Tech alumni are always finding ways to support the Institute’s mission of “Creating the Next.”

Niesha Butler, INTA ‘16, is a former Tech and professional basketball player and software engineer. Butler opened S.T.E.A.M. Champs on July 16. Located in New York City, S.T.E.A.M. Champs is an education center with the goals of exposing children to STEM at an early age. From robotics to coding to engineering principles, the center offers hands-on classes for children to learn more about technology. 

Butler’s own experiences as a Tech student, and being an athlete, have all helped shape the mission of S.T.E.A.M. Champs.

“I’ve had various careers. I was a professional basketball player, a software engineer, an actor, a sideline reporter and producer,” Butler said. 

“And all of that has brought me to the point that I have a passion for teaching kids and educating our young people and getting them more interested in tech.”

Butler sees technology-focused education as a key part of addressing cyclical poverty. 

“[In] New York City where I grew up, there is a real poverty problem, like a cyclical generational poverty problem, and I personally believe, even though I am a former professional athlete, I think technology is the way out,” Butler said. 

The initial idea to found S.T.E.A.M. Champs came during COVID — Butler had previously mentored under engineer and entrepreneur Lonnie Johnson, and had taught computer science at schools in underserved areas. Her experiences from that were part of the inspiration to continue working in the education field. 

“I recognize sometimes women and people of color don’t have that representation … a lot. And I felt like I just saw the girls come alive,” Butler said. 

Butler’s father helped to continue her inspiration and connect her to children in New York City.

“He took me to his old community center in the South Bronx, and he’s like, ‘Look, I want you to teach these kids. I want you to teach them whatever you know,’ and he taught chemistry in the public school systems for 10 years,” Butler said. 

“So he’s like, ‘Look, you know, they might not like chemistry, but they like video games, and you’re teaching kids to code games. They might like this.’” 

Butler loved the experience, and despite challenges such as finding a curriculum that engaged the children and how expensive the kits were, she decided to open S.T.E.A.M. Champs — a historic accomplishment for representation in the STEM field. 

“I’m the first Black Latina woman-owned STEM education center in the nation,” Butler said. 

As Butler has worked with more children at the center, part of her education approach is similar to how her two favorite Tech professors in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, Kirk Bowman and Michael Salomone, taught their classes.

“They understood everything I was going through,” Butler said. “I really wanted to learn. They figured it out and they worked with me and I felt seen and most importantly, I felt supported.”

That is one of Butler’s goals at S.T.E.A.M. Champs — to make the children feel seen. 

For Butler, one of the most rewarding aspects is to see children who were, at the start of the program, intimidated and a little unsure about themselves, become inspired to be an engineer, architect or scientist when they grow up. Butler describes it as giving her students a “blueprint for success” and something that can help both her students, and the world around them.

In contrast to education focused solely on STEM, S.T.E.A.M. Champs includes an artistic component, hence the “A” in the name. 

They do this mainly using EarSketch, a Tech web-based application where users can create beats and music using computer science.

“I try to make it cool so they understand how being a rap artist or an athlete or an actor or whatever has technical components,” Butler said. “… I try to expose them to different things that they use every day and make it technical.”

Activities like drawing cartoons, playing chess and making art help the kids learn how to focus and improve attention span. 

Looking to the future, Butler is looking at franchising the model to bring it to both inner city and suburban areas. 

“We’re doing the franchising model. I want to empower people to create and affect change in their community wherever they are,” Butler said. “So [we’re] creating an affordable, branded, quality STEAM product to be spread.”

Butler has advice, and words of support, for Tech students, especially those who are student-athletes. 

“I think the going thought of athletes is that we get everything easy … No, it’s really tough to be an 18/19 year-old kid juggling traveling, not going to class and not absorbing, your body hurts, your knee hurts, you have surgery, you have to play, dealing with being a kid and then trying to deal with a Tech schedule,” Butler said. “I wish people knew that — it’s hard. We’re earning our spot and then some as a Tech athlete.” 

Butler encourages student-athletes to take advantage of resources outside of the Athletic Association, including CREATE-X, which she herself participated in. 

For all Tech students, athlete or not, Butler remembers seeing her peers in classes applying pressure on themselves. 

“Georgia Tech students are high-performing students, obviously, but … I wish the kids knew more of a balance and understanding and appreciating the process,” Butler said. “So it’s how do you learn to not be so stressed out in a very stressful situation and how do you learn how to see clearly in a chaotic situation and work on those skills?”

From younger children to college students, Butler maintains the same advice. 

“Sports does a lot of good things for a person, but I do believe that tech is — no pun intended — is the best way [for] your future,” Butler said. 

To learn more about the various programs and opportunities offered at S.T.E.A.M. Champs, visit the website at steamchamps.com.

Our Take: 3/5 Stars

“Stray” is not conceptually groundbreaking — the apocalypse has occurred, everything living has died and robots roam the earth in their place. The cliché goes that if robots were to be the successors to humans, they would inherit humanity’s desire to dominate and ultimately be the ones to kill the humans. 

In “Stray,” robots have nothing to do with humanity’s demise at all — instead, the culprit is a life-eating, rat-like pest that infects much of the earth. In fact, there is an endearing novelty to the way the robots in “Stray” interact and speak. They have a childlike curiosity about humans; you spend many quiet moments reading their murals and diary entries reflecting on what life must have been like for humans or showing their respect and adoration for them. 

Much of the game consists of these little introspective snippets and frequently impart a pleasant appreciation of one’s own life. 

As for how the game plays, boy, can you jump! Rooftops, dangling pipes, powerlines — this cat goes anywhere it pleases. Most areas are open world, encouraging you to scavenge for missing music sheets for the local musician, walk all over computer keyboards and bat as many breakable objects off countertops as you want. 

However, the protagonist being a cat definitely creates some limitations; there is not a lot of combat, and enemy fights usually come in the form of running to safety or slow, deliberate use of tools to clear a path. 

The “monsters” are not really that scary, and the enemy areas are actually a less engaging aspect of the game due to their low stakes and simple nature. 

The graphics, however, are amazing and contribute to some great world-building. Since all the characters are trapped inside a closed-off city, everything feels cramped and overwhelming but in an intentional, non-distracting way. 

This game wants you to look at it, so the cutscenes are slow, forcing you to take in the scenery and the details. 

You could probably get through the whole game in three hours or so. However, by exploring and talking to every character and finding every collectible, you can probably spend up to nine or 10 hours completely traversing the game and its environment.

“Stray” is a simple game with a simple story, but it goes about telling that story in an alluring, unconventional way: through the eyes of a mostly harmless, quiet creature. 

The best parts, as in most other games as well, are the exploring and the side plots, which create a more immersive, holistic world. 

“Stray” is such a lovable game with its very own personality! It makes you think — but not too hard — and it’s got a mischievous little feline friend that you, ultimately and easily, come to adore.  

In July at the San Diego Comic-Con, Marvel Studios announced their plans for the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) through the end of 2025. As part of their announcement, they introduced the Multiverse Saga which spans Phases 4-6 of the MCU. 

For anyone new to the MCU, there are six phases that Marvel Studios uses to organize its movies (and TV shows). The MCU is also split into two sagas with Phases 1-3 composing the Infinity Saga and Phases 4-6 composing the Multiverse Saga. Phase 1 lasted from 2008-2012, beginning with the first “Iron Man” movie and ending with the first “Avengers” movie. Phase 2 lasted from 2013-2015, beginning with “Iron Man 3” and ending with the second Avengers movie, “Age of Ultron.” Phase 3 spanned 2016-2019, beginning with the third Captain America movie, “Civil War,” and ending with “Avengers: Endgame.”

Phase 4 kicked off with “Spider Man: Far From Home” in 2019 and is set to end this year. For the remainder of 2022, Marvel has announced the Disney+ series “She-Hulk” which began streaming on Aug. 18 and “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” which will be in theaters on Nov. 11. The second installment of Black Panther will round out Phase 4 of the MCU. 

Phase 5 is expected to span 2023-2024. In 2023 the MCU has the following lineup of Disney+ TV shows and movies: 

• “What If…? Season 2” (Disney+, early 2023)
• “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania” (in theaters Feb. 17, 2023)
• “Secret Invasion” (Disney+, spring 2023)
• “Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3” (in theaters May 5, 2023)
• “Echo” (Disney+, summer 2023)
• “Loki: Season 2” (Disney+, summer 2023)
• “The Marvels” (in theaters July 28, 2023)
• “Blade” (in theaters Nov. 3, 2023)
• “Ironheart” (Disney+, fall 2023)
• “Agatha: Coven of Chaos” (Disney+, winter 2023)
• In 2024 the MCU has the following lineup of Disney+ TV shows and movies: 
• “Daredevil: Born Again” (Disney+, spring 2024)
• “Captain America: New World Order” (in theaters May 3, 2024)
• “Thunderbolts” (in theaters July 26, 2024)
• “X-Men ‘97” (Disney+, fall 2023)
• “Spider-Man: Freshman Year” (Disney+, 2024)
• “Fantastic Four” (in theaters Nov. 8, 2024)

“Fantastic Four” is expected to kick off Phase 6. 2025 is currently set to feature just two movies starting with “Avengers: The Kang Dynasty” (in theaters May 2, 2025) and ending with “Avengers: Secret Wars” (in theaters Nov. 7, 2025). 

With all of these films and TV shows scheduled for the next three years, many fans have begun to ask the question: is Marvel attempting to do too much? Since the inception of the MCU in 2008 with the first “Iron Man” movie, Marvel Studios has steadily gained a large and dedicated fan base. Even casual watchers of the MCU have appreciated the storytelling, characters and interwoven plotlines across the myriad of movies and franchises. Praise for the MCU reached a fever pitch in 2019 when “Avengers: Endgame” was released, capping an 11-year story arc that introduced to the big screen many superheroes from Marvel comics, some known before and others new to the vast majority of the public. 

In the three years since “Endgame,” interest in the MCU has begun to wane. For fans who have been watching the MCU since 2008, there may have been disappointment that their favorite superheroes, such as Iron Man and Captain America are no longer around, or a sense of superhero fatigue that has come with seeing similar plotlines and no real risk involved for characters in the MCU as main characters deaths are few and far between. 

Overall, the MCU has also seen a drop in ratings for more movies in the past three years and recent accounts from Marvel Studios employees include unrealistic deadlines for graphic designers as the MCU relies more heavily on computer-generated
imagery (CGI). However even with these trends there is hope for fans of the MCU. With a number of new faces to the MCU, there are more characters to learn about, more storylines to explore and more to await when it comes to the overarching storyline of the Multiverse Saga that has yet to reveal itself. 

Yellow Jacket Roller Derby [YJRD] is a co-ed club sport team at Tech in Atlanta. While there are over 2,000 roller derby leagues, YJRD is one of the only collegiate teams in the world! During the pandemic, the popularity of roller skating skyrocketed, and the interest from people who wanted to join our team followed — in the past seven months, we’ve tripled the size of our team and now have 65 beautiful teammates. We’ve grown as quickly as we possibly could, as we can only get as many new members per semester as sets of gear we have to lend out.

We are an incredibly diverse team of women, non-binary folks and men brought together from all types of backgrounds, interests, majors, sexualities, gender identities… you name it! Everyone is unbelievably inspiring and intelligent, with teammates conducting state-of-the-art research, working on cars and robots, acing multivariable calculus exams, and just collectively changing the world for the better — all in their free time apart from roller derby practice. Though we are all so different in our identities and interests, we are all tied together by our devoted love for roller derby. At YJRD, there is no way that you won’t fit in!

Roller derby is a fast-paced, full-contact, collision sport played on quad roller skates on an ovalshaped track. A game, or what we call a “bout,” is an hour long and split into two 30-minute halftimes. Each halftime is further split into two-minute “jams.” There are two teams of 15 skaters with each team being able to supply five skaters for each jam. One of the five skaters is designated as the “jammer.” They are the pointscoring players and are identified by a star on their helmet. The four other skaters are called “blockers,” with one of them allocated with the “pivot” position (they have a stripe down their helmet), meaning they are capable of trading positions with the jammer in the middle of a jam if need-be. The team with the most amount of points at the end of the bout wins!

Jammers earn points for each blocker on the opposing team that they pass, which is where the hitting comes in! Blockers, not wanting the other team’s jammer to pass them, try to stop or knock the jammer out of bounds to prevent them from passing. While scrapes and bruises are unavoidable in roller derby, there are lots of rules to make the sport as safe as possible.

Players may touch their own teammates however they wish, but when it comes to making contact with the other team, they can only use the parts of the body that can be covered with a T-shirt and shorts — and cannot hit opponents square in the back. Protective gear that must be worn to play includes a helmet, mouthguard, wrist guards, elbow pads and knee pads. Players may also wear face shields and shin guards if they wish. Contrary to popular belief, roller derby does not allow elbowing, tripping, kicking or punching — that’ll get you sent straight to the penalty box! There are many more nuances to the rules of playing roller derby, like what a “lead jammer” is, “star passes” and other things that qualify as penalties, but this is the main gist!

Roller derby is different from other sports in that it is truly meant for anyone and everyone! This past year was one of the worst years for the transgender, intersex and nonbinary communities with over a hundred bills across the U.S. enacted to limit their participation in sports, access to affirming healthcare, privacy and, in general, prevent this community from safely presenting as their true self.

Roller derby is a sport dedicated to fighting against these restrictions and providing a safe space for the LGBTQIA+ community. Our team especially has tried very hard to make YJRD as inclusive and welcoming as possible by creating a Diversity and Inclusion Committee dedicated to publicizing workshops held by our school educating about the gender nonconforming experience, enforcing a safe space for our members, providing mental health awareness and highlighting skaters of color and fat-positive skaters.

We also skate through the Atlanta Pride Parade together! In order to be on the team, everyone must sign a Membership Agreement Form protecting our teammates against bullying, harrassment and discrimination — which can be hard to notice in a sport where we physically hit one another. This trust that we have in each other is what allows us to remain best friends even though we make each other bleed and bruise. No one falls without an apology, another teammate checking in to make sure they’re okay or a congratulations!

Unlike other sports, people of all ages are able to start from the ground up to learn how to play and master our sport, regardless of if you’re a kid or 40 years old. The average age of a derby team is early-to-mid-30’s and the oldest derby player kept playing until they were 75 — proving that age is truly just a number. Anytime we hear, “I wish I could play roller derby,” the only answer is “You can!” Regardless of prior experience or pre-existing injuries, anyone and everyone can learn how to skate and play — all it takes is some practice and dedication.

Roller derby is also special in that everyone develops an alter ego! This tradition began in the early 2000s during roller derby’s revival from its theatrical origins in the 1930s. Derby skaters are hardly ever addressed by their legal name… rather everyone chooses their own name to go by on the track (and in effect, real life)! It’s actually a running joke on the team about how new members don’t actually know their teammates’ real names because we only address each other by our derby names. It’s definitely funny to be out in public calling a teammate “Wench” or “Hardass” and watching strangers look confused at seeing them smiling back. This goes on even further as we dress up as our derby persona on fancy occasions like our bouts and team photoshoots. For example, our teammate Fly Fieri will always be covered in flames, and JoJo Jolt will always have a storm cloud and lightning bolt painted across her face. These names can be based on anything the skater wants: their interests, a play on words of their real name, a physical trait, their heritage or nothing at all! They’re typically a little dark, dangerous or aggressive. Other examples of derby names from the team are Primm Reaper, Executie, Sylvia Wrath and She Creature.

So far, our team’s biggest achievement would definitely be the GymShark feature! It was so shocking that out of all the teams in the world, our small team — barely five years old — was chosen. YJRD also had a joint-mixed Exhibition Bout with Atlanta’s main roller derby league, Atlanta Roller Derby, last semester. We held a couple practices with them beforehand and we learned so much from them. Being noncollegiate, most of the skaters on their team were older and have been skating for years, some even on the international scale. They were all so supportive, kind and ready to give us tips and tricks to gameplay even if we were practicing as the opposite team. I really mean it when I say that this altruistic and collaborative environment is just the culture of roller derby! There was such an amazing turnout to the bout — over 150 people showed up and all of the chairs we rented out were filled. Many people had to stand or sit on the ground to watch. After the pandemic halted our ability to play in a bout for two years, it was amazing seeing the support from friends, family, fans and others from the community for the first game that really any team in the world was able to play. We were so happy to expose roller derby to the Tech community and we were asked countless times when our next game was, even before the bout had ended!

Outside of roller derby, we would also love to see more inclusivity for all women in fitness. The world as a whole is, unfortunately, terribly misogynistic. Women from a young age are trained to be pitted against one another, to be called “bossy” rather than “assertive,” to learn to hate their physical appearance, to doubt themselves and to believe that they could never be enough. There’s this belief that women need to be docile, fragile and submissive to be feminine. We’re taught that being strong, ambitious and decisive is a bad thing; that to have muscles is to be too masculine; that being fat is something to be ashamed of. At every turn, anything and everything we could do or be is something that’s wrong and needs to be fixed — regardless of whether it’s hypocritical.

Roller derby has this excellent balance between harnessing masculine and feminine energy and supporting the concept of how to be human. Being a woman-dominated sport — and a sport that originated for “outsiders” — roller derby was able to set its roots and grow welcomingly away from the harsh commentary of a world made for men. Our rough sport is wholly athletic and aggressive. The whole point of the game is to use our bodies as a weapon against the other team. Points are earned by whether or not the jammer can maneuver quickly enough or hit hard enough to make their way through the pack.

On the flip side, our sport is impressively welcoming, inclusive and supportive. The kind-hearted nature of all players and consistently being surrounded by positive women who understand what life is like in the real world allow everyone to connect on an unspoken and intimate level. Roller derby is especially supportive and welcoming of the LGBTQIA+ community. It provides a safe space for those who can’t express their true selves in their day-today life and fosters a family of individuals to help guide and protect people on their path of discovering themselves. Bullying and hurtful commentary about peoples’ physique, race, gender, disabilities, sexuality or anything that cannot be controlled or healthily improved are rejected and are unwelcome in the world of roller derby. Hate does not belong here.

We foster an environment for individuals to be themselves and to strengthen themselves; not just to become more physically fit but to help accept themselves better in a world determined to make them feel less-than. If you would like to support us, we have a GoFundMe. Your donations will help us pay for venues for future bouts (the only place we can host is on an outdoor, uncovered basketball court with no public parking nearby), pay for other bout necessities (referees, announcers, EMTs, etc.), replenish our team gear, pay for team jerseys, pay for coaches, pay for travel for away games and support our teammates whose financial hardships might prevent them from having access to our sport. With much love, we thank you so so so much in advance!

On July 24th, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) issued its opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization: “The Constitution does not confer a right to abortion; Roe and Casey are overruled; and the authority to regulate abortion is returned to the people and their elected representatives.” With that, for the first time in US history, SCOTUS revoked a right that it had previously granted. No matter your views on abortion, this decision was a big shock.

In the past 50 years since Roe v. Wade was decided, advocates on different sides of the issue have fought to expand or restrict access to abortion. While some states sought to codify Roe and increase the availability of a wide range of reproductive and sexual health services, others have doubled down on making access to these services as difficult as possible. Since Roe, 1,381 restrictions have been imposed on abortion, with 46% of those being enacted in the last decade alone. And now with the Dobbs decision finalized, over half of US states are expected to restrict or completely ban most abortions. This decision and the policies enacted across the country are an embarrassment in the global arena, and reflect the steep turn American politics has taken away from public health and basic science. But we’re not here to examine how the government at all levels has continued to divest from public health. We’re here to discuss the public health case for abortion and reproductive freedom as a whole, and the implications of Dobbs on the health of all Americans.

The University of California in San Francisco led the Turnaway Study, a 10-year longitudinal study that “followed nearly 1,000 women who either had or were denied abortions and tracked their mental and physical health and financial impacts.” The study found that these women experienced greater violence from the men who had fathered these children and faced more health problems than the women who were able to obtain abortions. The long-term impacts of the trauma from violence and serious health problems is well documents, so there is little doubt that restricting access to abortion will only exacerbate health inequities in the United States.

Public health experts often tout that a person’s zip code is a large determining factor in their overall health. Beyond reproductive health, this will surely be the case in the post-Roe world. No states that ban or are likely to ban abortion offer paid family leave. The opposite is also true: every state that offers paid family leave has protected the right to an abortion. Without social nets and accessible reproductive healthcare, the financial burden on families is exacerbated. The effects also go beyond an economic impact. The Turnaway Study demonstrated that children birthed to people who sought abortions showed worse child development when an abortion was denied as opposed to when a mother was able to receive one. Women who were denied abortion were more likely to develop life-threatening complications during child-birth. As it stands, maternal mortality in the US is higher than every other so-called “developed nation.” Denying access to abortions will only worsen the maternal mortality crisis.

Even amidst all of these existing issues (and there are far more implications of the Dobbs decision on reproductive health in the US), more than half of US states will clamp down on restricting access to abortions. The only justification they have for taking such action is a lack of interest in truly addressing population health issues that are worsening the health of the nation. The public health case is very clear: restricting abortions will not decrease the loss of life, it will only exacerbate it.

While it may seem as though there is no hope, there are still many ways to receive the reproductive and sexual healthcare you or someone else may need. You can find a verified abortion provider at abortionfinder.org, and there are still options to obtain an abortion pill and use mail forwarding to get it to you (even if you’re in a state that bans or is planning to ban abortions) at PlanCPills.org. For those who need it, there is financial assistance available at abortionfunds.org and practical support, such as transportation, childcare, etc., at apiarycollective.org/pso-list.

And you can advocate for reproductive justice by supporting organizations such as Unite for Reproductive and Gender Equity (URGE), Access Reproductive Care, National Abortion Federation Hotline, the Center for Reproductive Rights and the Abortion Care Network. Finally, checkout resources the Student Government Association (SGA) at Tech has put out for reproductive justice by visiting https://linktr.ee/gtsga.

Get involved at Georgia Tech by visiting the Women’s Resource Center, Stamps Women’s Health Clinic, VOICE, Health Initiatives, and joining different student organizations that support sexual and reproductive health on campus including the Public Health Student Association, People Against Unwanted Sexual Experiences (PAUSE), Stamps Health Services Ambassadors, Support Health and Education (SHE) for Women, Buzz Mobile Health and the SGA Public Health Committee. The Dobbs decision will surely be studied and debated for many years to come, and maybe in the near future the decision will be overturned. But for now, the best we can do is reignite the fight for reproductive freedom.

Despite Dolly Parton becoming an icon for the LGBTQIA+ community and Lil Nas X’s attempt to bring country influences into this music, there remains a void of queer artists in the contemporary country genre. 

Orville Peck, a Canadian-based South African artist that hides his identity behind a fringed mask and a cowboy hat, is attempting to change that. 

Peck officially arrived on the country scene in 2019 with his freshman album “Pony” which introduced Peck’s heavy cowboy ethos and crowd crooning guitars. 

“Pony” was later amplified in 2020 with the release of Peck’s EP “Show Pony,” which featured an impressive collaboration with Queen of Country Pop and fellow Canadian Shania Twain.

Despite Peck’s infancy in his solo music venture, he has been recognized by drag queen all-stars and Grammy Award-winners alike for major projects. 

Trixie Mattel, one of the most successful mainstream drag queens to roll off of “Ru Paul’s Drag Race,” teamed up with Peck to cover Johnny Cash and June Carter’s iconic country duet “Jackson.”  

In 2021, Peck was invited to contribute to the 10th anniversary celebrations of Lady Gaga’s album “Born this Way,” releasing a robust, country version of the title track. 

Peck even opened for Harry Styles during his 2021 Madison Square Garden shows, providing more evidence of the wide range of affection the biggest names in today’s music feel for Peck’s talents.

Peck continues his up-and-coming legacy with the release of his sophomore album “Bronco.” Released on April 8, the album serves asPeck’s strongest step into the country music scene. 

With his best booted foot forward, Peck fully explores his identity and challenges the confines of the country genre. 

The album visuals alone show Peck’s transition from freshman pup to full-fledged cowboy artist, trading in his pastel “Show Pony” imagery for his newest album’s imagery that shows a muscled up Orville Peck, clad in golden chaps and standing in front of a bucking black stallion. 

“Daytona Sand,” the album’s introductory track, continues this strong imagery of Peck as the roaring instrumentals draw visions of a herd of mustangs galloping across Peck’s voice. 

The lyrics, depicting a tumultuous relationship between Peck and “big blonde,” mark the beginning of Peck’s exploration of his identity as a gay man navigating the conservative country music landscape. 

Perhaps the album’s greatest lyric, “I’ve been around long enough to know you can’t trust a man,” stems from this solid first track that signals the final departure of Peck’s lingering uncertainty as an artist.

Peck’s developing confidence as an artist is evident throughout his vulnerability on the album. “The Curse of the Blackened Eye,” a track that illustrates the effects of an abusive relationship, serves as the pinnacle of candid crooner ballads on “Bronco” with Peck’s deep voice evoking the aforementioned signature cowboy ethos he is known for. 

Peck’s superpower is getting listeners who would not classify themselves as country music fans to pay attention to him. 

At 2021’s Shaky Knees music festival, hosted just a little over a mile from Tech’s campus in Atlanta’s Central Park, Peck was a mid-day performance that garnered the attention of many festival-goers. 

Many gathered around the main stage of the festival in response to Peck’s powerful singing voice that boomed across the park, attracting many with his Cracker Barrel chic aesthetic that heavily differed from the festival’s typical indie alternative lineup. 

This superpower is evident in the album’s title song, which offers a dance-inducing track about breaking free and letting nothing hold you back, a message from Peck that is pervasive throughout the album. 

Peck continues to push back on elements of toxic masculinity and provides listeners with proud references to his sexuality on “C’mon Baby, Cry.” 

While some country adjacent artists, such as Lil Nas X, may beat around the bush or sweep their queer identity beneath the lyrics, Peck offers himself in full in a genre that traditionally lacks LGBTQIA+ representation. 

The album’s secret superstar song is “Kalahari Down.” Released early as part of Peck’s “Chapter 2” delivery of the album’s singles, “Kalahari Down” is a personal ode that depicts Peck’s upbringing in South Africa. 

Starting off with a whimsical harmonica solo, the nearly flawless song perfectly combines Peck’s soulful voice, a sorrowful guitar soundtrack and references to the cowboy lifestyle to create a painful tale of losing your way. 

Peck’s performance of the song summons the “gothic Elvis Presley” characterization given to him by Pitchfork’s review of the album. 

Sitting at nearly an hour-long, the album may seem like a long haul at first, but Peck’s ability to get listeners to lose themselves in his cowboy tales makes for an easy listening experience. 

The album showcases Peck’s talents that prove his deserving upcoming superstar status. 

Representing a culmination of Peck’s newfound confidence and desire to break into the country genre as a queer artist, “Bronco” provides a successful case argument as to why Peck should be considered one of the top new music artists of the year.