There’s a timeless quality to The Midwest Home Grown Band’s Life, Liberty & the Pursuit of Hippyness. With a jovial cover that harkens to a simpler time of peace and love, the music found in the grooves of the album lives up to the band’s noble pursuit. Throughout the record, life is uncovered and shared with listeners, and liberty is celebrated not as a political ideology but as a means to achieve, well, hippyness, what one can only assume is the happiest and kindest of emotions.

 

Tracks like “Tears” and “So Far” conjure memories of Jefferson Airplane and The Drovers, while “Road Trip” and “Just a Song” concoct a sound that is nearly distinct from anything else that’s being played today. And on “God Bless Our Soldiers,” the band shares its own protest in the form of a poem that calls attention to standing up for what’s right, and standing up for the troops. The poem leads into “Don’t Call Me a Loser,” with the prophetic lyrics, "Yeah, you know peace can be contagious, it just needs a place to start."

 

None of these songs exist in solitude, though, thus the result is an LP for the masses, with a little something for everyone. Made up of a handful of Michiganders—guitarist Eric Einhorn, harmonicist Maijel Chisholm, guitarist Bill Sisk, drummer Rob Brines, bassist Valentin Mirelez, and Jodie Coats on keys—The Midwest Home Grown Band simultaneously exist in the ‘60s while crafting music that speaks to today’s culture and society with profound truth and pristine rock and roll. Life, Liberty & the Pursuit of Hippyness captures this juxtaposition perfectly, and invites listeners to join the band on their lifelong journey to find true, unadulterated hippyness.