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Kansas City, Missouri native, Matt Pryor, is a household name for anyone who wasattuned to the second and third waves of emo. His genre-defining band, The Get UpKids, were among a small and legendary group that has shaped the musicallandscape for years. However, after growing tired of the boundaries it so needlesslyapplied, the internationally recognized frontrunners eventually transcended thegenre with their later albums and found themselves at home with a more indiesound.Most recently, on his latest album under his given name, Matt Pryor has presentedthe world with The Salton Sea, and it is abundantly clear that this is the continuationof a decades-long love affair with music and being outright obsessed withsongwriting. Steadfast fans of Pryors prolific career will also find themselves treatedto a style that is more reminiscent of the works of Paul Westerberg and Red HousePainters, that is of course laden with Pryors signature style, whose DNA is deeplyrooted in artists like Elvis Costello and The Afghan Whigs.It should be noted that the chosen title for the album is not one that was pickedarbitrarily, and while not a concept album, the period of time when the songs werewritten were some of the darkest days of Pryors life. After spending six months in adownward spiral in what he sarcastically refers to as the penultimate moments ofhis drinking career, Pryor finally hit rock bottom. A casual habit that became a full-on addiction had officially come to a head, and in the blurry moments when 2022became 2023, Pryor found himself with a choice that so many people before himhave been forced to reckon with: Keep going on this path and face certain tragedyor Clean up, get sober, and stay on the right side of the dirt.Thankfully, Pryor decided on the latter, and the beautiful composite left on the shoreline for all of us to enjoy is the album now known as The Salton Sea. For those unfamiliar, The Salton Sea is whats known as a terminal lakemeaning that newwater never flows into it, and its salinity increases incrementally due to evaporation and pollution The once high-spirited desert oasis was a tourist attraction for celebrities and the upper crust in the 1950s and 60s, and it is now a bona fide wasteland. Its not difficult to imagine that while in the throes of addiction, Pryor saw himself as this once lush and vibrant body of water that years ago was referred to as a California desert oasisbut it is now an uninhabitable veritable shadow of its former self.18+ with VALID IDNO ID = NO ENTRYNO OUTSIDE FOOD OR DRINKNO BACKPACKS OR LARGE BAGS