Rocket Miner are an acclaimed and seasoned instrumental post-rock band from Chicago whose heavy riffs of distortion and dynamic earthquakes of sound would be enough of a calling card. But Rocket Miner’s compositions also tend to blossom in slow-motion, like flowers in bloom, allowing the total grandeur of a track to develop in the fullness of time.

The band’s 2011 self-produced debut Songs For An October Sky has since been remixed by Matt Bayles (ISIS, Mastodon, Holy Fawn) and remastered for a tenth anniversary reissue, and Big Takeover is pleased to host its premiere today.

Originally produced and engineered by drummer Nick Biscardi, the record served as a first step in the band’s journey, taking them on roads out of town and to new heights together.

Now in 2021 – ten years later with a clearer understanding of the landscape around them – Songs For An October Sky exists more like a mile marker or breadcrumb from the past, imploring us to return to ourselves again.

But revisiting the past also means acknowledging the ugliness that walks in the shadows, lock-step with our memories. Because as the philosopher Heidegger tells us, “before you [can] know the truth about things, you [have] to care about them…it’s caring about things that ‘unconceals’ them in your day-to-day life, so that they can be known about. If you don’t care about things, they stay ‘hidden’—and…to be alive is ‘to be surrounded by the hidden.’”

And it’s with an unsure mixture of naive hope and blind faith that this 2021 encore is presented to “unconceal” what was already there years ago. To invite in all those parts hidden beneath the surface, to let other people help you get across the finish line, to go further than just that first step.

So it’s with this feeling in mind that Rocket Miner – now consisting of founding guitarists Larry Hryn and Chip Wortel, bassist Eric D’Asto, and the return of Biscardi to the mix – have opted to include on this release a new song, “Soul Catcher,” recorded by each member individually during COVID-19 quarantine. A modest way to find meaning in ourselves and those “little decisions” once again.

Biscardi reveals some details about the album reissue, commenting, “Releasing an anniversary edition of October Sky had been swimming in our heads for a bit, and then the pandemic came along. Returning to work on this record during quarantine was its own exercise in processing the last ten years through other intersecting lenses.”

“With so much of the music industry shut down in the last 18 months, and how easy it is to slip into feelings where nothing matters, having this time capsule to dust off and spruce up was as therapeutic as it was a reaction to no live shows.”

“It feels good to be able to do better by these songs and maybe in some selfish weird way, by extension, do better for ourselves.”

Pre-order the album reissue at Bandcamp

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