After a weeklong, sickness-induced break, I thought I’d come back with a handful of music for y’all. What I didn’t expect is that so many of my picks would come from the family of "psych rock." And like many real families, where your sister can be a lawyer while you’re up at 3am in a haze concocting recipes out of stale saltine crackers and various chip dips (the only ingredients you have in the house), the apples may not fall far from the tree but they can sure end up a ways off from one another. Rain Drop Garden from the Esskays is out there and verby, seemingly the only pre-reqs for being "psych," but it’s flowers all the way down. Jangly and poppy, never too demanding (but not boring by any means either), it’s an all-seasons offering of catchy numbers that wander but never lose sight of the path. Either way, take a shovel out to Rain Drop Garden and get to digging. -Austin Phy
