APR 13 ...........................................CHARLEY CROCKETT JUST ANNOUNCED 22 JAN 4 8 88.5 KGNU & PARTY GURU PRODUCTIONS PRESENT DIRTWIRE GONE GONE BEYOND, BLOSSOMN THE COLO SOUND, AVERY BREWING, JACK DANIEL’S & TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENT: MUSIC FOR MARSHALL FEB DRUNKEN HEARTS AND FRIENDS FEAT. BILL & JILLIAN NERSHI, DAVE WATTS, ANDY THORN & MORE BUFFALO COMMONS, PICK & HOWL FEB CHANNEL 93.3 & ROOSTER PRESENT BAD SUNS KID BLOOM, LITTLE IMAGE 12 JOSH RITTER FEB 20 SAM BUSH FEB 26 MAR 7 MAR MAR 20 22 MAR 25 26 4 97.3 KBCO PRESENTS LOS LOBOS TENTH MOUNTAIN DIVISION 18 MARCHFOURTH MAR 88.5 KGNU & 105.5 THE COLORADO SOUND PRESENT SARAH JAROSZ TAYLOR ASHTON 88.5 KGNU PRESENTS YVES TUMOR LIVE! 2022 MAR TAJ MAHAL SEXTET CARY MORIN ANDERS OSBORNE & JACKIE GREENE MAR GRATEFUL WEB PRESENTS 31 DEAD FLOYD 88.5 KGNU PRESENTS MAR MARTY STUART AND HIS FABULOUS SUPERLATIVES APR 19 ........................ LUCINDA WILLIAMS AND HER BAND BUICK 6 MAY 8 ...................................................................HENRY ROLLINS MAY 9 .....................................................WELCOME TO NIGHT VALE MAY 10 .................................................................. STEVE HACKETT MAY 16 .................................................................................. EELS UPCOMING SHOWS 25 26 FEB FEB FEB 105.5 THE COLORADO SOUND & 88.5 KGNU PRESENT FEB 105.5 THE COLORADO SOUND PRESENTS FEB 10 .......................................... GANO AND FRIENDS MAR 20 ...................................JERRY’S MIDDLE FINGER APRIL 15 ............................................ THE VELVETEERS MAY 6 ......................................................DELTA SPIRIT MAY 9 ...................................................... THE CHURCH JUST ANNOUNCED 20 JAN 22 23 27 28 JAN JAN JAN JAN 88.5 KGNU & PARADISE FOUND PRESENT GODSPEED YOU! BLACK EMPEROR FEB 5 11 FEB 12 FEB 16 FEB 18 FEB 19 FEB CHANNEL 93.3 & WESTWORD PRESENT AMZY TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENTS THE UNLIKELY CANDIDATES TENTH MOUNTAIN DIVISION + FLASH MOUNTAIN FLOOD SCHOOL OF ROCK BROOMFIELD ROOSTER, PARTY GURU PRODUCTIONS & TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENT TRIVECTA, ACE AURA, SHANK AARON WOOLI The words outside Josh Tryan’s home that inspired Fern Roberts’s new album title. WESTWORD & TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENT JAN MELLOWPUNK 29 KRONEN ROOSTER PRESENTS 6 PASSAFIRE DUBBEST ANDY FRASCO & THE U.N. THE COLO SOUND, UPSLOPE BREWING & TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENT: ANDY’S BIRTHDAY PARTY JIMKATA BLUSH, DRY ICE, JACKSON CLOUD ODYSSEY FISTS OF THE PROLETARIAT ROOSTER & TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENT THE GOOD KIND Subtle Action BY JOHN BEAR 88.5 KGNU & TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENT The writing was on the wall, so to speak, for I’ll Do It Again Tomorrow, the latest record from Denver band Fern Roberts. Frontman and guitarist Josh Tryan saw the words scrawled on a sidewalk near his house. “At fi rst it was very creepy,” Tryan recalls. “But then it became something I saw every day written in the cement. It was written in some sort of chemical that was removed and stained on the cement.” The words became a mantra of sorts for WOOD BELLY + PIXIE & THE PARTYGRASS BOYS 105.5 THE COLORADO SOUND PRESENTS THE STILL TIDE 88.5 KGNU PRESENTS THE CACTUS BLOSSOMS FOXFEATHER, EMMA ROSE TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENTS THE RIVER ARKANSAS GRAHAM GOOD & THE PAINTERS, PHANTOM PHARE, BRANDYWINE AND THE MIGHTY FINES JANE AND MATTHEWS GET A GOOD LOOK WORLD TOUR FLAURAL, LADY DENIM TERRAPIN CARE STATION PRESENTS SPORTS FABIAN MAZURMEMBA UPCOMING SHOWS FEB 27 ........................................... MOLLY TUTTLE & GOLDEN HIGHWAY MAR 2 ....................................................................................DOPAPOD MAR 3 ...........................................................................SCARY POCKETS MAR 5 .....................................................................G. LOVE & THE JUICE MAR 18 ........................................................................SIERRA FERRELL Tryan while he wrote songs that would end up on the new record, on which the band perfects its upbeat, catchy, psychedelic rock with esoteric lyrics that convey a light sense of melancholy. “I became very disciplined,” Tryan says. “I would wake up at 5 a.m. each day and work on songs for an hour before I headed to work. That creepy sidewalk became my mantra. I would see it every morning at six and every night when I got home.” He adds that he noticed small improvements in the songs every day, and he’s been amazed about how everything has progressed over the past several months. He’s hopeful about what the band can achieve moving forward. “I’m chronically way too hard on myself all the time about everything,” he says. “It was nice to say ‘This morning I got a little better at guitar’ or ‘I changed this phrase in the lyrics to make a little more sense.’ The next day I would do the same thing, and it just became a little narrative of celebrating really small successes.” It’s been a learning experience for Tryan, who expected the band’s fi rst record, Meet Them at the Door, to be a life-altering experi- ence. He was a little surprised when it wasn’t. “I’m reluctant to assume such things exist 20 anymore,” he says. “To see how incremental progress builds into something great over time is boring. It’s not very romantic, but it’s fucking cool.” The band says the new record “isn’t a story of romance or grand heroism,” but rather “an ode to subtle action and the power of remain- ing committed to our highest ideals, even in the face of uncertainty.” Tryan’s oblique lyrics tell a story of transformation, albeit a subtle, slow-moving one. “I have a tendency to narrativize my life and view it as a movie or a novel, almost to a fault,” he says. “I pictured releasing that fi rst record as sort of the climax — like the credits would roll and I would just have a triumphant victory. Then we fi nished the record, and I didn’t really feel any different or better about myself or the state of the world.” Drummer Amos Chase enjoyed the collab- oration the trio employed during the writing and recording process that ultimately formed the twelve songs on I’ll Do It Again Tomorrow. “All the songs really feel like one part Amos, one part Todd [bassist Spriggs], one part Josh,” Chase says. “It really came together as a pas- sion project. ‘I’ll do it again tomorrow’ — it’s great. That’s a lyric from ‘Catastrophe,’ and I think it’s really fi tting that we titled the album that way. I’m super proud of the work we did.” Spriggs agrees that the new record was more of a group effort than the band’s debut, which Tryan had more or less written and fl eshed out. “A handful of [the songs] changed from what they originally were when [Tryan] brought them to the table,” Spriggs says of the new album. “We just kind of fl ipped them on their head. It’s a totally different product.” Tryan enjoyed the collaborative approach as well. He says that one song, “Flatline Eyes,” ended up being a completely differ- ent — and better — tune once the band took a crack at it as a whole. “That was really cool for me as a song- writer,” he says. “Just to bring an idea that was completely underdeveloped and kind of watch other people believe in it enough to actually put work into making it something good.” I’ll Do It Again Tomorrow is available now on bandcamp.com. Fern Roberts plays HQ, 60 South Broadway, at 9 p.m. Friday, January 28; tickets are $10 at hqdenver.com. MUSIC JANUARY 20-26, 2022 WESTWORD | MUSIC | CAFE | CULTURE | NIGHT+DAY | LETTERS | CONTENTS | westword.com JOSH TRYAN
