The Witzard

Mikey Erg with Jeff Rosenstock, Alex Clute & Lou Hanman (CREDIT: Emily McKern) "Mikey Erg continues to set the gold standard for hooky Punk love songs. Love At Leeds is him at the top of his song-writing game—just one finely tuned ear-worm after another," writer Dan Ozzi gushes within a press release. Love At Leeds is the realization of many dreams for Mikey Erg. A life-long music obsessive, growing up in the early 90's, there was one sound he'd always hoped to capture on his recordings: the sound of Steve Albini. Steve's credits include Pixies, Flogging Molly, Iggy & The Stooges, and, of course, Nirvana's iconic third album, In Utero, one of Mikey's absolute favorite records. Mikey had never in his 20-plus-year recording career ever been able to make a fully-analog recording. Love At Leeds was the perfect time to rectify all of that. Love At Leeds by Mikey Erg Utilizing the same group of musicians that helped him realize his debut solo alb...

"You could fit the contents of Tony's previous releases on Slumberland and Matador [Records] onto one side of a 90-minute cassette and still have room left over for the eight offerings on CONFRONT THE TRUTH , but would you want it any other way? When Tony sings about "trying to move on but I just don't know how," no extension of the time it takes for him to bring that feeling across is going to solve the problem at hand. You're immediately thrust into the orbit of these songs; you know how he feels, and now you can relate. Transference is complete. You've got plenty of time left over to dwell upon them. The eight offerings on CONFRONT THE TRUTH notch a significant advancement in his style and approach. Almost completely absent from these new songs are the over-loaded guitar crunch of DISSED AND DISMISSED , or his earlier work with OVENS; it's replaced by gentle acoustic balladry, tasteful Mellotron and piano backing, the kind of musicianship that o...