Love Chords by Middle Blue

The seeds for this album were planted on December 30, 2015. Middle Blue was only seven months old at this point—just fourteen gigs in—but I was feeling good about where we were at, and how we had progressed. And when I’m happy about the state of things, I tend to start thinking about the future: Where could this go? What are we capable of? Where could we play? Who could we collaborate with? I was feeling ambitious that day, so I decided to cold-email one of my heroes, Headhunters drummer Mike Clark. He wrote back that day—the drummer from Thrust and Flood was taking me seriously?!—and accepted my invitation to play a gig with Middle Blue at the original Nublu. This was really going to happen.

After one rehearsal, we threw down two sets at Nublu. We did something of mine, a couple of Headhunters tunes, one of Mike’s songs. Honestly, it was great; we were jamming with Mike Clark! The next day, we got the tweet of approval from Mike: “I had a blast last night & Nublu playing with Middle Blue.. Great players who all were hearing some nice things !! Thanks Cats.” Two more killer gigs with Mike followed—for these we brought him to our regular spot, Troost—and then I asked the big question: Wanna make a record with us?

On March 2, 2017, Middle Blue got together at the Ice Plant in Long Island City. With Wayne Silver engineering, we did what we always do: We set up in a room and played our hearts out. Though we do lots of covers in our live shows, these were all Farberman originals. And all first takes. And it all happened in a single night. When you’re working with your friends and heroes, and not overthinking everything, music is easy.
- Brad Farberman

Middle Blue came together naturally. Guitarist Brad Farberman, who had worked in ensembles led by William Parker and Rhys Chatham, was looking to make his next move—something funky; something with tunes; a tight band but not necessarily set personnel—and so he did the only thing that really forces a musician to take action: he booked a gig.