Stygian Bough at Warehouse on Broadway: A Journey Through the Void

 

Slightly Feral Media 

Stygian Bough at Warehouse on Broadway: A Journey Through the Void

Live Music Photography, Doom Metal, and Ritual at Warehouse on Broadway

Stygian Bough at Warehouse on Broadway

Some shows are collections of bands. Some shows are experiences.

This was the second kind.

The raccoon arrived at Warehouse on Broadway with anticipation. I was about to experience one of my favorite bands in one of my favorite venues, and the camera was ready to collect data.

There are only two bands I have intentionally seen more than once: Drifter and Barrage.

This weekend I got to see both. Both contain musicians I first met while working as a stagehand. Both are extraordinarily talented. Both are populated by genuinely good humans.

Stygian Bough was on the list and when one of your favorite bands makes a weighty suggestion, a wise raccoon listens. 

It was a good weekend for the raccoon.

This particular evening brought Drifter, 40 Watt Sun, and Stygian Bough to Warehouse on Broadway for an experience that felt less like a concert and more like a journey.

The room was already beginning its transformation when I arrived. The haze was building. The lights were waking up. The drums were waiting patiently on stage. The audience had not yet entered the story. But the story had already begun.

Drifter 

There is much to unpack when it comes to Drifter and the reasons the band has such a hold on me.

The music is complex. And by complex, I mean astrophysics. The layers of sound create a gravitational pull of their own, like a black hole suspended somewhere beyond the edge of the observable universe.

One cannot simply observe it. One is drawn into it. Pulled toward it. Consumed by it. Like The Tide. 

Drifter: Entering the Void

The surprising part is what exists inside the void. While the rolling drums pull you through the gateway, the bass and guitar begin painting a landscape. 

It is always the same place. The blue hour. A deep forest. Ancient trees draped in moss. Branches reaching overhead. 

The distinct sensation that the forest is aware of your presence. Not hostile. Not threatening. Curious. Observing. Waiting. Something old lives there. Something older than language. Older than explanation. Older than words.

Drifter does not simply produce music. Drifter creates environments. And every time I hear them, I find myself returning to that same place.

When I walked into Warehouse on Broadway, the drums were already waiting on stage. Lights shone through the haze. The room was beginning its transformation.

Something about the raccoon: I have a sentimental heart. And I am a crier.

There is something about an empty drum kit sitting beneath stage lights that reaches into ancient parts of me. The drums are rhythm. The foundation. The driving force. They begin the conversation and they are often the ones who end it.

I am oddly obsessed with photographing those moments. The first strike. The final strike. The beginning. The ending. The heartbeat.

Drummers spend most of the evening hidden in the back on what is affectionately known as an ego riser. Exactly where they belong. They are animals. The engine room of the entire operation. Something about that speaks to me in places deeper than my soul.

So while the room filled and the haze continued to build, the raccoon did what raccoons do. I began gathering data.

Second only to haunted drums are pedalboards. Pedalboards fascinate me. I know embarrassingly little about them. The raccoon should probably fix that. But every board is different. Every arrangement is unique. Every collection of switches, knobs, cables, and mysterious glowing lights tells a story about the human who built it. They are functional. They are artistic. They are deeply personal And before a single note had been played, they were already helping tell the story of the night to come.

The raccoon feels a genuine fondness for many of the humans she observes and photographs. That is perhaps an unavoidable side effect of the work. Photography is often described as documentation. Sometimes it feels more like intimacy. Hours are spent sorting through images. Zooming in. Examining details. Looking for moments. Looking for truth.

Over time, you begin to learn people in unusual ways. Not through conversation. Through observation. You learn their expressions. The way they hold their shoulders. The way they position their feet. The concentration. The joy. The passion. The exhaustion. The vulnerability. The moments between the moments.

After repeatedly photographing Drifter, the raccoon knows these aspects of them well.

They are performers. That much is obvious. But very little of it feels performative. The data suggests something far more intimate is taking place. Each musician appears fully immersed in the experience they are creating. The audience is invited to witness it. Not the other way around. Perhaps that is part of why the music feels so powerful. Nothing about it feels manufactured. Nothing feels forced. The emotions are real. The immersion is real. The connection is real.

And because of that, there are moments when the raccoon forgets she is supposed to be working. Moments when the camera lowers. Moments when the data collection briefly stops. Moments when I find myself completely lost inside the experience.

The evidence suggests this happened more than once.

And then Drifter began to play.

The gate opened.

The audience stepped through.

The journey had begun.

40 Watt Sun: The Mirror in the Forest

If Drifter opened the gate, 40 Watt Sun handed the audience a mirror. The transition was immediate. Drifter had carried us into the forest. 40 Watt Sun asked us to stop walking.

A single musician occupied the stage. No wall of amplifiers. No elaborate production. No place to hide. Just a voice, a guitar, and enough emotional weight to quiet an entire room.

The performance was mournful. Heartfelt. Intimate in a way that felt almost intrusive. As though the audience had accidentally been entrusted with something deeply personal. At one point, I am fairly certain I watched an audience member wipe away tears. No one seemed surprised.

The raccoon certainly was not.

40 Watt Sun possesses a rare ability. He takes sorrow and makes it melodic. He takes grief and gives it shape. He takes the things most humans spend years trying not to feel and somehow transforms them into something beautiful enough that people willingly lean closer.

The room changed. Not dramatically. Quietly. Conversations faded. Movement slowed. The energy settled. People listened. Really listened. Not to the lyrics alone. To themselves. That may be the most remarkable thing about performances like this.

They create space. Space to feel. Space to remember. Space to acknowledge things that daily life usually keeps buried beneath schedules, responsibilities, notifications, and noise. 

Drifter had carried us through the gateway and into the forest. 40 Watt Sun asked us to sit down once we got there. To be still. To be present. To spend a little time with ourselves. 

The raccoon suspects this was intentional. Because by the time the final notes faded, the audience had already traveled a considerable emotional distance.And somewhere beyond the trees, something ancient was waiting.

The drums had been calling to it all evening.

Soon, it would arrive.

Stygian Bough: The Ancient Arrives

And then Stygian Bough arrived.

For those unfamiliar with the project, Stygian Bough is a collaboration between Aerial Ruin and Bell Witch. On paper, that description is accurate. In practice, it feels wildly inadequate. Some collaborations sound like two artists working together. Stygian Bough sounds like two worlds colliding. Aerial Ruin brings haunting folk melodies, vulnerability, and the deeply human aspects of the experience. Bell Witch brings enormity. Weight. Atmosphere. The sense that something vast is moving just beyond perception.

Together they create something that feels less like a band and more like a place. A place the audience is invited to enter.

Or perhaps more accurately: The ancient thing the drums had been summoning all evening finally stepped through the doorway. 

The forest had been there from the beginning. Drifter had painted it. The blue hour. The moss-covered trees. The feeling of being observed by something just beyond sight. The sensation that the woods themselves were aware.

At the time, it felt like atmosphere. By the time Stygian Bough took the stage, it felt like prophecy.

This was the thing waiting beyond the tree line.

This was the presence hidden among the branches.

The realization struck the raccoon sometime during Stygian Bough's set that the ancient thing emerging from the forest was being carried not by a guitar, but by Dylan Desmond's bass. 

Calling it a bass feels technically correct but spiritually insufficient. The instrument did not behave like a bass. It behaved like weather. Like geography. Like tectonic movement beneath the earth. The sound did not seem to arrive from the stage. It seemed to rise from somewhere beneath the room itself. The notes were not merely heard. They were experienced. Felt through the floor. Through the chest cavity. Through the bones.

The raccoon found herself wondering if this was what the forest had been trying to communicate all evening.

Drifter's drums had opened the gateway. 

40 Watt Sun had asked us to sit quietly enough to hear ourselves.

And now Dylan Desmond's bass was giving voice to the ancient thing waiting on the other side.

The notes did not feel played so much as unearthed. Not old. Ancient. 

This was the ancient thing the drums had been calling toward us all evening. Not evil. Not hostile. Not even particularly interested in us.

Simply ancient. The kind of ancient that existed before language gave names to things. Before stories. Before memory. Before humans gathered around fires and attempted to explain the darkness. By the time Stygian Bough took the stage, the audience had already traveled considerable emotional distance.

Drifter felt like home.

40 Watt Sun felt like confession.

Stygian Bough felt ancient. Not old.

Ancient.

The performance occupied a strange space somewhere between concert, ritual, meditation, and collective dreaming. Time became unreliable. Songs ceased feeling like songs. They became landscapes. The room responded accordingly. People stopped moving. Stopped talking. Stopped documenting. Stopped performing audience participation.

Instead, they experienced.

Warehouse on Broadway ceased feeling like a venue. It became a vortex. A place where a group of  humans agreed, for a few hours, to share the same emotional space. The music was heavy. But not aggressive. Heavy in the way mountains are heavy. Heavy in the way grief is heavy. Heavy in the way memory is heavy. 

The room did not resist it. The room surrendered.

So did the raccoon.

Drifter opened the gate.

40 Watt Sun handed us the mirror.

Stygian Bough asked us to stand in the presence of something older than both.

Not remembrance of a specific thing. Remembrance of something forgotten. Something buried deep enough that only music knows how to reach it. This was not simply a sequence of performances. It was a journey. Into the void. Into ourselves. Into something ancient waiting on the other side. And for a few hours inside a warehouse in Kansas City, everyone present traveled there together.

The Evidence

Standing in Warehouse on Broadway, surrounded by strangers sharing the same experience, the raccoon found herself thinking about something unexpected.  

This is why the work exists. Not the photography. Not the galleries. Not the social media. Not even the blogs. Those are merely methods of preservation. The work exists because moments like this are temporary. The final note fades. The lights come up. The crowd disperses. The gear gets packed.

The room returns to being an ordinary room. And yet something happened there. Something real. Something meaningful. Some humans gathered together and willingly traveled the same path.

Into the void.

Into themselves.

Into the presence of something ancient. Most of it will never happen exactly that way again. That is what makes it valuable. The photographs preserve fragments. The words preserve fragments. The field notes preserve fragments. None of them can fully capture the experience. But they can leave evidence that it happened. Evidence that for a few hours, art transformed an ordinary room into something extraordinary.

The raccoon considers this worth documenting.

Why the Raccoon Collects Data

The question eventually becomes unavoidable. Why does this matter? Why spend evenings in dark venues photographing musicians? Why spend hours editing photographs? Why write thousands of words about local bands? Why collect the data at all?

The answer begins with Drifter. The first time I heard them, I went to see Santa Claus. That is a ridiculous sentence. But it is also true.

A coworker invited me to a show in December of 2025. I expected an entertaining evening. I left with a new perspective. I left inspired. The music took me somewhere unexpected.

The artists became the muse.

The raccoon began experimenting.

Photography. Reels. Storytelling. Ideas. Lots of ideas.

In hindsight, I am certain there were a few weeks where the experimentation was awkward for everyone involved. To their credit, they quietly allowed it. 

What began with a coworker inviting me to see Santa Claus became this. It became Slightly Feral Media. It became the photography. It became the galleries. The blogs. The field notes. The systems. The plans. The adventures. The strange little empire currently being assembled inside the raccoon's feral brain.

There has been a theme emerging over the last few weeks as I have revisited some of the artists and musicians who touched me, inspired me, and ultimately changed the trajectory of my life.

At forty-seven years old. That feels important.

People often talk about life-changing art as though it only happens in stadiums. As though transformation requires fame. As though inspiration only counts when it arrives from a stage in front of twenty thousand people. The evidence suggests otherwise.

Musicians who perform in front of thousands change lives.

Musicians who perform for a few dozen people while dressed as Santa Claus in Lawrence, Kansas also change lives. The scale is irrelevant. The impact is not. Every night, local artists step onto stages and pour something deeply personal into the world. 

They create. They inspire. They challenge. They teach. They connect people. They remind humans there are other ways to exist. Other ways to see. Other ways to feel.

They raise up the next generation of musicians. The next generation of photographers. The next generation of creators. Sometimes without ever realizing they are doing it.

That is why the raccoon collects data.

Because what these artists do matters. Whether they are performing for ten people or ten thousand. Whether they are famous or unknown. Whether they are playing arenas or small clubs.

The work matters. The art matters. The artists matter. The venues matter.

These are the people changing the atmosphere of the world around them every single day. They do it by writing songs. Running venues. Supporting obscure artists. Building communities. Taking risks. Making things. Making space. Making magic. Making shit happen.

And every once in a while, someone walks into a venue expecting to see Santa Claus and leaves with an entirely different life.

The data strongly supports this conclusion.

Final Observation: The Importance of Gathering

The raccoon spends a considerable amount of time documenting humans. Concerts. Venues. Loading docks. Backstage hallways. Dance floors. Mosh pits. Parking lots at two in the morning. 

One observation continues to repeat itself. Humans gather when they need something. Sometimes they need celebration. Sometimes they need connection. Sometimes they need joy. 

And sometimes they need a place to carry things that are too heavy to carry alone.

The modern world offers very few opportunities for collective emotional experiences. Most people move through their lives surrounded by noise yet somehow isolated. Headphones. Screens. Algorithms. Private struggles. Private grief. Private joy.

Shows like this create something different. For a few hours, complete strangers agree to feel something together. To enter the void together. To sit with themselves together. To stand in the presence of something ancient together.

Nobody leaves carrying exactly the same thing they brought into the room.

The evidence suggests that is the point. Art does not always exist to entertain. Sometimes it exists to transform. Sometimes it exists to remind humans they are not alone. Sometimes it exists to reveal a path that was invisible before the lights went down and the first note was played.

The first time I heard Drifter, I thought I was going to see Santa Claus.

Instead, I found a doorway.

This particular evening reminded me that the doorway is still open. The forest is still there. The ancient things are still waiting beyond the trees. And artists are still brave enough to guide people toward them.

The data supports this conclusion.

Local music matters.

Local artists matter.

Local venues matter.

The humans making these things happen matter.

More than they probably realize.

Additional Data Sources

Should the reader wish to continue their own investigation, the raccoon recommends the following primary sources.

Drifter

The gateway.

The forest.

The first step into the void.

https://drifterheavymetal.bandcamp.com

40 Watt Sun

The mirror.

The stillness.

The invitation to sit quietly with yourself.

https://40wattsunmusic.bandcamp.com/music

Aerial Ruin

The human voice within the wilderness.

The folk traditions woven throughout Stygian Bough.

https://aerialruin.bandcamp.com/music

Bell Witch

The enormity.

The atmosphere.

The gravitational force beneath the experience.

https://bellwitch.bandcamp.com

Stygian Bough: Volume I

The collaboration between Aerial Ruin and Bell Witch that began this particular journey.

https://bellwitch.bandcamp.com/album/stygian-bough-volume-i

Stygian Bough: Volume II

The next chapter.

The forest remains.

The ancient things are still speaking.

https://bellwitch.bandcamp.com/album/stygian-bough-volume-ii

The raccoon strongly encourages further research.

Proceed at your own risk.

Some doors, once opened, remain open.

Gallery: Additional Evidence Collected in the Forest

Additional photographic evidence from Drifter, 40 Watt Sun, and Stygian Bough at Warehouse on Broadway may be viewed here:

https://mymidlifecrisiscreativeinc17.pixieset.com/stygianbough40wattsundrifterwarehouseonbroadway/

Field note complete.

The room left evidence.

The raccoon collected it.

Slightly feral. Entirely capable.

Romanticizing The Void Responsibly 

— Laverna the Rockin' Raccoon 🦝🖤

Slightly Feral Media · Published by My Midlife Crisis Creative Inc.