''Deadmalls and Nightfalls'' is the second full-length studio album by

Frontier Ruckus Frontier Ruckus is an American band from Michigan. The project is centered on the lyrically intensive songs of Matthew Milia, and was formed by Milia and banjo player David Winston Jones while growing up in Metro Detroit. In 2008, the band releas ...

, released on July 20, 2010 by Ramseur Records.

Reception

The album received positive reviews.

PopMatters ''PopMatters'' is an international online magazine of cultural criticism that covers aspects of popular culture. ''PopMatters'' publishes reviews, interviews, and essays on cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, fi ...

stated that the record "not only outdoes its predecessor, it reaches a level of top-notch songwriting most groups never attain on a greatest hits compilation"—calling it "a musical map to the psyches of its performers.""PopMatters"
/ref> Under the Radar wrote that ''Deadmalls and Nightfalls'' paints pictures, in vivid imagery of American scenery, life, and love, with not a single word misplaced in its poetic grace...an album meant to be combed through and listed to time and again, an album to bask in.""Under the Radar"
/ref> The album can be seen as the second installment in a trilogy of

Matthew Milia Matthew Milia (born November 6, 1985) is an American songwriter, musician, poet, and visual artist. He is best known as the leader of the band Frontier Ruckus. Early life Milia was raised in West Bloomfield, Michigan, where he attended Catholic ...

personal mythology Personal mythology refers to an individual's fundamental stories for making sense and meaning of the world. According to Dr. David Feinstein and Dr. Stanley Krippner, "A personal myth is a constellation of beliefs, feelings, images, and rules—op ...

set in

Metro Detroit The Detroit metropolitan area, often referred to as Metro Detroit, is a major metropolitan area in the U.S. State of Michigan, consisting of the city of Detroit and its surrounding area. There are varied definitions of the area, including the ...

—bridging ''

The Orion Songbook ''The Orion Songbook'' is the debut album by Frontier Ruckus, released on November 6, 2008. Reception The album received positive reviews, with Allmusic stating that it is "about as good a debut as a band can hope for." Crawdaddy! praised the al ...

'' and ''

Eternity of Dimming ''Eternity of Dimming'' is the third full-length studio album by Frontier Ruckus. A double album of 20 songs, the record is nearly an hour and a half in duration. The album's lyrical text is also unusually prolific, containing approximately 5,60 ...

''. Songs such as "Pontiac, the Nighbrink"—an intensely detailed depiction of

Pontiac, Michigan Pontiac ( ') is a city in and the county seat of Oakland County in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 census, the city had a total population of 61,606. A northern suburb of Metro Detroit, Pontiac is about northwest of Detroit. Founde ...

—foreshadowed the zoomed-in specificity with which ''Eternity'' would explore further themes of

memory Memory is the faculty of the mind by which data or information is encoded, stored, and retrieved when needed. It is the retention of information over time for the purpose of influencing future action. If past events could not be remembered, ...

and suburban space.''Metro Times''
/ref>''Kilkenny People''
/ref> "Does Me In" was used in the documentary ''My Heart Is an Idiot'' which follows the love life of

This American Life ''This American Life'' (''TAL'') is an American monthly hour-long radio program produced in collaboration with Chicago Public Media and hosted by Ira Glass. It is broadcast on numerous public radio stations in the United States and internation ...

contributor

Davy Rothbart David Ira "Davy" Rothbart (born April 11, 1975) is a bestselling author, Emmy Award-winning filmmaker, contributor to ''This American Life'', and the editor/publisher of '' Found Magazine''. Found Magazine Davy Rothbart's magazine ''Found'' is d ...

.''My Heart Is an Idiot''
/ref>

Ryan Adams David Ryan Adams (born November 5, 1974) is an American singer-songwriter, record producer, artist, and poet. He has released 23 albums, as well as three studio albums as a former member of alt-country band Whiskeytown. In 2000, Adams left ...

was a vocal fan of the album

tweeting Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, ...

: ""Loving the new Frontier Ruckus! Great band...this is what I want to get back to. Those tunes go forever..."''Lansing City Pulse''
/ref> The band performed several songs from the record for a

Daytrotter Daytrotter is a recording studio, music venue and subscription-based music discovery website located in Atlanta, United States. It hosts recording sessions with indie music acts. The original studio in Rock Island, Illinois, was founded in 2006 ...

session in 2010.''Daytrotter''
/ref> This was the first album by Frontier Ruckus to be accompanied by music videos, with a video shot for "Nerves of the Nightmind" in Los Angeles by Michael Fisk''Muzzle of Bees''
/ref> and a video for "The Upper Room" shot by David Meiklejohn in

Portland, Maine Portland is the largest city in the U.S. state of Maine and the seat of Cumberland County. Portland's population was 68,408 in April 2020. The Greater Portland metropolitan area is home to over half a million people, the 104th-largest metropol ...

. ''

Way Upstate and the Crippled Summer, pt. 2 ''Way Upstate and the Crippled Summer, pt. 2'' is an EP by Frontier Ruckus, released in 2011 between the releases of '' Deadmalls & Nightfalls'' and ''Eternity of Dimming''. It is only physically available on the double-vinyl edition of the form ...

''—an EP of five

alternative country Alternative country, or alternative country rock (sometimes alt-country, insurgent country, Americana, or y'allternative), is a loosely defined subgenre of country music and/or country rock that includes acts that differ significantly in style ...

songs—was released on the fourth side of the ''Deadmalls and Nightfalls'' vinyl package in spring of 2011.''Mostly Midwest''
/ref>

Track listing

All songs written by

#"Nerves of the Nightmind" #"Ontario" #"Springterror" #"Ringbearer" #"Silverfishes" #"The Upper Room" #"Does Me In" #"The Tower" #"Pontiac, the Nightbrink" #"How Could I Abandon?" #"I Do Need Saving" #"Pour Your Nighteyes"

Personnel

;Frontier Ruckus *Matthew Milia – lead vocals, guitar, harmonica,

pedal steel guitar The pedal steel guitar is a Console steel guitar, console-type of steel guitar with pedals and knee levers that change the pitch of certain strings to enable playing more varied and complex music than any previous steel guitar design. Like all s ...

, piano, bass guitar,

harmonium The pump organ is a type of free-reed organ that generates sound as air flows past a vibrating piece of thin metal in a frame. The piece of metal is called a reed. Specific types of pump organ include the reed organ, harmonium, and melodeon. T ...

*David Winston Jones –

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

dobro Dobro is an American brand of resonator guitars, currently owned by Gibson and manufactured by its subsidiary Epiphone. The term "dobro" is also used as a generic term for any wood-bodied, single-cone resonator guitar. The Dobro was originally ...

, voice,

mandolin A mandolin ( it, mandolino ; literally "small mandola") is a stringed musical instrument in the lute family and is generally plucked with a pick. It most commonly has four courses of doubled strings tuned in unison, thus giving a total of 8 ...

ebow The EBow, short for electronic bow or energy bow, is an electronic device used for playing string instruments, most often the electric guitar. It is manufactured by Heet Sound Products, of Los Angeles, California. It was invented by Greg Heet i ...

*Zachary Nichols – trumpet, singing-saw,

melodica The melodica is a handheld free-reed instrument similar to a pump organ or harmonica. It features a musical keyboard on top, and is played by blowing air through a mouthpiece that fits into a hole in the side of the instrument. The keyboard usual ...

alto horn The tenor horn (British English; alto horn in American English, Althorn in Germany; occasionally referred to as E horn) is a brass instrument in the saxhorn family and is usually pitched in E. It has a bore that is mostly conical, like the flug ...

euphonium The euphonium is a medium-sized, 3 or 4-valve, often compensating, conical-bore, tenor-voiced brass instrument that derives its name from the Ancient Greek word ''euphōnos'', meaning "well-sounding" or "sweet-voiced" ( ''eu'' means "well" ...

, voice,

*Ryan "Smalls" Etzcorn – drum kit, all percussions *Anna Burch – voice, bass guitar ;Guest Musicians *Ryan Hay – piano and

Hammond organ The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs generated s ...

on tracks 1, 2, 4, 9 *John Krohn – bass guitar on track 9 *Jim Roll –

fiddle A fiddle is a bowed string musical instrument, most often a violin. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including classical music. Although in many cases violins and fiddles are essentially synonymous, th ...

on track 7

Production

*Produced by Frontier Ruckus *Engineered and Mixed by Jim Roll *Mastered by Brent Lambert *Artwork and Design by Matthew Milia and Richard Maisano *Recorded and Mixed at Backseat Productions in Ann Arbor, Michigan during the winter of 2009–2010

References

External links

{{Authority control 2010 albums Frontier Ruckus albums