Barely a month after Brooklyn noise-rockers Parts & Labor made their triumphant return with Set of All Sets, their first album in 15 years, Dan Friel‘s other band, power trio Upper Wilds, continued their planetary series with Mercury. For a group whose music has always been inspired by space and the cosmos since the beginning, this is easily their most human work to date, with lyrics focusing on death and mortality. Skin cancer began to develop on Friel’s face as the group started working on the album, and though the cancer’s removal was easy and painless, the mere presence of something potentially life-threatening had a major impact on him and put a lot of things in perspective, from issues like climate change and capitalism to cemeteries and the afterlife.

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