Rock Oracle

September 23, 2025 Jason Shrum

Whitney Phillips is Listening

Whitney Phillips is one of those people that sees an opportunity to get back to our roots and build, rather than tear down. Oh, who is Whitney Phillips? Lemme spin the record back for a minute. I met Whitney years ago when she was a singer/songwriter from Seattle and a good friend of my now ex-wife’s. I knew she was good and that she was starting to scratch her name into the ledgers of the industry, however, she has become more than just the background voice that she used to provide to mega-stars.

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September 8, 2025 Jason Shrum

NIN Peels It Back in Nashville

The setlist drew from The Downward Spiral more than any other album, although they played from various records. The group was now gaining momentum with rising fury and ripped one expeditious track after another; this included ‘March of the Pigs’, ‘Repitle’ and “Heresy” (all from The Downward Spiral); then ‘Copy of A’ (from 2013’s Hesitation Marks) and ‘Gave Up’ (also from Broken). They then began their rapid trek onto the more intimate setup where it got more electronic with Boys Noize joining in for all four of the songs. These were essentially remixes as Boys Noise shifted the tonality a bit with his additional soundscape. It was ‘Vessel’ (Year Zero), ‘Closer’ (The Downward Spiral), ‘As Alive as you Need Me To Be’ (from the new TRON:Ares soundtrack) and ‘Came Back Haunted’ (Hesitation Marks). I would love to hear a proper recording of the joint they prepared on ‘Closer’ (I’ll include that clip too).

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September 4, 2025 Matt Perkins

Muddy Roots takes All Kinds

If you’ve never heard of it, Muddy Roots takes place every year at the June Bug Ranch north of Cookeville. I’ll be the first to say that I wasn’t sure what to expect from a punk festival in somewhat rural Tennessee but it’s a safe, fun place where feral kids roam free, Nazis aren’t welcome, and people genuinely look out for each other. Sure they have used Narcan out there and people break bones, but I’ve seen over a hundred people throw cash into a PBR twelve pack box to help someone out. We pick up our people who have fallen in the circle pit of life.

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September 1, 2025 Jason Shrum

I Believe in a Thing Called The Darkness

My passion for the British rock group began back in 2003 when I first heard the single ‘I Believe In A Thing Called Love’, off their debut album Permission to Land. Now singer/guitarist Justin Hawkins, his brother guitarist Dan Hawkins, bassist Frankie Poullain, and drummer Rufus Taylor (son of Queen drummer Roger Taylor) are back with their eighth studio album. If you know anything about The Darkness, then you know about a high level of intensity when playing live gigs. As the band first emerged on the scene there was this inkling that they were some kind of joke band. That they were spoofing the 1970’s hard and glam rock scene, but those ribbings were quickly left by the side of musicality road. This band is absolutely enthralling. Listeners and critics alike fastly found themselves realizing the technical fortitude of this sonically reverent band.

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August 25, 2025 Jason Shrum

Bully Packs A Punch at The Blue Room

I was back at The Blue Room again in Nashville to cover the Bully show with Jawdropped supporting on the second evening of a two-show engagement. You know you spend a lot of time at a venue when you walk up to the ticket person and they say, “Oh, it’s you again”. I laughed. Live music venues are my happy place, so I was certainly glad to be there again. This would be my third time seeing Alicia Bognanno and her band. “Bully” refers to her “inner bully” or the “inner demons” she confronts in her music and life. The name Bully also represents the initial band she fronted a decade ago but later became synonymous with Bognanno herself as the sole member.

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August 22, 2025 Jason Shrum

Arts Fishing Club Drops Lines in Blue Room Waters

Their sound is hard to root down and that’s why I am excited about their future. You can say they are this or that, but their ability to play just about anything is evident in their music. At the core, Arts Fishing Club is branded as an indie-folk rock band, but I am not sure that’s the best descriptor of what they are about, although I am not sure how I would list them if I had to. The music is fun. The band plays tight. It’s fast when it needs to be but slows down with all the right accents tapping directly into all the listeners emotions. They keep it light between songs too, letting the audience know just how much fun they are having. On this Thursday, in the dimly lit architectural aqua-bowl of a room, our guiding light was AFC.

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August 13, 2025 Jason Shrum

The Staggering Expanse of Man

The song’s beginning challenges the impact of our global footprint with its prose. The band is screaming for us to listen and take heed, but our consumption may be drowning those cries out. So, there is a musical shift that happens and the song structure slows as if to appeal to us with another approach. This is one of those many layers that the trio brings to the forefront of their efforts. With tightknit precision and playing, the group captures their audience in mystical undertones that float beneath rough and metallic surfaces. It is absolutely gorgeous to listen to the transition from heavy to soft without losing the engagement of the audience. It might have been three separate songs if conceptualized differently, but it works as one opus and only for a few seconds are we fluttering in this softened sonic status before being hurled back into a deeper sound. And for all this, we are just :40 seconds into our journey.