Connor Kelly & the Time Warp, This Egg

Johnmark Hendrix
Oct 9
2 min read

Updated: Nov 11

Nashville-based indie rock outfit, Connor Kelly & the Time Warp released their third studio album, “This Egg,” back in March in a graceful and delicate fashion. What feels like a jam band experience is reconstructed with extremely catchy hooks, and powerful one-liners. It’s full of soul, from the rhythm section to the hickory-smoked vocals of Connor Kelly.

The title track is either an exquisitely expressed retrospective on our own youth, or an extremely depressing song about Humpty Dumpty. Part of me wants it to be both. Nevertheless, it took two tracks to really sink into the concept of this album. It pulls to memories of circumstances beyond one’s own control. I wish I gave my inner child a cigarette before hearing this track. “This Egg” is an intervention on indifference. The song provides some universality in the lyrics like “You’re bright but you’re always playing dumb; As if you heard a sound." It’s keen to pull correctly on anyone's interpretation in any cycle of life.

The lyrical theme of this retrospective is captured and cradled gently with beautifully bluesy guitar work. Throughout the LP, it tugged on my hillbilly heartstrings and really kept me in. There are elements of folk, soul, and psychedelic rock littered throughout to pull to each emotion vividly. The drum and bass work true as the glue to the Time Warp’s sound. The negative space in “Lines In Your Face” becomes brushed and clouded by the cymbals and gliding guitars, a musical prose you’ll find all over. That R&B groove on the hook is extremely infectious.

Every piece is really meant to complement one another, and this album becomes a full experience rather than filler for strong singles. Connor Kelly wails away in “Spineless”, and it’s perfect execution of emotion in singing. “Roy G. Biv” pulls away from the retrospective and enters the more blasé side of the album’s psyche. You’re pushed into a foul sense of impulsivity with the line “I can lie in seven different colors." The wheels on the bus start spinning a lot faster with the surf rock riffs pushing it around.

This ruthless, but charming performance comes to a close with “The Only Way To Get Out." The only way, according to them, is to do “it” now. It’s a hopeful note to end on, assuming “it” means breaking from our shells and finally being ourselves. It’s realizing that what happens next in life is never up to us, but what we do with it is. Sometimes we find ourselves motivated by a missed connection. By the time that we’re able to handle things maturely, the moment has passed. It’s a harsh truth, but they lay it down like a smooth coat of butter. Ultimately, it made me believe in full album experiences again. Each song has its own moxie. We transitioned from moment to moment with precise intent. At the end, I wasn’t ready to let go of it. I see now that may be the whole point.