Album & Concert Review- Butch Walker's 'Peachtree Battle'

Best of 2013: Butch Walker

‘Peachtree Battle’ EP/Album Review

Concert Review 11/5/2013

House of Blues- Chicago, IL

By Anthony Kuzminski

[Buy the record HERE]

It took me a while to make sure this one was done right. Whenever I review something by Butch Walker it's more than a standard review or assignment. He's out there creating some of the best music of the last decade that covers a wide variety of genres making his music hard to place in one genre. That being said, it's also what makes it so good. 

First up, I take a look at his brilliant EP, Peachtree Battle, written in the shadows of his father's declining health. I also discuss the need for him to tour at this time and why his Chicago show was more than an enlivening one, but an enlightening experience no one will soon forget. 

Here's a small piece from the review:

One song on the EP that stands out is the aching “Coming Home”. The light of the song comes from its delivery. I thought about my father's wail as the opening piano chords of “Coming Home” echoed out of the speakers. I also heard the sound of his encouragement, his sage advice, and his frustration with me as a teen but above all else, I heard the sound of his undying love that I will take with me wherever I go for the rest of my life. I now watch that same love shared with my four-year-old daughter for whom he is a caretaker a few days a week. Their relationship is like no other and yet, he turned seventy this past July and he has entered the same decade that both his father and Butch’s father passed and yet I am not in a stage where I can think about losing him. One Saturday we came home from running errands to find my father pulling an cutting every weed from our garden, something we didn’t ask him to do but he did because he knew how pressed we were from time. When I bring my daughter home from his house, her coat is filled with sticks of gum and lollypops. When I ask her who gave her them, she lights up the world with a smile and simply says “Pa”. One day I will lay my father to rest knowing I can never repay him for the support and life lessons he provided. I do not want to think about how my daughter will react because the loss will be vast but I know I will play her “Coming Home” and tell her we will one day see him again. 

Read the rest of the review HERE. As always special thanks to Keavin at antiMUSIC for giving me free reign to write these introspective pieces.