I am writing this article on a Friday night in the dark while my wife sleeps in the next room, full of Excedrin to fend off a migraine. Monday feels like it was yesterday. So much has happened this week in the world that my brain has failed to process and grieve it all. I used to feel like this often when I was younger, but I didn’t think my mind was developed enough back then. I thought it would get easier when I grew up. Boy howdy, was I wrong.
In those times, I would reach for music. During the waking hours, when my body was up and ready to fight, I hit the heavy stuff: Punk, hardcore, protest songs. But when I needed to wind down, or when my physical form felt too raw and in need of healing, I would go for the experimental, the chilled-out grooves, the music good for turning out the lights and staring into the middle distance.
As I am in the latter mood at the moment, I’ve put on Smoke Midi’s Anytime, an album that takes a patchwork of sounds and forms them into incredible compositions fit for lapsing into a daydream. Smoke Midi – of Bangor, Maine – has released music online for a few years now, crafting a sound somewhere in the triangle of post-rock, psych rock, and indietronica. Anytime is the latest iteration of that sound’s development, which I could describe in one word: Ethereal.
The cool Maine winds come through in Smoke’s music, which combines tape loops, field recordings, drum machines, clips from TV and movies, and plenty of synths to create an atmosphere in which you can easily get lost. Playing through Anytime can help remove you from the train of thought you’re currently in – one that might be going down a bumpy track or getting stuck one stop from your destination – and place you in a new one, taking you exactly where you’re meant to go.
Anytime includes its fair share of instrumentals, including the first track “Broke City”, which introduces the album with a steady wash of sound and disembodied voices introducing the artist and the album. While the instrumentals are mostly short – “Shapes” is over two minutes, while “Destination Unknown” is eighteen seconds long – they shine as experimental compositions on their own and as leads into the songs that follow them. Other instrumentals on the record include “Breaking Cycles Is Lonely Work” and “Until Morale Improves.”
The tracks on Anytime with vocals give a little more insight into the inspiration behind Smoke’s music. “Off You Go” meshes loud bursts of sound over a chill drum track, as if to launch you into the stratosphere. It’s a self-reflective song about doing too much and going too far, causing someone you love to leave: “My instincts kick/And the mouth goes sour/I went too far/And off you go”.
Then, with the person you love gone, you may feel burdened with all the information you have about them, facts and figures haunting you and breaking you down. Smoke pours out these feelings in “Clear My Head”, especially on the spoken word bit at the end of the track: “Wish I could laugh, so low in the trash/My head is spinning, I feel insignificant/What am I supposed to do with all these details about you”.
The answer is to pour everything into the art. “Is it love? I don’t know/I feel an urge to let it out”, Smoke sings on “Mountain Tops”, a track about never feeling as good as being with the person you love, even if you’ve reached the highest summits either on the Earth or in life.
But even pouring everything into art can’t prepare you for real-life situations, especially in cases of sudden reconnections with the past. On “Acetone”, Smoke sings about running into an old friend and both he and the friend realizing they had drifted apart and weren’t who they said they’d be when they were growing up. With the situation so awkward, Smoke wishes both sides could strip away the layers and know vulnerability, returning to the friendships and connections of the past, knowing such a thing doesn’t come easy: “Beat down by big waves/The calm makes you feel safe/Without a net to fall in.”
“Bloody Mess”, despite the title, takes a turn for the positive, as Smoke sings about facing problems head-on instead of escaping into his head and using substances to cope. Smoke has addressed an aversion to drugs and drinking before, having titled his 2024 album Ten Months Sober. On “Bloody Mess”, Smoke proclaims his desire to celebrate the good things and tackle the bad, and understands how he used to react to stress in the past: “Used to destroy all in my path/Used to cope with drink and dope/Some days you just got to suck it up.”
When it gets too much to handle, again, the art is always there. But instead of withdrawing into it, finding connection is key. “Burnout” has a club vibe for sure, as Smoke talks about breaking away from everything that makes him feel small and stuck by hitting the dance floor. And when that helps him get back to feeling right, he’s ready to get back to facing whatever problems come his way, even if they’re internal, as he sings on “Workin’ On Myself”: “Workin’ on myself/Takin’ all the time I need”.
It’s never an easy task, but it’s a good goal to chase. On “Potofgold”, Smoke sings of beautiful things, including the titular pot of gold, but also “colorful wings and new shoelaces” and “honey and herbs, all things fresh in a flow state.” Getting right with yourself means having to find the end of the rainbow, and while arriving there seems like a daunting task, it’s too tempting not to see if the rumors are true: “There’s a lot of talk about a pot of gold.”
Anytime is definitely a record for people going through it by people going through it, and while Smoke’s definitely been on his journey, it’s never a bad time to start if you haven’t started. No matter what questions or problems you have to face, you do have to face them at some point in your life; you can’t just withdraw into a ball or a bottle and hope it’ll all go away. And if – at some point along the journey to find the gold – you have to take a rest, put on Anytime and jam out in your bed, or show the record to a friend and vibe with them, or go out to dance to some other music or appreciate some art.
Whatever you do, hopefully you’ll be ready to get back to work afterwards. The work is hard. But I’ll be right there doing it with you.
Take a listen to Smoke Midi’s Anytime below.
Written by Will Sisskind
