Double Time 

About a year ago at this time, Michael Gross—aka Whisperhawk—was in the early stages of a process leading to a full album of material, eventually completed and called Cold Bones. As luck and pluck would have it, he began to write some new songs, which begat more new songs, and then a few more.

Within a relatively short period of time, the eight songs that would become Music Album 2000 were blossoming. In tandem, the two works will be released on Friday, March 11 as two, stand-alone, eight-song digital albums, or as a double-disc CD.

The fast rush of songs isn't completely unexpected by the songwriter. "Some people might think that I write too many songs," Gross jokes. "I just always have. Over the last few years, I started getting into recording and producing myself, learning the ins-and-outs of all that. I guess a lot of us have had more time than usual at home, or more time to ourselves over the last couple of years. I just kinda dove into recording. And when I write something, I don't like to let it sit there for a later date. I get impatient in that way. I work quickly. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing; maybe a little bit of both. But that's always how I've worked: I write a song and want to record it as quickly as I can. It keeps me motivated and engaged.

"These two releases are the next in line of a bunch of music I've written and recorded over the last few years," he adds. "I wrote the songs of Cold Bones first, and recorded it in the spring of 2021. I mixed it into the summer, and planned on releasing it in the fall. But then, as I often do, I sat down and had a song idea. And then another idea, and then another. I ended up writing and recording eight more songs that were unplanned last fall. I took a little bit of time, and then decided on what I ultimately wanted to do with these things. I had the thought that there's no rule here, especially as an independent artist. I thought it'd be cool to put them out at the same time, rather than pumping out two separate releases around the same time."

The songwriter suggests on his bio that "both (are) melodic indie rock records with just enough keyboard and guitar solos to make Elvis Costello and Neil Young smile."

And pretty much anything on a Whisperhawk album these days is performed by the artist, himself. "Guitars, bass, keys, vocals," he starts. "Pretty much all of it. I programmed a lot of the drums, though I'm not a drummer, myself."

His notion is to accomplish as much as he can from his home studio in Davis County, right down to taking some photos or consulting with graphic designing friends who can help on that end of a project. As someone who mentions being an independent artist more than a few times in conversation, his goal is to capture as much of the creative control over a project as he can. From there, he hopes that the release finds an organic listenership, while also at least hoping that some one of these impressively-catchy tunes find a home in other media.

"It's always exciting to put your work into the world," he says. "I think it's harder to get attention now, because everybody can produce music themselves. There's a lot coming out all the time. It's easy to get lost or to not stand out. I have a group of fans, people who follow what I do. Ultimately, it's for them. I know that it's not going to be widely heard, most likely, but you never know. That's part of the fun, too, that there's always a chance people can hear it on a larger scale."

In the past, Gross' music, which he calls indie rock in "high-desert folk/rock spirit," has been featured in some film and TV work, with credits on ABC, NBC, CBS, MTV, FOX and the FX networks. He works with a licensing agency in Los Angeles, typically offering songs that are already in his catalog, not written on spec.

"Fortunately," he says, "every placement I've ever had was something I'd already written. I think that's the ideal way to go about it."

A member of the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation, Gross sometimes crafts lyrics that touch on Native American themes, though "I tend to write about things on my mind at the time, whether they're world events or personal things."

Whisperhawk will appear at The DLC @ Quarters (5 E 400 S) on Sunday, March 27 at 8 pm with Blunt Bangs and The Fever Drift. Tickets for the $10 show are available at quartersslc.com.