Los Angeles singer-songwriter Gregory Ackerman has a backstory worth knowing before you press play. His new album “Challenger Deep” was recorded entirely to tape at Verdugo Sound Studios in Glassell Park – and his sessions were both the first and last ever tracked there before the studio closed, bookending its entire lifespan. Produced and engineered by Dillon Casey, the trio of Ackerman on bass, McDaniel on drums, and Casey on guitar cut nine of eleven tracks live in the room, building structures in real time until someone said, “That was the one.” “Call Me Crazy” came out March 13th as a single from that record – originally a loose garage jam that evolved into something funkier and more unspooled in the studio.
You can never go wrong with a song as groovy as this. It will make you involuntarily move along with all of its moving parts. By “can never go wrong,” I mean when listening to it or recommending it to someone, but executing something this groovy is genuinely hard, and all the musicians have to be completely locked into the pocket, and that deep pocket is super tangible here. The choir of vocals over such an R&B-inspired groove is clearly influenced by gospel music. It’s like a jam where it seems like it’s gonna go on forever, and man, I wish it did.
The album title references the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench – the deepest point on Earth – as a metaphor for navigating grief. Ackerman married his wife, Carly, in 2024 while her mother was battling stage 4 lung cancer; she passed away the following year. That weight is all over “Challenger Deep” as a record, but “Call Me Crazy” is its most freewheeling moment, and sometimes that’s exactly what grief needs.
