Go to local shows.

I cannot emphasize this point enough. Beneath the glimmer of mainstream music is a thriving ecosystem of artists who are just as good (or better!) than anything you might find on on the radio. And while some folks might scoff and say, “but I don’t know any of those bands!”, the discovery is the point.

A few weeks ago, my band played a show in a city we’d never been, and we were delighted by both the reception we received and the quality of the bands we played with. For the point of this post, I’ll draw special attention to Anchors, playing that night as a solo act on electric guitar. I got a copy of the album and found that while the stripped-down arrangements helped to highlight David Black’s clever songwriting, the full band versions on record don’t obscure it any.

Adult Decisions offers a type of indie/alternative/whatever that’s hard to pin down because it comes from a little bit of everywhere. There are touchstones of multiple eras and genres, encapsulating the influences they’ve accumulated throughout their lives. There are bits of emo, shoegaze, 60s psychedelic, 90s alt-rock, folk… Just by listening, I can guess that they went through their emo phase and their Bon Iver period around the same time that I did.

Despite the clarity of these influences, Adult Decisions never feels scattered or unfocused. This is largely due to Black’s songwriting, which lays down a strong foundation for the arrangements to be built upon. With the songwriting as the epicenter, the band is free to swing out through different foundational sounds, creating a fine bit of indie rock that is as rewarding as it is inviting.