As horrible as 2020 was, it at least gave me this. An album I've wanted to hear for a decade finally saw release. An album I thought would never see the light of day. An album I've talked about since I heard songs from it played live numerous times back in 2010 when The Silent Years were still an active band, playing shows around metro Detroit. So while it was recorded well over ten years ago, Spider Season, the band's third full length album, finally saw release in 2020. There weren't many bright spots in 2020. This was one of them.
If you look at my posts on this blog about The Silent Years, there was a lot of anticipation in 2010 for this album. It was given a release date of April 20, 2010 in fact. The band started playing songs from it live earlier in the year, starting with a show at the Blind Pig in January. Four songs were played that night, "Baptized", "Wolves", "Teeth Like Trophies" and "Maybe You Will" which for ten years I've been thinking was called "Maybe We Will", it happens. It was the last song, the one I had the wrong title for, that haunted me especially when I thought about this long lost album. Long story short, the band ran into problems with the now long gone label that was set to release Spider Season, it got held up in limbo, Josh Epstein had to fight to get the album back from the label, then was stuck having to figure out what to do with the album when he was successful in wresting it back from the label. In September, as the band closed out the DIY Street Fair in Ferndale, Epstein announced from the stage that they had found a label to release the album and all seemed right in the world again.
From there, I can't really tell you why Spider Season never saw release on this different label. Epstein's new project with Daniel Zott, Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. really started taking off nationally around this same time frame in 2010 taking him to heights The Silent Years never quite achieved, and it's no surprise his full attention had to be focused on a group garnering more coverage and airplay than The Silent Years did. I held out hope that Epstein would release Spider Season as a download on Bandcamp or something of that nature, he even reunited The Silent Years to perform a song at a Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. show at The Crofoot in Pontiac in 2014, but as the years passed it seemed this album would never see the light of day.
But lo and behold, what happens in the middle of this shit year? Epstein mentions on Twitter that Spider Season is being released, it's really happening. And with Jr. Jr. now running their own label, Love Is EZ Records, it makes total sense. Over ten years after it was slated to be released, Spider Season finally came out in September 2020. So the question is, how can an album I've anticipated for this long possibly live up to the hype I've built in my mind? Well, I already knew the four songs I'd heard live back in 2010, still recalled their melodies and how they sounded, they were that ingrained in my head. That still left me with eight songs to explore, plus see how the studio versions of the other four turned out.
Needless to say Spider Season does not disappoint. I've missed this band so much. If The Silent Years never record together again, this is a perfect send-off. I love their earlier work but this to me is their best album. Produced by Sam Farrar and Noah Passovoy with the band in Los Angeles, this was the one that was supposed to take them to the next level. They toured nationally and had received some national press, but these songs were among the most accessible in their catalog. Although every track is full of the experimentation and wonderful surprises The Silent Years brought to all of their music, tracks like "Teeth Like Trophies", "Wolves", "Baptized" and "Keepsakes" are hook-heavy pop/rock gems. A song called "Cages" with a line about people living in said cages seems just a tad too prescient given the year it was released. Every song is kissed by the touches that made The Silent Years special, exploring multiple genres, the horns, Cassandra Verras' keyboard and violin work, Epstein's masterful lyrics and the entire band's insistence on creating meaningful pop and rock music with substance.
Things are slowed down a bit on "Little Love", one of two ballads on the album. Warm vocal harmonies dominate this one, it's a beauty. And closing out the album is THAT song, the one I most wanted to be able to hear again, the achingly gorgeous "Maybe You Will", just as I remembered it, from the melody, the chorus to the ending harmonies. It puts the finishing touches on a great album and a great band. I can't thank Josh Epstein enough for deciding to release Spider Season. It deserved a better fate a decade ago, it deserves to be heard now, and the hometown fans are grateful it's finally out in the world.
Favorite tracks: "Maybe You Will", "Teeth Like Trophies", "Wolves", "Little Love"
Spider Season was released September 25th, 2020 on the Love Is EZ label.
Purchase Spider Season from Amazon.com
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