Hot Mulligan Invades the Salt Shed with Bodies and Feelings and Fart Jokes

It's 5 a.m. in Tokyo, and half a world away
I'm sitting in a parking lot, you're laying in your grave
And now I am afraid of you, to know that it's all done
I didn't try hard enough to be a proper son
Please wake up
Please wake up

I was a theater major in college and during rehearsal for a show, our director told us about how big a fan he is of pulling a 'double reverse slam' on the audience whenever possible. Essentially he was talking about how the juxtaposition of two opposite feelings would create an emotional rollercoaster in a fraction of a second. Sure, you could have something sad happen in a play, but you know what would make it 100 times sadder? If something pants-pissingly funny happened the second beforehand. Now the chance wasn't there in every show to do something like that (turns out forcing slapstick into King Lear may not be the greatest idea), when the opportunity presented itself, it was a great way to really up the emotional impact of the performance.

Hot Mulligan are a band that seem to relish the double reverse slam. Take the lyrics above. It's from a song on their new album The Sound a Body Makes When It's Still and deals with lead singer Tades Sanville's grief and regret over the death of his grandmother, who was suffering from Alzheimer's. The song explores themes of guilt, loneliness, declining mental health, stress, and anxiety. It's one of the high points of the album put smack dab in the middle, right when you wouldn't expect an emotional gut-punch.

The song's title? 'Monica Lewinskibidi'.

Why take a touching and personal reflection on loss and depression and name it after a woman who provided one of the most scandalous Presidential sexual scandals in our country's history as well as a CGI head in a toilet that speaks gibberish who is most popular amongst 9-12 year olds? Because they can, and why not? And that's the kind of attitude the band has in general, where nothing really matters so why not act as stupid and immature as possible? And while you're at it, why not double down? Why not add a second emotionally charged and devastating song to the album and call it 'Cock Party 2'? Oh, Hot Mulligan did exactly that? Shocking!

The band rolled into Chicago for 2 nights at the Salt Shed on the Sound a Body Makes When It's Still Tour with Drug Church, Arms Length, and Anxious on the bill to help spread their specifically immature brand of nihilism to the masses just in time for the holidays.

Anxious' 2025 album Bambi was one of the better rock albums of the year. If I had to criticize anything, I would say that the sound is a little better on their debut effort Little Green House. Not that the sound on Bambi isn't good, but it just feels like all the instruments are fighting for attention where Little Green House sounded a bit more...spacious? I'm no professional musician or engineer so I may not know what I'm talking about, but that was my one wish for Bambi on an otherwise amazing record.

The good news? Anxious' live show, on top of being a nonstop frenzy of movement both onstage and off, sounds absolutely top notch. The room for all the instruments and vocals to stretch that I was hoping for on the record are on full display as the band ripped through songs like 'Counting Sheep' and 'Some Girls' off their sophomore effort. If you're looking for one of the young bands on he emo/rock scene looking to pick up the torch once carried by more melodic bands like Jimmy Eat World and Modern Baseball, go see Anxious as soon as is humanly possible.

Speaking of some of the best albums of 2025, Arms Length returned to Chicago for the third time in 2025 and the second time since the release of There's a Whole World Out There. And while they may not have the toilet humor streak that the night's headliners continue to show, they were not going to be outdone on the sadness scale. Combining feelings with maximum volume, lead singer Allen Steinberg threw down absolute poetry in songs like 'Fatal Flaw' (The moon keeps the sun at arm's length for she fears she would get burned/They have joint custody of Earth, they just take turns) while directing the crowd up and over the barricade in solidarity. Sometimes you just need to be sad for a while, and sometimes you need that sad to be loud and hit like a freight train. As much as There's a Whole World Out There does that on every listen, the impact is cranked up to 11 when the songs hit you in person.

DRUG CHURCH. DRUGGG CHURRRCH. There are certain bands that rock and then there are bands that rock so hard that you have to refer to them in all caps and after experiencing their punishing live show for the second time, there's no doubt they are that kind of band. It's not necessarily a volume thing, although they are loud. It's not only about being active onstage, even though they bounce off of every surface they come into contact with. It's just one of those things you know when you see, and with DRUG CHURCH, I knew it about the time I saw the 10th body or so crowdsurf its way over the barricade, which came approximately 30 seconds deep into 'Grubby' to kick off an electric 11 song set.

The odd man out in the night's lineup, DRUG CHURCH did not release an album in 2025. But their 2024 release Prude was one of my favorites of the year and made up a good third of the total setlist, alongside choice cuts from 2018's Cheer and 2022's Hygiene. And every few songs, lead singer Patrick Kindlon would stop the insanity for just long enough to give the crowd a combination of a PSA on how to properly care for your fellow mothers and a warning that things were going to continue to be batshit crazy.

The end result is an irresistible combination of post-punk aggressiveness, the gruffest vocals this side of the late Lemmy Kilmister, and a surprising amount of catchy hooks. This is one of those bands you need to go out of your way to see whenever they come to your town (or within a 2 hour drive).

"Steal from them. Fuck 'em,"

That's what constitutes holiday cheer from Hot Mulligan frontman Tades Sanville. Holding court between songs on the subject of working during the holiday season, Sanville had some choice (if unsurprising) advice on how to deal with employers that don't treat their workers right. But to be fair, it's not like we didn't have any warning. Just a few songs beforehand, Sanville literally announced "This is the part of the show that is very anti-religion and anti-capitalism!" before launching into 'Shouldn’t Have a Leg Hole but I Do'.

Like I mentioned at the top, Hot Mulligan is a band of contrasts, playing up emotions and dressing up those songs with dick and fart jokes. Sanville is anti-capitalist, but the band put a good amount of money into a bunch of AI generated animations to be shown behind their performance. Cutting edge technology, but used to show videos of everything from armadillos wandering the desert to an infinite trip down some kind of wormhole that looks a lot like a colonoscopy.

And what was Sanville's reaction to pointing these animations out? "This was expensive as fuck!"

It's extremely ironic that Hot Mulligan's new album is called The Sound a Body Makes When It's Still considering how many bodies were in motion during their entire set. I've been to a lot of shows at the Salt Shed over the last three years and this was by far the most crowdsurfing I've ever seen. There wasn't a single moment of the entire set (yes, even during the ode to Miss Lewinskibidi) when there weren't multiple fans pouring over the top.

And those fans were amply rewarded for their passion. One of the benefits of coming to the second night of a two-night stand is that sometimes the band feels like they need to switch things up from the first night, which usually means switching things up from how most of the tour has gone. And oh, did Hot Mulligan switch things up. They broke out cuts like 'It's a Family Movie She Hates Her Dad', 'Stickers of Brian', and the live debut of 'Prototheme', the single the band released this past July. A whopping five songs made their way into the setlist that the fans attending night 1 didn't get to mosh to.

Skipping the formality of an encore by not bothering to leave the stage, the band launched into their final two songs in fan favorites 'Equips Sunglasses' and 'BCKYRD' while absolutely covering the audience in a tsunami of confetti and catharsis. If only there was enough room for one last fart joke, things would have been perfect.

Hot Mulligan Setlist - The Salt Shed, Chicago 12.5.25

Moving to Bed Bug Island
And a Big Load
It Smells Like Fudge Axe in Here
Island in the Sun
Monica Lewinskibidi
How Do You Know It's Not Armadillo Shells?
Fly Move (The Whole Time)
Shouldn't Have a Leg Hole but I Do
Its' a Family Movie She Hates Her Dad
Gans Media Retro Games
Stickers of Brian
End Eric Sparrow and the Life of Him
John "The Rock" Cena, Can You Smell What the Undertaker
Prototheme
Drink Milk and Run
Shhhh! Golf is On
Cream of Wheat of Feet Naw Cream of (feat.)
Slumdog Scungillionaire
This Makes Me Yucky
Equip Sunglasses
BCKYRD