Bad History Month: God Is Luck

There are certain times where you need to take stock with an album. Step back and let it breathe a little. If it takes weeks (hell, even months!), then so be it. Good old-fashioned honesty has always superseded being first to the punch on something. The same honesty that the best artists often exhibit and, from an editorial point of view, it’s the least we can do when trying to unravel the complexities, the blood, sweat and tears that goes into producing the final result.

While some albums take a little long to sink into the pores, under the Bad History Month banner, the creations of Sean Sprecher have never fallen into this category. Having released one of the year’s finest EPs merely weeks prior (True Delusion), it was a glorious surprise when it was announced that the third Bad History Month full-length, God Is Luck, would follow so soon after.

Whether it be under Bad History Month or the Fat History Month moniker before that, Sprecher has always made music to serenade the outlier. A songsmith for the margins. The best songwriters often are, with a mental dexterity that breeds unique storytelling, artists like Sean Sprecher don’t choose: they are chosen. And while part of the battle is harnessing that gift, through the cracked prism, Sprecher has always tackled songcraft by penning songs largely for himself and himself only.

Out of the Bad History Month canon, God Is Luck is an album that sees Sprecher making you work for the results. Released within such a short space of time of True Delusion, one would have expected this as a taster for the main event. However, in comparison to the smudged, immediate lo-fi folk majesty, God Is Luck couldn’t be any different. While its 14 tracks may be a mountain too steep for some, duration aside, God Is Luck is an album that requires stern examination (in this case almost two months-worth).

Cory Hanson: Western Cum

To truly understand records like God Is Luck, you need to get to a certain place in your mind . Sprecher has talked about the album been centred on judging things differently, and there are certain snippets that attest to that. Rock Hopping, for example (“I wish to keep my mind clear of occupations”), and Winter Window, where Sprecher counts his lucky stars by ending the song with a waltz to the shops in pursuit of a packet of M&M’s.

These street-level snapshots are what growing older is all about. The small victories that, in isolation, feel ridiculously lifechanging for that fleeting moment. After a week spent feeling like I was at the bottom of the same well as Toru Akada in Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, God Is Luck was the album that not only provided the relevant light down that well, but also the golden hand that pulled me out of it.

It may sound self-indulgent to speak of an album in this fashion, but I believe there aren’t enough people discussing the power of the album, and while many will try and claim otherwise, it challenges and shifts the mind the same way it always has.

Pulling God Is Luck apart and seeing things a bit clearer two months on, and the biggest mind block is overcoming the 12-minute disjointed (and audaciously titled) Summer of 2069 – an exiled slab of noise that pits the first half of God Is Luck against the other. The move echoes the same notion of Holy Sons’ Coiste Bodhar from the seminal 2020 album, Raw and Disfigured. It’s interesting, but in Sprecher’s case, slamming this monolith in the middle of God Is Luck creates a beautiful contrast between both sides.

Looking at the first half, and Sprecher starts with the album’s eponymous track. “God is luck, here I am waiting,” he sings, amid a series of splashing rhythms and foggy melodies which eventually break through the other side where Firefly awaits. In part a Jack London-inspired stream-of-conscious tale of a day in the life of an insect, on Firefly Sprecher shrewdly gives us the view of a leafy suburban topography.

On the other side of Summer of 2069, and the glorious one-two combination of Shadow Work and Bad Blood are amongst the finest songs Sprecher has delivered. Back porch dirges of electric folk that are essentially the soundtrack to the Exploding In Sound story. Pile, Prewn, Bad History Month himself; the remnants are all there in this wonderful snapshot of sound that feeds into the kind of emotional intensity one experiences with the best art. Perhaps Sprecher’s puts it better during Shadow Work (“Where the light doesn’t shine”).

Then there’s the giddy rush of Am I Better. A glorious echo around the room that bursts with an array of beautiful possibilities. Those multi-layered dreamscapes where colours transcend everything else in your mind. And while Autumn contains the kind of story most of us encounter as we get older (“I saw you just last week”), it underlines what Sprecher sets out to achieve with God Is Luck. An album that clearly underlines personal growth.

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And that continues on TMTYLM. “Tell me that you love me, and then stay” he sings during a song that showcases personal growth better than any other on the God Is Luck. In many respects, it’s world away from the Old Blues’ cut, Low Hanging Fruit, the two albums contrasting insofar as viewing the world and situations from completely different head spaces.

On closing song Let It Ride, Sprecher pulls the remnants of every idea that forms this album, unleashing a howling blast for the ages. Alongside the aforementioned Shadow Work and Bad Blood, it’s another watershed moment, combining breezy, cloud-like melodies with searing noise that is seemingly reversed engineered.

With Sprecher’s hairpin turns of phrase, perhaps the most salient message comes on Touch the Riff. A song that underlines the number of emotions one goes through each day (“Take the risk, touch the riff / Try to find song that I’ve been keeping waiting”). Perhaps through the lens of more youthful eyes, Sprecher gets darker just a couple of moments later (“The future is only fiction – the ending of the story isn’t written”).

Again, it could be construed in numerous ways, but that’s the thing about Bad History Month. Moving with the speed and grace likened to a chapter from David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest, you never know quite where you stand with it, and that’s part of the mystique in Bad History Month’s world. A unique take, and with God Is Luck, once again Sprecher isn’t trying to be anybody but himself. Everyone’s got a story to tell, and Sprecher tells his with good old-fashioned honesty. And it’s a beautiful thing.

God Is Luck is out now via Exploding In Sound. Purchase from Bandcamp.