User:Invisiboy42293/Album articles

= Strange Doings in the Night = Strange Doings in the Night is the debut studio album by American cabaret rock band Sarah and the Safe Word. The album marked a turning point for the group, as they acquired several new members during recording and developed a more theatrical sound. It was unavailable on streaming for many years due to the band's dissatisfaction with the production quality, until a remixed and remastered version was released in 2022 via Say-10 Records.

Background and composition
Sarah and the Safe Word was formed in 2015 by lead singer Sarah Rose and guitarist Kienan Dietrich, who knew each other from the Atlanta music scene. Initially a three-piece with bassist Brandon Ward on their debut EP Afterlife (2016), Strange Doings in the Night saw Rose and Dietrich bring in a number of local session musicians to flesh out their cabaret-inspired sound; three of these - violinist Susy Reyes, keyboardist Beth Ballinger, and viola player Courtney Varner - quickly became official members of the group. Additionally, Maddox Reksten, who provided backing vocals on the album, later became the group's official bassist.

Musical style and themes
The band's signature sound began to develop on Strange Doings in the Night, which saw them exploring theatricality with strings, horns, keyboards, upright bass, and accordion with the help of local musicians. During the recording process they expanded from three members to six;   Rose has jokingly compared the group's large and eccentric lineup to Slipknot and the Dave Matthews Band. On the album, the title track combines pop punk and classical elements a la Dresden Dolls, "Pill Pusher" is a hard rock track reminiscent of Jimmy Eat World, and closer "D.K.Y." is a dark folk song with a violin solo.

The band's first EP, Afterlife, was written while Rose was recovering from a breakup and a suicide attempt; they would later describe it as the band's "darkest body of work" and say that they had "got all my dark stuff out" with the record. Strange Doings in the Night, meanwhile, "came out of me trying to rediscover myself, my voice, and who I was." Reviewing the album's 2022 re-issue, Julie River of New Noise Magazine described the song "You're the Sort of Man I Like" as "a modern, queer twist on a very classic vaudevillian duet", while the album as a whole had "a sort of whimsical style of gothicness that’s less Edgar Allen Poe and more Nightmare Before Christmas".

Release
The album was produced by Emarosa's Bradley Walden and released on March 28, 2017. The album was brought to the attention of Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman, who invited the band to perform at the tour's Atlanta stop in 2017. Shortly before the tour, Maddox Reksten, who had performed gang vocals on the album, was made the band's official bassist.

In October 2022, Sarah and the Safe Word teamed with Say-10 to release a remixed and remastered version of their first album, Strange Doings in the Night, along with a first-ever vinyl pressing. The record had previously been unavailable on streaming due to the band being unhappy with the production quality. In addition to remastering, the re-issue also features more contributions from Ballinger and Reksten, who were not official members during the original recording, and Reksten drew updated cover art for the new release.

Background and composition
On May 16, 2019, it was announced that Sarah and the Safe Word had signed to independent label Take This To Heart Records. Rose said that, while the band had been cautious about signing to a label, Take This To Heart had "given us a bigger platform to create what we’ve been creating for a long time now. They haven’t had their fingers in the pie, and we can continue doing what we’ve been doing." The announcement was accompanied by a new single and music video, "Formula 666", the lead single of an upcoming album Red Hot & Holy (which added three new songs to the previous EP). Marvin Doyital of Alternative Press included the single in "10 new songs you need to hear this week", praising it as a "cheeky punk banger" that was "proof that [the band] mean serious business".

The album, recorded with producer Aaron Pace, was released on May 24 through Take This To Heart. Rose described the album as "the full realization of the process of discovery that we started with SDITN" due to better incorporating "the overall theatricality of the band", while Dietrich noted that new producer Pace "helped us learn which aspects of the recording need to stay grounded so we can put maximum weirdness into the aspects that don’t." The following month, the band performed at Augusta Pride.

On Red Hot & Holy, the group, now having a settled lineup and more experience, expanded on the previous album's theatrical sound. Writing about the title track, Immersive Atlanta wrote that it "vividly demonstrates" that "the group’s theatrical take on alt-rock, pop, and emo has only grown more ambitious and fully realized". Album intro "Invocation" employs a music box and organ for a horror film atmosphere, while "The Louisville Shuffle (R.I.P.)" combines emo, jazz, and big band, using strings and brass to create a speakeasy feel. Lead single "Formula 666" is an uptempo punk song that features pop hooks, distorted guitar riffs, driving drums, and a chaotic heavy bridge with strings and screamed vocals.

For Red Hot & Holy, the group approached the songs as individual stories within a larger narrative. "Formula 666" tells of a 1950s drag racer who makes a deal with the Devil to save her girlfriend's life, meant to evoke grindhouse cinema and reminiscent of 1950s teenage tragedy songs, while "Dead Girls Tell No Tales" is a pirate-themed song in the style of a sea shanty. "Dig a Fancy Grace" is one of the band's few overtly political songs and is critical of capitalism, proclaiming at one point "Eat the fucking rich!". The title track was written to promote a "healthy perspective on intimacy and relationships". Rose described the album as having central themes of confidence, self-awareness, liberation, self-realization, optimism, and sarcasm in the face of adversity, and wrote album closer "Lit Cigarette" with the intent of ending the album on an empowered note.

Background and composition
The band began work on a new album, entitled ''Good Gracious! Bad People.'', in October 2019, recording with producer Jim Wirt (Fiona Apple, Something Corporate) in Cleveland, Ohio and planning for a March or April 2020 release. In January 2020 they released the single "You're All Scotch, No Soda", a new single and music video teased as the beginnings of a new album. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, the album's release was delayed, and the band took a hiatus from touring. In April, they released a cover of Fountains of Wayne's "Mexican Wine".

Despite the album delay, a second single, "Sick on Seventh Street", was released in May, with The Alternative describing the video as "like walking into a hazy bar, there’s something slightly off that keeps you coming back." The album's official lead single, "The Last Great Sweetheart of the Grand Electric Rodeo", was released in August; Adam Grundy of ChorusFM described the song as "encapsulating everything that this band is capable of creating when they are firing on all creative cylinders". Three more singles, ""Something is Afoot on Old Man McGrady's River", "Bottom of a Bender", and "When Oskar Fische Comes To Town", were issued before Good Gracious! Bad People. was finally released on October 30, 2020 via Take This To Heart. The album was positively reviewed; Grundy wrote that the band "appear poised to take the next dramatic leap into the limelight as their new record delivers all over the board", while Cole Faulkner of The Punk Site wrote "If ''Good Gracious! Bad People.'' doesn’t become a runaway breakout success, then something is seriously wrong with the music industry today".

On ''Good Gracious! Bad People.'', opening track "Welcome to Winterwood" features a prominent harpsichord riff as well as electric guitar, choir vocals, and "dreamscapey" reverbed strings; Rose intended the song to "remove you from where you are and let you enter a storybook." Lead single "The Last Great Sweetheart of the Grand Electric Rodeo" blends blues, rock, and folk to create what one critic called "a goth version of Charlie Daniels' 'The Devil Went Down to Georgia'", employing call and response vocals, strings, and honky tonk piano. "You're All Scotch, No Soda" features piano, violin, and a fast-paced "stop-start" rhythm similar to Black Parade tracks like "House of Wolves" and "Mama". "Sick on Seventh Street" is a slower cabaret song that incorporates a vocal refrain from keyboardist Beth Ballinger, chiming bells, and minimalist percussion. "Bottom of a Bender" has elements of hardcore and screamo with guttural vocals, as well as a theremin to create a "spacey" vibe. "Disobedient" features industrial elements reminiscent of Nine Inch Nails and Marilyn Manson, while closing track "The Bonnie Dell House" has elements of Southern rock.

On ''Good Gracious! Bad People.'', "Welcome to Winterwood" depicts a shadowy mythical location in the forest where "villains", "racketeers", and "wayward travelers" find refuge, setting the tone for the album. "You're All Scotch, No Soda" confronts misogyny, toxic masculinity, and machismo within hookup culture, with lyrics such as "Told me to smile more/So I took his teeth". "The Last Great Sweetheart of the Grand Electric Rodeo" was inspired by "rodeo sweethearts and robot cowboys riding horses", and tells of a woman seducing a mechanical rodeo cowboy. "Sick on Seventh Street" is a tribute to the band's experiences with New York City's nightlife. "Bottom of a Bender" utilizes sci-fi imagery such as rayguns and time travel; the band compared the song to Chumbawamba because it "sounds very get knocked down and get up again". Other tracks describe a greedy and disloyal television star ("A Celebration - With A Vengeance?!"), a mysterious stranger who grants wishes at a cost ("When Oskar Fische Comes To Town"), and a hurricane that causes the body of a murder victim to resurface in Lake Pontchartrain ("Something is Afoot on Old Man McGrady's River").