It’s been a long, slow wait for National Photo Committee to drop their debut album. What began seven years ago as a freewheeling alt-country outlet for Max Bottner, formerly of Indiana egg-punks Liquids and the anarchist hardcore band Side Action, eventually expanded to a full band. A grainy two-song upload in 2019 was followed, two years later, by the Chicago group’s first EP, Songs About Sticks and Rocks, and steady gigs opening for YHWH Nailgun, Hotline TNT, and Sharp Pins. Finally, this past New Year’s Eve, their full-length debut surfaced as an unfussy YouTube post—only to get pulled one week later as Bottner sought label distribution.
Now released by Ever/Never Records, Red Hot Photo Committee is expansive and polished—a testament to the prolonged run that produced it. It’s the sound of a band delighting in its own reverberations, armed with the hearty instrumentation of country rock, a notebook stuffed with amusing stories, and the spirit of ragtag friendship. Its rich musical choices immediately grab you: Henry Moskal’s gorgeous pedal steel twirling around “Foam the Field,” that howling tenor saxophone in “Adelaide,” the lopsided drumming in “It’s Hard” by Jason Shapiro, who makes good on his anointment as the city’s “best emerging antifolk artist.” The 12-minute “Gizzard” could make believers out of jam agnostics as the shimmering groove, laid down by bassist Will Carr, extends into an inviting, borderline romantic progression. As Bottner puts it earlier on the record: “I believe I’m well intentioned/and I intend to take it slow.” Over its eight songs, the album makes a strong argument for National Photo Committee joining the ranks of Wilco, Ryan Davis & the Roadhouse Band, and fellow best-in-class artists putting a Midwestern spin on sunburnt Americana.
National Photo Committee couldn’t and don’t try to sever their punk roots along the way. That lineage comes through in their ungovernable guitar noodling, inspired by underground icons NRBQ and Bottle Rockets, and a boisterous energy befitting of drunken basement shows. It’s that scratch in Bottner’s voice when, three minutes into “Before the Feeling’s Gone,” he screams, “And then one becomes the other” as his bandmates come thundering behind him. It’s in the offhand references to smoking cigarettes picked off the sidewalk, aging like sharp cheddar cheese, and ironically questioning God after hearing the ’90s soft-pop hit “One of Us.” It’s in the annoying cell phone ringing during “If I Wait” and the band’s decision to leave it in the mix.
And then there’s Bottner’s singing voice; from the deepest corner of his lungs comes a commanding bellow with a low, rattling timbre, like a cross between Bill Callahan and Jason Molina. His voice is so deep that it bestows Bottner with several extra decades’ worth of wisdom, allowing him to masquerade as an elder authority. “If I Wait” is a love story of long-distance pining and old-fashioned devotion, and Bottner’s baritone relays its details—handwritten letters, counting the days until reuniting—with the magnetism of a black-and-white romance on Turner Classic Movies. On other tracks, he modulates his delivery to beef up tales of loneliness and desperation. National Photo Committee know the best stories around a cowboy’s campfire come down to who’s telling them, and Bottner is both a powerful singer and a towering narrator.
The pearls of advice that Bottner tucks into these roving alt-country tales are ultimately what give Red Hot Photo Committee its lasting charm. “And the sweetest music ever heard/Made not by men/But by a bird,” he sings in “Foam the Field,” like the memory alone of that birdsong could bring a tear to his eyes. Perhaps the greatest piece of wisdom Red Hot Photo Committee shares is the importance of patience. Just as their album had a long road to fruition, National Photo Committee take their time exploring where and how each track develops, without sacrificing its story or mood. Spin their 2023 live record to hear how several of these songs have grown over the years. What began as twangy rock barreling ahead onstage has settled into comely arrangements that steady your perception of time, all under the watchful eye of Bottner unfolding his dusk-time tales.
