The Madison musician discusses his power-pop solo project’s new EP, “Low Times, High Anxiety.”
Rocket Bureau, the solo project of Madison multi-instrumentalist and producer Kyle Motor, released its first EP, Low Times, High Anxiety, earlier this week. As on Rocket Bureau’s previous run of singles, Motor played all the instruments, recorded it to analog tape in his basement studio, and aims for power pop’s muscular but unabashedly tuneful sweet spot. But this time the project takes a couple of surprising turns: The lyrics aren’t about made-up love interests but about struggling with depression, loneliness and anxiety, and the production at times departs from Motor’s meat-and-potatoes approach, especially on the noisy breakdown of “Can’t Stand It” and the woozy acoustic psych of “I Don’t Sleep Well.” Motor joined me at WORT-FM studios this week for a talk about the album and his work with other Madison bands including The Motorz, The August Teens, Brown Derby and The Low Czars. Rocket Bureau doesn’t have any live shows planned yet, but Motor will be pulling double-duty at the mini beer-fest Hullabrew on May 9, where he’ll be playing drums in Brown Derby and keyboards in The Midwest Beat.
Thanks to Dylan Brogan at WORT for producing the segment. A shorter version aired earlier this week on WORT’s In Our Backyard news show.
