“I’ll see the world while you stay at home,” opens Shawn Rosenblatt on the latest Netherfriends LP Middle America. Devotees to WCR (or any local music publication really) know of Shawn’s 50 songs 50 states project, in which he gave up any lease-dependent piece of land, traveled to every state in the Union, performed, then wrote a new song as well. "Ambitious" doesn’t even begin to describe the project, but after hitting up Hawaii last April, he completed the endeavor. So now that all is said and done, it’s finally time to eternalize his efforts on wax. Last Spring we got the Angry East Coast EP, but now we’ve got a full album about the middle west summed up in shrouded psych-pop goodness.As anyone who grew up around here knows, the Midwest doesn’t particularly carry an exciting connotation. I’ve seen the best minds of my generation destroyed by coasts, the promise of a faster pace and life affirmation. So what does someone who has traveled extensively around the entire country feel about it? “Middle America, you seem to surprise every day,” Shawn sings on "Des Moines, IA" with a Wayne Coynesque gruff falsetto. Likewise, in "Columbus, OH": “Staying here would be the worst thing you could do.” The region that contains all of the in-between places, the God-forsaken highways whose mile-markers can’t pass quickly enough, is actually rather complex, intricate and often inconsistent. The beauty and simplicity of nature and farms can be as malevolent and unforgiving as any urban landscape.
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