Stereogum had this to say about Middle Children and I couldn’t have said it any better, “it mostly sounds like a DIY version of Wilco or the Replacements.” And with that, I can’t wait to hear all of Earth Angel, and take in a set at SXSW. Here’s a little more on the band.
The auteur of Middle Children is Patrick Jennings, who writes, arranges, and records the band from his home in Bloomington, IN. His music became known to most initially through his band Hot New Mexicans, and later Purple 7. Jennings left Purple 7, a multi-songwriter group, to play music with childhood friend, Ginger Alford, formerly of the band Good Luck. The team enlisted a handful of musicians to make “Earth Angel,” include Kyle Houpt, Christopher Butcher, and Matt Tobey.
Jennings and Alford bring a history of playing together in bands from their Mississippi Delta hometown, as well as hosting shows for touring bands from said unlikely outpost in the south. Rather than an expected storybook fleeing to New York or LA, Jennings spent most of his young adulthood in Athens, GA. Here he seemed to absorb parts of the eclectic pop of the Elephant 6 sound and its focus on homegrown yet high-quality recording and production. He was a multi-instrumentalist in the band Nana Grizol and spent some time in the touring band of Julian Koster’s The Music Tapes.
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Middle Children are here