne, Indiana’s Brass Rail can pack in a lot of sound. This show of indie shoegaze and psychedelic acts was no exception.

First up was local band Leones, who played a good set of bass-forward shoegaze with thick Latinx psychedelic touches.

Second on the bill were Chicago’s Diagonal. I’ve been a fan of the band for a while now and was happy to finally catch them live. They played a sold psychedelia set of mostly new material from their upcoming album. One of the funniest parts of their set was how they kept referring to Gary Numan and playing parts of “Are Friends ‘Electric’?” after I played it on the Brass Rail’s juke box while they were doing their sound check.

Closing out the night was Ft. Wayne’s Necromoon, who are not a Dead Moon cover band. They play a mellower version of psychedelia than Dead Moon (and to be fair, few bands can match Dead Moon’s raw power) but still put out a lot of sound as they played songs about love and death and other subjects with a bright hope to them.

All in all, it was a fun night of live music in a small venue and a nice oasis in the dead of winter.

Keep your mind open.

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Fat Hot – Self-titled

Garage rockers Jonathan Kahler and Gamble Scrantom make up the duo Fat Hot, and their self-titled album (currently only available on cassette or as a download, no less) is a fun, snarky, fuzzy treat.

Opening with “Boatman Love Song,” the album gets a rough surf rock sound going before unleashing reverbed vocals about found and lost love. “Ghost Drugs” is a fun little tune that seems to be about a spirit hoping to get some spirits from a young woman. The catchy “Bad Drink” continues the theme of substances that alter one’s state of mind as they sing about searching for a bad drink while lamenting the loss of a shoe.

“Krakken Me Up” returns to the earlier nautical theme and continues the Flat Duo Jets-like wall of blues rock Fat Hot seems to have mastered early in their career. “Sweet” is a slow burn about a one-night stand that might end up in danger, disaster, or both. It unloads around the 2:15 mark with a surprising fury before going back to a simmer for a little while. “Sour” is the longest track on the album, coming it at nearly six minutes, and it’s full of scorching guitar and drum fills that mix stoner metal with psychedelia.

“Harpy Woman” is the second reference to a mythological monster, and the seventh time Fat Hot unleashes blistering riffs and beats. “Shudder” brings up a common theme in blues-garage-psych-psychobilly tracks – the Devil. It’s a toe-tapper of a tune about impending death. The album ends with another salute to being a sad drunk – “Rye Smile.” The guitar work on it is deceptively tricky and the drum work switches on a dime at any given moment.

This is a fun record, and a pleasant discovery for me. It will be for you, too.

Keep your mind open.

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Rewind Review: Diagonal – self-titled (2016)

Chicago-based psych / shoegaze rockers Diagonal play an intriguing mix of both genres. Their self-titled album, currently only available on cassette or digital download, starts with a meditative, almost ambient, nearly instrumental song called “Aura.” I listened to this on a frosty northern Indiana morning as the sun rose over harvested corn fields. It was perfect.

“Wide Eyed” teases you with a bit of drone sludge before breaking into a heavy shoegaze riff. “Inside Your Mind” is so steeped in psychedelic tea that you can pretty much see rear projection oils when you hear it. “Where to Go” ups the fuzz and races by you almost before you realize it’s happening (and I love the trippy fade-out).

“Waterloo” is another rocker that puts in enough reverb to almost make it a weird dream that eventually turns into a crazy psychedelic nightmare. “Come Down” reminds me of early Black Angels material with its distorted yet somehow crisp guitars and lyrics lost in layers of reverb. The album ends with “Cave” – a loud, wild, feverish freak-out that swirls around you like a tornado full of broken, dead trees and shattered houses.

It’s a solid release, and Diagonal is definitely a band to watch and hear. They have the chops to be serious players in the psych-rock game.

Keep your mind open.

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