Chicago is a city with an overwhelming amount of musical history behind it, meaning at any point you’re walking around there, you could be rubbing elbows with faces from magazines, billboards and playbills. It’s the kind of place where no matter which coffee place you choose, the person standing between you and the barista has a 50% chance of being a performer of some kind.
But in a way, this is just the surface of something far more interesting – a truly diverse, non-linear, and ever-changing mosaic of talent that’s tough to compete with but thrilling to digest. It’s a gift that keeps on giving when you think about it, but also, one that keeps taking. How are we supposed to keep track of it all of the hits keep coming with bands like Tortoise, Shellac, and Joan of Arc, not to mention the city’s deep connections to blues, jazz, and house music?
Well, there is one way to escape this matrix, and that is to put it completely out of mind. Take Cheer-Accident for instance. Since 1988, the Chicago stalwarts have left craters in the world of prog while playing and collaborating with bands like U.S. Maple, The Flying Luttenbachers, and Gastr del Sol, all of whom are bands we worship here at the blog but who never quite cracked that Top 40… not that they wanted to.
Cheer-Accident’s sound has always been somewhat liquid while firmly rooted in prog and post-punk, adapting it’s shape the will of its creators, and they’re back to do it again with Admission, a vintage pop-flavored prog math romp that proves that the band is as flexible and freewheeling as ever.
Stream it now in full below:
Explains Mark of SKiN Graft Records, “this is not the first time Cheer-Accident has released a pop oriented album, with two earlier examples being The Why Album and What Sequel… SKiN GRAFT has been working with CHEER-ACCIDENT since the album Salad Days back in 2000. And Thymme goes all the way back to the earliest days of SKiN GRAFT with the bands Brise-Glace (alongside Jim O’Rourke and Dazzling Killmen’s Darin Gray), Yona-Kit (Jim, Darin and Zeni Geva’s K.K. Null) and You Fantastic! (with Darin and Tim Garrigan also of Dazzling Killmen). Admission was originally pitched as a successor to two of my favorite “non-SKiN GRAFT” CHEER-ACCIDENT albums, The Why Album and What Sequel? Both are pop records at heart and when I began work on the design of the LP, it was conceived as the conclusion of a trilogy – with the cover art tying back to the previous albums. But as we went along, things started to change…”
Says Thyme Jones, “we very nearly named it “Now What”, viewing it as the final installment in this pop trilogy. But that started to feel wrong, because: Why get locked into a “series” every time we happen to lean on the more melodic and concise aspect of what we do?”
“When I saw Jim Drummond’s photo of the collection of porcelain figures, it helped set an entirely new direction for the cover art in motion… And the work done on that eventually led to the title of the album,” says Mark.
Here’s a bit more from the press release:
“CHEER-ACCIDENT is clearly the underdog of Chicago. Always unpredictable, always entertaining, but darn hard to pigeonhole. Imagine an indie prog band, an emo band that can laugh at itself, or a band that might get compared to Trans Am or the Champs (but has probably never heard either), or maybe the best bet is to set that blender on “10” and dream about Steely Dan, Chicago (the band) and U.S Maple. CHEER-ACCIDENT thrills in dissonance and odd chord changes, yet are undeniably A POP BAND. Chicago has had its share of indie giants, like Tortoise, Joan Of Arc, Shellac, The Sea And Cake, Seam, and Don Cab to name a few.
Cheer-Accident fits right in among the crevices. But they sneak in the back door, taking things to another level, with songwriting that will make you cry, musicianship that will make you tremble, and the hooks and the looks needed to go down in musical history. CHEER-ACCIDENT has an eccentric sense of humor that combines a lush pop style with bursts of bizarre changes; at just about the point where you become convinced that any given song could make it on commercial radio, they “blow it” with some left-field turn straight off a cliff. Their latest album, and first for SkiN GRAFT is “Salad Days”, a celebration that music is being made at all – A Hi-Fi invitation to the band«s explorations into the dark world of lo fi consciousness (mixed by Steve Albini!!!).”
(You can, and should, read the rest here)
In addition to the new album, the band is actually set to tour the U.S. next month, and seeing them live honestly sounds like an amazing time as lots of Admission sounds like it was meant to be heard that way, even if the mastering job from Shy Diamond is damn near immaculate. We highly recommend both:
Friday, July 18. Muskegon, MI. The Credit Union.
Saturday, July 19. Columbus, OH. Cafe Bourbon St.
Sunday, July 20. Pittsburgh, PA. Poetry Lounge.
Monday, July 21. State College, PA. Manny’s.
Tuesday, July 22. Catskill, NY: Avalon.
Wednesday, July 23. Baltimore, MD. Wax Atlas.
Thursday, July 24. Philly. The Rotunda.
Friday, July 25. DC. Rhizome.
Saturday, July 26. Durham, NC. Fuzzy Needle.
Sunday, July 27. Columbia, SC. Transmission.
Monday, July 28. Athens, GA. Venue TBA.
Tuesday, July 29. Knoxville, TN. The Pilot Light.
Wednesday, July 30. Cincinnati, OH. Woodward Theater.
Thursday, July 31. Louisville, KY. Whirling Tiger.
Friday, August 1. Indy. The Healer.
Saturday, August 2. Chicago, IL. Martyrs’.
(Thanks for reading! If you’re looking for more music, check out our Bandcamp compilations here. If you like us, or possibly even love us, donations are always appreciated at the Buy Me A Coffee page here, but if you’re in a generous mood you can also donate to folks like Doctors Without Borders, the PCRF, Charity Water, Kindness Ranch, One Tail at A Time, Canopy Cat Rescue, or Best Friends Animal Sanctuary that could probably use it more – click on their names above to check ‘em out if you’re so inclined. Thanks again!)