A SUNKEN SHIP IRONY "EVERYONE IS SAD" REVIEW
Bluntness. It’s the source of a great punk song’s power, when raw lyrics turn a straightforward chord progression into something transcendent. This ethos comes through in spades on Everyone is Sad, the latest EP from the Minneapolis folk-punk duo, A Sunken Ship Irony. In case the title doesn’t give it away, this thing is a brutal six-song gauntlet of short, straightfoward, and raw anti-folk crooners that prove sometimes the best antidote for emotional turmoil is unflinching emotional honesty.
The instrumentation is pretty low-key throughout this EP, mostly composed of lo-fi acoustic guitar strums and Josh and Morgan’s quavering dual vocals in the forefront. The lovely xylophone embellishments and quirky synth tones that colorized the band’s 2019 LP Ant, I make a return appearance on some key tracks here, such as “The Saddest Ghosts in the World”, whose brooding synth cello and reverb-soaked xylophone combine to create a haunting instrumental passage before cutting out to an a cappella group vocal featuring some punishingly raw shouts from Morgan. The transition is unexpected and chilling, and one of my favorite moments from the EP.
The xylophones also feature on the closer “Fall in Line with the Quitters (Reprise)”, this time as a dreamy counterpoint to the song’s rough instrumentation, which features a beautifully overdriven vocal track buried low in the mix under Josh’s strained retelling of a dream he just had about “a field of poison ivy dotted with yellow flowers”, and his attempt to find meaning from this image that may or may not be there to find. More group vocals repeating the mantra “Maybe I’ll be fine / With a little bit of time” bring the song and EP to a close with lyrics that sound almost hesitantly hopeful.
The song “Grit in the Machine” is another highlight, with Josh’s mumbled double-tracked lyrics guiding us through a story of a class revolt, complete with guillotines and the severed heads of the bourgeoisie. But somehow Josh’s unassuming vocal performance here makes the gruesome imagery almost whimsical, while still retaining the world-weariness that soaks all the way through this EP.
And that’s another common element of these tunes. They all deal with sadness, both on a personal and global scale, yet the melancholy is juxtaposed with the band’s playful and quirky sound that has become their trademark by this point. It’s as if the only real coping mechanism against the overwhelmingly sad state of the world is to just be honest about how it makes you feel. The band themselves own up to this fact on the track “No Answers”, where they admit they have no concrete solutions to offer their listeners, but they do have the power to write music with staying power. With “just a voice, a couple songs, and a guitar”, A Sunken Ship Irony has crafted an excellent collection of short songs that provide, in the absence of real answers, something a little deeper and perhaps more hopeful than that, which is real camaraderie with their listeners.
A Sunken Ship Irony: Everyone Is Sad:
Josh Wirtanen (he/him) - Guitar, vocals, bass
Morgan McCandless (she/her) - Synth, vocals
(Melodic Noise) How's your day going?
(A Sunken Ship Irony) Today is alright, though life in general has been very strange lately due to the pandemic. I'm guessing that's not an uncommon way to feel right now? Not bad, really, just sort of strange. There's this dreamlike quality to the pace of life right now, and I think it's been messing with my head a bit.
(MN) What is your formed/origin story?
(ASSI) A Sunken Ship Irony formed way back in 2004, and it's been re-formed more than a dozen times since then. Morgan and I were trying to count how many members there had been, and I think we ended at 32, with the feeling there were probably some really short-term members I might have forgotten? So more than 30 people have been in this band at one time or another.
(MN) Genre?
(ASSI) I think we're walking the line between indie folk and folk punk right now.
(MN) Label?
(ASSI) Folk Bug Records is a collective I put together with some friends. Our next physical release will be a Folk Bug release, and when things return to normal-ish, we've got some other bands who will be releasing on Folk Bug. Well, I should maybe check back in with them. Everything is so up in the air right now in general that all of this could change, I suppose.
(MN) What was the inspiration behind the album?
(ASSI) Everyone Is Sad has a far less interesting origin story than our previous full-length record Ant, I. Basically, Morgan was crashing at my place, and I woke her up one afternoon (she's a night owl) and said, "Hey, let's make a record today." That was pretty much it. We had all these songs that we'd demoed out previously, so we decided to do fresh recordings of them and put them out into the wild. From the time I woke her up to the time we released the EP was maybe three days? This one happened super fast. In comparison, Ant, I took about six months to record.
We have a bigger project that we've been working on for a very long time, but it has a lot of complexity to it and requires a lot more people. So that's on hold until we can start getting together in bigger groups again. But I promise you, it's got some real bangers on it! In fact, two tracks that have become staples of our live show are both planned for that.
In the meantime, Everyone Is Sad happened because we took some the stuff we'd cut from other projects and threw it together. It's basically a "fresh recordings of B-sides" EP, I think. But then it ended up turning out way better than either of us had expected. It might be my favorite Sunken Ship recording in retrospect.
(MN) Is there something that connects the songs together and what stands out on the album?
(ASSI) When I look back at it, Everyone Is Sad is a collection of songs that are all responses to feeling helpless. That wasn't intentional, but that really comes through in repeat listens, I think. There's also a sense of nihilism, which was present on Ant, I, but it feels front and center here.
"Grit in the Machine" is the exception. It's a song that, in classic folk tradition, is about people rising up against an oppressor. We'd been doing a lot of Line 3 protest shows with our friends the RiverRats, and that song came out of that. So that's an action song. The entire rest of the EP, though, is filled with passive songs.
"The Saddest Ghosts in the World" can't change the situation they're in. They just sort of perpetually haunt the space where they ended up, and that's where they'll stay until the sun swallows the Earth. It's actually kind of darkly hilarious how melodramatic that song is. "No Answers" is about feeling like people look to you for guidance when you have none to give. "Going Down in Flames" is a breakup song that I wrote way back in like 2012. It's a little embarrassing, but it's also honest despite being this weird blend of self-deprecation and arrogance. I think 2012 was a year of extreme highs and extreme lows for me, so that scans, I guess. The title track, "Everyone Is Sad," is about acknowledging where you ended up and just accepting that you can't do anything about it. That's the first track on the EP, and the final track, "Fall in Line with the Quitters (Reprise)," has a similar theme, though it ends with the repeated line "Maybe I'll be fine with a little bit of time," which I think has maybe a twist of hope to it?
Oh, so that track is actually part of a much bigger song that I wrote with my friend Tyler, and that's why I added "Reprise" to it. The part we recorded For Everyone Is Sad is the bridge into the last chorus and the outro. There are two verses that weren't included on that recording, and I'm hoping to do a full version with additional folks involved for the next release.
Interestingly enough, this EP was recorded the first few days of April, so the COVID-19 lockdowns were just beginning. The whole COVID thing seemed surreal at that point, and I don't think many of us expected things would be as bad as they still are in September. So as we were recording the EP, that was in the back of our minds, but it didn't feel real quite yet, and we certainly weren't focusing on it. But so many of those songs ended up being incredibly poignant in the months that would follow. That wasn't intentional at all, by the way. I didn't have the perspective back in April that I have now. But sitting in lockdown for what, six months? That has really brought some relevance to those songs. I feel every one of those songs so hard right now.
(MN) Are you locals or transplants?
(ASSI) I (Josh) live in Minneapolis. Morgan is a wanderer, but she kind of lives in Eau Claire, WI.We have other members who we play shows with, but they've sort of spread out across the United States. It's been a very strange year.
(MN) What are some of your influences and Minnesota influences?
(ASSI) I have a degree in literature, so I read a ton of books. Much of my influence comes from the things I read. I think that comes through more clearly on Ant, I, because there are direct references to Albert Camus and Franz Kafka, though you can maybe tell I've read some Marx when you listen to "Grit in the Machine"?Musically, I grew up listening to punk rock, but as I've aged I became more and more aware of the connections between the punk rock ethos and the old working-class folk songs. I mostly formed an acoustic project because we can't keep a drummer to save our lives, but that ended up becoming something of a blessing later on, I think. I can do more things with an acoustic guitar -- maybe not musically, but logistically. We can play shows at campfires and in parking lots and things like that, so that's always been really cool. It makes touring a lot easier too.Wait, what was the question?
(MN) Who are some of your favorite current Twin Cities artists?
(ASSI) With so much of the music scene on hold right now, my "current favorites" are more like "favorites from six months ago who I wish I could see live right now." But Admiral Fox has become one of my favorite local acts, and they're good friends of ours. Morgan did the artwork for their latest EP "Nowhere Is Safe," which is absolutely incredible. I saw that Melodic Noise did a review of that EP when it came out. It's so good!As far as live shows, if you've neer seen the RiverRats, you absolutely need to. They put on some killer shows, and they'll make shows happen in the most random places. I saw a picture of them doing a show in a pirate cave! We did a show with them in a fort in the middle of the woods. They're legends of the Minneapolis folk punk scene, for sure.My Mom's Guitar is one of the hidden gems of this scene, and they're fantastic.And boy do I miss getting to see Joe Bartel live.
(MN) What is your favorite venue to play and see shows in the Twin Cities?
(ASSI) I've always had a ton of love for the Varsity, and we did get to play there one time. Part Wolf has been an amazing venue as well, and I really hope we can start doing shows there again soon. I miss it so much.
(MN) What can fans expect when they come to your shows?
(ASSI) That's such a hard question to answer because A Sunken Ship Irony is constantly evolving. If you know us, I suppose you can expect to be asked onstage to sing "To You, the Defeated" at the end of the set. I love gang vocals, and I would love it if we could just have like a dozen people on stage screaming along with us all the time!
(MN) Do you have a favorite or crazy memory of playing a show?
(ASSI) We did a tour a year ago (oh wow, it's been an entire year since our last tour), that ended with a three-day stint in Ohio. We did a show in Yellow Springs, then hit up an open mic in Dayton, and closed the whole tour out with a show in Springfield. Those three days stand out as particularly special. Time moves slower when you're on tour, for some reason. Maybe it's because you break out of your daily routine and have to basically redesign your routine every single day. But those three days felt like a lifetime, and I want to go back so badly and see our friends again.
(MN) Other hobbies?
(ASSI) I read a lot of books and play a lot of video games. I did video game journalism as a career for a while, and I've recently been getting back into it, only I own my own websites now.Morgan is super into collecting old science fiction books and watching schlocky horror films. And just being Morgan. Aw, I miss Morgan.
(MN) What do you like about living in the Twin Cities?
(ASSI) I grew up in small towns up north, so I love that I can go to shows almost every night of the week (in normal times). I think our music scene is great, and there are so many people here who are all creative in such different ways. And I always feel like I end up discovering at least one new incredible artist per week. There's just so much talent here.
(MN) Is there anything that sets the Twin Cities scene apart from places you've toured?
(ASSI) I've talked to people from outside the Cities, and there's this idea that this is a really tough scene to break into. And I think that leads to musical acts that have this level of tenacity that's really respectable. The bands that seem to do best here have this element of creative problem-solving to make shows happen in such weird and unexpected ways. I mentioned the RiverRats earlier, and they're the sort of act that I'm talking about here. They work so hard to make sure there's always music happening around town, and that's incredible. They also do some really important activism work, which is cool as well.
(MN) What are your favorite places to grab food or drink in the Twin Cities?
(ASSI) I haven't had a meal outside my apartment in six months, and I'm worried that a lot of my favorite places might no longer exist by the time life stabilizes again. I know Egg and I shut down, and that was one of my favorite breakfast places, for example. Precision Grind was my favorite coffee shop in town, and they shut down (though that was before COVID). I'm worried to name any additional names because I might never see those places again.
(MN) What are the band's plans for the future?
(ASSI) Everything is sort of on hold for now. But when we are able to start playing shows again, we'll be printing physical CDs of the Everyone Is Sad Deluxe Edition, which will be on Folk Bug Records. That will include all of the Everyone Is Sad EP and all of the Let's Start a Fire EP (which released digitally in April of 2019). I think we have a live track and maybe even a couple demo tracks that we might tack onto the end of it too. It's going to be really cool.We also have a bigger recording project that we've been wanting to tackle for quite some time, and I hope we can get working on that soon. That would be a proper follow-up to Ant, I, and I hope to include a pretty robust lineup of friends to play instruments on it.
(MN) Is there anyone you'd like to thank or shout out?
Oh yes! Shoutouts to Dan DeMarco (Admiral Fox), Joey Novacheck and Jae Yates (My Mom's Guitar), Lucas Kurmis, Misha Louise, and every single one of the RiverRats. You people are rad, and I miss all of you so much!
Also, is it weird if I post a link to the retro gaming website that I run? We do detailed articles about video game history, and I'm really proud of this website! retrovolve.com
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Review by: Dan DeMarco, Writer @itsadmiralfox
Interview and edited by: Andrew Perrizo, Owner @PlaylistTC
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