ERIC WALLGREN “The Flowing Burial Ground” C21 (Midwest Action)

Eric Wallgren’s sophomore release holds the same School of Lou Reed vocal flavor as his previously Delicious* album did last year, but on this one, he trades in the loosey-goosey bedroom psychedelia for a more powerful GBV/Magnetic Fields feel, employing some driving, captivating drum machine beats and beatifically cheesy preset tones instead. The result is an infectiously charming string of indie earworms all crammed into 1/3rd of an hour’s time. Super fun! Pretty much anybody should be able to get behind “The Sinking of Claude Dillinger” ballad, and I strongly suggest you give yourself the opportunity to file in!

https://eric-wallgren.bandcamp.com/album/the-flowing-burial-ground

and/or

https://midwestaxn.com/

—Jacob An Kittenplan

*that album was also pretty great. Just sayin’!

ERIC WALLGREN "Delicious" C29 (Midwest Action)

Back-seat, washed-out guitar chords & jangly leads, impeccably-tasteful, driving bass lines, no-frills percussion and that speak-sung, bottomed-out baritone vocal delivery that wavers intentionally juuuust outside of harmony…

Arise, ye LOUtheREEDan congregants and rejoice in this Delicious series of psalms! Not since Adam Green’s “Minor Love” has an artist so thoroughly appropriated and re-imagined TRANSFORMERS and spun it into a fresh new set of rock-fucking-solid singalong jamz. If Lou Reed had started out on a K-Records budget, this is, without a doubt, what it would have sounded like.

When this dude comes to town and plays your neighbor’s backyard bonfire, light up your sparklers and sway along to the Ballad of Huff Tillman, a gloriously glib tale not-not involving an alternate-universe Michael Jackson and his rise to fame on the carnival circuit.

https://midwestaxn.bandcamp.com/album/delicious
and/or
https://eric-wallgren.bandcamp.com/releases

--Jacob An Kittenplan