Atlanta musician Mathis Hunter, alumnus of local groups Noot d'Noot and the Selmanaires, has been issuing noteworthy solo work along the way as well. His trippy debut LP, Soft Opening, came out back in 2010, but he's been on a tear more recently, releasing the comparatively straightforward hard/classic rock fare of Countryman in 2017 and Mother Tongue in 2019. Musically, Hunter's latest dispatch, Mood Lighting, represents something of a return to the fuzzy trippiness of Soft Opening ("Crimson Yellow" could easily be mistaken for an outtake from Pink Floyd's Meddle or Obscured by Clouds), while the groovy psychedelic funk stew that Noot d'Noot so often paddled around in seeps back into play on opening track "Clone It Off." Lyrically, the mood traffics in darker waters, as the album was written and recorded while Mathis was going through a divorce. Artwork by Henry Owings (Chunklet)
