PREMIERE: Rocket Miner Release New Single “Soul Catcher”

rj frometa Thursday, September 9, 2021 Content Leave a comment

Rocket Miner’s compositions tend to blossom in slow-motion, like flowers in bloom, allowing the full grandeur to develop in the fullness of time.

If shoegaze is “the scene that celebrates itself”, then post-rock must be “the scene that finds meaning in itself”. Like a kind of jazz, each piece moves with just enough vigor to keep a listener on their toes for what’s next; the thesis statement revealed by nuances of those little decisions along the way. These songs are a journey, not a destination.

Originally produced and engineered by drummer Nick Biscardi, Songs For An October Sky served as a first step in the band’s journey, taking them on roads out of town and to new heights together. Now in 2021–ten years later with a clearer understanding of the landscape around them–Songs For An October Sky exists more like a mile marker or breadcrumb from the past, imploring us to return to ourselves again.

The first taste of this comes in the form of his new single “Soul Catcher”, a song , recorded by each member individually during COVID-19 quarantine. The song does a very good job capturing the essence of the record.

As he puts it “When we originally released …October Sky it mostly stood as a studio production of our 2010-11 live set, and as part of that live set Chip [Wortel] had composed in Ableton a few short transitions to play while we sipped drinks and caught our breath between songs. However, as we soon found out, those 45 seconds of MIDI ping-ponging did not translate to an enjoyable listening experience when part of a record. As the anniversary remix began to come into focus, we had so much more time to slow down and catch our breath in quarantine that we set our sights on replacing “Track 04” altogether. Chip once again got us started with a lengthy bed of synthy ambience, I recorded my drums in a practice space, then Larry [Hryn] + Chip added more guitar, and finally Eric [D’Asto]–who I’ve never met IRL–slid in a bass part that we think really glues the thing together. In total there was about 8-9 min of music that I cut down and arranged to a more palatable length, and if you listen closely I even found a couple spots to hide that original MIDI section…so in a way perhaps “Soul Catcher” is the interlude we always saved space for, but hadn’t written yet?”