(Self released, digital) I love when a record has a big mood. And if the two overriding themes driving that mood are outer space and the lonesome West? Yippee ki-yay, parental fornicator! Vermont s oddball alt-country outfit Western Terrestrials deliver the peanut butter and jelly of genre tropes on their newest album,
Back in the Saddle of a Fever Dream. Recording partly in Nashville, Tenn., the Terrestrials shook off natural disasters and a pandemic to deliver a record that feels as consistent as it is stylized. Opener Space Cowboy s Got the Blues ushers the listener right into the album s vibe: loneliness, paranoia and tongue-in-cheek humor. When that cosmic wind starts whipping around the astral plains / E.T. can t phone home from the range / Like an old coyote howling at the moon, croons bandleader Nick Charyk. Then, Yeah, this space cowboy s got the blues.