The Good Life, Everybody’s Coming Down (Saddle Creek, 2015). Release date Aug. 14.

by Tim McMahan, Lazy-i.com

Lots to cover and virtually no time to do it. Here’s the bullet list:

The Good Life will release Everybody’s Coming Down — their fifth full-length album and first in eight years — on Aug 14 on  Saddle Creek. The band premiered the first track off the album, “Everybody,” yesterday.

From the press release:

Everybody’s Coming Down marks a vibrant sonic evolution for The Good Life. The album fully expresses the band perhaps more so than any previous release, combining and reflecting each member’s nature and strengths: drummer Roger L. Lewis’s love of classic rock, multi-instrumentalist Ryan Fox’s chaotic approach to melody, Stefanie Drootin-Senseney’s propulsive yet tuneful bass parts, and Tim Kasher’s deft, complementary song writing. Viscerally hitting songs like rollercoasting anthem “Everybody” and the boisterous “Holy Shit” sit alongside psychedelic-tinged rock like “Flotsam Locked Into A Groove” and the ambient, atmospheric “Diving Bell,” as well as The Good Life’s now-known lyrical, folk-indebted pop (“The Troubadour’s Green Room,” “Midnight Is Upon Us”). Lyrically, Everybody’s Coming Down is an engrossing, contemplative mix that touches on existential and cosmic queries, ruminations on regrets and self-worth, and the power of memory versus experience.

Everybody’s Coming Down was written mainly in late 2014, and The Good Life played a few shows that August, October and December to road-test some of the new songs. Recording began in January 2015 at Omaha’s ARC studios and finished in the quartet’s respective homes, which are scattered across the US: Chicago, IL (Kasher), Omaha, NE (Lewis), Los Angeles, CA (Drootin-Senseney), and Portland, OR (Fox). The band then traveled to Dallas, TX to mix with John Congleton (St. Vincent, Baroness, Angel Olsen, Cloud Nothings) at his Elmwood Recording. A full track listing and cover artwork are below.

As you already know, The Good Life are slated to play this year’s Maha Music Festival Aug. 15, which will be followed by a U.S. tour with Big Harp.

Will Kasher write a script for this album, too?

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Tampa indie band Merchandise (4AD Records) headlines at Slowdown Jr. tonight.  According to The Georgia Straight, the band’s 2014 album, After the End, was met with “universal acclaim, with critics and fans alike responding to its lush layers of chiming guitars and brooding melodies with comparisons to the Smiths, the Church, and Echo and the Bunnymen.” Indeed, despite its 4AD pedigree, the band has a surprisingly commercial sound. Opening the show is Cloakroom (Run for Cover Records) and local heroes Super Ghost. $10, 9 p.m.

Also tonight, Matt Whipkey and his band perform at Reverb Lounge with The Willards. It’s a warm-up show for his opening set tomorrow night for Dwight Yoakam at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa. Tonight’s show is $7, 9 p.m.

Finally, singer/songwriter David Kenneth Nance plays a set tonight at Almost Music in Benson. Also on the bill are Itasca, Oath and The Full Slabs. $5, 9 p.m. More info here.

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Read Tim McMahan’s blog daily at Lazy-i.com — an online music magazine that includes feature interviews, reviews and news. The focus is on the national indie music scene with a special emphasis on the best original bands in the Omaha area. Copyright © 2015 Tim McMahan. All rights reserved.