JPW + Dad Weed

After 15 years of collaborative experiences and cheering each other on from various distances, Zachary Toporek and Jason P. Woodbury have finally teamed up on Amassed Like a Rat King. Toporek is best known as the leader of 1970s pop-style collective Dad Weed, while Woodbury fronts spooky desert-jangle combo JPW (alongside his work with the eclectic online music magazine Aquarium Drunkard).

Uniting the strands of their crisscrossing musical sensibilities, the duo’s collaborative debut sprawls across 11 tracks of hypnotic psych-folk, mid-century pop fantasias, and ‘90s alt-pop bliss-outs. 

“I’ve always admired the open heartedness Zach brings to his creative work, but moreover, to his entire life,” Woodbury says. “These songs were born out of a lot of tender moments and connection, weekends spent indulging in unguarded joy and musical energy.” 

“It’s funny how something so obvious can still be a surprise—Jason’s been my favorite songwriter and singer that I’ve personally known for years, he’s introduced me to some of my favorite music, and we’d even collaborated on a few tunes here and there to great success and delight,” Toporek says. “But it still felt like a revelation when we got into the studio together and started discovering this record.” 

Though early sessions were amorphous and exploratory, it didn’t take long for the collaborators to lock into rhythms, often resulting in rapid-fire songwriting, arranging, and production. “We’d finish eight hours in a blink,” Woodbury says. “I’d be writing and editing lyrics while Zach’s getting drums mic’d up. We’re writing harmonies, talking about sound design, recording takes, seemingly all at once. There was a special thing that seemed to happen between us, which felt distinct from our individual projects — a shared ‘third mind’ situation.” 

Working in tandem, the duo indulged their shared inspirations, covering a wealth of stylistic ground. This begins with the Wilburys-inspired jangle-pop of the title track—an ode to Woodbury’s rural Arizona upbringing. “When I was in first grade, my family moved to a small cotton town called Coolidge, and ‘Amassed’ is drawn directly from memories I have of being very young, hanging around my family’s machine shop and watching for the train to come rolling by.” 

From here, JPW & Dad Weed drift into driving ’70s soul-rock on the Toporek-led “Frighting,” unabashed but covert ’90s alt-poppers like “Everybody’s Talking (Again)” and “So Brighty There,” and psych-folk epics like “It’s Happening.” The latter detours from Flaming Lips-style orchestral-pop into an alternate dimension Everly Brothers cut before, a lush funk break takes us back to where we started again. And while the music is light, the songs probe into deep questions about identity, inner knowing, cosmic expanses, and what love—the big kind of love, the love that helps create energy between people, partnerships, and communities—looks and acts like in the face of the vast unknown. 

“We’re so lucky it’s crazy,” Toporek says. “Jason writes more songs than anyone else I know and has such a zeal for creating that he’d gladly put out voice memos of his songs. I’m lucky if I write a few songs a year lately, but I’m a studio rat who loves discovering the song as I record it. So there’s a counterbalancing going on with us that’s helpful and productive, but the magic really comes down to the fact that, once we hear something, we both get so excited and chase it down as fast as we can.”

Self-produced and recorded entirely by Toporek and Woodbury, the songs were then passed over to Sam Coen (Kevin Morby, Dangermouse, Karen O) for mixing. With his ear steering the ride, the record comes together to form a kaleidoscopic whole. Imagining an alternate reality where classic soul oldies, organ-drenched prog breaks, and glassy-eyed soft-rock filtered onto AM radio airwaves, Toporek and Woodbury have located a liminal space where timelines blur and moments exist forever.  —Jesse Locke

1. Amassed Like a Rat King // 3:24
   
2. It's Happening // 4:23
   
3. Everybody's Talking (Again) // 3:24
   
4. Far Off Road // 4:16
   
5. Frightening // 4:02
6. Chain of Gravity // 2:49
   
7. Not Sure What I'm Looking At // 4:19
   
8. Figure of Speech // 3:07
   
9. Straight Lines // 4:55
   
10. So Brightly There // 2:17
    
11. What If I Were Dying // 3:13