by Lydia Pudzianowski (@doritoshangover)
Atlanta’s Arbor Labor Union released their first album of fuzzed-out folk-punk, Sings for You Now, on Athens’ Arrowhawk Records in 2014, when the band was known as Pinecones. Their second, 2016’s I Hear You, found them at Sub Pop, and it showcased slicker production, punchier percussion, and harder edges. The two albums are clearly the work of the same musicians processed differently, and because the organic material was as good as it was, the result was excellent both times.
The same goes for New Petal Instants, their third album. Arrowhawk has welcomed them back, and the result sounds very much like a homecoming, as if it were recorded at a house show with the windows open during a summer afternoon. There are acoustic guitars and electric slide, banjos being plucked, and birds chirping. You can somehow hear the sunlight shining through leaves on “Under the Tree.” But New Petal Instants isn’t fully blissed-out and glassy-eyed, though, which is what sets Arbor Labor Union apart from a lot of bands producing similar tunes (along with their signature driving energy, inextricable from their punk roots). “Pipers Play’d” opens with the lyrics “Lookin’ at the front-page news, singin’ armageddon blues.” “How Long Was I Gone” melts into a sort of echoing madness by its end, implying that we may not actually be back yet. The album lyrically addresses some anxieties and frets a little, but it successfully takes a load off in the same breath. It’s the musical equivalent of scrolling through Twitter, closing it, and going for a walk.
Arbor Labor Union have been making music long enough that they can (and should) be compared to themselves, but for entry-point RIYL purposes, New Petal Instants is what the Traveling Wilburys might have sounded like if Wilco and the Meat Puppets were on board alongside Bob Dylan. It’s fitting—unavoidable, even—for there to be an undercurrent of anxiety in an album released by an American band in 2020. With New Petal Instants, Arbor Labor Union addresses that while expertly offering a solution simultaneously.