Bad History Month: True Delusion EP

“We live in a world where the toilets flush themselves / But here’s good news / People like to live dangerously,” sings Sean Sprecher on The Future. One of the many highlights from Bad History Month’s 2013 self-titled release.

Under the Bad History Month guise, Sprecher – who has also operated under different aliases, including Sean Bean and Jeff Mefff – is a self-effacing songsmith that has helped underpin the foundations of stalwart label, Exploding In Sound, also providing a nice foil to fellow labelmates, Pile and their wonderfully ragged post-hardcore walls of sounds.

Sprecher’s songs consist of morose tales that not only make the mundane seem like magic, but also hold a glorious cynicism that few can match. Riddled with guilt and the intricacies of the game we call life (“I don’t hold grudges, but the grudges hold me” – Grudges), over the years, Sprecher has carved out a niche sound world.

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Through simmering avant-folk-inspired songcraft that pulls together the remnants of protopunk and post-hardcore, Sprecher’s songwriting is as honest as the day is long. It’s seen albums like the aforementioned self-titled, Dead and Loving It (2017) and Old Blues (2020) among some of the most underrated releases from indie-rock’s underground of the past couple of decades.

Where honesty in songwriting is concerned, while a lot of listeners don’t like to cross that bridge, instead trying to use the artform to escape their own gloomy realities, for the few that like to take the plunge, Bad History Month is the lead ticket. Those who connect, connect. Take the line from Childlike Sense of Hatred, for instance – “I could find an enemy that isn’t me”. All told, you’re either in or you’re out. Unlike the late David Berman (who Sprecher has often been compared to over the years) there’s no room for humour, and whilst both whip-smart songwriters, Sprecher’s messages are far more direct.

Bad History Month’s latest offering comes in the way of True Delusion, via Julia’s War. Recorded with Sun Organ’s Tim Jordan and Dan Angel, while the EP clocks in at just over 15 minutes, so concise and pressing, one could argue that it’s the gateway for those not yet acquainted with the project.

Beginning with a series of lo-fi noodling, the eponymous track slowly morphs into one of those breezy in-between moments that Guided By Voices effortlessness shoehorn into an album. It’s an unexpected beginning, and perhaps one of Sprecher’s most tender moments on tape.

Breakdown Lane is the song The Dream Syndicate never wrote. With particles of protopunk and paisley underground reverence, it’s a song that effortlessly glides through the generations, essentially making it timeless.

A gritty number weighed down by a thick blanket of lo-fi, The Other Side contains the wonderful pessimism we have always associated with Bad History Month (“The grass is always greener / Which means the other side also sucks”).

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On The Golden Thread, the title says it all. Sullen drama through the lens of fractured folk that is seemingly reverse engineered. Alongside the rustic rumble of Pretty Good Decision, it’s a bruising one-two combination that leaves the listener stunned and scrambling for a sense of balance.

Bad History Month have always ended their albums emphatically, and it doesn’t change with Over the Hills – a song that rubs shoulders with anything on Duster’s Together. Yearning for that alternative life through the classic daydream, we are quickly dragged back to reality and all its conquering worth. After all, Bad History Month wouldn’t exist without it.

Such as the emotional force of these songs, True Delusion feels more like an LP than an EP. Feeling far longer than the 15 minutes it clocks in at, it’s because these songs freeze time and grapple you into submission. That’s the measure of all great songwriters, and once again Bad History Month’s Sean Sprecher proves that he is among the finest out there.

True Delusion is out now via Julia’s War. Purchase via Bandcamp.