Nervous Verbs on tour
It would be reductive to say that the latest Nervous Verbs album Moments of Riot is just
another installment in singer-songwriter Mike Montgomery’s deep discography. From his
quarter-century in the formidable post-rock trio Ampline, to his decade-plus run co-leading
R. Ring with Kelley Deal, through countless production credits at his Candyland Recording
Studio, and finally arriving at the debut of his most personal project, Nervous Verbs’ Pony
Coughing in early 2025 (Don Giovanni Records), Montgomery has consistently conjured
inventive, emotionally resonant songs. And while Moments of Riot shares some of the aural
intimacy found in his recent work, this understated collection suspires with a tragic beauty
borne out of hospitals, bereavement and, ultimately, hope.
“Tapping on My Skull” opens the album with a stately acoustic guitar figure scoring graceful
traces across a rolling, woozy sea of Kate Wakefield’s (LUNG) cello and Adam Pleiman’s
pedal steel. And like any good overture, the song establishes the greater whole’s emotional
landscape. When the distinctly lofi vocals swim up in the mix, Mike makes a devastating
disclosure: “With my fingers interlaced I dream I’m any other place.” The listener is
simultaneously invited in but made aware that mortality looms large over these songs.
The evocative collision of emotional openness, rough home recordings, and gauzy
instrumental overdubs is expanded on the next song, “To Tripwire Arrows.” Montgomery
explains, “The acoustic guitar track and my vocal heard here are my very first time playing
through the song. All other tracks were added to the original voice memo recording.” The
result feels like a frayed, decomposed rock song briefly urged aloft with Seth Kauffman’s
(Floating Action) flutes and Betsy Wright’s (Ex Hex / Bat Fangs / Superchunk) ethereal
backing vocals on its two bridges: “Dare me to run but words aren’t enough now / I’m not
scared of blood but it’s really coming now.” And at three minutes, the song collapses on
itself, exhausted.
“Of Chrome” ticks up the BPM with a chugging barrage of guitars and an expanded choir of
voices (a reassuring multitude of Wakefields, Kelley Deals, and Kristian Svitaks) stitched
over Montgomery’s home recordings in summons that traverses the distance between Walt
Whitman’s “Drum-Taps” and Wilco’s A Ghost is Born before spilling into the hymn-like “Will
You Bring This Body Home.” Again featuring the gracious support work of dear friends –
Scott Torres on piano, Sven Kahns on pedal steel, and Nick Hill and Seth Kauffman on bass
– this quiet side-closer, another plussed-up demo, is ultimately given over to Mike’s young
son: “You can hear him clanging away on stuff sitting next to me, at the kitchen table . . .
Those sounds are loud here and there, but when I hear his voice at the end, it anchors me
to a place and time, and this is a song to him anyhow, so it’s fine by me that he’s elbowing
his way into it."
If “Tapping on My Skull” serves as an overture, side B’s “How They Call” presents Moments
of Riot’s swirling intermission of guitar loops over the murmur of friends’ indistinct voices
(Wright, Ed Crawford, Kim Deal, FB, and Laura King) before unveiling the majestic album
highlight “I Will Find Them All.” In addition to Wakefield’s lovely string accompaniment and
Pleiman’s keening pedal steel, the sumptuous production features Rick McCarty (cymbal
swells), Alexis Marsh (woodwinds), Charles Chase (guitar), and Adam Nurre (drums, bass,
piano, and synths). It’s a gorgeous song that feels restorative, like inching toward some kind
of acceptance on the other side of loss.
The album’s final two songs present Moments of Riot’s central tension and release in
miniature. “One Long Syllable,” whose haunting melody feels like a timeless motif from a
half-remembered movie soundtrack, dips back into the heartbreaking mundanity of grief:
“On the wall by the telephone, in case things worsen / Some numbers I could call if I were a
different person” and “Passing notes to kill the time.” With “One Long Syllable,” the album
lingers in a nearly ambient haze, holding its breath before resolving with “I Have Seen
Ruins,” a song that dates back to the origins of Mike’s solo work. Released in 2023 as the
first Nervous Verbs single on Don Giovanni Records, Montgomery always intended it to
close out his second album, so he remixed it. He confesses, “It’s the only time I've ever
played the song, since I can't re-figure out what chords I was playing when I wrote it and did
the demo.” Adding Devin Ocampo (guitar) and Daniel Martin Moore (electric piano) to the
album’s stellar cast of players, “I Have Seen Ruins” finds an easy gait in brushed snare,
lush seventh chords, and wavering pedal steel not unlike Neil Young’s Harvest. The closer
finds Montgomery turning to memory for solace. He sings, “ I have seen ruins – their hearts
removed by centuries of thieves / And through it all it was you and me.”
Despite its moments of staggering beauty and intimacy, Moments of Riot is a challenging
and profoundly honest album made between hospital visits and kitchen table demos. And
while this Nervous Verbs album is another collection of great Mike Montgomery songs,
Moments of Riot feels like both a mournful rumination and a hopeful new beginning.
--Andy Hittle 2026