Alexander Skye Band - Storms of the Heart

Location: Moab, Utah
Year: 1983
Label: New Horizons Records
Catalog Number: NH-0001

Style: Rock, New Wave, Psychedelic Rock

Moab in 1982 was not the outdoor tourist destination that we know now, but rather a small desert city that was just starting to attract adventurous and innovative mountain bikers. Nothing is known about the members involved in the recording but the Moab address further adds to the mystery, a place filled with ancient petroglyphs of indigenous people. The cover shows simple type paired with an image of a desert plateau that somehow seems eerily void of the weird music that is found inside.

Storms of the heart is a mysterious and genre clashing album that falls in the cavern between synthy new wave and 80’s psychedelic rock. The vocals are not cosmetically polished but rather gawky and satirically charged. There’s tongue in cheek humor in the air but it never goes overboard into the sea of novelty, at least in my opinion.

Fans of Utah counter-culture will also recognize references to the Edward Abbey novel The Monkey Wrench Gang that is illustrated by the legendary R. Crumb. The books features scenes from Utah as well as other Southwestern states. The novel concerns use of sabotage to bring attention to environmental damaging activities that threaten the desert wilderness.