Review – Johnny Blue Skies (Sturgill Simpson) “Mutiny After Midnight”

Not Applicable on the Country DDS. AI = “n/a” (but probably clean).

Leave it to Sturgill Simpson to do the most Sturgill Simpson things possible when releasing his latest album Mutiny After Midnight, officially recorded under his pseudonym Johnny Blue Skies and the Dark Clouds. When he initially announced the album on February 13th for a March 13th release, Mr. Blue Skies alluded that the album would only be available on physical media–CD, vinyl, and cassette, and in limited quantities no less.

As Sturgill toadies showered him with praise for shooting a meaty middle finger at streaming services and their meager payouts, Simpson decided late on the afternoon of March 1st to make the album available completely free to stream a dozen days before the physical release on the service that makes Spotify’s penny fraction payouts look outright altruistic. We’re talking the cheapest streamer of them all: YouTube.

Needless to say, there are a few pre-order people who are slightly peeved at this unusual development, but overall Sturgill Simpson acolytes are over the moon to get the latest album dropped in their lap as the world starts to burn in yet another regime change war in the Middle East.

As Sturgill promised, Mutiny After Midnight is a hedonistic disco album overall, though with some other textures in there too, including what’s fair to call a fairly country-sounding song in “Don’t Let Go.” But Johnny Blue Skies promised us a dance record, and a dance record is what he delivered—at least in a late ’70s perspective on dance music. Devoid of drum machines or recognizable synth, an organic record like this would still probably be labeled “Americana” these days.

Simpson also promised in a lengthy missive ahead of the album that it was all recorded live, with lyrics written on the spot. That pretty much checks out with what you hear, including the greasy, organic, groove-laden aspect of the music, sometimes accompanied by rather unremarkable lyricism. Though at other times, Johnny surprises you with some strong one-liners, and with moments of deep insightfulness that are worth not missing (see some of them in the song reviews below).

Simpson said he wanted this album to be fun. Approached with the right mindset, Mutiny After Midnight certainly is that. He also said it was a protest album. It is that too, though these protest moments are resigned to a few select tracks. Other select tracks are purely sex songs, fulfilling the “hedonistic” pact he made with the pre-order crowd. All of this also feeds into a underlying unseriousness about the album that’s a little hard to dismiss.

There’s not a lot of complexity to praise on this record, where the genre medium and his monster band could have lent to some more strong compositional moments like they do at live shows. Mutiny After Midnight feels a little rushed. Even most jam band music finds more involved moments. And though we only have a YouTube stream to go off of, the recordings are quite muddy, obfuscating some of the lyrics, and not conveying a lot of presence to suck you in. Sturgill has a history of turning in hissy, busy-sounding tracks. Mutiny After Midnight‘s are guilty as charged.

The caveat here of course is that the album deserves to be heard on vinyl before any final judgements are passed, or at least HD audio. And it goes without saying that any review published before 24 hours after its release comes with a bit of preliminary caution, though this set of ears listened intently multiple times, and on different mediums before coming to any hard conclusions.

“Hey, what do you think about Sturgill Simpson? ” has become sort of a cultural ink blot test. Releasing an album on YouTube two weeks before its official release with political songs and racy sex songs will only turbo charge that aspect. If you’re a country fan and yearn for the days of his early albums, you’ll be cast off as a simp. If you take in Mutiny After Midnight hook, line, and sinker, you’ll be called a homer who thinks Mr. Blue Skies can do no wrong. Both assessments might be correct to some extent.

But a fair, cool-minded judgement can come to the conclusion that Sturgill Simpson accomplished exactly what he wanted to with Mutiny After Midnight, which was to make a fun dance record. It’s also fair to conclude that this goal, and the result still presents a slightly inferior version of the Johnny Blues Skies experience compared to the much more purposeful, patient, and involved Passage du Desir, or even some of his live shows.

If you want to check out an involved, well-composed, and genius interpretation of the hedonistic culture found in American dance clubs that’s full of vile insight and cutting irony, check out Beck’s Midnite Vultures, which has withstood the test of time. In the Sturgill Simpson/Johnny Blue Skies discography, Mutiny After Midnight feels like a side project, but with the promise of conveying positive vibes fulfilled.

7.4/10

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The Dark Clouds are Laur “Little Joe” Joamets (guitar, steel guitar), Miles Miller (drums), Johnny Blue Skies (Sturgill Simpson), Robbie Crowell (Keyboards, saxophone) and Kevin Black (bass).

EDITOR’S NOTE: The YouTube player for this album COULD disappear at any time.

Song Reviews:

1. “Make American Fuk Again”

This is supposed to be a fun album, and it starts off with a very fun song. You could consider it Sturgill’s “Sexy Back,” though an introverted 40-something Star Wars nerd with a gaggle of kids isn’t exactly what revs America’s engine. Lyricism is not the album’s strong suit, but it is with this song. It starts with the personal revelations Johnny enumerates at the beginning.

Been learning lessons and getting bubbles busted
Learning how to turn ADHD into hyper-focus
Getting my heart broke by people I trusted
Weaponizing my autism to shit out an opus
Been coming to terms with my obsolescence
Taking ketamine to kill my depression
It beats being fogged out on anti-depressants

But the most interesting line might be: “Don’t know why everybody’s afraid of me. I’m a sensitive boy when push comes to shove. I’ve got that Hunter Biden energy. I make a hooker fuk around and fall in love.”

2. “Excited Delirium”

This feels like the album’s early ’80s trash punk, pre glam rock selection to add some variety to Sturgill’s disco era—something different but still germane to the time period he’s looking to evoke. It’s fun. But like multiple selections on Mutiny After Midnight, it’s mostly empty calories. The lyricism is about the militarization and overreach of the police, and specifically makes allusions to the killing of George Floyd. It uses the frenetic energy of the song to communicate the unhinged nature of law enforcement raids and leering protesters.

3. “Don’t Let Go”

Yes, Mutiny After Midnight has a country song, or at least, country-ish, complete with Little Joe playing steel guitar, though the saxophone might throw some off the scent. It’s not hard to surmise that this selection is about Sturgill’s wife Sarah. It feels like the most heartfelt, and maybe un-fun song on the album. It’s also the one where the murkiness of the recording feels like it holds it back significantly. It’s a good song nonetheless.

4. “Stay On That”

This is a sex song for sure, though interpretations of the lyricism might be debated until someone uploads some liner notes. “Stay on that ‘D’ baby, ’till you hit that ‘G'” would be one interpretation, though others might hear “Wrapped up like a douche, you know a runner in the night.”

Otherwise “Stay On That” is a one chord funk groove with shallow lyricism that doesn’t really go anywhere. But that’s also kind of the point. It embodies the uninhibited funky disco hedonism Mr. Blue Skies promised.

5. “Viridescent”

Though on the surface this is a mirror ball dance floor song about a woman with viridescent eyes and pleasant smelling hair, Sturgill also embeds some interesting insights in the lyricism not to be overlooked.“Some days I feel like I’m on fire. My emotions get so amplified. Some days I want to disappear and retire, then want to hop in the saddle and ride,” he says. This underscores Sturgill’s on again, off again relationship with music. Ultimately, “Viridescent” might just be a dance song. But it’s also a song about passion, and its sometimes swelling and fleeting nature that can be unwieldy and difficult to predict.

This is also one of the few songs that features some legitimate guitar solos, perhaps from both Sturgill and Little Joe.

6. “Situation”

Another sex song, Sturgill forgoes the innuendo to issue lines like, “Wanna get you wet. Wanna make you sweat.” The hook “No doubt about it girl, you’re a situation” is a good one … for a vapid dance floor hookup song, which is what “Situation” is.

If Florida Georgia Line or Sam Hunt issued the line, “Just let me be your lollipop, taste that sweet sensation,” they would get trounced by the distinguishing Americana crowd that gravitates towards Sturgill. Because it’s Sturgill, it will be deemed as artsy, and forgivable via irony. But like a few of this album’s tracks, the value in this song is ephemeral, however bolstered by the sped up ending that does make for one of the more fun moments of the album.

7. “Venus”

Maybe the weakest song on the album, the groove doesn’t find its pulse, the lyrics feel pretty cliche and almost like placeholders (“You be Venus, I’ll be Mars”). “Venus” strains itself to be a dance song, or a love song. After six minutes, a meandering melody and beat, and repetitive elements that never transition to being catchy, you’re ready for it to be over.

8. “Everyone Is Welcome”

This is yet another sex song, but one that looks to forward a political message about inclusivity, then fold that back into the conversation about sex.

“Life is better fluid like sexuality. Inhibitions are better off rejected. No place in the universe for individuality. The truth is knowing that it’s all connected. Two is enough, but three’s a whole lot of fun. Four’s a fu-king party when everybody comes.”

This is more of the hedonism Sturgill Simpson promised us. But something about the way Sturgill couches all of this feels inauthentic. When he’s singing other songs of his like “Don’t Let Go” or “Oh Sarah,” this feels like the real Sturgill. “Everyone Is Welcome” seems to be angling for shock value, or to purposely make the right people feel uneasy. Or does Sturgill participate in polyamorous gender-fluid orgies? Has he ever come across as being of that ilk?

9. “Ain’t That A Bitch”

It feels like this is the song where Sturgill’s sonic vision for this album is finally realized in a more expansive and imaginative idea of what “funk” or “Disco” music could be. A forceful and political song, it dishes out plenty of red meat to a hungry constituency, though some of the lines feel like their more for applause, are rendered trite from their simplicity of perspective, or sometimes could just as well implicate people on the left as on the right, whether that’s the intended target.

“Keep the present script on minimum wages. Lock up all the minorities, put the babies in cages. Anybody speaks out, simply dismiss ’em,” Sturgill sings … and then it’s hard to make out where it goes next, like a lot of the lines from the album. But the upshot is, “The poor stay poor, the rich get rich. Nothing ever changes baby ain’t that a bitch.”

It sure is.

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