White Reaper

White Reaper was the final headlining act and closed out the night with a bang. Pulling partially from their new album and partially from their old hits, the hour worth of consistently engaging music Louisville alt rockers made the room extremely lively and fun to listen too. White Reaper have been pushing out good stuff in the Indie music scene for the last decade with albums like The World’s Best American Band and You Deserve Love. Their new album Only Slightly Empty maintains this consistency while also introducing more mature theme’s about relationships, fame and our world at large. If you want a more in depth review of the album you can read our review of it by KRUI writer and reporter Will Clair.

World’s Worst

World’s Worst first opened up the show phenomenally pulling mainly from their new album American Muscle. With a variety of influences from genres like Shoegaze, Emo, Grunge & Slacker Rock they had a really great performance filled with a nice mix of more relaxed and more high energy songs. My favorite from the set was their last track Rockets. It ran pretty long but I would’ve listened for 10 more minutes because of how it used its repetitive drumming, hypnotic bass lines and beautiful guitar tones (shoutout fuzz peddles) to create this really powerful and addicting wall of sound. After the set was over I got to speak with two of their band members Zach and Jake and had a nice conversation about some of their origins and influences. They all met in the skateboarding scene around University of Utah and formed Worlds Worst in late 2019, after having to split up briefly during covid they reformed towards the end of 2020 and have been going really strong since. If you wanna hear more about their story you can check out the interview KRUI’s own Logan Melia did with them. Great work and thanks for doing an interview with us World’s Worst!

Lip Critic

Lip Critic really amped up the audience for their half hour. Coming in with two drummers, a power electronic set and a lead singer who you would’ve thought was on coke. The pit went into a frenzy. Moshing, walls of death, crowd surfing and general high energy dancing made for a really fun set. The lead singer added to this quite a bit with running into the crowd multiple times and other crazy hijinks. Their mix between styles of dance and electronic music with more traditional American hardcore and metal makes for a really interesting boundary pushing music.

I wanted to highlight their unique style and genre blending that was seen across their performance and music as a whole. Their set consisted mainly of their 2024 album Hex Dealer which I got to buy a CD of afterwards at their merch stand. After taking it home to listen I immediately felt the same rush I felt at their show within the first few tracks and this kept going for the whole album

Kicking off the album with It’s The Magic, the track starts with a powerful bass and initially calm vocals before slowly introducing more instruments. Going into the second chorus the songs continues to intensify until the screeching vocals and heavy drums in verse three, carrying on for the rest of the song. 

Track two Love Will Redeem You wasted no time amping up. The heavy repetition and vocal effects are extremely effective at creating this chaotic almost manic vibe. This theme of manic anger continues on into the song The Heart, which is seemingly about an inescapable feeling of pain rushing through someone’s heart. The scattered vocal lines mixed with lyrics such as “Is beating inside me, a feeling untimely, can’t fight it off, can’t fight it off” effectively induces this feeling of anxiety and paranoia within the listener.

When speaking with the group after the show they discussed some of their influences within industrial hip hop artists such as Death Grips and Danny Brown, the latter of which they’ve actually opened for. These influences really show within their next two tracks. Starting with Bork Pelly we get a fun posse cut with underground rappers GHOSH & ID.Sus and continuing onto the very catchy Spirit Bomber. Both of them are the first fully rapped songs on the album and feature these very manically delivered non linear lines akin to MC Ride and other industrial hip hop artists.

The second and final feature on the track comes from DJ Izzy Da Fonseca on Death Lurking. The repetitive vocal lines create a very hypnotic yet fun and catchy atmosphere leading perfectly into Milky Max. Their most popular song delivers perfectly on what so much of what makes this album so great from front to back. The infectious riffs, the manic yet catchy lyrics, the insane vocals combining with intense electronic production and live drumming create such a fun and powerful song that was both amazing live and amazing to listen too at home.

The next three tracks are where you can see their hardcore roots blossom further. The heavy drumming in the Sermon outro, the breakneck pace of I’m Alive and the screeching vocals on My Wife and The Goblin really push the listeners stamina with nonstop high energy songs. In The Wawa (Convinced I Am God) in it’s own unique way tells what I believe to be a story of a man rejected by conventional society and norms and turning to find his own truth, ie: convincing himself he’s god. I think this perfectly exemplifies how many of the songs lyrics (despite being seemingly nonsensical) have some deeper ideas and meaning behind them. This concludes with the final track Toxic Dodger a braggadocious track that I see as the group almost manifesting their success within music. Repeating “If you wanna stop me you’re gonna have to kill me” until you believe it as hard as they do, and to be quite honest after finishing this record I think I do.

Even a year after its initial release Hex Dealer still remains one of the most exciting and boundary pushing release’s within underground music and this show was living proof of that. Their high energy genre blending sound and undeniable production talent lead to great albums and even better performances. I think its valuable for music audiences to challenge their ears by listening to music that doesn’t neatly fit into specific genre labels which is why I think artists like Lip Critic are so important. And I would definitely keep them on my radar of up-incoming talent within Electronic, Experimental Hip Hop and Noise music.

The post October 4th: White Reaper, World’s Worst & Lip Critic at Gabe’s. Lip Critic’s Hex Dealer Album & Show Review. appeared first on KRUI Radio.

This show will be one of White Reaper’s first since the release of their 5th studio album, Only Slightly Empty. The current members of the band are Tony Esposito as lead singer and guitar, Ryan Hater on keyboard, and Hunter Thompson on guitar. This album marks the first release since the departure of drummer Sam Wilkerson and his twin brother and bass player, Nick Wilkerson. Even with these founding members leaving, they were able to create an amazing alt-rock album that can energize you throughout its 29-minute runtime.

When I first heard about Only Slightly Empty, I was very hesitant and had low expectations since they were missing their rhythm section, but after hearing the first song on the album, all my worries were pushed to the side. The first song on the album, Coma, is a song that throws you in the deep end, with a very soft intro that immediately turns into a wall of heavy guitars and lyrics about distaste for the world and how no matter how hard they try to make it better, the bad seems to beat it out. The next song, Blink continues with the theme of the world rejecting them with the lyrics, “They all hoped I would die in here / So I pulled my punches and took my meals / For a waiting man that’s a life left cold.”

In the songs Honestly and Freakshow the lyrics move from how he is victimized by the world to how he won’t sit back and take it anymore. The way he strikes back at those who have wronged them is addressed in Eraser, talking about how they will get rid of those around them who only bring them down. These themes are representative throughout the album as a whole and signify a metaphorical end to the first half of the album, from theme to overall sound.

The next two songs in the album explore confusion within a romantic relationship. Blue 42 dives into the problems that the singer is admitting to in the relationship, from neglecting their partner or making them feel lesser. It continues with the sound of strong guitars from the previous songs, but that quickly changes with Pocket. The guitars change from aggressive to almost having a calming effect as the songs become more personal. Pocket deals with the singer coming to terms with the end of a relationship and wanting to end things. Rubber Cement and Touch let us see deeper into his mind and how he feels and yearns for another person, wanting to go back to them and equating them as home.

This album holds a lot of great music and is just one of many amazing albums from White Reaper. This album marks a turning point in their careers as an almost brand-new band. To see them as they are now, come visit their show this weekend at Gabe’s. Detailed show and ticket information can be found here.

The post Concert Preview: White Reaper w/ Lip Critic and World’s Worst at Gabe’s Oct. 4. An open-eyed look into the new record Only Slightly Empty appeared first on KRUI Radio.