“You can cry to the heavens …
but you’ve fallen from grace …
though you’re years from the gutter …
you’re still flat on your face.
So will you break down, like the man that you …
the man that you … ain’ttttt …
the man that you … ain’ttttt”
Corktown Popes of Corktown, Detroit, Michigan.
“The Man That You Ain’t”
If you found my “Fog Song” video verbiage too much, you better check out now, weak one- my very new friend, and music idol, Ian “The (NOT) Terrible” is only going to get lionized stronger and stronger in my pen and heart- held in and spoken loud … from here on out.
This early 30ish musical mountain of a man, raised in the calm hamlet of Lake Orion, MI … has unleashed a brutal, unrelentingly and deeply honest aural assault on us all. Am not going to detail what I’ve learned anew about his physical and personal torments, except to say life hasn’t dealt him a tough hand- it’s taken his personal deck of cards and shredded them to ribbons … dreams, hopes, plans, pursuit of happiness unimpeded by happenstance- all that and more.
OK, let me relax for a sec- bottom line is he ain’t going away, retreating, walling himself off from life- I would tell him that at my own very real peril. He’s doing what he knows- putting his life, both external events and internal repents- in both unreal and real, heartfelt words … out there on this record- for all of our benefit … and I really pray for gain of his heart, soul and brain.
So let’s talk about some songs (about time, right?). Crushingly, driving into the record- the doomed, gloom phrased, “I got the Detroit blues” based (so appropo now), “Death Rattle Blues (From the Cass Corridor)”.
That death chain rattling, echoing, car cruising beat … aimed direct into the specter of a city and finding all the downtown downers- all told in Ian’s hollow, hungriest heart, shell of a voice.
“The bar was filled with demons and ghouls, and all other manner of frights. A foxy little witch hopped off her bar stool, and she locked me clear into her sights. She said, ‘Hey hon, you got a dollar? I need to go to the liquor store … and drown the death rattle blues (from the Cass Corridor)”.
You go buy the CD and hear the song itself in its entirety to get the rest of this corrupted, twisted late night of the urban soul lament- grow a couple, will ya.
Continuing the lost soul out on the road trip … here comes “Burning Highway” in all its Johnny Cash, “I Walk the Line”, rickety beat glory- what a tour de force of tragicomic scenes out on that hot, scorching (or even snow-squalled) pavement.
Deal with this, y’all- “There’s a truck broken down in the middle of the road … there’s a man with cracked leather skin walking through the sleet and snow … forest noises follow me, man, everywhere I go … riding down a dusty trail, Detroit to Tupelo”.
And then, “Dead Eyes of the Storm” … perhaps this record’s darkest, very wide-ranging, soul deep sucking out the insides of one’s lessons to survival- some how … some way- but some even then … will fall back to begin again.
After its gentle guitar and violin opening, this mild musical motif yields to Ian painfully expelling out thoughts like- “Seems we’re floating in the ether, of some secret realm … ghostly voices in the AM static … there’s a madman at the helm. Everyone is so quick to anger, when the thoughts and ideals clash … but now we’ve reached that stage of the opera, where the phantom rips off his mask”.
Finally, in all this chaos, Ian looks out for relief, and then must go back within- all of us- “I sent out a text a while ago, I’ve yet to get an answer … psyche flooded with the quakes and visions of some collective, unconscious cancer … in the Dead “Eyeeesss” of the Storm … you see where we’ve been born.”
Few more, veered off-road compositions- “Red Elk, “Hydras”, “Halloween Town” et al … so all eat- em’ up now. Not a dud or sad sack or clunker on this record- no way, no how, no low or banal bow.
Ignore this man and his monumental, wildly wounded and wounding music at your own peril, but I doubt anyone with a healing head, bleeding heart, seething soul … can even try to delude themselves into it.
Find this musically and physically massive, not passive … force of nature at- https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1413200860&fref=ts
“You know I ain’t no religious man …
but I’ll tell you one thing … love … Curtis … is the promised land”
Ian James Pinchback of Ferndale, MI (originally Lake Orion, MI)
“Curtis Is The Promised Land”
Whew … well, my music-loving maniacs … what can I say- THIS IS THE REAL DEAL. Once hearing it- if you don’t feel it, keel over from it, believe it, conceive it, need water to relieve it … then get lost, loser. I won’t stand for anything (in my mere real or web presence) but one million percent devotion to this dude- ’cause he’s earned it, learned it- and actually turned it, burned it … into the heads and hearts of anyone blessed and damn lucky enough to listen. Cuts through the miasma of your spiritual stillness or the cloudiness in the orb upon your shoulders … just ain’t good enough to describe this song- ain’t f – – – in’ good enough by a long shot. Good Luck with all that- and buckle up inside, it’s gonna be a bumpy ride …
TimMusic- “I don’t fear the words and sounds … just try holding them close to my heart” 