Illinois Entertainer January 2019 | Page 26

continued from page 22 ing of military-academy click tracks wreathed with his neighborly, conversa- tional rapping that’s never aggressive or threatening. Which makes it all the scarier when you pick up on the dark thoughts he’s putting down. And you can hear him lose control in real time. Like Eddie Brock wrestling with that demanding alien sym- biote in Marvel Comics’ book and movie Venom, the auteur starts out on Reaper defi- ant, full of piss and vinegar in “Hopes Up” (featuring Dashboard Confessional), “Black Heart,” “Clarity in Kerosene,” and “Funeral Fantasy,” wherein he imagines a you’ll-be-sorry-when-gone scenario at his hometown mortuary. But on the following Ruiner — with every track ending in ‘er,’ you can feel the constrictor coiling around him, tightening, tightening, from the falsetto optimism of “Reminiscer” through the problem-noticing “Better” and the title cut, which first broaches suicide as a viable solution. And the difficulties — and pres- sure — just keep mounting for the poor kid, who can only fight back with his music. And after all, he did dub his discs with ghoulish titles like Reaper. “I’ve always been an overthinker, and I think that’s where my anxiety comes from. And overthinking your own mortality just goes with all that,” he observes. “The worst part of it was for four or five months there, I couldn’t even go to the gro- cery store,” the singer says. “I had a panic attack every single day. It was pure hell.” But he also saw it as a teachable moment, and was open to gleaning positive insights from pure terror. “And I guess the main thing I learned about myself is that I am not my feelings, and that feelings aren’t 26 illinoisentertainer.com january 2019 facts. I learned that you can be the observ- er of your own emotions, so I don’t say that I’m anxious — I say that I’m feeling anxious. And I learned a lot of that from my meditation practice, which is really helpful for me. Because sometimes when you’re in it, it feels like there’s no escape. But through mindfulness, I’ve found that there are ways to sidestep it and get bet- ter.” He understands that suffering often set the stage for some compelling art (or at least some snide Venom-versus-human verbal conflict). “And it’s sad, but true,” he allows. “But in buddhism, the Dharma is your special, unique set of skills and how you use them. And for me, that’s music. So I would much rather not have to go through what I’m going through. But I get to create these things that people get to lis- ten to, and maybe they’ll realize that they’re not alone. That there is something worthwhile, waiting for them out there.” Someone recently posited that there are three types of people in the world — Seers; Those who can see only when they are shown; And those who will never see. Mulherin likes this concept and considers himself to be one of the enlightened for- mer. “I’m always in that space where — especially in the creative arts community — there’s just a different layer of feeling,” he says. “And there are crummy things that can come with that. But I feel like there’s a sixth sense within people who have a creative mindset. I mean, why do some of my favorite artists have to be some of the most tortured people? I’m just talk- ing out loud here, but all I know is, I’ve never been in a great mood and been com- pelled to write a song about it. I guess I just continues on page 41