by Dan Goldin (@paintingwithdan)
Two years after the release of their full length debut, Madison, Wisconsin’s Whippets are back and once again set to dismantle post-punk from the inside. Their sound can at times be hard to place, pulling their ideas from disparate corners of alternative rock, blending together bits and pieces of shoegaze, garage punk, and the fuzzier end of indie rock. In the end, the trio wind up with their own pulsating vision of whacked out art punk, deranged and disorienting at times, but still committed to a sense of accessibility and a strong hook. Set to release their second album, No Skulls on October 2nd via No Coast (Wristwatch, Bobby Hussy, Julian Heresy), the album proves itself to be appropriately freaked out, waiting for impending doom but exercising the sonic freedom to simply ignore it.
“Nothing New,” is our first collective glimpse into the new album (so much for the sentiment of the title), a song that follows a permeating buzz of dense guitars into an exploration of reluctant relationships, the kind that feel more like a curse than they do a welcome co-existence. Hammering it out with sustained distortion and light soaring riffs, the band take off out of this stratosphere as they bash and claw under the weight of all that rock ‘n’ roll electricity. If the energy presented is a confident swagger, it comes with a certain anxiety that’s being molted in the process.
Catch the band on tour this year in the US and next year in Europe:
09/04 - Madison, WI @ Gamma Ray w/ Sinking Suns & Something Is Waiting
09/05 - Winona, MN @ Ed's No Name Bar w/ The Reach Outs & Porcupine
10/08 - Minneapolis, MN @ Zhora Darling w/ Busey & Brüder
10/09 - Madison, WI @ Mickey's Tavern w/ Busey & Brüder
10/10 - Chicago, IL @ Liar's Club w/ Busey & Brüder
11/01 - Indianapolis, IN @ Turntable w/ The Faint
01/22 - Netherlands
01/23 - 01/26 - France
01/27 - Köln, DE @ Sonic Ballroom
01/28 - Dortmund, DE
01/29 - Hamburg, DE @ Komet
01/30 - Berlin, DE @ Schokoladen
01/31 - Hannover, DE @ Nordstadtbraut
02/01 - Bayreuth, DE @ Schokofabrik
02/02 - Winterthur, CH
02/03 - Tübingen, DE @ Blauer Salon
02/04 - Stuttgart, DE
02/05 - Karlsruhe, DE @ Alte Hackerei
02/06 - Limburg, NL @ Kakadu
02/07 - Arnhem, NL @ Cafe Bosch
02/08 - Bruxelles, BE @ Le Chaff
02/09 - Billom, FR @ La Perm
02/10 - Annecy, FR
02/11 - Germany
02/12 - Groningen, NL @ Vera w/ Primitive Ring
02/13 - Netherlands