FIELD NOTE // GRAVITY IS NOT FOR EVERYONE

Violenteer, Circling Over, Burn Barrel, and Drifter at miniBar in Kansas City

Written and photographed by Alethea F. Mehdipour — Slightly Feral Media

HEAVY IS NOT A SPECIES, EITHER

Heavy is a vague word. Much like metal. It can mean doom. Sludge. Noise rock. Post-metal. Doomgaze. A guitar tuned low enough to disturb something beneath the foundation. It can mean drums that enter through the chest instead of the ears. It can mean pressure.

Gravity.

The weight of a room full of humans carrying things they do not discuss with strangers. Silence can be heavy. Deafening, even. The raccoon has observed this.

On August 1, the raccoon migrated to miniBar in Kansas City to collect concert photography evidence of Drifter, Burn Barrel, Circling Over, and Omaha headliner Violenteer.

She had never been to miniBar. This became obvious almost immediately. The raccoon entered the building, became briefly uncertain about where live music might be concealed, and nearly followed a strange man through a door he was holding open.

It was the bathroom. This was not the entrance to the show. Fortunately, the raccoon caught flashes of two previously studied species: Joel Denton and Brodie Belt of Drifter. Known humans. Moving upward. The raccoon followed.

This is how she discovered The Basement Upstairs. That is what miniBar calls it. The raccoon entered the room and observed the low ceiling, dark corners, narrow stage, cables, amplifiers, and humans assembling elbow to elbow beneath the weight of the evening. It has a lot of stickers. And very randomly placed booths.

The Basement Upstairs gained another name that night.

The Void in the Basement Upstairs.

THE THINGS THAT LIVE INSIDE THE VOID

Previous Slightly Feral Media investigations have established that live music venues contain creatures. Sound Elves coil cables when no one is watching. Lighting Gods place illumination in locations where light does not traditionally live. Guitar Gods inhabit glowing pedalboards and respond when summoned with sufficient feedback. Hair Gods gather wherever dramatic movement and adequate length make manifestation possible.

The raccoon arrived at miniBar expecting a smaller ecosystem. She was incorrect. There were no lasers. The raccoon checked. Still, the room changed color around the musicians as though something in the dark already understood where the shadows belonged.

Several pedalboards glowed.

The musicians stepped on them. The noises changed. Everyone still behaves as though this were normal. The raccoon needs more documentation. The evidence supporting haunted pedalboards continues to become overwhelming.

Then Old Man Gloom arrived. Dean Edington will henceforth be referred to by his proper field classification: Old Man Gloom. Or Doom. Because of the genre. Raccoon humor.

He is a local mythical legend in his own right.

He also brought a creature with him. Humans have apparently classified this creature as The Junk Rig. This is an deceptively plain name for something so glorious. The creature appears to be part instrument, part effects processor, part percussion apparatus, part command center, and part object recovered from behind a door that should have remained sealed.

It is 100 percent sentient and seems to be an extension of Old Man Gloom. or Doom- this is yet to be determined. This is no longer a working theory. When pleased with the offering, it glows bright pink. The raccoon has witnessed this. Old Man Gloom (or Doom) operates the creature deliberately. The creature may also operate Old Man Gloom. Both things can be true.

The raccoon has managed to squeeze exactly one tiny piece of anatomical information from Old Man Gloom: somewhere within the creature lives a Korg KAOSS Pad KP3+.

According to Korg, the KAOSS Pad is a real-time effects processor and sampler controlled through an illuminated touchpad. It can manipulate effects, loops, samples, reverberation, tempo, and other sounds while glowing visibly in the dark. This explains one organ. The remainder of the creature remains unclassified. If Old Man Gloom is Poseidon ruling The Tide, this creature is the trident. It does not simply accompany him. It extends his reach. It allows him to disturb the pressure, summon frequencies, rearrange the atmosphere, and communicate directly with whatever lived inside The Void before humans invented language.

The Hair Gods followed Old Man Gloom into the room. The Guitar Gods were already waiting inside the pedalboards. The Lighting Gods had not yet fully manifested. Circling Over would take care of that later.

But something else lived inside The Upstairs Void. Something older. Not the Old Gods. Older than that. The things the Old Gods found waiting. The ones that existed before gods were gods. Before humans developed language. Before anyone looked at darkness and decided it required a name.

These creatures do not appear for lasers. They do not require spectacle. They respond to pressure. Silence. Gravity. Drums. Low frequencies. And, apparently, bright-pink offerings made through a completely sentient creature humans have named the Junk Rig- henceforth known by the the raccoon as The Completely Sentient Junk Rig.

The raccoon also identified threshold creatures living somewhere between the first note and the moment a room stops being a room. Their primary behavior appears to be making humans forget there was ever a door.

DRIFTER DAY

The raccoon had been looking forward to Drifter Day. She usually does. Drifter shows do something to the chemicals in the raccoon’s brain. There is a settling. An altogether UN-settling settling, but a settling nonetheless.

Someone once accused the raccoon of being friends with the guys from Drifter. Friends? Not exactly. The situation is considerably less convenient. The raccoon attends Kansas City and Lawrence live music to observe. She watches behavior, clothing, movement, interactions, stagecraft, strange equipment, human migration patterns, and whatever the Hair Gods are doing with the Lighting gods. She collects evidence.

Then Drifter begins. The photographs still happen. Obviously. The raccoon continues perceiving the music through the lens, adjusting settings, finding angles, and pressing the shutter. But she forgets to observe everything else. There is no culture. No audience. No photographer.

There is only The Void. The heaviness. The drums.

The raccoon simply is. At the same time, she is not.

This is why Drifter is her favorite. They make her forget that she exists.

THE RACCOON HAS A LOT OF WORDS.

There are many people who can verify this. The raccoon loves words. As a small creature, she read dictionaries and encyclopedias because she ran out of other books. She began writing poetry in second grade. She has spent most of her life searching for the exact words that allow another human to FEEL what she means. Words matter. Heavy is not the same as loud. Dark is not the same as sad. Silence is not the absence of sound. Nothingness is not empty.

The raccoon has a lot of words yet, she has not found the correct ones for Drifter. Not yet. What happens in that music feels older than language. Primal. Something humans understood before they could explain it. The experience is never confusing while it is happening. It becomes confusing afterward, when the raccoon attempts to place it into sentences.

Field observations suggest The Void existed before grammar.

DRIFTER IS THE GATEWAY

Drifter opened the show. They often do. This is appropriate. Drifter is the gateway. They open The Void and then hold the door for whoever comes next.

The Lawrence, Kansas trio includes Brodie Belt on guitar, pedalboard, and auxiliary percussion; Joel Denton on drums and percussion; and Dean Edington on bass, vocals, electric cello, and The Completely Sentient Junk Rig. The band developed from music Brodie had written outside WARD and SYBASSION, with some material reaching back to 2009. Drifter took its current form around 2020 and began performing live in 2021. Their releases include Herald in 2022 and Grigori, released May 23, 2025.

The combined aptitude of these three humans is impressive. The Keeper of Time does not merely play the drums. Joel Denton changes the atmospheric conditions inside the room, shifting from restraint to thunder as though gravity itself has been included in the percussion arrangement.

The Architect of Pressure, Brodie Belt, builds enormous structures from guitar, pedals, and noise. Then, during The Flood, Brodie Belt puts the guitar down, crosses the threshold, and joins the percussion—as though the wall of sound has become too large to maintain with strings alone.

Old Man Gloom moves between bass, vocals, electric cello, The Completely Sentient Junk Rig, and his bright-pink trident as though communicating with primordial entities is an ordinary part of performing live music in Lawrence and Kansas City. Three humans. Several instruments.One open portal. The raccoon has since learned from confidential sources that while Dean goes by Old Man Gloom as a joke, Brodie goes by Young Man Gloom. Joel just goes by Joel. This seems suspect.

The raccoon remains unconvinced this is merely a band. It is a summoning. Something always answers.

OLD MAN GLOOM HOLDS THE DOOR

Old Man Gloom’s history helps explain something important about Drifter. Dean Edington lists his position in the band as Old Man Gloom. This should not be confused with membership in the band Old Man Gloom.

It is a role. A classification. Possibly an earned title.

Definitely a warning.

His history within underground music and live production extends across decades and includes work connected to The Esoteric, Machine Management, Thoughtcrime Digital, Wrath and Ruin, Eyes of Iolite, The Beaumont Club, Mammoth, Relapse Records, Avalanche Productions, The Bottleneck, and KJHK’s loud-rock programming. Several of his job descriptions are informative. Tour manager. Guitar tech. Driver. Babysitter. Production manager. Loader. Frequency Contamination Advisor. Senior Vice President of Details.

These are not merely previous jobs. This is the résumé of a local mythical legend who understands how underground music moves, survives, tours, enters rooms, and gets back out again. That history explains the humility. It explains why Drifter can carry that much musical weight without requiring the evening to revolve around them. It explains why they so often open the door for another underground band traveling through.

Drifter does not behave like an opening band waiting to become the important band. They understand that opening the room is important.

That is what Drifter does. That is what Old Man Gloom does. That is what the Keeper of Time and Architect of Pressure do.

The sentient creature glows pink.Old Man Gloom holds the door.

THE FLOOD

There are humans who would not enter The Void in the Basement Upstairs. There are humans for whom the weight would be too much. Drifter calls one of its songs The Flood. This feels less like a title and more like useful field terminology. The Flood is not water. It is the moment the guitar, bass, percussion, pressure, and everything the room has been carrying become one thing.

The underground music community will welcome you in its own way. It will not necessarily use an abundance of words. It may stand beside you without touching. It may pass you ear protection. It may make room.

But, it will not let you drown in The Flood if the heavy is more than you can sustain.

BURN BARREL ENTERED

Burn Barrel played second. Between sets, the raccoon spoke with the drummer’s girlfriend and her father, who was visiting from St. Louis. The father is also a musician. This was a fabulous conversation. It also provided useful intelligence.

Burn Barrel is a newer Kansas City band. This explains why attempts to locate a lengthy history online produced limited evidence. The species is still emerging.

Burn Barrel entered the room harsher than Drifter. Not thrash. The raccoon checked that classification, too. The sound remained closer to doom and sludge, but with rougher edges and a greater likelihood of leaving permanent claw marks.

If Drifter opened The Void, Burn Barrel began examining its structural integrity. They made the pressure less ceremonial. More immediate. Less like standing at the edge of something ancient. More like discovering the ancient thing had moved closer.

The drummer’s girlfriend and her father had described a newer band. What appeared onstage did not feel tentative. The Hair Gods remained present. The Guitar Gods showed interest.

The creatures from before gods were gods did not leave.

CIRCLING OVER

Circling Over traveled from Denver and played third. The band formed in 2022 after bassist Joe Elmore posted an advertisement looking for musicians interested in creating post-metal.

The humans who answered did not already know one another. They assembled anyway. This is how Circling Over became, well, Circling Over. The current lineup includes Anthony Fonzi on guitar and vocals, Joe Elmore on bass, Bobby Malone on guitar, and Andrew Castanheira on drums.

Their music draws from post-metal, doomgaze, shoegaze, and ambient sound. These descriptions are technically useful. They do not adequately explain what happened inside The Void in the Basement Upstairs.

Circling Over was ethereal. Not delicate. Ethereal is often used to mean soft, floating, or pretty. This was not that. This was atmospheric weight. Something enormous moving above the room slowly enough that the humans beneath it had time to understand exactly how small they were.

The band released the Never EP in 2024, followed by Amends through Braeburn Records in August 2025. The raccoon had the opportunity to speak with members of the band and learned that they anre involved in multiple other musical projects.

Further classification is pending. The available evidence already suggests one human may be maintaining several habitats.

The raccoon respects this behavior.

THE LIGHTING GODS ARRIVED

Old Man Gloom brought the Hair Gods into The Void in the Basement Upstairs. The Guitar Gods occupied the pedalboards. Then Circling Over arrived and summoned the Lighting Gods. The room changed around them. Color collected in the shadows. Light found the hair, the instruments, and the exact edges of the humans producing all that atmospheric weight.

There were no lasers. There was no elaborate production system. The Lighting Gods did not care. Circling Over gave them sufficient material.

The Hair Gods, Guitar Gods, and Lighting Gods held another meeting inside miniBar.

Whatever presides over The Void in the Basement Upstairs accepted the offering. Old Man Gloom’s creature glowed bright pink. The room was enormous despite being physically incapable of becoming larger. This was either the result of lighting, sound, collective perception, spatial interference caused by ancient entities, or the bright-pink trident opening a small dimensional breach.

All five explanations remain plausible.

VIOLENTEER

Violenteer closed the night. The Omaha headliner formed in 2021 and includes Randy Cotton, Barry Cotton, and Eric Ebers. Its members carry histories connected to Ritual Device, Ravine, Ocean Black, Members of the Press, Minne Lussa, and decades of recording, touring, and underground music between Omaha and Portland. A shared connection involving Season to Risk and Steve Tulipana helped bring these humans into the same orbit.

Violenteer’s sound contains noise rock, melodic doom, post-metal, and a strain of 1990s heaviness that knows exactly where the sharp edges are stored.

There is another important detail. Violenteer does not use an electric guitar. Two basses. Drums. No electric guitar.

The raccoon repeated the count. The result remained the same. Randy Cotton occupies the right channel. Barry Cotton occupies the left. Eric Ebers holds the center with drums. One bass generally occupies the low end. Violenteer brought another bass and asked what might happen if the low end had its own low end.

The answer involved weight. Pressure. Sharp edges. And substantially more range than the word bass suggests. Instead of using an electric guitar to provide the expected upper structure, the two basses divide, overlap, distort, and build their own architecture.

Field observations suggest the absence of a guitar did not leave empty space. It created room for something else to exist.

By this point, the raccoon was tired. She slipped out before the end of Violenteer’s set and did not interact directly with this species. This does not lessen their place in the room that night. The raccoon collected what evidence she could have Violenteer performing inside The Void in the Basement Upstairs at miniBar in Kansas City.

The evidence spoke for itself.

THE PHOTOGRAPHY GODS

The raccoon later discovered that another previously undocumented entity had attended the show. There is OBVIOUSLY a Photography God involved in this ecosystem. Concert photography requires a teeny-tiny autofocus point aimed at one important feature while everything moves. Not little movement. BIG movement.

Add stage lighting. One millisecond, everything is blown-out bright. The next, everyone is Shrek green. Then the red light arrives and removes whatever evidence remained. The tiny autofocus point begins reconsidering its career choices. The raccoon searches for somewhere to focus. Then she finds the artist’s rhythm. The sway. The return. The hands. The lights. The tiny fraction of a second when all the patterns meet. Patterns are everywhere.

The resulting photograph showed Randy Cotton, right-channel bassist for Violenteer, bent over his instrument while the lights, movement, hands, strings, and focus aligned. Apparently, the Photography Gods looked at the movement, the lighting chaos, and the raccoon’s increasingly concerned autofocus point and said: Here,Little Raccoon. Have this.

The location of the Photography Gods remains uncertain. However, new evidence suggests they may have been hiding inside Old Man Gloom’s bright-pink creature the entire time. This would explain the glow. It would explain the timing. It would explain why Old Man Gloom has been behaving as though the creature is perfectly ordinary.

Local mythical legends are notoriously difficult to interrogate.

Further investigation is inevitable.

THE OUTLIERS

The raccoon has spent a substantial amount of time observing boxes. Humans enjoy them. They use boxes to classify music. Doom. Sludge. Noise rock. Post-metal. Shoegaze. They place each species inside its appropriate box, close the lid, and behave as though the investigation has concluded. The creatures inside The Void in the Basement Upstairs did not appear especially interested in remaining classified.

These humans were outliers. The ones who looked at the available box, examined its structural limitations, and began building something stranger beside it.

Drifter brought bass, guitar, drums, electric cello, auxiliary percussion, Old Man Gloom, and one glorious sentient creature capable of glowing bright pink when satisfied.

Burn Barrel entered as a newer Kansas City species with limited documentation and none of the hesitation expected from something still emerging.

Circling Over began when several humans who did not know one another answered an advertisement and proceeded to build something enormous, atmospheric, and ethereal enough to summon the Lighting Gods into a small upstairs room.

Violenteer looked at the traditional rock-band arrangement and removed the electric guitar.

Entirely.

Two basses. Drums. No electric guitar.

That pattern continued throughout the night. The expected thing was removed. Rearranged. Rebuilt. Or connected to a sentient pink trident operated by a local mythical legend.

These were not humans failing to fit inside the box. They had inspected the box. They understood it. They simply found it insufficient.

The raccoon respects this behavior.

GRAVITY IS NOT FOR EVERYONE

There are people who would never enter The Basement Upstairs. There are people who could walk through the door but would never enter The Void.

The gravity is not for everyone.

Not because they would be unwelcome. But some people have no desire to stand beneath that much weight.

The raccoon understands.

She also knows the life that brought her to the exact moment she is writing this. She knows the horror stories. The triumphs. The battles fought and wars waged inside her own mind and soul. She knows what made her into someone capable of carrying the pressure, nothingness, and EVERYTHING-NESS The Void offers without being crushed.

The Void in the Basement Upstairs was elbow to elbow with other humans whose paths had given them depth and mountain-like fortitude.

They stood inside the gravity. They did not break. Darkness is not always despair. Heaviness is not always intended to crush.

Sometimes humans already carry enormous weight. The music gives it somewhere else to exist.

FOUR RELATIONSHIPS WITH HEAVINESS

Drifter opened The Void. Burn Barrel tested its structural integrity. Circling Over filled the air above it and summoned the Lighting Gods. Violenteer sharpened its edges.

Four bands. Four relationships with heaviness. One room above a bar that miniBar calls The Basement Upstairs.

The raccoon calls it The Upstairs Void. Both names are accurate.

The Lighting Gods found it. The Guitar Gods occupied it. The Hair Gods blessed it. The Photography Gods left evidence.The things older than gods were already there. Gravity is not for everyone. For the humans who entered that room on August 1, it did not need to be.

VIEW THE COMPLETE KANSAS CITY CONCERT PHOTOGRAPHY GALLERY

CONDUCT YOUR OWN FIELD RESEARCH

The raccoon collects evidence, but field observations should never be the end of the investigation.

Listen to the bands. Follow their pages. Purchase their music and merchandise. Attend their shows. Support the venues, promoters, production crews, touring artists, and local musicians who keep underground music alive.

DRIFTER

CIRCLING OVER

VIOLENTEER

Skinsuit Communications

Field note complete.

The Void left evidence. The raccoon collected it. Further investigation is inevitable.

ROMANTICIZING THE VOID RESPONSIBLY.

Slightly feral. Entirely capable.

— Laverna the Rockin’ Raccoon 🦝🖤

Written and photographed by Alethea F. Mehdipour — Slightly Feral Media
Published by My Midlife Crisis Creative Inc.
All photographs and written content are protected by copyright. Please do not download, reproduce, alter, or redistribute images without permission. Bands and performers may contact Slightly Feral Media regarding personal and promotional use with proper photographer credit.