Lyrics

Just last week in Kansas
5, 4 days before
Fell up those steep stairs
Jumped to the attic
Just last night in Kansas
Tracked the black magic

Oh yeah
Uh-huh
Oh yeah
Uh-huh

Just me and your canvas
Caught in vertigo
Painted the bloodstars
Under the rainbow

I can’t remember what
I came here for

Oh yeah
Uh-huh
Oh yeah
Uh-huh

Just last night in Kansas
12 short hours ago
Spied on ‘lectric spiders
Tripped the undertow

Don’t you wanna be alive
before you die?

Drank a gallon of gasoline
Smoked a barrel of carpet fuzz
Chased around synthetic dragons
Just because

Just because
I’s in Kansas
I’s in Kansas
I’s in Kansas

Overall Impression

tcr!’s “in kansas” is a raw, chaotic fusion of punk grit and alt. rock’s refusal to sit still, blending a snarling sonic palette with a lo-fi attitude that’s equal parts detached and deranged. It’s not just music—it’s a mood swinging from the rafters of a condemned garage in middle America.

Opening with a groove-injected bass line and dissonant guitar textures, the track quickly establishes an undeniably off-kilter sense of character, and by the time the main chord progression kicks in with its unnerving chromatic shifts, you know this track isn’t aiming for polish—it’s aiming for presence.

The guitars crunch with the fervor of sandpaper dragging across an old amplifier, their fuzzed-out tone chewing through any notion of clean structure. It’s punk, but smeared with the introspective grime of alt. rock—gritty, unfiltered, and hypnotically imperfect. The unpolished aesthetic is crucial. This song wouldn’t work if it were clean. Its magic is in the fray—the feedback that’s just a bit too loud, the mix that feels duct-taped together, the vocals that sound like they were recorded in a busted hallway mic.

It’s the kind of rawness that can’t be faked because it’s not about imperfection—it’s about intention.

Strongest Point(s)

Vocally, tcr delivers in a slouchy, mono-tonal style that’s more incantation than melody—less about hitting notes and more about exhaling attitude. The performance walks the line between apathy and obsession. The repetition of lines like “Oh yeah / Uh-huh” doesn’t dilute the intensity—it cements the track’s narcotic haze, as if the singer is trying to convince themselves they’re still tethered to reality.

The lyrics themselves are a surrealist fever dream, tapping into Americana psychedelia and punk absurdism. “Tracked the black magic,” “Painted the bloodstars,” “Drank a gallon of gasoline”—this isn’t storytelling so much as myth-making through a cracked lens.

Kansas here isn’t a place; it’s a hallucination, a backdrop for existential free-fall. The song wanders between the mystical and the mundane, turning every image into an act of rebellion against coherence. And then there’s the rhythm section—those drums don’t play as much as lash out. The groove is unbridled, barely restrained chaos. It’s not about precision; it’s about propulsion.

The entire track thrives on this sense of motion teetering toward collapse, and that’s precisely what makes it work.