Their second album Wings of Love (2020) already showed signs of an excellent individual sound, something that is in full force on their latest, Sitting Pretty. It is quite an apt title, as Peter Kegler, who was the leading songwriter on their previous efforts, now gives more limelight to Marley Lix-Jones, both with songwriting and vocals.
Running from the Chase is the sophomore record from North Carolina’s Truth Club, expanding their garage punk sound into knotty and emotional textures that open up the soundscapes innumerably. Their debut album put the listening public on notice, whereas this release shows seasoning and a bit more patience and restraint.
C.O.F.F.I.N haven't so much reinvented the approach of truly vital punk but shown the world another path forward. In a world where everything feels so direct all the time, it's nice to see something truly playful. Not in that it makes drunken slam dancing easier, but rather it says something about this tendency for balance.
Winten, the Naarm/Melbourne based project of Bridgette Winten, uses songwriting more therapeutically than anything on her debut album Waving To My Girl. Writing mostly at night in her bedroom, Winten allows the thoughts that only come to us when we feel alone to map together a cohesive and beautiful journey of recovery.
After dropping Ceres & Calypso in the Deep Time, the members of Candy Claws were ready to move on to other endeavors. However, online fanatics couldn’t seem to stay away. This third and final album from the group, while generally well received on release, has garnered cult-classic status throughout the past decade.
The Map and The Territory, EXEK’s latest album, never subsists on dread or tension, the sound is rarely claustrophobic, but the sense of mystery is palpable, we’re wandering the unknown. That seems to be by design, as the band worked to create an emphasis on pop structure, but the atmosphere remains vast and disorienting.
Deady brings a fresh sonic expression of throwing a middle finger to the system through their lyrics taunting ACAB on one of the more punk rock albums to be released this year. Deady unfolds into further exposure of greed and blindness while also being an album you enjoy simply because of the hex-girl whining and electrifying strings.
There’s a clear constellation of influence with Adult Mom, but Paper Bee are more pastoral lyrically, often blurring between the body and the earth. Even the rhythm of the title, its looping and returning, is reflected in the sweeping structures of the songs, and feels like a mirror of the natural world.
All Around You finds its roots in the exploration of how to find light in a world that can feel, at times, dark, senseless, and devoid of meaning. From the ashes emerges a hopeful record that encourages listeners to tune in to the beauty that is all around us - if we can only find the courage to look.
Irreversible Entanglements are grounded in jazz, or if you want a more precise categorization, spiritual jazz, but this quintet has something that can also be labeled as an experimental post-punk mentality and approach to spiritual jazz. What they have brought to Protect Your Light is the musical experience they gained.
With ear issues seemingly on the men, it would seem mclusky are ready to reconvene their second coming, a handful of great songs leading the way. The band released as “double A-side” single, with subsequent “double B-sides” to boot, delivered via Bandcamp in order to raise money for international touring and hefty visa costs.
Patio’s Collection offers a fresh and exciting expansion of their brittle post-punk by loosening the grooves and imparting a bit of disco inspiration into the formula. They still retain their tight connection and anxious tension, but there is a bit more freedom to explore new directions and challenge themselves to their benefit.
Released via Iron Lung Records, the West Coast purveyors of some of the finest anarcho punk this side of hell on Earth, Buyer’s Remorse wastes no time in uninviting you into its harsh soundscape, filled with diatribes against modern contradictions, life debts, paranoid anxiety, addictive decay, and traces of assorted human wastes.
The band’s document of near-impending implosion, Live in Brooklyn 2011, is perhaps the most giving and gracious accidental greatest-hits and entry point to Sonic Youth they could have asked for. It was given a digital release in 2020, but now is the first of any of those digitals to receive a proper physical treatment in this decade.
