Tuesday the Sky - Indoor Enthusiast

Angry Metal Guy

Jim Matheos is not the kind of artist to sit still in one place for long. Best known for his splendid guitar work in amorphous US progressive metal band Fates Warning, he also wields a vast assortment of offshoots and side projects, some closer to his usual style than others. Instrumental solo effort Tuesday the Sky is one of Matheos’ more distant adventures with its ambient post-rock soundscapes and touches of electronica. Debut album Drift spawned in 2017 in the wake of Theories of Flight’s writing sessions. Moody 2021 follow-up The Blurred Horizon largely eschewed the more explosive bits, leaving one Huck n Roll with respectful but mixed feelings. Now, four more years later, Matheos is revisiting Tuesday the Sky again with third album Indoor Enthusiast. How enthusiastic should fans of Matheos be for the return of this questionably named project?¹

Crafting delicate atmospheres remains Tuesday the Sky’s bread and butter. Taking notes from Sigur Rós and Brian Eno alike, Indoor Enthusiast drifts between moods and genres. On the minimalistic end of the spectrum, dreamy and introspective electronica tracks like “Zugzwang” and “The Last Lonely Lamppost” act as the base sound for the album. Drums and guitars provide additional instrumentation as counterbalance in both accentuating and maximalist ways, occasionally entering familiar metal territory (“The Nearest Exit May Be Behind You,” “Set Fire to the Stars”). While Matheos experimented with things like this alongside Kevin Moore in OSI, the material on Indoor Enthusiast is generally more low-key than OSI’s most somber moments. And sans vocals, the onus is even more on the songwriting to prove the album’s worth.

Indoor Enthusiast takes much better advantage of layers and texture than prior works. Drift kept its loadout of strange but exciting ideas separate, and most of The Blurred Horizon stuck to a quiet, minimalistic gloom. In contrast, Indoor Enthusiast fuses its elements together more often in both subtle and unsubtle ways. This leads to a stronger active experience while still making sense album flow-wise. Improved composition allows some of the quieter material to shine and pop (“Get Lost,” “Between Wind and Water”), and “Does It Need to Be So Loud?” even brings back the electronic alt-rock gloom of Disconnected. Deep build-ups lead to satisfying crescendos, with “Set Fire to the Stars” using the record’s full arsenal to make a case for the strongest Tuesday the Sky song yet. Not all of the record’s quirks land equally well. For instance, some of the glitchier effects used (“The Nearest Exit May Be Behind You,” “Memento Mori”) are distracting and take away from the album’s introspective vibe. But overall, Indoor Enthusiast’s songs have both the variety and quality to be distinct and interesting.

The instrumentation of Tuesday the Sky sounds as crisp as ever, a quality expected of Matheos. The rock instruments sound excellent, accentuating the wide variety of electronic effects at the core of the album. The album’s elements combine naturally and have plenty of room to breathe. Though wonderfully produced, it does feel like there is too much downtime between Indoor Enthusiast’s highlights. Matheos’ greatest strength is undoubtedly his tasteful and subtly complex guitar wizardry, and sometimes the nature of a project like Tuesday the Sky gets in the way of that strength—the back-to-back of twins “Ghost Train” and “Zugzwang” slowing down momentum early on. The second half of the album, fortunately, avoids the “background music” pitfall. While I do feel like the album still leaves something on the table, its strong highlights make the record a pleasant experience front to back.

Though wandering slightly off course at times, Indoor Enthusiast is the most cohesive Tuesday the Sky record yet. Its individual ingredients of rock, metal, and ambient electronic mix together better than before, with memorable dynamic shifts keeping things going. Compared to last year’s North Sea Echoes debut, Matheos has certainly improved the minimalistic experimental side of his songwriting; the album as a whole feels like it develops towards something. I do still think he can do even better, but he is making it work. I don’t know what direction Tuesday the Sky will go to next—if any—but Indoor Enthusiast gives this side of Matheos a fresh and solid foundation.



Rating: Good!
DR: 9 | Format Reviewed: 256 kbps mp3
Label: Metal Blade Records
Websites: tuesdaythesky.bandcamp.com | tuesdaythesky.com | facebook.com/TuesdaytheSky
Releases Worldwide: October 24th, 2025

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