by Conor Lochrie (@conornoconnor)
Following the release of their 2018 self-titled EP, Melbourne band Hooper Crescent underwent a lineup change, welcoming two members: Ash Stirling (Hideous Towns) and Gemma Helms (No Sister) joining original members Sam Cummins, Kate Allan, and Ian Ngo, forming a five-piece. Object Permanence is their full-length debut, released via the perennially-excellent Spoilsport Records. It will also see a European release through French label Polaks Records, who have taken quite a liking to Australia in recent times, previously releasing records by Moth and Vintage Crop.
Cummins has spoken in interviews about the idea that the guitar is passe which strikes at a great irony, for his band has created a record of refreshing guitar music. It possesses the same angular ability that has made a band like Omni’s brand of post-punk so accessible; in this same way, Hooper Crescent’s sound is easily transferable to an American audience. Each song may be muscular and driven - “I Fell Backwards,” for example, contains a thrashing and hardened middle section - but they are also blessed with playfulness and melodiousness. It’s art rock meant to be strutted to, highly energetic and moveable, and Object Permanence is a relentlessly rhythmic record, balancing any nervy guitar with an underlying catchiness.
The lyrics are sardonic and sharp and mix the personal and the political. Cummins and the band realize that all art must contend with the precariousness of 2020. So we have songs like the elusive “Sour Fruit” and “I Fell Backwards” alongside “Touchscreen” and “Logos”: the former uses its upbeat rhythm and zigzagging keyboards to unload an exhausted critique on our constant usage of phones (“find solace in a piece of glass”); the latter is an acerbic anti-capitalist tirade, examining the disconnect between creativity and capitalism.
It’s a tight eight-track LP but the rhythm is allowed to breathe at points, songs like “Constant Fascination” ending in climactic drawn-out guitar jams. Cummins’ vocals are also a joy to behold. There’s an elasticity to his delivery that informs the playfulness of the music. On “Two Hour Park,” its meandering pace allows for his alluring drawl to dominate. “Bible Studies” premiered on Post-Trash last month and it’s an endlessly repeatable post-punk anthem about being trapped in an environment that feels antithetical to one’s core beliefs; the sunny groove belies the sharpness of the words. In this song too Cummins explodes, his delivery in the latter part sounding suddenly maddened and excitable (this unexpected unleashing would be wonderful to see in a live performance, one expects). “Strike Like Gold” is a menacing end to the album, the guitars confrontational, all swagger and depth, as Cummins’ voice - by now a signature - yelps and rises and yelps again.
The band stated that Object Permanence was a suitable album title “because there are a lot of themes throughout the album that allude to the memory of people, objects and events that may have seemed transient at the time, but have continued to have an effect on our lives and have manifested in these songs.” So too, would this description be applicable for a vinyl version of Object Permanence: this exquisite post-punk record may not be played by one everyday but its sound will have a lingering effect in the mind.