Jeffrey Runnings
Piqued (Independent Project Records)
We've said it before, likely more than once, but a new release from Independent Project Records is cause for celebration. The packaging is always incredible, the notes fascinating, and there's often, as is the case here, a bonus CD sitting next to the LPs. You can spend hours with this thing.
Of course, it helps if the music is great, and this offering from Jeffrey Runnings, creative force with Nebraska post-punk band For Against, is glorious.
"Piqued is a celebration of the artist’s lifelong quest for a sound that, stripped to the bones, is all the more powerful and cathartic for its restraint," the press release reads. "Recorded by Runnings at home on an old 8-track cassette machine, the album plays just like a late ‘80s mixtape, lovingly compiled to showcase the beautiful emptiness of post-punk’s more eloquently quiet peaks."
There are two LPs, and both feature enough curveballs and off-the-wall surprises to ensure that the listener is never bored. Simultaneously bleak and cinematic, it really is a tremendous experience.
"Piqued is available on vinyl (Black or Transparent Magenta), Special Edition CD and digital, and comes with a 4-track EP of rare recordings from the late ‘80s — two of them previously unreleased," they say. "This bonus EP comes on Clear Silver 12’’ for the vinyl edition and as bonus tracks on the CD."
