by Chris Coplan (@CCoplan)
There’s lots of weird things about living in Arizona. The late October days that reach 95 degrees. The unrelated series of Rainbow Donuts across metro Phoenix, but the thing that gets me the most is the geography of culture. This idea that we’re close enough to a place like L.A. for art and music to filter in but still removed enough that we’re very much a desert. In terms of music specifically, it has an interesting effect on bands/artists.
Take Tucson’s very own CLASS. Over a series of excellent EPs, the band perfected a nostalgia-laden, perpetually jittery blend of garage rock made for drinking at tiny clubs. Now, the quartet have unveiled their second full-length, If You’ve Got Nothing, which feels like a big step. While it’s very much connected to the EPs, its presence and identity further exemplify something about the place in which it was born and what that means for the band’s continued evolution.
CLASS already occupy a rather intriguing place amid the dual universes of garage and punk rock. "Burning Cash" (which also appeared on this year's equally great But Who's Reading Me EP) exemplifies that — it’s a frills-free, retro-tinged jam that's as heavy on the big-time hooks as it is this wholly edgy, slightly sneering tendency. As a baseline, it's pretty damn effective — it shows how much CLASS are synched with the sounds and trends of the last twenty years (especially amid many West Coast-adjacent outfits) and yet are remixing these ideas without the structure and echo chamber of bigger cities. It's Arizona to its heart because it speaks a certain language but it likely learned that tongue by communing with the saguaros (or other stereotypical desert imagery).
This twelve track record feels like a subtle but effective step up from that process. "Behind the Ball" exudes a more overtly poppy undertone, which is nothing new for bands of their ilk (see The Jam, Raspberries, etc.), but CLASS keep that edge and sneer intact no matter the catchy choruses, and the track rides aesthetical and sentimental lines with ease. Or "Two-Way Track," that flirtation feels grander than ever, and there's moments where the song practically tumbles into some sort of buffer zone between folk rock and The Band. That indirect but still seemingly confident swing captures some undercurrent of heft and vitality across this LP.
Even when some of these moves are subtler than others — "Inspect the Receipt" seems to capture Operation Ivy-esque punk in a bottle with that guitar — they're a way to communicate new ideas and perspectives without overwhelming CLASS' core sound. I could go on — the surf-y vibes of "Oh! The Nerve," the Devo-meets-hardcore in "Grid Stress" — but the point remains: CLASS are solidifying in front of our very ears even as they further evolve.
So the question remains, what's it all really mean? Beyond a truly rocking record, I think it shows an awareness of CLASS’ "hometown" mantra of commitment and exploration. They're engaging with that nebulous tendency in a way that feels more interesting because there’s so many more shades and sizes to it. Is it wholly deliberate? Who knows — the end result remains the same as CLASS are remixing these musical and cultural elements with a grace and subtlety that makes for thrilling music that you can feel is pushing buttons and boundaries alike.
The fact that this tendency feels almost invisible speaks to both the band's endless musical curiosity and how much their Tucson-bred outsider status has come to extend and enhance their sonic wanderings. Sure, it's not exactly super inventive to remix rock's biggest hits, but CLASS do it in a way that asks questions of these influences and gets people thinking about our relationships with these traditions — in a way that remains endlessly exhilarating.
With this record, CLASS are taking that small but mighty step toward balancing their larger place and goals in the music biz — it’s about innovation as a result of curiosity, yeah, but mostly about the power of accepting your homebase for all its inherent structure and wrinkle of magic. Take another album track, "Task Collector." It not only exemplifies some of things they're doing across this record, but there's a clear genius here in how they tackle this with a unique feel and production value to eschew genre ties and a general place in time for something else entirely.
That something else could be lots of things for almost anyone (like maybe just a grand old good time), but for me it’s about occupying the space between these ideas. A bubble between cultures and timelines that speaks to something essentially powerful about rock — as a way to celebrate your weirdness, build meaningful community, and perhaps escape the confines of a society that was never yours to call home. A purer experience, yeah, but mostly a new perspective that anyone can access if they just move outside themselves a step or two.
I get that CLASS' music speaks to a certain, rather sizable audience without any of the context, but it's all of that stuff under the peppy chords and endless cool that feels the most vital — a story about how a band from this mostly tiny desert town found the big, bright world and distilled it for our entertainment (and whatever they needed from it as well). It's a connection that I readily share with the band as residents of this generally wild state, where we grapple eternally with our place in these larger cultural conversations, but even if you're from Hiptown, USA, the end result should still speak to you: timeless rock that blasts through the layers to move and groove you in equal measure. If they keep evolving along this line, CLASS could make Arizona even cooler than ever.