Chief Broom are a Boise, Idaho, USA-based indie and alternative rock act led by Shadrach Tuck. They’ve just completed their debut album written in the wake of the tragic death of his brother and band co-founder TJ Tuck. An exploration on the fragility, monotony, beauty, and horrors of everyday life, it’s called hidden in plain sight.
By Graeme Smith
At the age of 22, Tanner TJ Tuck tragically passed away from a fentanyl overdose. A huge proponent of the Boise music scene, his brother and their bandmates were determined to carry on his legacy. We see that in their debut which is infused with the life and untimely death of TJ.
The album opens with the prologue snuff. Captured audio of a young Shadrach and TJ sets the scene before heavy, moody guitar riffs come in. They provide a looping and unnerving melody and there’s a real sense of trauma in the composition. It’s a powerful and emotional beginning.
We then get the album’s title track. There’s a feeling of creeping horror in its slow burning intro before things become lively and urgent. The pleading vocals during its grungy chorus are a highlight. DFAH brightens things up with its melody without losing any of the impact of its hard-hitting lyrics. The reflective if only rounds of the first part of the album. It opens stripped back and acoustic drawing the listener in before slowly unfolding over seven minutes of melancholic rock.
Suspended in air gives us a quiet and nuanced interlude before bless my ignorance (outskirts) gives us perhaps the album’s most experimental moment. It has an ambient start before developing into an arrangement that marries rock with jazz. At over ten minutes long, it’s a beast, and a highlight.
Saved (?) brings us ecclesiastical organ and a healthy dose of subversion. A reprise of if only provides a striking, meditative coda before leaks closes the album. Acting as an epilogue, it ends things on a cautiously optimistic note, finding the silver lining in tragedy. It’s another highlight.
Alongside Shadrach, Chief Broom features a revolving cast of collaborators, including guitarists William “Cheese” Cheeseman and Frankie Tillo. On drums, you can find Max Voulelis, and on keys, Jake Marchus. For their debut, we also get strings and woodwinds from Ben Youtz, Kayce Guthmiller and Shaun Scrivner.
Hidden in plain sight was tracked and engineered by Shadrach and TJ’s father, Terre, at their childhood home in Star, Idaho. It was mixed and produced by Sonni DiPerri and Adam Gonalvez. The album is out now, and you can listen to it below.
