Music 2022: The Year in Review

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It was the year when the training wheels came off, mostly at least, with audiences and venues negotiating live music after the lockdown. It also seemed a year when artists began sharing the bounty that was created with all the downtime—and the downtime’s attendant lessons, be they life, musical or technological.

By no means exhaustive, here is a snapshot of what crossed my musical radar in 2022. 

It is a short list of local music folks who have played Saturday Night Live (The Spanic Boys, Sam Llanas with Robbie Robertson, Timbuk 3) and The Grammys—and it is an even shorter list of who have performed with Joni Mitchell. Milwaukee’s SistaStrings Monique (vocals, cello) and Chauntee Ross (vocals, violin), moved to Nashville in 2021 and began ticking off the boxes.

This year they toured with Brandi Carlile and played SNL in December. The duo also performed with The Rainbow Coalition of the Loving, Allison Russell’s touring band. In July at the Newport Folk Festival, SistaStrings were part of Carlile’s posse backing Joni Mitchell. The historic set was the first high profile show Mitchell played in 20 years. They return home Jan. 25 to play the Pabst Theater with Milwaukee Ani DiFranco and expat Peter Mulvey, with whom they collaborated for the album Love Is The Only Thing.

Love Is the Only Thing by Peter Mulvey & SistaStrings

Peter Mulvey’s mission statement, To make an anti-fascist record, you must keep kindness and compassion in the foreground, could be a tall order. The veteran songwriter collaborated with SistaStrings and drummer Nathan Kilen on a baker’s dozen songs—snapshots of America in 2022. Opening with a wistful “Shenandoah,” Mulvey shifts gears to the gritty “Old Men Drinking Seagrams,” a clear-eyed look ala James McMurtry, portraying day to day contempt. “Early Summer of ‘21” is a journal entry, a look back at the early tentative steps out of the pandemic, “nobody can tell you until you see it with your eyes, no matter how full up with sorrow, behind the clouds there was always the sky.” Mulvey’s “Song For Michael Brown,” seeks compassion for the victim, his city, and the man who shot him down; the marchers and even “the angry hype-man on TV”—it may be among the best he’s written … yet.

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Saves by Convert

Bay View Bash, the annual street festival returned with a bang as Convert played an explosive, closing set that assaulted the senses with sound and light. The forward-thinking group has one foot firmly grounded in the history of musical anarchy.

More blitzkrieg, less bop, wrote the Shepherd Express’ Allen Halas of the group’s album Saves. That’s the M.O. of Milwaukee hybrid punks Convert… [who] enter the realm of dystopian-sounding electronica, fusing it with punk for a pseudo-industrial sound. If that’s putting it too eloquently, just know that the record is absolutely pulverizing. 

There is no larger reason to corral all of these releases together. Yet following their trajectories it becomes evident they all share an aesthetic, hardly definable, which comes from a sense of genuineness, songcraft and an appreciation of the organic process how music can be made. Seldom do these artists create in a vacuum; key here is the basic sense of communication that comes across in the playing with others. It may be there is magic those sparks. Notably, a fair number of key players migrate among these groups, fluidly suggesting a lack of ego in service to creativity.

E.B. Albeit aka bassist Eston Bennet

Informed by the charm of rock steady and dub sounds of Jamaica, Eston Bennet (who can be seen playing bass with Joseph Huber and The Thriftones) released a clutch of songs this year as E.B. Albeit: the EPs Magic Banjo and What I’m Working With and the mildly-psychedelic single “My Bicycle”—his ode to that humble yet reliable form of transportation.  On “What I’m Working With” he wears his pragmatism on his sleeve, “I don’t fret … I retro-fit, cuz I know what I’m working with.” Songs from The Magic Banjo build on droning banjo/kalimba and heads for hypnotic territory occupied by Tuareg desert blues like Tinariwen and Mdou Moctar.

Skywriter by Matthew Davies (Fox Cry Records)

Whether solo or fronting The Thriftones, Matthew Davies embodies the characters of his songs. On Skywriter he continues on this path while also showing a sense of domestic maturity. This collection of songs could be casual conversations with friends or advice to children or even sharing a family moment while driving when his song comes on the radio.

The Downtowner by Joseph Huber

Since his dues-paying days with .357 String Band, Joseph Huber’s music has continued to evolve. On his latest album The Downtowner he veers from the cinematic “The Spirit of Tennessee” to the elegiac “Thankful.” “When I Was You and You Were Me” retains the jolt of Bluegrass adrenaline and standout track, “Dog Days” was written by bassist Eston Bennett.

Poor Pretender by Long Mama  

“We’re like a weird, misfit country band and we like it that way,” Long Mama, Kat Wodtke said, Travel, movement, and a sense of transition may be underlying matters at hand, and also surface as ones that tie the album together. The moody drama of “Badlands Honeymoon,” “Kite Flyer”, “The Narrows,” “Dust and Gravel” suggest the qualities that may be best referenced in the title cut’s sentiment, “This phoenix is drinking fire/And holding court in the ashes.” Samual Odin (whose day job is playing with Horseshoes and Hand Grenades) thumps or bows his upright bass; Andrew Koenig’s Telecaster accents add to the story telling.

For Old Time's Sake by Horseshoes & Hand Grenades

It’s been over a decade since this band of brothers formed at UW-Stevens Point. With five albums and other side projects to their credit For Old Time's Sake feels like a band taking stock. With each member capable of fronting the band, familiar tunes “Darlin’ Corey,” “500 Miles,” “Ain't Gonna Grieve My Lord No More” and “Tennessee Waltz” play like a jukebox beyond genre. Live performance is where HHG made their reputation and tunes like “Skillet” and “Big Broun Trout” suggest the unbridled glee their energy is capable of unleashing.

Lipstick Detox and The Last Silent Desert (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) by Lyric Advisory Board

Multi-instrumentalist and producer Allen Coté (as Lyric Advisory Board, his ongoing project of shifting personnel) released a pair of albums seemingly under the cover of night. While both Lipstick Detox and The Last Silent Desert (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack) feel like they were recorded around the kitchen table, these would be very different kitchens. Lipstick is Coté and John Shepley Frater’s downhome acoustic music; intimate and conversational, with Coté calling out solos from the others. Often lighthearted thanks to fiddler John Patek and vocalist Kate Mernul, there is humor, but it is balanced by the darkness of  “Everything Here.” The heavy medicine of that song sends with a bit of dialogue, “I don’t want hover on that too long.”

Though it was released first, Desert may be subtly referenced by Lipstick’s “Through the Panes.” Described as “the first in a series of alternative therapy sessions,” Coté and Shepley Frater convened in Door County in early December and recorded the album in one field day. The roughly eight-hour recording binge was improvised, arranged and utilized with homemade instruments. Far from formless “jams,” songs and structure emerge and disappear only to be referenced again. There are hints of Syd Barrett, Skip Spence and the acoustic album the 13th Floor Elevators never made.

Acid Rain by Amos Pitsch (JAC World; A Division Of Crutch Of Memory Enterprises)

Amos Pitsch is pissed off. Stomping out of the gate like a Crazy Horse outtake, “I’m So Angry” jabs a finger at the chest of Republican senator “Ronald Johnson’s seven figure gold.” This thick vinyl LP with a dozen songs, seemingly plucked out of time recalls the likeable studio schizophrenia of Todd Rundgren’s early work. Like Rundgren, the ambitious and talented Pitsch played all the instruments, wrote the songs, recorded and mixed the album, as well as creating the artwork.

On certain albums the sound of the studio becomes a member of the band and that is the case here—warm electric pianos and ripping guitar solos convey Pitsch’s attitudes. “Two by two, 10 by 10. We are walking off the cliff again,” he sings in “(We Got It Made) in the U.S.A.” That song and “Our Old House” suggests this album is really a concept of sorts.

Let’s Go! By The Hungry Williams

John Carr is the lynchpin in a family of three generations of drummers, so it no surprise that rhythms are an integral part of The Hungry Williams sound. Let’s Go!, like the band’s live shows, is an instant party. Just add water, or whatever you are drinking. Vocalist Kelli Gonzalez’ charged vocals takes the blueprint of jump/swing/early rock and roll, and with the reserved horsepower of some of the city’s finest veteran musicians, makes something old sound fresh. Nothing heavy or philosophical here, simply reasons to groove, from “Mardi Gras Day” to “669 (Across the Street from the Beast”).

“Never Really Found You” by Terry Alan Hackbarth

Opening with a stark guitar riff that recalls the best of ‘60s psychedelia, “Never Really Found You” eases into folk-rock territory. Terry Alan Hackbarth (Trolley, The Nice Outfit, Mike Mangione) steps out front with a melancholy earworm that clocks in under three minutes. Here’s hoping for more.