It is confession time my friends. I sent the request to do a favorite, overrated, underrated album feature with Rosetta way back in November of 2017. The band literally got back to me with their responses a week later. What year is it you might ask? Well it is 2019 of course. Yep! I am now finally getting around to posting this feature a year and three months later. That’s 15 months to you and me folks.
Anyway the intention behind my initial request to the Rosetta was to get some coverage to their then brand new album Utopioid that dropped in September of 2017.
Well clearly that didn’t happen, but at least I am shedding light on it’s greatness now. Utopioid is nine tracks of post-hardcore-space-metal virtuosity. Rosetta has chops and dynamics for days. This band makes music that is just perfection on so many levels and hits exactly in the right spot, literally every time. You’d think I would have been more motivated to post this feature when the band sent back their punctual responses, but you know what?! I am the main editor and manager of this damn website and sometimes I don’t have time to work on my own stuff (que the heartbreaking and sad folk indie song).
Okay so now maybe a little bit of background on Rosetta besides them making post-hardcore-space-metal virtuosity. They are five people from Phildelphia who have been a band since 2003. Rosetta became fully independent in 2013, which is like the coolest thing ever. Throughout the 15 plus years they have been working hard, touring hard, and playing hard. Hard!
In January of this year they released something a little different a four track EP called Sower of Wind an experimental/instrumental release and according to Rosetta’s bandcamp, “These sounds are organic outgrowths of latent ideas from each of the four parts of Utopioid. Thank you for having an open mind.” So since they just dropped something new and worth promoting I figured now would be as good as time as ever to finally share the band’s responses to the favorite, overrated, underrated feature request.
Sorry for the delay Rosetta…
Enjoy!
Bruce McMurtrie Jr. (drums, percussion, vocals ):
Favorite: Cave In – Jupiter – Changed the way I️ thought and felt about rock and roll and playing the drums.
Underrated: Silverchair – Diorama – Beautiful, really strong songs with amazing melodies.
Overrated: Spending time in the sun.
Matt Weed (guitars, vocals, keyboards):
Favorite: Stars of the Lid – The Tired Sounds of Stars of the Lid – Pretty much listened to this at least weekly for 13 years now.
Underrated: NIN – The Fragile – The legacy of this record is starting to be rehabilitated now, but for a long time it was the dark horse in the catalog for NIN fans and the mainstream just ignored it. But it’s monumentally influential for all sorts of contemporary underground music — rock, metal, electronic, and otherwise.)
Overrated: Post-metal.
Dave Grossman (bass, vocals):
Favorite: The Minor Times – Summer of Wolves – I love everything this band ever put out so it was hard to pick a favorite release. The minor times along with Backstabbers Inc. defined what angry music should sound like to me.
Underrated: Comes with the Fall – S/T – This was William Duvall from Alice in Chains’ band prior to joining AIC. Just a great rock record. Duvall snuck me into one of their shows when I was underage which I still think is awesome.
Overrated: Soap shoes.
Mike Armine (vocals, electronics) :
Favorite: Quicksand – Slip – This stood out from the saturated 90s grunge backdrop. Too heavy and noise laden to be poppy but too dynamic to be hardcore. This has been in my car CD player for the last 10 years. No joke.
Underrated: Dalek – Absence – It’s rare for me to have seen Dalek play to more than 20 people. It’s criminal. Dalek nails the sweet spot between beautiful noise scapes and mammoth hip hop breaks every time. They are truly an unstoppable force with a mature and well-read social commentary.
Overrated: “Doodle” dogs.
Eric Jernigan (guitars, vocals, keyboards):
Favorite: The Velvet Teen – Elysium – This band is a shape-shifting wonder. I love everything they’ve done, but with this self-produced 2004 album, they abandoned guitars in favor of piano, strings, and horns. The depth of the lyrical content is staggering.
Underrated: Sun Kil Moon – Admiral Fell Promises – Made by an aging, ornery white guy who took up classical guitar after many years of writing the most emotionally devastating “slow-core” the world ever heard. What more need be said?
Overrated: Fiat currency.