Logan Farmer‘s new EP, Butchers, presents a world in turmoil, especially after an election that has created more problems than has been solved. What he plays, largely reflects the struggle to survive when the odds are stacked against you.
While his main instrument is an acoustic guitar, his influences range from trip-hop to dreamy shades of Americana. He blends and balances sounds within that mix as he looks at a country that seems to no longer understand its role. As he sings Landlord, visions of ownership, poverty, and lost promises come to mind.
Monastery comes alive with thoughts of complicity in the madness in these modern times. Because we don’t live in a monastery, but among other people, we are all responsible for what occurs. Gently, the song focuses on the guitar before finishing with a wash of synthesizers that frame our responsibility for trying to live apart from the madness knocking on our door.
Faith and obsession provide the background for Butchers, where the bass plays a simple beat as sounds and synthesizers offer a glimpse into what could go wrong. Starting like a march, while guitars bolster the song, there seem to be dips into moments of madness that get stronger as the song continues.
Psychically, the EP occupies a space reminiscent of David Bowie and Pat Metheny’s “This Is Not America,” although the songs he plays come from a completely sonic territory, framed by a world gone wrong and not understanding how to make things right again.
With 100% of the proceeds from this collection going to the Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition, Farmer is clearly trying to make a change to the deteriorating conditions he sees playing out in America’s political landscape.
The images that Logan Farmer unfurls hit home less as accusations than as a litany of the failures, that he believes he bears some responsibility for. In looking at this world, he wants us to see that we all bear part of the burden of what is going on. Taking a stand is the unspoken answer. We see the evils we must endure, along with those we are responsible for. In order not to be “Butchers,” we must move forward in a direction where we see our actions for what they are. A remarkable collection, Logan Farmer’s Butchers shares the pain while seeing ways to mitigate the damage.
Butcher EP (May 23rd, 2025) Western Vinyl
Bandcamp: https://loganfarmer.bandcamp.com/album/butchers-ep
