I’ve been intrigued to hear much of what Independent Project Records has been releasing of late. The US Post-Punk scene of the that they document was primarily a West Coast scene that flew totally underneath my radar at the time. But recent issues have, yes, piqued my interest! I’d never heard of Jefferey Running’s combo For Against, but they originated far from the California shores; positing a Post-Punk that sprang from Nebraska!

When recording this second solo album [the first was 2016’s “Primitives + Smalls“] Mr. Runnings had two big influences on the way it sounds. The first was technical; he used an 8-track cassette home studio to record the album on. Finding fresh bricks of the sacred Maxell UD-XLII C-90s tapes at his local Goodwill! The second was the news that in late October of 2024, Jeffrey was diagnosed with late stage cancer. “Piqued” would then become his musical epitaph as he died in March 3rd of this year. We are all fortunate in that he was able to complete the album which will be released on Friday, July 11th. And then some.

Jeffrey Runnings: Piqued – US – CD [2025]

1. Batman Forever 3:55
2. Just Before Nothing 2:55
3. Threadbare 3:50
4. Mayfair 2:06
5. Bloom 1:05
6. The Courage of Voluntary Trees 3:44
7. Heretofore 3:33
8. Failed Rescue Attempt 2:43
9. Glorious Grey 3:57
10. Value 2:41
11. Elegy 4:38
12. Follow 5:10
13. Light of My Life 3:33
14. Watch 3:17
15. Demolition Blast 4:59

The album began with “Batman Forever;” an ironically named duet between a percussion block and piano. But as I imagined, and the liner notes verify, “Batman” was Mr. Running’s nickname for his husband. So the song was not at all about Val Kilmer’s time under the cowl. Heavily treated guitar added cascades of DreamPop filigree. When Jeffrey made his vocal debut in the song, the line “you’re the one I want to be there” was almost the full lyrical content. More mantra than lyric, but when he slipped in “when the very last light goes out” it stated all he needed to in the most effective way possible.

The placid tempo and the overall mix on the 8-track tape machine made for a sound drenched in warmth. The significant bleed between the instruments and tracks, all using a heavy arsenal of phasers, flangers, and reverb, made for a vibe that had been marbleized from its individual components into an amorphous Rococo swirl. Were those treated guitars or cellos? Synths or flutes? Tellingly, this album sounded like it could have been made with just a Mellotron and a lot of determination. The sonics were 4AD by way of the late 60s.

A rhythm section returned with a vengeance on “Just Before Nothing.” Motorik drum machine vied with deep bass guitar pulls. Sustained chords of synth loops contrasted with the slightly twangy guitar; played closer to conventional this time. The song was generous with harmonic overloads that breezed through the soundscape like doppler shifting big rigs on the highway of the song.

I knew this album was for me once I heard “Threadbare,” which was steeped in the same vintage effects as much of the sound of the Henry Badowski “Life’s A Grand…” album that I reviewed earlier this year. Synths were run through phasers to attain a gloriously smeared vibe redolent of early Tubeway Army. The motorik drum machine upped the Krautrock potential of the song even as the string synths laughed off such accoutrements. The result was a glorious, writhing bolus of energy that circled back onto itself again and again.

“Mayfair” is another instrumental that has gotten stuck in my mind for hours at a time of late. Spectoresque drum machine grounded a sound where acoustic guitars could be harps and cellos, and I still can’t tell if that was a flute in the mix or heavily treated synth. It proffered a tentative, bucolic delicacy that was like a summertime’s rapture. With the brief “Bloom” acting like a faster paced coda, sweeping us along from our reverie.

This was primarily an instrumental album, but “Heretofore” stood out for its inclusion of a singing performance from Runnings with closer to a typical pop structure. Chiming guitars set against what sounded like urgent cellos in the mix tipped their hand towards the classic Echo + The Bunnymen sound. But Runnings let the song settle into a propulsive instrumental groove by halfway through to let the ambience have the final word.

The darkly hued “Failed Rescue Attempt” was a foreboding instrumental That took some of the Mellotron vibe of the great OMD B-side “Navigation” and pushed it into “The Killing Moon” territory with the string synths speaking to hope but getting overruled by the flanged bass dragging us down as the bass drone overload blotted out the sun. One can imagine that this was the height of intimacy for this album, with a title that obliquely spoke to the realities of stage IV cancer.

“Glorious Grey” seemed to throw back to the Numan outlier vibe once more with a call-back to “I Nearly Married A Human;” with clockwork percussion and synths and piano in a delicate interplay. Jeffrey was concerned with paring the music back to let the music move toward simpler states; a not unrealistic concern when recording to eight tracks, but the sophistication of the arrangement here seemed to give lie to that stated goal.

The flanged guitars and overloaded synth drone of “Value” was, with “Just Before Nothing,” the closest this album came to a headlong rush of energy. It was more content to play its cards close to its vest in a reserved manner. And the final track on Jeffrey Runnings final album; what else could it be called but “Elegy?” I loved the sense of beauty in the chiming guitars juxtaposed with the melancholy synths. Suggesting a crystalline delicacy in the tenderness it afforded. With a glorious extended coda reaching for transcendence.

The CD and the LP of “Piqued” also comes with four bonus tracks. This was material recorded in the late 80s by Jeffrey that he rediscovered the master tape for, remixed the tracks, and hoped to include with the album in some form. “Follow” had a Factory Records vibe with gossamer harmonics competing with a curious, loping beat. Once Jeffrey gave voice in the song his singing was just another drone in the mix with endless reverb. “Light Of My Life” had a prominent vocal against the motorik beat and dissonant chords. The tarpit bass was the anchor to the song. The strummed acoustics of “Watch” were the strongest example of Robin Guthrie influence here. “Demolition Blast” was driven by nearly frantic Klaus Dinger drum machine while Running’s voice was so liberally dosed with reverb that he ended up getting lost with the guitars in a haze of sound.

The sound of these recordings are starkly different from those in “Piqued” in that they are bolted into their late 80s milieu. Whereas the overarching sound of the main album looks to the techniques of recording that were from the late 70s but through the low-fi on the means of recording, attained a vibe strongly redolent of the late 60s. Shoegaze as Post-Psychedelia. While Running’s intention was to include them, they stand apart from the integrity of “Piqued” as nothing more than a sidebar.

How can we not be fascinated when an artist approaches their end and seeks to interpret their emotions in their art for all of us to share in? There’s an undercurrent of melancholy here but the feeling is dignified. From the evidence of this album, ironically my first exposure to Jeffrey Runnings, I don’t think that he was capable of wallowing, and if he did, he’d probably think the better of sharing it publicly. There are allusions here to his journey that resist maudlin overstatement. Indeed, his aesthetic here of paring down the music to its base essence; trimming vocals and lyrics down to a keenly honed presence was as much of a design decision as it was to record it on an analog 8-track home studio.

Perhaps that last gambit was the creative decision that resonates the strongest here. This made for a recording that sounded out of any one time, but was strongly suggestive of several at once. I love the sound of musical elements swirled together as here in a mix where everything is intrinsic and nothing sounds apart from the gestalt of it all. Where instruments were treated to flow and mutate together so that nothing could be outside of context.

The album will be released on Friday in DL/2xLP/CD. The DL is $11.99 and it will get you the music, but one of the delights of Independent Project Records is their packaging finesse. CD folio’s in letterpress with metallic and fluorescent inks must be in hand to delight. I strongly suggest the physical issues here. The CD is $15.00 with two LP packages also available. One in black vinyl with the album and the four track EP on a separate disc for $35.00. And the colored vinyl option for $40.00 with transparent magenta for the LP and clear silver for the EP.

As I said, this was the first time that I’ve heard Jeffrey Running, But I hope that it will not be my last. If this sounds good to you too, then DJ hit that button!

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