9.27 -- STEELVILLE, MO --------------- MO Roots Music Festival
9.28 -- JASPER, AR ------------------------------ Horseshoe Hell
10.4 -- COLUMBIA, MO -------- Biscuits Beats & Brews Festival
10.5 -- EAGLE, WI ------------------------------------- WISE FEST
10.9 -- COLUMBUS, OH ---------------------- Summit Music Hall
10.10 -- CHICAGO, IL ---------------------------------- Chop Shop
10.11 -- MADISON, WI -------------------------- Majestic Theatre
10.12 -- GRAND RAPIDS, MI ---- The Intersection / The Stache
10.25 -- ASHEVILLE, NC ----------------------- The Orange Peel
10.26 -- KNOXVILLE, TN --------------------------------- The 808
10.27 -- LOUISVILLE, KY ------------------------------- Zanzabar
10.29 -- CLEVELAND, OH ------------------------------ The Roxy
10.30 -- DETROIT, MI --------------------------- Majestic Theatre
10.31 -- MILWAUKEE, WI -------------------------------- Vivarium
11.1 --- MINNEAPOLIS, MN -------------------------- First Avenue
11.2 --- IOWA CITY, IA ------------------------- Wildwood Saloon
11.15 -- TULSA, OK ------------------------------ Mercury Lounge
1.10 --- KANSAS CITY, MO --------------- Knuckleheads Saloon
Banjos and synthesizers... Dulcimers and wubs... Strange flashing lights... Unexplained phenomena... The Spooklights (formerly MK Ultra) is a collaboration of Ben Miller and Pat Kay that is not what anyone would have expected from these two renowned torchbearers of Ozark mountain music tradition heretofore. It's certainly not what they expected when they traded keys to one another's bunker of busted toys and forlorn experiments during the lockdown of a global pandemic.
From a pile of spare parts and fringe ideas, these industrious cobblers of homemade gear soldered a few choice wires between Electronic Music and their trademark "Ozark Stomp Grass" producing a jangle-stomp time-machine to vessel their most bizarre implements and soundscapes. In it, they have embarked on a journey exploring hillbilly music from a distant future. Hop on in, y'all. It’s only weird the first time.
The Spooklights' debut album entitled 'MK Ultra,' an homage to the original band name, was released October 27, 2023 and is available on all platforms!
Let's back up a bit. When we set out on this adventure together during the pandemic era it wasn't serious. We each had a handful of solo shows and decided to casually split them just for kicks. At the first show, we ended up sitting in with one another rather than doing individual sets. We bantered over the mics between songs about what we might call this if we ever did it again...some of you were there for that. MK Ultra! M for Miller, K for Kay, and Ultra because "Ultra!"....an enhancement, by virtue of our forces aligned - which quickly escalated into our mantra: a vow to jettison any notion of creative guardrails. No rules! Make it weird! Bold! Cool! So no…we never vetted this name. We didn’t stop the show right there and check its availability. We were having FUN and we honestly had no reason to believe that this was going to become a "thing".…ha…at some point in the hundreds of shows that followed we got rather serious about having fun. At some point it became clear that this little name we'd chosen was making it hard for people to find us online... Many of you who *knew what you were looking for* still had trouble finding this very page. Underground! This was cute…until it wasn’t.
The risk of downstream battles over the band name aside, we have worked way too hard on this record for people to have so much trouble finding it on streaming platforms where a bazillion other artists already use the same name...and even more trouble finding it on a web search when you have a bazillion webs hits for CIA conspiracy stuff (AND a bazillion other artists who use it). We've worked tirelessly giving our own meaning to the name, and we love that so many of you recognize it, and know it to be ours. Nevertheless, we do not own this name. We want a name our music can own…this isn’t a project anymore. It’s a band... a band that deserves a name as unique as the music itself.
We were originally going to name the album after a paranormal enigma that exists near Route 66 on the OK/MO border near Joplin, MO. We loaded out from a show in Joplin one night and decided to take a cruise on Spooklight Road on the way home in hopes of seeing it for ourselves. It was late, the road was narrow, and when a car would come we'd have to drive to the end of the road and turn around. Just as we were leaving, we saw something strange in the rearview a mile or so behind us... we all got out and watched in awe as multiple flickering balls of light hovered and danced above the road. As of October 1, 2023, that name, The Spooklights, will become the name of the band and MK Ultra will become the name of an album that will be available to you to hold in your hands this October. (More history on the Joplin Spooklight below).
Even though it hurts to let it go, it feels great to memorialize it as the title of our debut album, the first of hopefully many chapters in this weird journey: a journey we’re grateful to have endeavored upon with you.
Onward and Upward
The Spooklight (also called the Hornet Spooklight, Hollis Light and Joplin Spooklight) is a paranormal light enigma near Route 66, southwest of Jolin, MO, along a farm road called E 50, colloquially known as "Spooklight Road." Check out one of our favorite articles on this "superior mirage" HERE.
For booking info please contact pat@stompgrass.com