The album was released in September 2021.
At that point, forty-seven-and-a-half-years old and having relentlessly bought records and chased new music for 2/3 of my life, I’ll be honest: I thought I’d heard it all.
And then I heard HEY WHAT, by the Duluth MN rock band Low.
HEY WHAT sounds like, in the 11th hour of the 11th hour, you’ve defeated the plague. Played at any volume—and the correct volume is all of the volume—it sounds like pure, liquid velocity. It sounds like your speakers giving way to the ocean’s weight, furious and crushing. It sounds like existence and reality and whatever continuum of time it is that we’ve all been lulled into thinking we’re living in, is turning inside-out upon itself. When I think of how the band wrote and produced the record, I think it sounds like the album was made—somehow—and then blown to pieces, pieces that were then gathered together and shot into space on a rocket, where they were reassembled by machines. The record sounds like it would sound if you were standing directly underneath that very rocket, as it left the launchpad.
HEY WHAT sounds like the ground disappearing beneath your feet. It sound like hope, but hope with all of the odds against it. Like you’re not-quite-buckling, but you’re beyond the speed of sound, and pieces are falling away from you. Unnecessary pieces. It sounds like, in music production terms, the dissonance and degradation and attack and whatever mind-shattering beauty is found in the deepest wells of the red zone. Like it’s tearing you apart, the pieces that are left, breath by breath, cell by cell.
That’s what the record sounds like. It’s all true.
But as I re-read those words, what they might not do, is to properly convey that, yes, this is an album you should actually and intentionally choose to listen to. Because it most certainly is.
So, let me add this: HEY WHAT is the most staggeringly beautiful record I’ve ever heard, and at its heart, I think the album’s songs are among this century’s finest hymns.
Which just starts me all over again.
HEY WHAT sounds like, if you listen to it at the right time and the right volume—and the correct volume is all of the volume—you’ll find yourself so sure that this is unquestionably the greatest album ever, that tattooing its artwork on your body begins to feel like the only next step, the only path forward, the only way to persuade the sun to agree to rise tomorrow. That is, until you see the album cover. The album cover, which looks like the album sounds: distressed, discordant and disintegrated, overwhelming, infinite and absolute, nothing, something and everything, as wide as the universe, as precise as the Nth degree, and as quicksilver as a lightning flash.
So, about that tattoo. It’s a metaphor.
Because if you heard the album, at that time, at that volume—all of the volume—then you’ve already been marked forever.
Low is the husband-and-wife duo of Mimi Parker and Alan Sparhawk. Their first album came out in 1994. No two albums released since could ever be called the same. Rather, there’s a persistent evolution and exploration and reinvention. It’s a career that is simply, endlessly inspiring.
At the beginning of December, I drove, alone, for a few hours to see a loved one in the hospital. It was grim.
I listened to a couple things on the drive: Hiss Golden Messenger’s deep, seasonal record, and then the Clem Snide songs “The Ballad of Day by Day,” and “Hilary,” and “The Ballad of God’s Love.”
And then I listened to HEY WHAT.
I was driving our work van.
I turned the volume on the stereo up as loud as it would go.
Over the next several days, I listened to the album in its entirety—which is the one and only way to listen to it—two, three, four, five times a day, at that same volume—which is all of the volume.
Loud: the ocean’s weight, furious and crushing.
Loud enough that I couldn’t hear myself scream.
Loud enough to nearly push tears back inside my eyes.
Two particular verses on HEY WHAT stood out to me at that volume, at that time. They go like this:
My mistake
My mistake
My mistake
My mistake
My mistake
Just get me out of the way
Somebody else take the stage
and
Know that I would do anything
Is it something that I can't see?
{While editing this essay, I decided to redact a short anecdote about my loved one being upset about my drinking, amongst other things. I removed the story because I haven’t asked permission to tell it, and won’t. The anecdote included the darkest and saddest joke I ever made.}
I love to drink; it’s one of the great joys of my life.
Drinking is my go-to way to celebrate something good.
It’s my go-to way to weather something challenging.
And it’s my go-to way to get loose and feel less troubled when things are anxious, or excited, or overwhelming, or monotonous, or, you know, when things are pretty much any way at all.
But it became an evil thing to me.
The darkest and saddest thing, really.
After HEY WHAT came out, I was reading a feature-length interview with Mimi and Alan in Pitchfork. It’s called, ‘Low Still Don’t Sound Like Anyone Else.’
At the conclusion of the interview, the writer asked the band for insights on how they sustained the longevity of their career, their creative partnership, their marriage. Alan replied, eloquently.
I wrote down part of Sparhawk’s reply, the last line of the interview, in my notebook:
“Also, don’t drink alcohol. It’s hard enough as it is—alcohol will ruin everything.”
The notebook I’m referring to is the one where I wrote down all the things I could do, or do better, if I didn’t drink. The one where I made a list of people who I would apologize to, and attempt to make amends with. The one where I acknowledged I was no longer in control. Where I surrendered.
I started writing the essay you’re reading now a significant number of weeks since my last drink. My notion, as I type these words, is that I’m a significant number of weeks into forever.
Who knows, really?
But if you see me someday soon, with a beer in my hand, and a touch of whiskey on my breath, then I welcome you to smack that beer right out of my hand.
If you maybe spill some on me when you do it? I won’t mind.
And then tell me you like me better without a beer in my hand.
Because, the thing is, I also like me better without a beer in my hand.
And I’m hoping that someday, my loved one will, too.
Buy HEY WHAT on vinyl from your local record shop or Sub Pop, or listen to it on your preferred streaming service. Apple | Spotify | Amazon
Finally, here’s the album cover. It’s perfect: