Soaked in the late-night easy listening of the 1970s, Drugdealer is an entirely pleasant proposition: a smooth drift down the landing strip of a boogie-era night. Tracks such as “Suddenly”, “The Real World” and “Honey” have racked up millions of streams on digital platforms and stand as evidence that Michael Collins, over a series of solid releases, has built on niche fan loyalty to construct something more durable than situational background music. Peel back the retro-sweetness of the project, however, and sharp-eared listeners will uncover some genuinely considered songwriting and moody lyricism. As a well-regarded session player, Collins deploys serious and varied musical talents across his records, so the question that dogged Steely Dan before him inevitably arises: how will any of that translate live?
The band’s trajectory is worth sketching briefly. Collins first came to notice playing under the name Run DMT, a lo-fi psychedelic project launched in 2009, before a legal dispute with an EDM act of the same name forced a rebrand (Allmusic 2016). Rechristened Salvia Plath, the project took a folkier, more layered turn on the 2013 album The Bardo Story [2013]. With Drugdealer, Collins changed course again, looking to the singer-songwriters of the early 1970s and soft-rock pioneers such as Harry Nilsson and Steely Dan for inspiration. The End of Comedy [2016], assembled from sessions spanning nearly four years and released via Weird World, drew in collaborators including Ariel Pink, Natalie Mering of Weyes Blood, and Jackson McIntosh of Sheer Agony (Weird World 2016). Subsequent albums Raw Honey [2019] and Hiding in Plain Sight [2022] continued in the same richly collaborative vein, the latter recorded across nine separate locations and featuring Tim Presley, Kate Bollinger, and Sean Nicholas Savage, among others (Mexican Summer 2022).
Playing to a packed crowd at Electric Brixton, the band took the stage looking the picture of hip LA musician types, and as the songs unrolled, fan favourites received a rapturous welcome from an equally louche crowd of moustached devotees.
The expectation had been clear: the slick, crystalline sound of Laurel Canyon, delivered with the precision of a studio full of session players. What arrived instead was something muddier. The mix dampened the very melodies that Collins has made his name on, and the playing lacked the articulacy one might have hoped for. There were moments of stellar individual performance from across the ensemble, but as a whole the set wanted the cohesion and polish that both the band’s premise and the calibre of musicians involved might have led one to expect.
That said, Collins is a charismatic performer, and the warmth in the room was palpable enough to carry proceedings a considerable distance. A particular highlight came when an audience member was invited onstage to sing: the volunteer rose to the occasion with some confidence, and the moment had the spontaneous charm that no amount of studio preparation can manufacture. When the band eventually let the evening build into a full-throated climax, they showed precisely what they are capable of. With better sound on a different night, what is clearly a formidable group will fulfil its promise.
DRUGDEALER, 13th March 2026, Electric Brixton, Supports: Longplayer, Bug Teeth
Bibliography
Allmusic (2016) Drugdealer: Biography. Available at: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/drugdealer-mn0003538007 [Accessed 13 March 2026].
Mexican Summer (2022) Drugdealer: Hiding in Plain Sight. Available at: https://mexicansummer.com/artist/drugdealer/ [Accessed 13 March 2026].
Weird World (2016) Drugdealer: The End of Comedy. Available at:https://weirdworldrecordco.com/2016/07/drugdealer-the-end-of-comedy-out-september-9th-2016/ [Accessed 13 March 2026].
Domino Music (2016) Drugdealer debut album The End of Comedy released September 9th. Available at: https://www.dominomusic.com/news/uk/drugdealer-debut-album-the-end-of-comedy-released-september-9th [Accessed 13 March 2026].NTS (n.d.) Drugdealer: Artist Page. Available at: https://www.nts.live/artists/37220-drugdealer [Accessed 13 March 2026].
The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance. – Aristotle
