{"title":"Tapes","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"american-football-american-football-lp2","title":"American Football - American Football (LP2)","description":"\u003cp\u003eNot long after Polyvinyl Records released \u003cstrong style=\"background-color: initial;\"\u003eAmerican Football\u003c\/strong\u003e's self-titled debut album in 1999, the band called it quits, having only played a smattering of Champaign-Urbana college house parties and sets at small clubs like Chicago's legendary Fireside Bowl. Such an inauspicious turn of events made what followed all the more incredible. Over time, the record went on to become one of Polyvinyl' best selling releases to date, and ended up serving as \"one of the single most influential rock records of its time‚\" according to Noisey and many others. To most everyone that found them after the fact, the band was no more than an apparition. The record the only artifact left behind as a timeless snapshot of a group of individuals in transition, newly discovered each year by a fresh crop of music fans reaching a similar inflection point in their own lives.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen\u003cstrong\u003e \u003c\/strong\u003eAmerican Football announced in 2014 that they would play live for the first time in 15 years, the built up appreciation for that eponymous LP physically manifested itself as they sold out 3 nights at Webster Hall in New York City in a matter of hours, and then went on to do the same at venues around the world. A quarter of a lifetime removed, and at times thousands of miles away from the house on the sleepy street in the middle of Illinois depicted on their debut album's iconic cover, they found themselves playing to sold out crowds that numbered in the thousands in London, Tokyo, Barcelona and beyond.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe again self-titled \u003cem\u003eAmerican Football\u003c\/em\u003e finds the band with new material that takes them on a serendipitous detour down a familiar road. It is replete with the swelling emotions that might be spurred on by locked away memories unearthed by a familiar scent or crack in the concrete, or the rush of warm apprehension when coming face to face with a lover left before the fire was close to going out. \"The past still present tense‚\" sings Mike Kinsella on \"Home Is Where The Haunt Is,\" but while the house on the cover and the title of the album are the same, they are made strange by time and new found perspective. \"We've been here before,\" he declares on album opener \"Where Are We Now?‚\" \"but I don't remember a lock on the door.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt a time when reunions have become rote, American Football is decidedly an anomaly. There is no past glory to relive or reignite, nor the burden to branch out and break from a well worn formula. Seventeen years later everything still feels brand new, because for them it is. They are a band that for one reason or another closed the lid on their creative output just as they were beginning an unforeseeable upswing, and are just now after a stasis returning to uncork it with the benefit of greater maturity and better musicianship. The sound is even more expansive, the lyrics less naive and more world weary, the songs have greater depths to explore and layers to peel back throughout. \"You can't just forget all the other lives you've lived,\" Mike Kinsella sings, and every single one of the nearly two decades worth of experiences since they last put pen to paper as American Football seem to bleed through on this record.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAmerican Football is Steve Holmes (guitar), Mike Kinsella (vocals, guitar), Nate Kinsella (bass), and Steve Lamos (drums, trumpet). \u003cem\u003eAmerican Football \u003c\/em\u003ewas recorded at ARC Studios in Omaha, NE, and SHIRK Studios in Chicago, IL, and was produced by Jason Cupp.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Orange)","offer_id":50775271309619,"sku":"PRC-320LP","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50818974449971,"sku":"PRC-320CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Metallic Gold)","offer_id":50818974515507,"sku":"PRC-320TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50818974548275,"sku":"PRC-320DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/6accf039aa84cec3ee56c4507bdd0c7614585bba_a39fb8eec7fd291cbb3078ab47275a8d58feede9_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838687"},{"product_id":"alvvays-antisocialites","title":"Alvvays - Antisocialites","description":"\u003cp\u003eAcross \u003ci\u003eAntisocialites\u003c\/i\u003e' 10 tracks and 33 minutes the Toronto-based group dive back into the deep end of reckless romance and altered dates. Through thoughtful consideration in basement and abroad, \u003cstrong\u003eAlvvays\u003c\/strong\u003e has renewed its Scot-pop vows with a powerful new collection of manic emotional collage.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe album opens with the excellent strum-’n-thrummer ‘In Undertow,’ a hi-amp breakup fantasy that is both crushing and charming for its level-headedness. \"You find a wave and try to hold on for as long as you can, you made a mistake you'd like to erase and I understand,\" sings Rankin, her voice full longing not for another person necessarily, but for what to do next. \"Meditate, play solitaire, take up self-defense,\" Molly continues, laundry-listing some strategies for moving on. \"What's next for you and me? I'll take suggestions,\" she deadpans under crashing waves of feedback and Farfisa.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eReplete with more songs about drinking (‘Forget About Life,’ ‘Hey’), drugging (‘Lollipop (Ode To Jim)’), and drowning (‘Already Gone’), \u003ci\u003eAntisocialites\u003c\/i\u003e is a multipolar period piece fueled by isolation and loss. Perversely enjoyable dark drama springs from Rankin’s phonetic twists, quick-sung rhymes and irreverent syllable-play. “So morose for me, seeing ghosts of me, writing oaths to me,” the self-described introvert sings on the Cocteau-pop stunner ‘Dreams Tonite,’ the song from which the album’s name is derived. “In fluorescent light, antisocialites watch a wilting flower.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTo write \u003ci\u003eAntisocialites\u003c\/i\u003e, Rankin traveled to Toronto Island -- working in an abandoned classroom by day and sleeping a few feet from shore at night -- to avoid a stifling heat wave in the city. “I carried a small PA on the ferry in a wheelbarrow,” she recalls. “Every morning I would listen to my favorite records on the beach, then I’d write melodies and record demos in the classroom.” After tracking with keyboardist Kerri MacLellan and bassist Brian Murphy at Kingsize in LA, Rankin and guitarist Alec O’Hanley continued recording and mixing in their Toronto basement. A few friends descended to play on the record, including Teenage Fanclub’s Norman Blake.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eAntisocialites\u003c\/i\u003e details a world of ice cream truck jingles and radiophonic workshop noise, where Rankin's shining wit is refracted through crystalline counterpoint. ‘Not My Baby’ is a centerpiece, a meditation on the rapture of escape following the sadness of separation. Elsewhere, ‘Plimsoll Punks’ is the band’s answer to Television Personalities’ ‘Part-Time Punks’ and a winking surf opus indictment of the self-righteous who intend to condescend. Molly wrote the rapid-fire sugar stream ‘Lollipop (Ode to Jim)’ after singing ‘Just Like Honey’ with Jesus and Mary Chain. ‘Your Type’ is a beautiful primitive stomp about running around Paris with vomit on your feet post-Louvre ejection.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe record concludes with a movement that is at once stark and celebratory. On ‘Forget About Life,’ the apartment stands in disarray as undrinkable wine is inhaled: “When the failures of the past multiply and you trivialize the things that keep your hand from mine, did you want to forget about life with me tonite?” The resonant freaks in Rankin’s tales don’t find much resolve, but with equal doses of black humor and heartstring-tugging, \u003ci\u003eAntisocialites\u003c\/i\u003e rings a truer tone.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Orange\/Blue Mix)","offer_id":51621498093875,"sku":"PRC-9676LP","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Clear w\/ Yellow Splatter)","offer_id":50775279534387,"sku":"PRC-334LP","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50818988966195,"sku":"PRC-334CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Yellow)","offer_id":50818988998963,"sku":"PRC-334TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50818989064499,"sku":"PRC-334DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/Alvvays_Antisocialites_Bandbox2025_MOCKUP_SQ.jpg?v=1749175869"},{"product_id":"jeff-rosenstock-post","title":"Jeff Rosenstock - POST-","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003e\"In certain circles, Jeff Rosenstock is one of the most important figures in modern punk.\"\u003c\/i\u003e – Pitchfork\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIt's New Year's Day. You're still coming out of the haze of 2017. Maybe your New Year's Eve got a little crazy, maybe it got a little dark. You're not sure if you're going to actually get out of bed before noon, but you roll over and check your phone, just in case anything terrible has happened while you were sleeping.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWait.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhat?\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCall your best friend. There's a new \u003cstrong\u003eJeff Rosenstock\u003c\/strong\u003e record.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn certain circles, this is a pretty fucking sick way to start a new year. And for the rest of us, it's still quite a gift. Because there's this crazy, un-crushable thing about Jeff: He makes you want to believe in something again.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eJeff Rosenstock wrote \u003ci\u003ePOST-\u003c\/i\u003e in a double-wide trailer in the Catskill Mountain town of East Durham, the snow-covered hills surrounding him like a landscape of blank pages. The serene, empty space was a big change of scenery for a guy who bounces around the world like a human comet, playing super-catchy, super-devastating shout-alongs to dedicated fans around the world—in Iowa, in Australia, in Mexico, in Sweden. In Croatia, an elderly woman approached him after the show and nervously told him in broken English that she was a big fan. She brought him a beachy sculpture. It's hanging in his bathroom. He'll totally send you a picture of it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAfter playing with \u003cstrong\u003eBomb the Music Industry!\u003c\/strong\u003e for a decade, Jeff switched gears and produced records for The Smith Street Band, Dan Andriano, Mikey Erg and more, and started putting out records under his own name. After the release of \u003ci\u003eWORRY.\u003c\/i\u003e, things started to get way more intense for Jeff and his band. They made their first TV appearance on \u003ci\u003eLast Call \u003c\/i\u003ewith Carson Daly, \u003ci\u003eUSA Today\u003c\/i\u003e called \u003ci\u003eWORRY\u003c\/i\u003e the #1 album of 2016, and the band took to the road, touring endlessly for the past two years, taking breaks only to record new music.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"2017 kinda felt like the year when we snuck in the back door,\" says Rosenstock, \"We kept getting opportunities to do stuff - even though we take those opportunities to do stupid shit like say how much we made on stage.\" (This is the guy whose Pitchfork Music Festival performance last summer trended on Twitter after he took the stage and exclaimed, “Seventy-five hundred! Dollars! For us! To play! This festival!” Because, you know, he felt like he had to come clean about it.)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAs if writing, recording, producing, and touring aren't enough, Jeff has also been tapped to compose all of the music for a brand new Cartoon Network program, \u003ci\u003eCraig of the Creek\u003c\/i\u003e, airing in 2018.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWritten in the days after the 2017 Presidential inauguration, \u003ci\u003ePOST-\u003c\/i\u003e's lyrics get (really) heavy but the melodies are so catchy and the builds are so big and bright that the end result is more of a rallying cry than a surrender. 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It is irresistible although more than a little on the nose to say this of the reissue but, we are so excited that It Is Happening Again.\" –Jamie Stewart, Xiu Xiu\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl 2xLP (White \u0026 Clear)","offer_id":50775129948467,"sku":"PRC-312LP","price":30.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50818987393331,"sku":"PRC-312CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Clear)","offer_id":50818987458867,"sku":"PRC-312TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50818987491635,"sku":"PRC-312DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/XiuXiu-Twin_Peaks-white-clear-001.jpg?v=1746220559"},{"product_id":"american-football-american-football-deluxe-edition","title":"American Football - American Football (Deluxe Edition)","description":"\u003cp\u003eIn the 15 years since its release, \u003cstrong\u003eAmerican Football\u003c\/strong\u003e's self-titled debut full-length has quietly become one of the most fiercely beloved titles in the Polyvinyl catalog. 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It was a pioneering album where lyrical clarity was obscured and complicated by the stealth musical textures surrounding it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLike Slint's \u003ci\u003eSpiderland\u003c\/i\u003e, or Codeine's \u003ci\u003eThe White Birch\u003c\/i\u003e, even Talk Talk's \u003ci\u003eLaughing Stock\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eAmerican Football\u003c\/i\u003e asked far more questions than it cared to answer. But there wasn't a band around anymore to explain it, anyway. The three young men who made the album – Mike Kinsella, Steve Holmes, and Steve Lamos – split up pretty much on its release.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFifteen years later, American Football reunited (now as a four-piece, with the addition of Nate Kinsella). They played far larger shows than in their original incarnation and recorded their long-anticipated second album, 2016's \u003ci\u003eAmerican Football (LP2)\u003c\/i\u003e. 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It is a sign of the album's magnitude in sound, and of the band's boldness in breaking away from home comforts.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAmerican Football also joked that \u003ci\u003eLP3'\u003c\/i\u003es genre was \"post-house\" because of this very conscious visual break. But, in a strange way, there are links in \u003ci\u003eLP3\u003c\/i\u003e with an actual post-house genre: shoegaze. The more exploratory members of the original British shoegaze scene were inspired by the dreamtime and circularity of house music (ambient house in particular), cherishing its sonic possibilities. That spirit drips into \u003ci\u003eLP3\u003c\/i\u003e, most obviously on \"I Can't Feel You,\" a collaboration with Rachel Goswell of Slowdive.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe album also features Hayley Williams from Paramore on the album's catchiest moment, \"Uncomfortably Numb‚\" and Elizabeth Powell, of the Quebecoise act Land Of Talk. Mike wrote lyrics in French especially for her.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eLP3\u003c\/i\u003e is contemplative, rich, expressive, yet with a queasy undercurrent. It is heavy with expectancy, revealing its ideas slowly, eliciting the hidden stories people carry around with them. \"I feel like my lyric writing has changed a lot over the years,\" says Mike. \"The goal is to be conversational, maybe to state something giant and heavy, but in a very plain way. But, definitely in this record, I keep things a little more vague.\" As on the first album, the lyrics on \u003ci\u003eLP3\u003c\/i\u003e may seem confessional and concentrated, but the more you scrutinize them, the further their meaning slinks away. Or, as Mike tellingly sings on \"I Can't Feel You\": I'm fluent in subtlety.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Somewhere along the way we moved from being a reunion band to just being a band,\" says Steve Holmes. 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American Football stands as an enduring symbol of elusive emotional landscapes, where introspection can be as dramatic as confrontation.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Light Blue)","offer_id":50775377871155,"sku":"PRC-374LP","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50818997846323,"sku":"PRC-374CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Blue)","offer_id":50818997879091,"sku":"PRC-374TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50818997944627,"sku":"PRC-374DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/33bb9c2c04edad73bbb877b4c9bbb8a76cdc9fdc_c53b28b53be7bafae416644557df72584aeae7cb_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838721"},{"product_id":"jay-som-anak-ko","title":"Jay Som - Anak Ko","description":"\u003cp\u003eMelina Duterte is a master of voice: Hers are dream pop songs that hint at a universe of her own creation. Recording as \u003cstrong\u003eJay Som\u003c\/strong\u003e since 2015, Duterte’s world of shy, swirling intimacies always contains a disarming ease, a sky-bent sparkle and a grounding indie-rock humility. In an era of burnout, the title track of her 2017 breakout, \u003ci\u003eEverybody Works\u003c\/i\u003e, remains a balm and an anthem.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eDuterte’s life became a whirlwind in the wake of \u003ci\u003eEverybody Works\u003c\/i\u003e. After spending her teen years and early 20s exploring an eclectic array of musical styles—studying jazz trumpet as a child, carrying on her Filipino family tradition of spirited karaoke, and quietly recording indie-pop songs in her bedroom alone—that accomplished album found her playing festivals around the world, sharing stages with the likes of Paramore, Death Cab for Cutie, and Mitski.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn November of 2017, seeking a new environment, Duterte left her home of the Bay Area for Los Angeles. There, she demoed new songs, while also embracing opportunities to do session work and produce, engineer, and mix for other artists (like Sasami, Chastity Belt). Reckoning with the relative instability of musicianhood, Duterte turned inward, tuning ever deeper into her own emotions and desires as a way of staying centered through huge changes. She found a community; she fell in love. And for an artist whose career began after releasing her earliest collection of demos—2015's hazy but exquisitely crafted \u003ci\u003eTurn Into\u003c\/i\u003e—in a fit of drunken confidence on Thanksgiving night, she finally quit drinking for good. “I feel like a completely different person,” she reflects. Positivity was a way forward.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe striking clarity of her new music reflects that shift. After months of poring over pools of demos, Duterte, now 25, essentially started over. She wrote most of her brilliant new album, \u003ci\u003eAnak Ko\u003c\/i\u003e—pronounced Anuhk-Ko—in a burst during a self-imposed week-long solo retreat to Joshua Tree. As in the past, Duterte recorded at home (in some songs, you can hear the washer\/dryer near her bedroom) and remained the sole producer, engineer, and mixer. But for the first time, she recruited friends—including \u003cstrong\u003eVagabon\u003c\/strong\u003e’s Laetitia Tamko,\u003cstrong\u003e Chastity Belt\u003c\/strong\u003e’s Annie Truscott, \u003cstrong\u003eJustus Proffit\u003c\/strong\u003e, \u003cstrong\u003eBoy Scouts\u003c\/strong\u003e’ Taylor Vick, as well as bandmates Zachary Elasser, Oliver Pinnell and Dylan Allard—to contribute additional vocals, drums, guitars, strings, and pedal steel. Honing in on simplicity and groove, refining her skills as a producer, Duterte cracked her sound open subtly, highlighting its best parts: She’s bloomed.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eInspired by the lush, poppy sounds of 80s bands such as Prefab Sprout, the Cure, and Cocteau Twins—as well as the ecstatic guitarwork of contemporary Vancouver band Weed—\u003ci\u003eAnak Ko\u003c\/i\u003e sounds dazzlingly tactile, and firmly present. The result is a refreshingly precise sound. On the subtly explosive “Superbike,” Duterte aimed for the genius combination of “Cocteau Twins and Alanis Morissette”—“letting loose,” she says, over swirling shoegaze. “Night Time Drive” is a restless road song, but one with a sense of contentedness and composure, which “basically encapsulated my entire life for the past two years,” she says—always moving, but “accepting it, being a little stronger from it.” (She sings, memorably, of “shoplifting at the Whole Foods.”) Duterte focused more on bass this time: “I just wanted to make a more groovy record,” she notes.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe slow-burning highlight “Tenderness” begins minimally, like a slightly muffled phone call, before flowering into a bright, jazzy earworm. Duterte calls it “a feel-good, funky, kind of sexy song” in part about “the curse of social media” and how it complicates relationships. “That’s definitely about scrolling on your phone and seeing a person and it just haunts you, you can’t escape it,” Duterte says. “I have a weird relationship to social media and how people perceive me—as this person that has a platform, as a solo artist, and this marginalized person. That was really getting to me. I wanted to express those emotions, but I felt stifled. I feel like a lot of the themes of the songs stemmed from bottled up emotions, frustration with yourself, and acceptance.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe title, \u003ci\u003eAnak Ko,\u003c\/i\u003e means “my child\" in Tagalog, one of the native dialects in the Philippines. It was inspired by an unassuming text message from Duterte’s mother, who has always addressed her as such: Hi anak ko, I love you anak ko. “It’s an endearing thing to say, it feels comfortable,” Duterte reflects, likening the process of creating and releasing an album, too, to “birthing a child.” That sense of care charges \u003ci\u003eAnak Ko\u003c\/i\u003e, as does another concept Duterte has found herself circling back to: the importance of patience and kindness.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In order to change, you’ve got to make so many mistakes,” Duterte says, reflecting on her recent growth as an artist with a zen-like calm. “What’s helped me is forcing myself to be even more peaceful and kind with myself and others. You can get so caught up in attention, and the monetary value of being a musician, that you can forget to be humble. You can learn more from humility than the flashy stuff. I want kindness in my life. Kindness is the most important thing for this job, and empathy.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCover Artwork by \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/mariamedem\"\u003eMaría Medem\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Purple)","offer_id":50818996273459,"sku":"PRC-390LP","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50818996306227,"sku":"PRC-390CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Red)","offer_id":50818996404531,"sku":"PRC-390TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50818996470067,"sku":"PRC-390DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/e190ae03e1b0ce4c39be8d646852af3cdd67d781_3f89ef8e3d976e6fcfe25d9630c286e309b9027e_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838723"},{"product_id":"anna-burch-if-youre-dreaming","title":"Anna Burch - If You're Dreaming","description":"\u003cp\u003e When \u003cstrong\u003eAnna Burch\u003c\/strong\u003e introduced herself on her 2018 debut \u003cem\u003eQuit the Curse\u003c\/em\u003e, it was with a concentrated wash of energetic, serotonin-boosting pop. Jangly guitars, blithe vocal harmonies and an occasional undercurrent of grungy fuzz all converged in seemingly straightforward songs that hid their complexities under sunny hooks. The impact of the songs was immediate and exciting, presenting narratives of confusion and upheaval with melodies so bright it was hard to do anything but smile. Two years later, Burch’s follow up \u003cem\u003eIf You’re Dreaming\u003c\/em\u003e takes us down a different path than its predecessor, shedding some nervous energy in favor of a deeper exploration of an internal world.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e After months on the road in support of \u003cem style=\"background-color: initial;\"\u003eQuit the Curse\u003c\/em\u003e, Burch disappeared for a while. The long stretches of touring had been broken up by only a few weeks off here and there, and a month spent writing in Berlin between European dates. The time she did get to spend at home in Detroit was disrupted by several unexpected housing changes, adding to the transient feelings brought on by constant touring. When things finally stabilized, Burch encamped into a slow, thoughtful and intentional writing process for what would become the second album. Days were spent playing guitar, exploring unconventional chord changes, ruminating on song structures and allowing her subconscious to wander until lyrics materialized. Though about half of the songs were already written, this time was dedicated to taking a closer look at the loose ends of three years of ideas and seeing if there were common threads that held them together.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eIf You’re Dreaming\u003c\/em\u003e was tracked with producer \u003cstrong\u003eSam Evian\u003c\/strong\u003e in his home studio in the Catskill mountains of upstate New York. Where the first album had been a rush of inspired songwriting followed by a drawn-out process of arrangement and mixing, Burch and Evian worked with self-imposed time limitations to establish a sharper focus and get to the core of the new songs. The work was swift but somehow more relaxed, locking into a groove of tracking the basic elements and then expanding on the arrangements with overdubs and auxiliary instrumentation. The end goal was to present not just an assortment of new songs, but craft an album that moved dynamically through an interconnected emotional arc.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e With recurring themes of isolation, weariness and longing, these songs deliver that emotional arc with a delicate but uncompromising execution. Burch’s intrinsically catchy songwriting dials down the urgency of her debut a notch, taking a turn towards airy, jazz-voiced chords, floating reverb and an expansion of the sonic palate with unexpected instrumentation. The soft-rock bass grooves and understated saxophone lines of “Not So Bad” push an impressive pop structure into exciting new territory, and the sweetly melancholic “Tell Me What’s True” centers around muted electric piano, its languid but metered vibe recalling the gentler side of \u003cstrong\u003eCarole King\u003c\/strong\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e The nuance of arrangements that could sometimes get buried on \u003cem\u003eQuit the Curse\u003c\/em\u003e rises to the surface on patient, opulent tunes like “Every Feeling” and in the twelve-string guitar hooks of “Party’s Over.” The album drifts dreamily as much as it hones in with a sharper clarity on some of Burch’s most personal songs.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Even at its most introverted, \u003cem\u003eIf You’re Dreaming\u003c\/em\u003e is always warm and present. It’s a deliberately drawn chapter of Burch’s work, trading in the wild-eyed and sometimes neurotic party hopping of \u003cem\u003eQuit the Curse\u003c\/em\u003e for a more solitary walk after midnight. Daring and clear-headed, these songs cut deeper in their subtleties. \u003cem\u003eIf You’re Dreaming\u003c\/em\u003e moves with intention, taking its time revealing new layers of sophistication and growth in Burch’s always charming songcraft.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003chr\u003e\u003cp\u003ePhotography by Chloe Sells and Anna Burch\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePackaging Design\/Layout by Alexa Viscius ( \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/alexavisciusphoto\" target=\"_blank\"\u003eInstagram\u003c\/a\u003e | \u003ca href=\"http:\/\/alexaviscius.com\/\" target=\"_blank\"\u003eWebsite\u003c\/a\u003e )\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Half Cream\/Half Black)","offer_id":50818997584179,"sku":"PRC-398LP","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50818997616947,"sku":"PRC-398CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Red Tint)","offer_id":50818997649715,"sku":"PRC-398TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708194746675,"sku":"PRC-398DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/0503bf609757acf2e75aa8cbc0d8323b_a4548c83da733d670edb4fd3c0861b61b7167ef1_product_photo.jpg?v=1735838736"},{"product_id":"strfkr-future-past-life","title":"STRFKR - Future Past Life","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSTRFKR\u003c\/strong\u003e has always been a constantly evolving entity, growing over the years from rambunctious beginnings into the manicured electro-pop perfection they exhibited on their last studio album, 2016’s pristine \u003ci\u003eBeing No One, Going Nowhere\u003c\/i\u003e. New album \u003ci\u003eFuture Past Life\u003c\/i\u003e breaks new ground, dialing back some of the high-gloss production they’re known for to craft songs that are stripped down, spaced out and somehow as visceral as they are dream-like. STRFKR goes deeper into these songs by breaking them down to their essential elements, finding a new immediacy when working with raw materials.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMuch like the music on \u003ci\u003eFuture Past Life\u003c\/i\u003e, the way the album came together is strange and winding. In 2014, STRFKR’s principal songwriter\/lead vocalist Josh Hodges was staying in Amsterdam for a few months, working on the music that became \u003ci\u003eBeing No One, Going Nowhere\u003c\/i\u003e. By complete chance, a European traveller who was crashing at Hodges’ house in L.A. while he was abroad connected him with some like-minded musicians in Amsterdam, Mathias Janmat and David Hoogerheide. Even though they were more or less strangers, the three musicians clicked almost instantly, coming up with new songs within the first few hours of meeting. They got together to work on new ideas several times while Hodges was in Amsterdam, and the new Dutch collaborators even ended up contributing to the STRFKR song “Tape Machine”. Hodges made his way back to the States, but as time passed he found himself returning to the songs from those Amsterdam sessions. Ultimately the band decided that material was so inspired and magical, it was something that needed to be heard. Honing in on the vibe of those songs, they were able to reinterpret those demos into something new, retaining the core elements of their sound as they routed it into new territory.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eHaving returned to Portland after living for a time in L.A., Hodges finished the album in his new home studio, getting input abroad from Janmat and Hoogerheide and at home from bandmates Shawn Glassford and Keil Corcoran to help flesh out the final renderings. For the first time on a STRFKR album, every song is driven by acoustic guitar as synth melodies take on a more supportive role. Rough-edged mixes push the drums into the red and trade cleaner production for an atmospheric lo-fi approach. Lead single \"Never The Same\" is warm and direct, with a straightforward delivery that highlights how vulnerable the band's lyrics can be. This kind of careful, hushed energy is new territory for STRFKR. Going out on this ledge results in one of the band's most rewarding songs, one that's mysterious and lush but as intense as a secret being whispered in your ear. The multiple viral melodies of “Deep Dream” twist ecstatically as reverb-coated percussion and distant ambient textures add to the otherworldly vibe. “Budapest” locks into an airy groove, washed over by waves of angelic vocal harmonies from Polyvinyl labelmates \u003cstrong\u003eShy Boys\u003c\/strong\u003e. The entire album feels stuck on a cloud somewhere between earthbound rhythms and alien song structures doused in echo.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe immaculate but danceable pop that has long been STRFKR’s calling card is pushed into exciting new places on \u003ci\u003eFuture Past Life\u003c\/i\u003e. On past records, heavy lyrical themes and darker undercurrents could get obscured by infectious hooks, but here minimal arrangements cut to the emotional center of the songs. It’s a strange and beautiful sonic environment, one that finds STRFKR growing as they embrace the chance and spontaneity that brought these songs about in the first place.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eArtwork \u0026amp; Packaging Design\/Layout by Sohale Kevin Darouian ( \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/dorkside_of_the_moon\/\"\u003eInstagram\u003c\/a\u003e | \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/sohale.me\/\"\u003eWebsite\u003c\/a\u003e )\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Yellow)","offer_id":50818996961587,"sku":"PRC-408LP-YLLW","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (180-Gram Black)","offer_id":50818997027123,"sku":"PRC-408LP-BLK","price":21.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":52708194353459,"sku":"PRC-408CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Yellow Tint)","offer_id":52708194386227,"sku":"PRC-408TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708194418995,"sku":"PRC-408DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/7c775a4e70384d336941d5436a71bd0c873fa2f9_71973da8096791e0cec9d3b8b1cc34552784db00_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838741"},{"product_id":"jeff-rosenstock-no-dream","title":"Jeff Rosenstock - NO DREAM","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eNO DREAM\u003c\/i\u003e is the fourth full-length from \u003cstrong\u003eJeff Rosenstock\u003c\/strong\u003e. It comes at a time of unparalleled chaos and confusion, division and despair, the depths of which would have been impossible to predict when much of it was being written over the course of the last few years. And yet the record feels prescient, unexpectedly and uniquely suited for this moment.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“It was feeling like a very personal record for me,” says Rosenstock, newly settled in Los Angeles after a lifetime on the opposite coast. “A lot of it was stemming from the anxiety I was feeling from the last two years, this existential crisis of wondering who I am.” Rosenstock has found himself in a surprising position. As he puts it simply: “I didn’t expect to be doing well, in my life, ever.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAfter building a cult following with the acerbic ska-punk of the Arrogant Sons of Bitches and DIY heroics of Bomb the Music Industry!, Rosenstock’s first proper solo record, 2015’s \u003ci\u003eWe Cool?\u003c\/i\u003e, was a step into uncharted territory, fully untethered from genre and expectation. Followed by 2016’s \u003ci\u003eWORRY.\u003c\/i\u003e and the surprise New Year’s Day launch of \u003ci\u003ePOST-\u003c\/i\u003e in the early hours of 2018, Rosenstock was facing down that least punk of opportunities: a career playing music.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I got so used to putting out records that only a few people in the punk underground liked,” he says. “And a lot of people in the punk underground also didn’t like them, either.” Except things have changed, and \u003ci\u003eNO DREAM\u003c\/i\u003e arrives with an entirely new set of expectations in an entirely new era. The greatest surprise is that Rosenstock’s deeply personal self doubt is expressed in a way that captures a universal feeling of shock and uncertainty, his own growing anxieties about his place in the world holding space for our own. “I was trying to not be afraid of using phrases that weren't immediately clear to me, aside from how they sounded and felt, then allowing them to reveal themselves over time.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe resulting songs would be recorded once again with Jack Shirley (Deafheaven, Hard Girls, Joyce Manor) at the Atomic Garden, where Rosenstock took on mixing duties alongside Shirley for the first time. Opting to stay off the computer “even more than usual” and record to tape with outboard gear, the result is a lived-in sound that gives each song its own individual voice and organic energy. “Scram!” pulls from the overdriven guitar sound of Kerplunk in its mash-up of chugging palm mutes and Weezer melodies, while “Old Crap” mines the pop-punk of Rosenstock’s youth and dares to drop a classic “pick it up!” rallying cry.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Music is all vocabulary - you learn new words but you don’t forget the old ones,” he says. Having taken some time away from his work as a solo artist to recalibrate and reset over the last year, Rosenstock stayed busy playing alongside Mikey Erg, recording and touring with the Bruce Lee Band, releasing a Neil Young covers record with frequent collaborator Laura Stevenson, reissuing two of his own out-of-print early albums, compiling a live album and 76 page photo book, and scoring over 80 episodes of the Cartoon Network series Craig of the Creek. In fully returning to his own voice, it’s no surprise that Rosenstock’s output has never been more eclectic, reflected across \u003ci\u003eNO DREAM\u003c\/i\u003e’s 13 songs.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eUltimately, it’s the title track, with its breakneck pivot from dreamy Mazzy Star to careening Minor Threat, that gives the album its aching heart. “You can’t help it. You can’t stop it. You see these atrocities and want it to end. But it’s not going to stop, and when that feeling sets in it’s a full-on panic freak-out.” It may not be a hopeful message, but it’s one that ties together the sense of impending doom and gives it direction, voicing a rage that many struggle to articulate.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I thought I had just made a record for no one,” he says. “What’s the point of feeling this way? 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In fact, she was planning on making a record with Against Me!, the band she’s fronted for the past 23 years. But clearly, nothing went according to plan this year. “We came home from the Against Me! tour we were on in March, and right before we left, we had been in the studio working on songs, and I had been working on them for months prior,” says Grace. As she sat at home, all of her tours canceled, and the members of Against Me!—as well as her other band Laura Jane Grace \u0026amp; The Devouring Mothers—spread across the country, she was left with a batch of songs and no band to record them with. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003e“I sat around for a month-and-a-half at a home just being shellshocked being like, ‘What the fuck happened and what the fuck is happening with the world?’ As I started to get my bearings, I just came to the realization that waiting was going to kill the record and kill the songs. I spent two years working on all these songs, and the idea of throwing them away didn’t sit well with me,” says Grace. “But then I was like, ‘What am I waiting for?’ All I have to do is adjust my scope. I can sit here on my fucking ass and do nothing, or I can work.” \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eSo, Grace got to work. She picked up the phone and called Electrical Audio, the iconic studio in her adopted hometown of Chicago, Illinois, to ask if she could make a record with famed engineer Steve Albini. The goal was to go in and document these songs exactly as she’d been playing them in her home, straight to analog tape. When she hung up the phone, she had four days booked. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eThe result of the session at Electrical Audio is \u003ci\u003eStay Alive\u003c\/i\u003e, a record that doesn’t just embody that title, it serves as the guiding principle behind its creations. But it also put life back into an industry that’s been ravaged by venue closures, cancelled tours, and delayed records. “By putting the songs out, that puts the label in work, that puts a photographer in work, that puts a graphic designer in work, that puts a merch company in work, that keeps it alive,” says Grace. “You hear on the news every day about people losing their jobs and everything collapsing, and I want to fight against that. The only way I can think to fight against that is to work.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eAcross the 14 songs that comprise \u003ci\u003eStay Alive\u003c\/i\u003e, Grace takes all her pent-up fears, anger, and anxiety and releases it, like an olive branch to the weary listeners who are feeling those exact same ways. As she says in “Blood \u0026amp; Thunder,” a love song to Chicago—or perhaps a mea culpa for “I Hate Chicago” on The Devouring Mothers album \u003ci\u003eBought to Rot\u003c\/i\u003e—the album’s thematic premise is all but spelled out: “When you give in and quit \/ There’s a power to be found in it.” It’s an idea that may sound odd on its face, but it displays Grace’s commitment to no longer resisting the changes in front of her. On a record that sees her traversing the globe—from Marbella, Spain to Glasgow, Scotland to London, England to the Land of Oz—”Blood \u0026amp; Thunder” is a begrudging embrace of what can’t be changed; Instead of resisting the city she once loathed, she finds the beauty in the little things, like the moon rising over Indian Boundary Park, or the wind rolling up Western Avenue. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eThe album’s title is one that surfaces in the record itself, and serves as a subtle rejoinder to her Polyvinyl labelmate Chris Farren, who gifted Grace a hat that said “Can’t Die,” and she’s spent the last two years running in it every single day. By flipping the phrase on its head, Grace built her own message; one based around work, struggle, and reaffirmed commitments. In certain cases, songs like “Hanging Tree,” which has a chorus that builds to the phrase, “A burning crucifix and a hanging tree,” have been kicking around since 2017, but finally found a moment that made sense for it on \u003ci\u003eStay Alive\u003c\/i\u003e. And in the case of “Shelter In Place,” a song about her own isolation and introspection, the pandemic finally gave words to a feeling she’d long had but was never able to accurately describe. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eThe songs that make up \u003ci\u003eStay Alive\u003c\/i\u003e are documents of a time and a songwriter who experienced enough to find levity in the simple act of doing the work. Recorded with nothing more than an acoustic guitar, an occasional drum machine, and her own powerful voice, Grace’s distinct songwriting signature is front and center. What’s more, she made it purely for herself. “I just want to put this out because it makes me feel alive and it’s giving me something better than sitting here losing my mind while the world falls apart,” says Grace. “It doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks about what you do. Just stay alive.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Early Bird Vinyl (Clear w\/ Yellow, Blue and Orange Swirls)","offer_id":52707430629683,"sku":"PRC-418LP-EB","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Lapis Lazuli Blue)","offer_id":50819148939571,"sku":"PRC-418LP","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50819149005107,"sku":"PRC-418CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Purple)","offer_id":50819149070643,"sku":"PRC-418TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50819149136179,"sku":"PRC-418DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/LJG_StayAlive_EB_LP_1_b6ef6742-1736-44ea-b8df-e2127544b79a.jpg?v=1763416623"},{"product_id":"ian-sweet-show-me-how-you-disappear","title":"IAN SWEET - Show Me How You Disappear","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eReciting mantras is a form of teaching — leaning into the repetition, retraining your brain, learning new realities. For Jilian Medford, it was a way to fight through her anxieties. And here, on \u003ci\u003eShow Me How You Disappear\u003c\/i\u003e, through a haze of tangled, inverted pop, her new truths push their way to the surface.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eMesmeric and kaleidoscopic, shimmering with electrified unease, \u003ci\u003eShow Me How You Disappear \u003c\/i\u003eis both an exercise in self-forgiveness and an eventual understanding of unresolved trauma. Medford’s third record as \u003cstrong\u003eIAN SWEET\u003c\/strong\u003e unfolds at an acute juncture in her life, charting from a mental health crisis to an intensive healing process and what comes after. How do you control the thoughts that control you? What does it mean to \u003ci\u003eget better\u003c\/i\u003e? What does it mean to have a relationship with yourself?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eThe inklings for the record began slowly. In 2018, Medford wrote “Dumb Driver” on an acoustic guitar while living in a “hobbit hole” back house in Los Angeles. Skeletal, stripped-back versions of the undulating, amorphous “My Favorite Cloud” and “Power” emerged next. Mentally she was in a dark place. By January 2020, following increasingly severe panic attacks, Medford began a two-month intensive outpatient program, including six-hour days of therapy. It yielded an unprecedented level of self-reflection for Medford, who already plumbs the depths of her emotions for her songwriting. She took a step back from music to completely immerse herself in the program, and once she felt ready to move on at the end of February, the rest of the songs poured out of her.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eRecorded with Andrew Sarlo (Big Thief, Empress Of), Andy Seltzer (Maggie Rogers), and Daniel Fox, among others, Medford approached this album as a curator. She handpicked the producers that fit each song, which explains the range and experimentation showcased. Medford then recruited Chris Coady to mix and tie everything together into one cohesive piece.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eThe resulting record envelops both Medford and the listener like water: its ebb and flow, the ease with which it can switch from nourishing to endangering you. Fully immersive, with guitar lines as quick to sound grungy as they are to ascend to astral distortion, it’s a lush cacophony of experimentation. While writing the record, Medford revisited the discography of her forever favorite band, Coldplay and noted inspiration from Young Thug’s bizarre and magical vocal delivery. With these influences and many more, Medford’s pop melodies are inverted by the freak world she builds around them.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eThe cyclical nature of obsessive thought patterns shapes \u003ci\u003eShow Me How You Disappear\u003c\/i\u003e. It’s self-referential, each song in conversation with one another, tracing the same relationship and the desire to be an escape artist from your own life. But there’s also the repetition Medford learned to help herself via Emotional Freedom Technique tapping, which involves tapping pressure points on the body and repeating mantras to curb anxiety.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003e“Since I learned that method in therapy, it has saved my life and seeped into my music,” she says. “Songwriting has always been a tool for me to process my emotions. But this technique has allowed me to apply more intention to that practice.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eFor her, the refrain of “Get Better” hits that hardest, a sort of emotional thesis of the album. She explains, “This song came from being stuck in an infinite loop of destructive thoughts and the only way to get out of my head was to repeat my goal over and over. By saying ‘I want to get better, better, better’ out loud, I started to feel something.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003eShow Me How You Disappear \u003c\/i\u003ealso offered a certain liberation to Medford. As personal as it is — like preceding albums \u003ci\u003eShapeshifter\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eCrush Crusher\u003c\/i\u003e — here, post-therapy, Medford was able to approach her songwriting in a new way. She learned how to distance herself from the immediacy of her work, to put space between her personal identity and her art. There was less concern about fitting every piece of her story into the lyrics. Instead, this time, she held back. “I think there’s something to be said for leaving things out,” Medford says. “This is the first record that I leave that space for myself. I feel a freedom on this one that I haven’t felt with the others. People always say ‘I put all of me into this’, but I actually didn’t this time — I left space.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:#000000;\"\u003eDizzying and enthralling, \u003ci\u003eShow Me How You Disappear\u003c\/i\u003e is the sound of someone coming apart and putting themselves back together — the moment an old mantra, repeated into the mirror time and time again, finally clicks. To look at your reflection, and finally feel seen.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAll songs written by IAN SWEET.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eProduced by Andrew Sarlo, Daniel Fox, Andy Seltzer, Will Van Boldrik \u0026amp; deadmen.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMixed by Chris Coady.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMastered by Joe LaPorta.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e*Except “Sword,” Mixed by Matt Peters and Mastered by Harris Newman.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAlbum Artwork by Milagros Lupotti (Elfffy) (\u003c\/span\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/eeeeelllfffyyyyyyyyy\/\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e\u003cu\u003eInstagram\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003ePoster Artwork by Ema Gaspar (\u003c\/span\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/ema_b_g\/\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e\u003cu\u003eInstagram\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003ePhotography by Lucy Sandler (\u003c\/span\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/lucysandler\/\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e\u003cu\u003eInstagram\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"background-color:transparent;color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eDesign \u0026amp; Packaging Layout by Elyse Lankford.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Clear Blue)","offer_id":50819149332787,"sku":"PRC-428LP-RETAIL","price":21.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50819149365555,"sku":"PRC-428CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (White)","offer_id":50819149398323,"sku":"PRC-428TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708193108275,"sku":"PRC-428DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Early Bird Vinyl (White\/Silver Mix) – SOLD OUT","offer_id":52708674666803,"sku":"PRC-428LP-EB","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/0bca159d8b20d600ae4f2ac59e51e2122677dfec_3517939e150010188b4565a59952abbaf026cc01_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1763440270"},{"product_id":"squirrel-flower-planet-i","title":"Squirrel Flower - Planet (i)","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSquirrel Flower\u003c\/strong\u003e’s heart-rending sophomore album \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e, following her 2020 debut \u003ci\u003eI Was Born Swimming\u003c\/i\u003e, is exactly that. A singular planet, a world entirely of artist Ella Williams’ making. The title came first to her as a joke: it’s her made-up name for the new planet people will inevitably settle and destroy after leaving Earth, as well as the universe imagined within her music. “\u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e is my body and mind,” Williams says, “and it’s the physical and emotional world of our planet. It’s both.” Buoyed by her steadfast vision and propelled by her burning comet of a voice, the record is a love letter to disaster in every form imaginable. Tornadoes, flooding, gaslighting assholes, cars on fire—these songs fully embrace a planet in ruin. As Williams rides from melancholy to jubilance to complete emotional devastation over the course of twelve songs, she carves out a future for herself and those she loves. \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i) \u003c\/i\u003eis at once a refuge, an act of self-healing, and a musical reflection of Squirrel Flower’s inner and outer worlds.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWilliams wrote most of the songs on \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e before the COVID-19 pandemic, but disaster looms large in its DNA. Susceptible to head injuries having played a lot of sports in her youth, Williams received three concussions from 2019-2020; two at cafe jobs in her home state of Massachusetts, and a third, funnily enough, while making out with someone in a sloped attic at a house show. Amidst the chaos of touring internationally during her own healing process, she began weaving threads between her physical and personal sense of ruin and her lifelong fear of the elements: of being swept up by storms, floods, and the deep ocean. “To overcome my fear of disasters,” Williams says, “I had to embody them, to stare them down.” This journey of decay and healing is the lifeblood of \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e. “I’m not scared of the storm,” she insists on “Desert Wildflowers.” “I’ll be lying on the roof when the tornado turns.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOnce quarantine set in, Williams, known for her magnetic live concerts, began to produce demos in her room, amassing a collection of more than 30 recordings. “I constantly write,” she says, “but because of the pandemic and the unemployment checks I received, I was able to spend every day recording what became the skeleton of this album.” Feeling a sense of artistic synchronicity over international phone calls with producer Ali Chant (PJ Harvey, Perfume Genius), and with newfound covid antibodies, Williams flew to Bristol, UK in the fall of 2020 to record \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e at Chant’s studio, The Playpen. “We had this shared creative language,” she recalls, “and the recording process was, like my demo process, very sculptural. Instead of recording live with a full band, we built this record layer by layer, experimenting, taking risks.” Williams dedicated her time in Bristol to exploration, both in the studio and outside of it. As she roamed the city in her beloved green garden mucks, the same boots featured on \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e’s album art, Squirrel Flower unlocked a new creative alchemy.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhile Williams and Chant played most of the instruments on the record, Bristol drummer Matt Brown and Portishead’s Adrian Utley also joined their sessions. “Adrian brought such stunning textures to the arrangements,” Williams says. “I was starstruck watching him play guitar with a pair of pliers.” And when Chant suggested the idea of backup vocals, Williams, whose voice had until now stood alone in her songs, enthusiastically enlisted friends and family to join her remotely with their voices and instruments. Around Squirrel Flower’s voice and vision dance the contributions of Jess Shoman (Tenci), Tomberlin, Katy J. Pearson, Jemima Coulter, Brooke Bentham, and her brothers Nate and Jameson Williams, as well as her father Jesse.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe songs on \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e are Squirrel Flower’s instruments for connection: with the people in her life, her collaborators, audiences, and ancestors; a lineage of artists whose spirits continue to inform her art. At the heart of this record is an insistence on connection and healing in the face of catastrophe. Williams treats her songs like well-loved cars, vehicles with busted exteriors and flame-kissed engines. These songs hurtle down a freeway wracked by firestorms and flash floods, their drivers in search of human connection, no matter how tenuous, no matter how painful. In this search for communion, Squirrel Flower sings with the clarity of an artist who has discovered not only the precise power of her voice, but all the devastating shapes it can take.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOn the explosive lead single “Hurt A Fly,” Williams is a volatile, relentless presence. She takes the persona of a manipulative lover as she lurches from guilt to sorrow to renewed fury, backed by whirring, frenetic guitars. And in “I’ll Go Running,” Williams begins on a haunting simmer, pitching her voice over languid, slow-burning guitars from quiet resistance to full-on emotional rebellion by the song’s end: “I’ll be newer than before \/ I’ll be something that you’ve never seen.” It’s the mantra of an artist in flux, obsessed with motion and change, but determined to move and change on her own terms. On “Flames and Flat Tires,” the third single, Williams rides this motion onward in a bright wave of sound, comparing her body to a burning car on a 4am joyride, the city crumbling behind her.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOn \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e, Squirrel Flower reveals a bright and uncompromising vision, confident in her powers of self-healing and growth. No matter what the disaster ahead of or within her looks like, and no matter how she shape-shifts to meet it, Squirrel Flower will always be a world of her own, a space-rock flying down the road in flames and flat tires. As \u003ci\u003ePlanet (i)\u003c\/i\u003e wheels to a close from the cartop lovesickness of “Iowa 146,” the floodwaters of “Deluge in the South,” and the tornado fury of “Pass,” to the hushed climax and acceptance of “Starshine,” she leaves us to face down disaster with hope in hand:\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eDon’t let it pass.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eDon’t let it wither.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAll music and lyrics written by Ella Williams.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eProduced, engineered and mixed by Ali Chant at The Playpen, Bristol, UK in September\/October 2020.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMastered by Heba Kadry, NYC.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAdditional production by Ella Williams.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAdrian Utley recorded at Planet 245, Bristol, UK.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003ePhotography by Tonje Thilesen (\u003c\/span\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/tonjethilesen\/\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e\u003cu\u003eInstagram\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eLayout Design by Mac Pogue (\u003c\/span\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/macpogue.com\/\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e\u003cu\u003eWebsite\u003c\/u\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003e).\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Blood Orange)","offer_id":50819000860979,"sku":"PRC-435LP","price":21.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50819000926515,"sku":"PRC-435CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape","offer_id":50819000959283,"sku":"PRC-435TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50819001024819,"sku":"PRC-435DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/dae76916297a17ca74f0d1bf199ad349027edaa0_a899a832a6a1b84dbae3b96823f39b95d9804266_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838766"},{"product_id":"jeff-rosenstock-ska-dream","title":"Jeff Rosenstock - SKA DREAM","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eSKA DREAM\u003c\/i\u003e is a complete re-recording of \u003cstrong\u003eJeff Rosenstock\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003ci\u003e’\u003c\/i\u003es critically-acclaimed 2020 record \u003ci\u003eNO DREAM\u003c\/i\u003e however this time around all the songs are ska songs you’re welcome. The very good idea to make this record came together when, like many other bands throughout this pandemic that refused to participate in super spreading events, we were trying to find a fun way to make some music together to share with people. Otherwise we were just spending our evenings texting the group chat in dread about the collapsing world around us. Not the most fun band activity.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAs with most things ska in my life, what started out as a fun goof with friends eventually morphed into “Hey, what if we tried to make it good though?” All of us have a pretty deep history playing and touring the country in punk\/ska bands. We all understand the stigma that comes along with ska, we’ve all dealt with the pitfalls of it, and we’ve all kept on truckin’ regardless. If you are one of those people who loves music as long as it isn’t ska, that’s cool, we see you. This record isn’t for you and you don’t have to listen to it. Byeeee.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOkay, everyone else, we see you too, we love you and check it out, \u003ci\u003eSKA DREAM\u003c\/i\u003e is real.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eRECORDING INFO:\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eWe live in different cities and don’t see each other a lot. This record was arranged through file-sharing, as SKA DREAM is the obvious 2021 analogue to The Postal Service’s Give Up. Drums were recorded by Matt Embree (Rx Bandits) in his practice space in Long Beach, CA. Mike Huguenor’s guitar was recorded at District Recorders in San Jose, CA. All other instruments were recorded in our respective homes.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eSKA DREAM was mixed and mastered by Jack Shirley.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003e“NO TIME TO SKANK” contains a very short tribute to “Our Time” by The Suicide Machines. “Leave It In The Ska” contains a snippet of “Nite Klub” by The Specials.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eThis record includes contributions from Jer Hunter (JER, Skatune Network, We Are The Union,), Rick Johnson (Mustard Plug), Laura Stevenson, Ara Babajian (The Slackers, Leftover Crack), Boboso, Sean Bonnette (AJJ), George Clarke (Deafheaven), David Combs (Bad Moves), Chris Farren, Augusta Koch (Gladie, Cayetana), Angelo Moore (Fishbone), Franz Nicolay, nonregla, Elise Okusami (Oceanator), Mike Park (Bruce Lee Band, Skankin Pickle, Asian Man Records), PUP, Anika Pyle (Katie Ellen, Chumped) \u0026amp; Shannon Toombes.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Half Black \/ Half White)","offer_id":50775415521587,"sku":"PRC-441LP-SPLITBW","price":21.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":52708192420147,"sku":"PRC-441CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (White)","offer_id":52708192452915,"sku":"PRC-441TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708192485683,"sku":"PRC-441DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/e22db322f236ee1725dd102bce341e086bd06427_cea1abf8afe1eb49a44a69e306322d319e768695_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838768"},{"product_id":"rodrigo-amarante-cavalo","title":"Rodrigo Amarante - Cavalo","description":"\u003cp\u003eLos Angeles, December 8th, 2013\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis is my first solo record. It was made during an unexpected but very welcome exile, in a land I wouldn't have predicted I'd linger for too long; the west of the west. From there on it's turning around, so I thought. My arrogance was to think that I'd be immune to the promised land effect, the invitation wasn't for me, I was passing through, and not particularly impressed. But the sense of distance and my newly acquired refreshing anonymity kept me staying, they felt useful. I found myself leaning on that distance, projecting onto it, the space echoing back to me with a new voice. There was my double, in the distance, a company, the only viable witness to that distance, a critic of what I was craving, a bully, a brother. This realization produced a dialog, an attempt to reconcile with this onlooker, a plan to think less and feel the way though, as the jockey craves to merge in spirit with his vehicle, to be guided by it. Cavalo means horse in portuguese, a word we also use for people who channel spirits in service, something normal to us in Brazil. Another instance of an amalgam between vehicle and vehiculated, and writing these songs felt like that, an attempt to merge these often conflicting voices, the mind and the gut.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI was as a foreigner, enamoured by the new and yet still attached to the luggage I thought I had left behind, dragging things I thought I had abandoned. They say we travel just so we can come back, I say we do it to look back, even if we never return. Distance was a gift to me measured by a certain discomfort, a type of pain that floods without drowning, that washes. Maybe that's what saudade means. I don't feel I am ever possessed when I write but I do feel I am a vehicle to a voice I hear and sing back to in an ever so slightly failed attempt to portray it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI have repeatedly found myself a foreigner, so I grew up imagining I was brave for it, an explorer, moving from city to city every three years as a kid, pretending to have the forbearance and courage I ended up forging while secretly carrying the resentment of the imposed detours, of the wait to return. When I finally arrived back in Rio no longer a child and with an accent three times tampered I realized that my home town wasn't mine, that I had invented it in light of what I saw elsewhere, its memory a dream of scents and light that didn't seem to exist in space, maybe in time. I discovered myself a stranger, what I had been since I first left and knew to be temporary, what I realized was definitive. And it was a bitterness at first but it slowly turned into something sweet, warm, I felt free and grateful, I suppose I had to invent that too, cut the bushes to a new path. I departed again. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI ended up finding myself in a type of desert, dry with foreign trees, a fake oasis, so I thought. I was happy to feel alone, overwhelmed with the void clear of familiar reflections, with immense silence, a mirage at last, the place where I wrote these songs from. I believe that everybody can feel foreign in one way or another; in the way that they feel they're perceived by others, in their bodies, their streets, in their fate perhaps, so I dream that this feeling turned into songs, a vehicle to me, a tool that served me and moved me, can also move you, serve yet others, with luck.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTo give room to the voice of this echo, amplify it, I opened up as much space in the music as I knew how, subtracted all undue, undressed arrangements, threw adjectives away. I used different languages to forge a new voice, one empowered by lack of vocabulary, without subterfuges, one that had to know what it wanted to sing. I also threw away the cover of the album. Everything that was inside protected by the cover came out, naked, clean of directions, added flavours, serving suggestions. Words, simply. And the simple beauty of the page revealed itself, black and white that we like to use as a synonym of things clear and exact, but that is where the infinite delight of interpretation resides, where the fertile gap is. A page is beautiful because it's only a possibility, it has to be entered to signify. Inside the sleeve only the music. And there was yet another distance: inside and outside, words and music. the thing and the name of the thing, me and my name in print. Between one and the other is the open hand, the train at the station, an opening in the veil, a familiar scent: the unpredictable mirror, echoing. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThank you for the chance.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRodrigo Amarante\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Neon Orange)","offer_id":50775415619891,"sku":"PRC-433LP","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50819001549107,"sku":"PRC-433CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (White)","offer_id":50819001581875,"sku":"PRC-433TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708192387379,"sku":"PRC-433DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/2930ef9f9a529750be2d4534f27e02ce0ee2b329_5fb90f64cbfb17ff92a53bb3ac27067ffc91118c_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838764"},{"product_id":"rodrigo-amarante-drama","title":"Rodrigo Amarante - Drama","description":"\u003cp\u003eLos Angeles, March 18, 2021\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI was told there was a bio written for me, to promote my new record \u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e, and that I should review it. It wasn’t news from outer space but it caught me off guard, like a friendly dental appointment reminder. My line of work involves cringeworthy tasks at times, at least this was one I could do in private, secretly. But the tone, a sort of resumé oozing enthusiasm, reminded me of my early days of crossing the US border coming from Brazil for hire. I was smiley and unintentionally talkative, just very friendly, thinking I could charm the officer out of inviting me to a further exchange in an adjacent room. My jolliness only served the purpose of displaying my fear of law enforcement, the fragility of my immigration status and instability of my line of work. I would be wearing my reading glasses.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOfficer:\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003ci\u003eWhat kind of music?\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMe:\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003ci\u003eOh, well, how should I put it? ...You see officer, I'm from Brazil, Rio de Janeiro, and I grew up in a samba school – a school in the sense of a school of fish, you know, because we parade during carnaval, kinda like fish do, all up against each other going whatever the others do. A strange thing that in English they’re the same words isn’t it, a collective for fish and students? What I mean is that this school isn’t an educational institution, although it was a school to me in that sense as well. In any case, to answer your question, my music isn’t typically Brazilian per se but that sound I grew up with comes through even when I’m writing in a different style, say a waltz, those polyrhythms, jazzy chords, they sneak in. The thing is, (sigh) …even though I loved bossa-nova and samba as a kid, I really wanted to be Johnny Marr when I first picked up the guitar, from The Smiths? You know The Smiths, officer? \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI would give the officer no option other than to despise me and hand me over to his colleague with the rubber gloves. Here's how this exchange currently plays out:\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOfficer:\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003ci\u003eWhat kind of music?\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMe:\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003ci\u003eJazz.\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOfficer:\u003c\/strong\u003e \u003ci\u003eAlright.\u003c\/i\u003e (Stamp)\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI eventually stopped smiling at border patrol officers and TSA personnel like Alice arriving in Wonderland. I can’t blame them for considering it suspicious behavior to be in excellent spirits after 19 hours strapped in a cold barrel with tins of dog food, not to mention the bouquet. I should have listened to my father on that one. \"Be straight, they don't go on hugging the milkmen like we do.\" We didn't have milkmen, my dad didn’t say quite that. Milkmen are a thing of old American films for me, but thinking in English brings the target language’s imagery, it’s a funny thing. In any case, the bio felt to me a bit like the smiley period of border crossing. I’ll give it to you:\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“You may know Rodrigo Amarante already. You may have heard “Tuyo,” his theme tune to the Netflix drama \u003ci\u003eNarcos\u003c\/i\u003e, or the Little Joy album, recorded with Fab Moretti and Binki Shapiro, you might have noted his name among the credits on songs by Gal Costa, Norah Jones and Gilberto Gil; or perhaps you saw him play live with Brazilian samba big band Orquestra Imperial, or with Rio rockers Los Hermanos; you really should have heard his debut album, \u003ci\u003eCavalo,\u003c\/i\u003e released in 2014. You may think you know Rodrigo Amarante already, but \u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e, his second solo album, is going to introduce a whole new level of confusion to the mix.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI get it, how else does one introduce someone in my position, promoting new material with a considerable potential of anonymity, other than listing their most notable accomplishments? A bit of a general’s chest plate there but, alright.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Born in Rio de Janeiro in 1976, Rodrigo points to two incidents in his past that fed directly into the recordings: a childhood illness that makes him appreciate the beauty of the second chance; and that moment when his father tried to prepare his son for the real world – eliminating all the drama and sensitivity from the young man’s life – by cutting off his long hair.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe haircut, I must say, wasn't exactly forceful, I wasn't held by elders of the clan in tears or anything. I wanted to be what my dad wanted me to be, and he had a point: the bangs were too sweet and the streets were making a mess out of me weekly. He had my consent. I did think of that haircut when I decided the record was called \u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e, what I believe that moment represents. That word was a trigger – the same word in Portuguese – and I had to embrace it, since I’m carrying it anyway. \u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e was what had to go, or be concealed. Truth is, I hated the haircut, I learned how to look tough but I felt ugly.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNow, I did mention these two events when talking about making the record and it’s true they’re both significant to me, but in different contexts, we’ve got to slow this down here. For one, mentioning a childhood illness in passing is no pickup line. What is this, a pitch for charity? This has to feel like an invitation, not an invoice. I’ve got to cut that out. For another, nothing really “feeds directly into the recording”; that’s precisely the point in calling it \u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e. Between events I’ve lived and songs I write there is me, the middlemen; a corrupt reporter with tampered evidence, a censor really, even if unwittingly. We talk about connecting the dots but I think of memory more as a coloring book.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe point is, no matter how genuine I strive to be, there is always a tale I’m hung up on. The beauty and humor in that, the release in playing it out without prejudice, embracing the incoherence and hyperbole of memory instead of forging a reasonable amalgam; that is a wonderful instrument, one filled with music. It feels relaxing to abandon the illusion of verisimilitude and bring forth the confusion and contradiction of what I have to work with, these tales. That is the sound of \u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e. Dressing up as means to reveal, rather than dressing down, to conceal. Tickling memory into confession, seeing through the eye holes of a mask. This feels like a concept I followed but that isn’t so. It came as a posthumous realization, as it often happens with me. These songs were the instruments to realize it, not the other way around.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eNow that I’ve let it out, had a couple of drags, I feel more at ease. Besides, I was told that something should be said about the music itself, how it sounds, and that is not my area of expertise, so I’m going to hand back to the biographer now and try not to interrupt again...\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e began life at the end of 2018, with a session involving Rodrigo’s regular band - “Lucky” Paul Taylor on drums, bassist Todd Dahlhoff, Andres Renteria on congas, and Amarante on guitar – resulting in four tracks – “Maré,” “Tango,” “Tanto,” “Tao” – that would make the final cut. An upbeat, seemingly happy song with darker aspects hidden beneath the surface, “Maré” is based on Spanish proverb: \u003ci\u003ethe tide will fetch what the ebb brings\u003c\/i\u003e. “Things that arrive in your hand by destiny, they are just as easily swept away,” explains the writer.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Tango,” though, may be the key to the theme of the album: Rodrigo falls in love on the dance floor, the lovers sway clumsily until they adjust their balance, become familiar with the other’s steps and, at last, become one. The melody is buttery and the arrangement is accommodating, but don’t be taken in. It’s a song about a relationship disguised as a partner dancing lesson, a song about needing support, struggling with voicing that, and eventually finding it.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAlso dating from the 2018 sessions, “Tao” is a different beast entirely. “It’s the ridiculousness of the human condition. Suffering comes from being attached to something, I’m like: “OK, detach, that’s all good... but there’s this girl, I can’t get her out of my head.” It's a disguised comedy, very much inspired by Alan Watts, the Taoist philosopher. I would have never written this song without his sense of humor.” Midway through, however, the groove kicks in and you’re in the studio with The Rolling Stones in 1971, their brass players, Bobby Keys and Jim Price (both played, like most of the horns, by David Ralicke), cooking up a mesmerizing gumbo.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Tara,” meanwhile, feels like something Astrud Gilberto might have sung at the height of bossa nova’s global popularity. There’s a beautiful string arrangement, upright bass, a smooth tenor sax reminiscent of Stan Getz, but with the twist of the big-band-era muted horns on the chorus, nearly self-deprecating, as if mocking such idealized infatuation.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWriting and recording continued through 2019. Some songs were pulled out from the back of drawers, more ideas came anew. “”The End,” I think I started writing that 10 years ago. Other songs went into the trash bin, but I’ll be sniffing about in there for the next record. “Sky Beneath” was a quick one because of the emotional state I was in, it was one of those. I wrote that as a folk song, arranged it with the African polyrhythm, then the Central America guitar section, then violins... A friend told me it’s like that “I’d Like To Teach The World To Sing” commercial for Coca-Cola. I absolutely disagree.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I Can’t Wait” took on the eerie qualities of a John Barry theme, while still ruminating on the power of love. To be free is to belong. “That song will throw some people off. There are records that are like a box of attempts at the hit single – some great records are like that – but every song is trying to achieve the same kind of thing. I admire such focus but I simply can't do that. And now I’ve said that, “I Can’t Wait” will definitely be a single.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn early 2020, with the album not quite ready, lockdown hit Los Angeles and Rodrigo found himself alone, adding overdubs – inexplicably, he’s not overly proud of his horn playing on “Eu Com Você” – and mixing the completed tracks with Noah Georgeson, though the two were never in the same room. Unsurprisingly, isolation dictated the sound of the album. “Lockdown and limitation have produced some great ideas. I started the album wanting to be the man I was supposed to be when my father tried to empty my head of all my drama. I planned to focus on rhythm and abandon those rich Brazilian harmonic traditions, the rich chord progressions and modulations I inherited. Instead, I embraced the complications I’ve inherited.” \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eDrama\u003c\/i\u003e closes with the piano on “The End.” ‘To live is to fall.’ After all the emotional upheavals the singer has put his cast through, is this some kind of farewell to this mortal coil? “Everything furthers,” says Amarante, and adds: “Staring at the absurd while remaining kind, being open to the gifts of confusion; that's why we create these tools that are stories and songs, to help us see each other.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTo be fair, given how delicious a squid popsicle can get, this bio wasn’t that bad. It had clever moments and it was quite sensitive to the material at times. Remember though, if any quotes stood out to you, that wasn't me simply talking to you now, but a pre-recorded message. Just a heads up.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eI dearly hope you enjoy these songs.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRodrigo Amarante\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eWritten and Arranged by Rodrigo Amarante.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eProduced by R. Amarante.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMixed by Noah Georgeson.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMastered by Heba Kadry.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eRecorded by R. Amarante at Rodrigo’s.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eLive Band Sessions Recorded at MCJ Studio by Mario Caldato Jr. and Jonathan Maia.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAdditional Engineering on “The End” by Samur Khouja.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eCover Design by R. Amarante.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eLayout by Claire Hungerford.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eCover Photography by Frederik Jacobi.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Half Clear Olive \/ Half White)","offer_id":50888633516339,"sku":"PRC-422LP-EB","price":27.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Clear Olive)","offer_id":52708192321843,"sku":"PRC-422LP-RETAIL","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50819000434995,"sku":"PRC-422CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (White)","offer_id":50819000467763,"sku":"PRC-422TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708192354611,"sku":"PRC-422DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/e6c5e2357dfea74373441735823e87cc47b02190_3d295a1f151d06d4fe5d817fc4af87ab6699ea35_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735936819"},{"product_id":"pedro-the-lion-havasu","title":"Pedro The Lion - Havasu","description":"\u003cp\u003eLake Havasu is a community of winding hillside roads, launched in the 1960s alongside a brick-for-brick rebuild of the original London Bridge. \"It's this very synthetic, gimmicky place set in this soulful, desolate landscape,\" laughs \u003cstrong\u003ePedro the Lion\u003c\/strong\u003e's David Bazan, who moved to the Arizona city for one year in seventh grade. Bazan collected his earliest childhood experiences for 2019's \u003cem\u003ePhoenix\u003c\/em\u003e, the prolific artist's celebrated return to the Pedro moniker and the first in a planned series of five records chronicling his past homes. To write its sequel, Bazan traveled to Havasu four times over several years, driving past his junior high campus, a magical skating rink, and other nostalgic locations that evoked feelings long suppressed. \"An intersection I hadn't remembered for 30 years would trigger a flood of hidden memories,\" he says. \"I was there to soak in it as much as possible.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDriving the inscrutable loops of Havasu's lakeside, Bazan listened through an audiobook of Tom Petty's biography, eventually dialoguing with Petty's voice in his mind. A revelation from the book–that Petty subconsciously wrote the song \"Wildflowers\" as an act of kindness toward himself–inspired Bazan to approach his own work with radical generosity toward his young self. \"I wanted to be there for that kid,\" he offers. \"That twelve year old still needs parenting, and still needs to process.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTo revisit his past with openness, Bazan modified harmful work habits he'd accepted as necessary. That meant doing away with deadlines, and accumulating moments of play as he felt moved to–\"Rather than squeezing stones every single time. I'm on a slow journey away from that,\" he clarifies. As he worked through the music that became \u003cem\u003eHavasu\u003c\/em\u003e, flexibility and curiosity informed the arrangements. Bazan began writing on a simple synthesizer and drum machine setup. He detoured to a more elaborate assortment of analog electronic equipment, then woodshed his original two-handed keyboard arrangements on fingerpicked acoustic guitar.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eConcurrently relearning his catalog for a weekly series of livestream concerts also renewed his gratitude toward songwriting. \"I was trying to evaluate what I have to show for 20 years of kicking my own ass,\" Bazan quips about the strenuousness of full-time touring. \"But the garden of my songs is what I've been building. It doesn't have to be an ego test.\" Approaching his discography with appreciation reconciled cognitive dissonance about the music of his childhood, which Bazan had dismissed as cheesy. \"As a kid, that Richard Marx song would come on and I would swoon. I've been working my whole life to pretend that wasn't there, and I wanted to honor the sappy, emotional kid that I was. It helped me see myself,\" he admits.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen he entered the studio with co-producer and engineer Andy D. Park (who worked in the same capacity on Phoenix), Bazan planned to make a desolate, desert-informed record. But the duo quickly realized a rock configuration closer to Pedro's classic sound would convey the landscape and stories best. Bazan switched to a Les Paul, which brought smoothness and linearity; though he'd planned to use a drum machine, he laid down scratch drum kit and bass as an experiment. Listening back the next day, those initial rhythm section takes had a sense of joy and ease that augmented the record's themes of psychic healing. \"First Drum Set,\" which faithfully chronicles Bazan's lifesaving switch from clarinet to drums, builds the explosive jubilation of musical self-discovery into triumphant fills, like a throbbing heartbeat overflowing with love. \"Teenage Sequencer\" takes on the rattling anxiety of mind-body disconnect, using trepidatious bass, vacillating guitar slides and hopeful tambourine to evoke the crushed-out ups and downs of the mutable edge of thirteen. \"There goes nature, pulling me along like a sequencer,\" sings Bazan, wondering: \"Will I always be a teenager now?\" And on \"Making the Most Of It,\" stuttering hi-hat adorns downtempo, arpeggiated guitar, adding playfulness to a reckoning with concealed emotion. \"I can go along to get along, but let me know when I can quit making the most of it,\" Bazan shrugs. Yet the contrasting optimism of the music reflects an imperative to communicate feelings both light and heavy: to break through the scar tissue of tender memory and find peace.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThough Bazan wrote, arranged, and performed most instruments himself–as is characteristic of most of his work, solo and with Pedro the Lion–several key collaborators helped him find the self-accepting tenderness needed for \u003cem\u003eHavasu\u003c\/em\u003e. Pedro live drummer Sean T. Lane makes appearances on every track, but on a self-constructed noisemaking instrument called \"the bike.\" It's composed of various metal objects and strings mounted on a bicycle frame, rigged with contact mics and run through a drone-accentuating pedalboard. \"It can be percussive, it can be ambient. It's a real nightmare machine. It's just great,\" Bazan enthuses, highlighting its crucially menacing counterpoint to the otherwise \"wistful, melancholy, guilty pleasure romcom\" progression of \"Own Valentine.\" A warm moment exploring his synth setup with longtime collaborator Andy Fitts led to the insistent new wave sound of \"Too Much.\" And on album opener and cinematic scene-setter \"Don't Wanna Move,\" a riff appears that was first devised by Pedro guitarist Erik Walters and used on Phoenix's closer. \"I was psyched to open this record with it,\" Bazan says. \"I'm trying to have a flow between the records, so if people want to engage with that, there's something there.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThough the next three albums in the series are not fully written, Bazan currently understands \u003cem\u003ePhoenix\u003c\/em\u003e and \u003cem\u003eHavasu\u003c\/em\u003e together as a completed exposition in a traditional three-act structure. \"I want to paint a picture of how my family and parents and everyone I love got coopted by nationalistic, authoritarian religion,\" he lays out. \"I'm planting the seeds for that, and my own culpability is part of it.\" Though these careful compositions pave the way for darker stories in later acts, Bazan resolutely emphasizes the curative nature of returning to Havasu, mentally and musically. \"It gave me the ability to make vulnerable choices, and connect with a part of my younger self that I didn't want to turn my back on,\" he suggests. \"I worked through a lot of self-judgment, and was kinder to myself on this record than I have been before in any songs.\" The result is an open-hearted acknowledgment of shame and elation both, spaciously but delicately arranged in affirmation of the nurturing those feelings deserve – even if the kid in need of validation has long since grown up and moved away.\u003cbr\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eProduced by Andy D. Park \u0026amp; David Bazan\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAll songs written \u0026amp; arranged by David Bazan (except: track 1 music written with Erik Walters \u0026amp; track 2 music written with Andy Fitts)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAll instruments \u0026amp; vocals by David Bazan (except: percussion on tracks 3, 4, \u0026amp; 8 by Sean Lane \u0026amp; keys on track 5 \u0026amp; additional keys on tracks 4 \u0026amp; 8 by Andy D. Park)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eRecorded by Andy D. Park at The Crumb\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMixed by Andy D. Park at The Crumb with David Bazan\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMastered by Chris Colbert at Numberstation\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eArt Direction by Jesse LeDoux\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eCover photos by David Bazan\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eStudio photo by Ryan Russell\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (White and Navy Mix)","offer_id":52708185473331,"sku":"PRC-431LP-EB","price":24.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Transparent Peach)","offer_id":50819003089203,"sku":"PRC-431LP","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (180-Gram Black)","offer_id":50819003121971,"sku":"PRC-431LP-BLACK","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50819003154739,"sku":"PRC-431CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Smoky Tint)","offer_id":52708185538867,"sku":"PRC-431TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708185506099,"sku":"PRC-431DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/af0e5d55bfcbde0ea5981afa1e8db6dbf6ffa5e8_214140feba81425f8f1d2e9a6ad915496d94804c_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1762372696"},{"product_id":"momma-household-name","title":"Momma - Household Name","description":"\u003cp\u003eFollowing \u003cstrong\u003eMomma\u003c\/strong\u003e’s beloved 2020 LP \u003ci\u003eTwo of Me\u003c\/i\u003e, which introduced the world to the symbiotic writing style and profound creative intuition of founders Etta Friedman and Allegra Weingarten, the band’s third studio album \u003ci\u003eHousehold Name\u003c\/i\u003e reveals an exciting new chapter marked by both personal and artistic growth. Now based in Brooklyn, New York, after relocating from hometown Los Angeles, the duo upgraded from GarageBand and took their time writing and recording in a proper studio alongside multi-instrumentalist\/producer Aron Kobayashi Ritch and drummer Zach CapittiFenton. The resulting album, mastered by Grammy-winning engineer Emily Lazar, is a tightly-stitched collection that is magnetic and dynamic, and also marks their debut for Polyvinyl Record Co.\/Lucky Number—who signed Momma in the midst of the pandemic before the band members had even finished college. In chasing their idols and embracing personal storytelling, the band has skillfully carved out their own path. \u003ci\u003eHousehold Name\u003c\/i\u003e showcases an unfettered vulnerability elevated by serious alt-rock bombast, and is an album that tells the world: This is Momma.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAcross the 12 songs, Weingarten and Friedman, who met and formed Momma in high school, cull lyrical inspiration from their own lives for the first time–a contrast with the conceptual fiction of Two of Me. “I went through a lot of changes as we were writing and demoing this record. The biggest was that I was going through a really messy breakup, which was motivation to make this record the best it could be. I really felt like I had something to prove,” Weingarten says. “I wanted to write about heartbreak, which isn’t something we normally focus on in our lyrics. Etta and I ended up writing several songs on our own because we were having two really different experiences during this time. It’s the first record where we each have three songs that we sing solo on.” Friedman adds, “After making \u003ci\u003eTwo of Me\u003c\/i\u003e, I think this album couldn’t help but to get personal. This was the first time all of us worked together throughout the entire process of demoing, recording, etc. We’ve never had the luxury to work this intimately together for such a prolonged amount of time.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBygone heroes also helped inspire a lyrical theme throughout \u003ci\u003eHousehold Name\u003c\/i\u003e: the rise and fall of the rock star, and the tropes and tribulations that come with that arc. The theme allowed the group to celebrate (and, in some cases, directly reference) icons like Nirvana, Pavement, Smashing Pumpkins, Veruca Salt, and the Breeders’ Kim Deal, while weaving in their own perspective and experiences. “It became a little game like, ‘Oh this is the ‘Cannonball’ moment or the ‘Drain You’ moment,’” Weingarten recalls of the writing process. “Having that, because we’re all nerds, gave us motivation to keep writing different kinds of songs, and also created focus so that we’re not just presenting scattered ideas. Our guitar chords aren’t classic grunge chords; as Momma, we have our own style.”  \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Lucky,” one of the album’s standouts, was written when Friedman was across the country from their partner, and draws inspiration from Liz Phair’s “Nashville.” “She so perfectly put into words how mundane life can feel the most blissful when the person you love is around,” Friedman remembers. “I think harping on that thought, and missing my partner so much, is what helped write ‘Lucky.’ I can be lazy, boring, brushing my teeth, naked, half awake, and still get butterflies from them. I just felt like a real winner to be in love with my best friend.” Meanwhile, “Motorbike,” sung by Weingarten, expresses a different, illusionary side of young love. “I was hung up on this guy who I thought was super cool,” Weingarten recalls. “The song ended up being purely fantasy - I was writing about all of these scenarios that didn’t actually happen, because this guy really wasn’t giving me the time of day. But it all felt real in my head - once you write out the lyrics, rewrite them, demo, and redemo a song, you forget that these weren’t real experiences. It becomes a part of you.\"\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAlthough \u003ci\u003eHousehold Name\u003c\/i\u003e was mostly inspired by the musicians’ own lives, much of the album embraces a satiric sensibility with its tongue-in-cheek rock culture references. “No Stage” is told from the point-of-view of a jaded rock star who desperately wants to make it big (\"If I’m famous for the night \/ I’ll be lonely all my life\"), and the triumphant highlight “Rockstar” is about a reverent fascination with Tenacious D’s over-the-top, comedic preoccupation with being ‘The Best Rock Band of All Time.’ Co-written with producer Kobayashi Ritch (whose indelible guitar riff demos served as the song’s foundation), “Speeding 72\" details a fast burning romance between two kids who meet at a show and then go for a ride, referencing Pavement’s “Gold Soundz” with nostalgic admiration.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAfter collaborating on every aspect of the songs—from writing to arrangements—Momma recorded \u003ci\u003eHousehold Name\u003c\/i\u003e at Studio G in Brooklyn and Kobayashi Ritch’s home studio in Los Angeles. Kobayashi Ritch took on the roles of producer and mixer—like Flood on Smashing Pumpkins’ seminal \u003ci\u003eMellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness\u003c\/i\u003e—aiming to embrace all the band’s ‘90s influences while also bringing the sonics forward with a contemporary freshness. “Artists like Nirvana and Liz Phair were obviously huge influences for this record, particularly in the songwriting, but I drew just as much inspiration from artists like Frou Frou, Linkin Park, Pinback, and Garbage. That era of popular music was really inspiring to me because those artists celebrated the production instead of hiding it away, and it made the music feel energetic and daring,” he explains. “I wanted to bring that mentality to Momma, and make this album feel intentional and complete. I also wanted to make sure we weren’t just making a throwback record. While our influences are definitely noticeable, I think the different sounds and vibes and songwriting help it read as something new and exciting that only Momma could make.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eHousehold Name\u003c\/i\u003e perfects a balance of heavy riffs, deep emotions, inviting sonic production, and a lighthearted, wry sense of humor, creating a singular lane for Momma in today's world of alt rock. The album introduces a thrilling new era of the band to not only listeners, but also to the members themselves. “There have been so many times where I have begun to write words to a tune, just out of pure emotion from something I experienced, and I don’t actually realize how I feel about the situation until I listen back to the lyrics after a few days,” Friedman notes. “So, when an artist gets personal in their music, it seems to me that the listeners and the artist are having the same experience at once, which is a better understanding of the writer as a whole. That’s what I want these songs to give to the listener: a true introduction to all sides of Momma.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMomma is Allegra Weingarten, Etta Friedman, \u0026amp; Aron Kobayashi Ritch\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAll songs written and performed by Momma\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAllegra Weingarten – Vocals, Backing Vocals, Electric Guitar, Acoustic Guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eEtta Friedman – Vocals, Backing Vocals, Electric Guitar, Baritone Guitar, Bass Guitar on Speeding 72, Wurlitzer\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eZach CapittiFenton – Drums, Electric Guitar, String Arrangement\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAron Kobayashi Ritch – Production, Mixing, Engineering, Electric Guitar, Acoustic Guitar, Baritone Guitar, Percussion, String Arrangement, Drum Programming, Keyboards, Sampling, Ambience\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eKevin Grimmett – Bass on all tracks except for Speeding 72\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eHayden Ticehurst – Assistant Engineering\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eDorothy Carlos – Cello on Lucky and No Bite\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eSebastian Jones – Double Bass on No Bite\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eRecorded in Brooklyn, NY at Studio G and in Los Angeles, CA at Aron’s House, 2021\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMastered by Emily Lazar and Chris Allgood at The Lodge, NY, 2021\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAll photographs and Super 8 stills taken by Daria Kobayashi Ritch\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAlbum artwork designed by Etta Friedman\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Sand)","offer_id":50775421780275,"sku":"PRC-457LP","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50819000336691,"sku":"PRC-457CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Red)","offer_id":50819000369459,"sku":"PRC-457TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50819000402227,"sku":"PRC-457DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/e0ed1fd446f3bc0960ac777d765e6e8a84c4ecea_45524b3185df57c4e76e67e91c9087061ef26f55_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838791"},{"product_id":"alvvays-blue-rev","title":"Alvvays - Blue Rev","description":"\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAlvvays\u003c\/strong\u003e never intended to take five years to finish their third album, the nervy joyride that is the compulsively lovable \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e. In fact, the band began writing and cutting its first bits soon after releasing 2017’s \u003ci\u003eAntisocialites\u003c\/i\u003e, that stunning sophomore record that confirmed the Toronto quintet’s status atop a new generation of winning and whip-smart indie rock.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eGlobal lockdowns notwithstanding, circumstances both ordinary and entirely unpredictable stunted those sessions. Alvvays toured more than expected, a surefire interruption for a band that doesn’t write on the road. A watchful thief then broke into singer Molly Rankin’s apartment and swiped a recorder full of demos, one day before a basement flood nearly ruined all the band’s gear. They subsequently lost a rhythm section and, due to border closures, couldn’t rehearse for months with their masterful new one, drummer Sheridan Riley and bassist Abbey Blackwell.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eAt least the five-year wait was worthwhile: \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev \u003c\/i\u003edoesn’t simply reassert what’s always been great about Alvvays but instead reimagines it. They have, in part and sum, never been better. There are 14 songs on \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e, making it not only the longest Alvvays album but also the most harmonically rich and lyrically provocative. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eThere are newly aggressive moments here—the gleeful and snarling guitar solo at the heart of opener “Pharmacist,” or the explosive cacophony near the middle of “Many Mirrors.” And there are some purely beautiful spans, too—the church- organ fantasia of “Fourth Figure,” or the blue-skies bridge of “Belinda Says.” But the power and magic of \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e stems from Alvvays’ ability to bridge ostensible binaries, to fuse elements that seem antithetical in single songs—cynicism and empathy, anger and play, clatter and melody, the soft and the steely. The luminous poser kiss-off of “Velveteen,” the lovelorn confusion of “Tile by Tile,” the panicked but somehow reassuring rush of “After the Earthquake”.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eThe songs of \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e thrive on immediacy and intricacy, so good on first listen that the subsequent spins where you hear all the details are an inevitability.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eThis perfectly dovetailed sound stems from an unorthodox—and, for Alvvays, wholly surprising—recording process, unlike anything they’ve ever done. Alvvays are fans of fastidious demos, making maps of new tunes so complete they might as well have topographical contour lines. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eBut in October 2021, when they arrived at a Los Angeles studio with fellow Canadian Shawn Everett, he urged them to forget the careful planning they’d done and just play the stuff, straight to tape. On the second day, they ripped through \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e front-to-back twice, pausing only 15 seconds between songs and only 30 minutes between full album takes. And then, as Everett has done on recent albums by The War on Drugs and Kacey Musgraves, he spent an obsessive amount of time alongside Alvvays filling in the cracks, roughing up the surfaces, and mixing the results. This hybridized approach allowed the band to harness each song’s absolute core, then grace it with texture and depth. Notice the way, for instance, that “Tom Verlaine” bursts into a jittery jangle; then marvel at the drums and drum machines ricocheting off one another, the harmonies that crisscross, and the stacks of guitar that rise between riff and hiss, subtle but essential layers that reveal themselves in time.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eEvery element of Alvvays leveled up in the long interim between albums: Riley is a classic dynamo of a drummer, with the power of a rock deity and the finesse of a jazz pedigree. Their roommate, in-demand bassist Blackwell, finds the center of a song and entrenches it. Keyboardist Kerri MacLellan joined Rankin and guitarist Alec O’Hanley to write more this time, reinforcing the band’s collective quest to break patterns heard on their first two albums. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eThe results are beyond question: \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e has more twists and surprises than Alvvays’ cumulative past, and the band seems to revel in these taken chances. This record is fun and often funny, from the hilarious reply-guy bash of “Very Online Guy” to the parodic grind of “Pomeranian Spinster.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eAlvvays’ self-titled debut, released when much of the band was still in its early 20s, offered speculation about a distant future—marriage, professionalism, interplanetary citizenship. \u003ci\u003eAntisocialites\u003c\/i\u003e wrestled with the woes of the now, especially the anxieties of inching toward adulthood. Named for the sugary alcoholic beverage Rankin and MacLellan used to drink as teens on rural Cape Breton, \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e looks both back at that country past and forward at an uncertain world, reckoning with what we lose whenever we make a choice about what we want to become.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: #000000;\"\u003eThe spinster with her Pomeranians or Belinda with her babies? The kid fleeing Bristol by train or the loyalist stunned to see old friends return? “How do I gauge whether this is stasis or change?” Rankin sings during the first verse of the plangent and infectious “Easy on Your Own?” In that moment, she pulls the ties tight between past, present, and future to ask hard questions about who we’re going to become, and how. Sure, it arrives a few years later than expected, but the answer for Alvvays is actually simple: They’ve changed gradually, growing on \u003ci\u003eBlue Rev\u003c\/i\u003e into one of their generation’s most complete and riveting rock bands.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMolly Rankin : Vocals, Guitar, Production\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAlec O’Hanley : Guitar, Keyboards, Bass, Production, Mixing, Engineering\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eKerri MacLellan : Keyboards, Vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eSheridan Riley : Drums\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAbbey Blackwell : Bass\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eChris Dadge : Drums\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMoshe Fisher-Rozenberg : Drums\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eDrew Jurecka - Cello, Viola\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eJoseph Shabason - Flute, Baritone Saxophone\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003ePhil Hartunian - Guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eShawn Everett : Production, Mixing, Engineering\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAdditional Engineering : Stephen Koszler, Phil Hotz, Robbie Lackritz, Nyles Spencer, Julian Decorte, Amy Fort, Ivan Wayman\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eDesign \/ Layout by Scott Fitzpatrick, MR + AO\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003ePhotography by Janet Vanzutphen\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAdditional Work by Nora MacLeod + KM\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"text-align: left;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eAll Songs Written by MR + AO\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Black\/Blue Mix)","offer_id":51621493670195,"sku":"PRC-9677LP","price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Blue)","offer_id":50934861168947,"sku":"PRC-465LP","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50934861201715,"sku":"PRC-465CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Black)","offer_id":50934861234483,"sku":"PRC-465TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":50934861267251,"sku":"PRC-465DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Silver \u0026 Light Blue Mix) – SOLD OUT","offer_id":52707524903219,"sku":"PRC-9688LP","price":30.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/Alvvays_BlueRev_Bandbox2025_MOCKUP_SQ.jpg?v=1763417443"},{"product_id":"kero-kero-bonito-intro-bonito","title":"Kero Kero Bonito - Intro Bonito","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eOriginally released in 2013,\u003cstrong\u003e Kero Kero Bonito’\u003c\/strong\u003es debut mixtape, \u003ci\u003eIntro Bonito\u003c\/i\u003e, was a monumental success in the underground hyperpop scene bubbling up throughout the band’s hometown of South London. The trio, featuring Gus Lobban, Jamie Bulled, and Sarah Midori Perry, started crafting their unique blend of electronic pop music \u003c\/span\u003eafter school friends Gus \u0026amp; Jamie met Sarah on the internet. \u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eWith Perry’s unique singing style (featuring lyrics in both Japanese and English), the band went on to write influential tracks such as “Sick Beat,” “I’d Rather Sleep,” “Pocket Crocodile,” and others that were inspired by J-pop, dancehall, and video game music.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eThe \u003ci\u003eIntro Bonito\u003c\/i\u003e mixtape paved the way for Kero Kero Bonito’s rise from underground glitch pop wizards to a monumental act within the PC Music scene and beyond. 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With each passing year, it feels like the temperature of the universe boils five degrees hotter, and with each new album, Rosenstock’s music grows more unwieldy and lawless. Louder, faster, more feral. Which brings us to 2023—a planet on fire, a mere 90 seconds to midnight on the doomsday clock, and the release of Rosenstock’s appropriately titled, anarchic record, \u003ci\u003eHELLMODE\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003e“To me, the album feels like the chaos of being alive right now,” Rosenstock says of \u003ci\u003eHELLMODE\u003c\/i\u003e. “We’re experiencing all these things at the same time that trigger our senses, and emotions that make us feel terrible. We’re just feeling way too much all at once!” But for all its textured turmoil, there are also surprising glimpses of clarity and grace to be found in \u003ci\u003eHELLMODE\u003c\/i\u003e, when Rosenstock deliberately slows things down in places that are prettier and more delicate, rare moments of shelter in the storm. Which only makes it more rewarding when these moments unexpectedly unravel and spiral back into extreme, manic chaos, like abruptly being flung into a Nintendo game on level 99.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003eHELLMODE\u003c\/i\u003e marks the fifth studio album the prolific Rosenstock has released in the last ten years under his own name, following the dissolution of his beloved cult projects Bomb the Music Industry! and The Arrogant Sons of Bitches. Also tucked into his rapidly expanding catalog is a live record, a ska reimagining of his 2020 album \u003ci\u003eNO DREAM\u003c\/i\u003e, and various dumps of stray songs and loose singles. And somewhere on the side, he has found time to score the Emmy-nominated animated series \u003ci\u003eCraig of the Creek\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eRosenstock’s rising profile and critical acclaim over the last decade have been something of an anomaly. He’s a proud torchbearer of the punk sonics, aesthetics, and ethos of his youth, leaning into pop punk and ska sensibilities that were deemed Decidedly Uncool by the gatekeepers of the time. (On any given day at a big outdoor music festival, he is likely the only musician who will bust out a saxophone solo.) But when Rosenstock celebrates these styles, he somehow ends up getting praise from tastemakers and landing on prominent year-end lists. Maybe it’s because his appreciation doesn’t feel like cheap nostalgia or surface-level cosplay. Everything he does is just so damned sincere.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eThat success is something Rosenstock has been conflicted about, and fuels some of the anxiety that runs through \u003ci\u003eHELLMODE\u003c\/i\u003e. “It’s weird feeling success at the worst possible time, while the world falls apart,” he says. “These things I’ve been unintentionally working towards for the last two decades have come to fruition now, when everything is on fire.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eTo record \u003ci\u003eHELLMODE\u003c\/i\u003e in the summer of 2022, Rosenstock once again enlisted his longtime studio collaborator, Jack Shirley, the Grammy-nominated master of heaviness who has recorded all of Rosenstock’s studio albums. But this time, they took a slightly more ambitious approach, booking time at the legendary EastWest Studios in Hollywood. They recorded to tape in Studio 2, the same hallowed ground where System of a Down recorded \u003ci\u003eToxicity\u003c\/i\u003e, and where Whitney Houston laid down vocal tracks for \u003ci\u003eThe Bodyguard \u003c\/i\u003esoundtrack. The newfound studio resources produced the biggest and most expansive Jeff Rosenstock record to date. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003e“I looked at it like: Well, we’re never gonna make a major label debut record. But I really like the sound of a lot of those records from the 90s—the Rob Cavallo stuff, the Jerry Finn stuff,” Rosenstock says. “So what would we do if we were in the studio trying to make that kind of record? It’s funny, I feel like in 2023, you can write an unabashedly poppy punk song and it’s probably not gonna be on the radio anyway, so it doesn’t feel like a sellout move. We felt free to make something that just kicks as much ass as possible.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eJOHN DEDOMENICI - BASS\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eKEVIN HIGUCHI - DRUMS, PERCUSSION\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMIKE HUGUENOR - ELECTRIC GUITAR\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eDAN POTTHAST - ACOUSTIC GUITAR, WURLITZER, VOCALS\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eJEFF ROSENSTOCK - ACOUSTIC \u0026amp; ELECTRIC GUITARS, SAXOPHONES, CLARINET, ORGAN, SYNTHESIZERS, PIANO, VOCALS\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eADDITIONAL VOCALS BY CHRIS FARREN \u0026amp; LAURA STEVENSON\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eTROMBONE ON “WILL U STILL U” BY JEREMY HUNTER\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eVIBRAPHONE ON “HEALMODE” BY SKYLAR SUOREZ\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eTRASH CAN ON “LIFE ADMIN” BY CHRISTINE MACKIE\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eRECORDED BY JACK SHIRLEY AT EAST WEST STUDIOS IN LOS ANGELES, CA AND THE ATOMIC GARDEN IN EAST OAKLAND, CA\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eMIXED BY JACK \u0026amp; JEFF | MASTERED BY JACK\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eENGINEERINGLY ASSISTED BY LOGAN TAYLOR\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eADDITIONAL RECORDING BY JEFF, JEREMY \u0026amp; SKYLAR IN THEIR PLACES OF LIVING\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003ePRE-PRODUCTION AT BALBOA STUDIOS IN LOS ANGELES, CA\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0,75%,60%);\"\u003eINTERNATIONAL VOX \u0026amp; CLAP CO. 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Its final score, as the curtain closed and the lights came up, was comprised of the orchestrations that preceded and followed the final act: the buzz of a barber's razor, the droning resonance of a tattoo machine, and the brush of electric sound from the surprise gift of a friend. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eFor a decade, a leading figure and frontwoman of post-punk staple band Against Me!, Laura Jane Grace, had been slowly accruing black-laden bodywork by master Japanese tattoo artists Gakkin and Kenji Alucky. Beginning at her feet, Gakkin's freehanded, organic figures and Alucky's high-contrast geometric works had taken the three all over the world together just as it had taken inches all over Laura Jane's figure. Finally, though this artistic exercise in time and tattoo ink came to a head. Literally. The last place Laura Jane Grace needed tattooed, was her head. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eWhilst on tour in Europe that Summer, Laura Jane Grace, reached out to Gakkin. His shop had been relocated to Amsterdam and the two agreed to meet while they were both there. Pain of course was a consideration, but the most decisive action was that Laura Jane Grace needed to shave her head. As a prominent figure in the trans community, Grace’s hair is tied to their physical identity, and she understood that shaving it would come with questions. That didn’t stop her though, and soon enough her scalp was bare, and she was under the deft hand of her trusted tattoo artist. Two days later, Laura Jane Grace’s head was adorned with bold stroked roses crying around and the wings of a bird of prey, the story was at its close. Or so she thought.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eJust before her departure, Gakkin presented with a token of their work together over the years; a black hollow-body Gretsch guitar, adorned with swirling white and silver cloud-like shapes hand-painted by Gakkin. And it was on this guitar, in the American Hotel in Amsterdam, that Laura Jane Grace commemorated this experience by writing the sixth track “Birds Talk Too” on her newest album \u003ci\u003eHole In My Head\u003c\/i\u003e. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eA musical force since Against Me!'s debut in the late 90's, Laura Jane Grace has never shied away from themes of political commentary, environmentalism, social critique, and candid self-exploration. Following the 2012 public announcement of her gender transition in the pages of Rolling Stone, Laura Jane Grace racked up several accolades. Against Me! released its most acclaimed record to date, \u003ci\u003eTransgender Dysphoria Blues\u003c\/i\u003e in 2014, which was followed by an Emmy-nominated 10-episode companion documentary, \u003ci\u003eTrue Trans with Laura Jane Grace\u003c\/i\u003e. In 2016, Laura Jane Grace teamed up with journalist Dan Ozzi, to co-write her acclaimed memoir \u003ci\u003eTRANNY: Confessions of Punk Rock’s Most Infamous Anarchist\u003c\/i\u003e which went on to be featured on \u003ci\u003eLate Night with Seth Meyers\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eFresh Air with Terry Gross\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eThe Daily Show with Trevor Noah\u003c\/i\u003e, and rightfully named one of Billboard’s “100 Greatest Music Books of All Time”. \u003ci\u003eHole In My Head\u003c\/i\u003e is Grace’s twelfth album and an exciting hallmark in her colorful and extensive career. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eRecorded at Native Sound in St. Louis, Missouri with David Beeman and mixed \u0026amp; mastered by Matt Allison (engineer for acts such as Lawrence Arms and Rise Against), the album is a sonic curio cabinet containing multitudes. \u003ci\u003eHole In My Head\u003c\/i\u003e features warm 50s-rock-influenced guitar riffs, saved-for-later lyrics, love letters to St. Louis, dysphoria apparel, and thoughtful reflections on a punk life lived. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eThe record's title track \"Hole In My Head\" takes off with a driving guitar-heavy approach that will be welcome to long-time fans of Against Me! Electric machinations drive the song for about 10 seconds before launching into the first verse and punctuated by two lines that serve as the chorus as the song progresses, \"I won’t learn to feel less\/ I need a hole in my head\". The lyrics are captured visually in the album's cover art done by the talented Australian artist and designer Annie Walters. Walters contrasts a black and white photograph of the crumpled, short-haired figure of Laura Jane Grace against a barrage of bright color and illustrative imagery that bursts upward from Grace's splitting head. Much like the song, the cover at first comes off as explosive, possibly violent but upon closer inspection, it becomes clear that the stream of color stems from a physical need for comfort and release. Grace's clutching hands (in image and in writing) are opening herself up.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eBaby what’s the scene?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eI’ve got places to be\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eSomething left unsaid \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003ewill explode if not released\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eI need a hole in my head\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eI won’t learn to feel less\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eKeeping up the pace, \"Hole In My Head\" is followed by \"I'm Not a Cop\" and \"Dysphoria Hoodie\" in that order. \"I'm Not a Cop\" continues in the themes of self-examination and is backed by a 50\/60's rock style melody a la Jonathan Richman and Eddie Cochran. Richman's influences make several appearances throughout the record. Grace replicates Richman's distinctive musical styling in the form of jangly guitar rhythms and staccato response harmonies. As the melody is juxtaposed against present-tense ruminative lyrics, the song creates a melodic microcosm of sorts. A space in which the listener cannot stop themselves from examining the progression of rock music as a constant form of counter-culture form of expression.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eThe first single from the record is one which audiences who have seen Laura Jane Grace play in the last couple of years may be familiar with. “Dysphoria Hoodie” (released on October 4th), has been a staple in Grace’s setlist, and one which is as personal as it is pertinent in today’s climate. When asked about the song Grace says, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003e\"This is a song about gender dysphoria and your favorite hooded sweatshirt. Any trans person out there knows what a dysphoria hoodie is — it's the hoodie you wear when feeling low and dysphoric and you don't want the world reading your gender. Hide your body shape, hide your head, and disappear as much as you can. Wrap yourself up in it like a blanket anywhere you go. Make your flesh become cotton. Instant protection from the outside world. My dysphoria hoodie happens to be an Adidas hoodie, so yes, this is in fact really just a tribute song to my favorite Adidas hoodie.\"\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eFalling away from the comforts of \"Dysphoria Hoodie\" and following \"Birds Talk Too\", the album pivots back to the influences of Jonathan Richman in the following song \"Punk Rock in Basements\". Heavily inspired by Richman's \"Parties in the USA” and Dion’s “The Wanderer”, \"Punk Rock in Basements\" was written through a post-pandemic rose-colored lens. In the song, Laura Jane Grace looks back on the formative underground spaces of her youth. For decades, basement shows were hallmark experiences for anyone involved in their local punk scenes. They shaped movements, connections, and culture through the forced, sweaty proximity necessary to pour over raucous punk music. It's hard to say whether we'll ever be able to recapture the feelings of those spaces the way they were before the pandemic. Difficult meditations which Grace considers in the lyrics of the song. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eYeah we were loud, we were proud, we were freaking out\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eIt was the sound of revolution that translated into action\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eI can still taste the sweat\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eI have been carried by the motion\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eI have been deafened by the volume\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eThe music gave us freedom\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eIt was a reason to believe in\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eWay, way loud!\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eSee the past appearing \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eDon’t it make you wonder, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eif you’re coming or you’re leaving?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eWay, way loud!\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eSee the past repeating\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eDon’t it make you wonder,\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eif you’re following or leading?\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eAs the album's sound begins to settle, Laura Jane Grace's writing shifts to reflect her surroundings. For the last couple of years, Grace has split her time between Chicago and St. Louis, Missouri. And despite her 2018 song \"I Hate Chicago\", Grace wants it known she, in fact, does not hate the Windy City. As a parent, home is wherever Grace's daughter is. But after spending the pandemic cooped up in an apartment where she was unable to make music the way she wanted, she needed to get out. Shortly after, Laura Jane Grace landed in St. Louis and (quite serendipitously) posted up in a studio that formerly belonged to Jay Farrar, frontman of Son Volt and founding member of Uncle Tupelo. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eIt was in St. Louis that Grace celebrated her 42nd birthday, a day commemorated in \u003ci\u003eHole In My Head\u003c\/i\u003e's seventh track \"Tacos and Toast\". This track in addition to its predecessor \"Cuffing Season\" slows down the tempo of the record moving forward as its lyrics delve into Grace's renewed ability to make music in a new place. Grace follows up this love for St. Louis in the album's ninth track, \"Keep Your Wheels Straight\" as well. Immortalizing a night of CBGB's and nonalcoholic beers, a city plagued by urban decay is brought back to life. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003e“St. Louis really opened its arms to me and I just have such a great time when I’m there… it’s a really special city … It’s like, to me it feels like the way every city in America felt when I first started touring in the late 90’s. And this crazy mix of like, fun and adventure, but danger and possibility”\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eBacked by her own drumming, Grace's forward vocals complement her skills as a guitarist on \u003ci\u003eHole In My Head\u003c\/i\u003e, while the added contributions of Drive-By Truckers bassist, Matt Patton, bolsters a full-band sound throughout the album. Patton, who was recruited through a brief conversation with Grace over Twitter, brought a smooth and collaborative experience to the project, despite the genre differences between the two. When asked, Matt said:\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003e\"I would say that our working relationship was immediately comfortable just in the way that she was able to articulate you know, what it was that she wanted me to do. And you know, she had the musical cue and vocabulary to get her points across to where we can work efficiently without any confusion or disagreements. It was a, you know, it was a different level for me.\"\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003ePatton’s playing is all over the record, but really took his moment to shine when given a blank slate with the song “Mercenary”. According to Laura Jane, “Mercenary” is the oldest song on the record and had been workshopped on and off over the years. Patton had wrapped up his time in the studio with Grace and was headed home when Grace sent him the track and told him to do whatever he wanted with it. “Mercenary” has a more roots-based sound with a metronomic sliding bass sound which allows it to stand out on the album. Grace’s ever clear vocals keep it consistent with the rest of the songs though. There is a sharp edge in her voice, almost as if she’s breathing out a challenge as she sings:\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eIf there’s money on the table \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eyou can take it and leave\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eIf there’s a seat in the car \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eno one rides for free\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eI’ve got gold, solid gold\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eCome on and shine with me\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eGo on and take all you want\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eThere’s nothing here that I need\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eWriting from life is easy to do but it’s difficult to master. Life is strange, it’s messy, and for all the talk of it being short, living is the longest thing we can do. How do we get to the point of it all? Writing about it is just one way to make sense of it all. In taking these strange moments, it’s tempting to crowd the story with metaphor or description in an effort to entertain others as we invite them to these parts of our lives. Laura Jane Grace has honed her craft as a songwriter, and takes on the difficult task of telling her stories without losing the details. In the final two tracks of the album “Hard Feelings” and “Give Up the Ghost”, there is almost a stream of consciousness where Grace flows between apologies and regrets to seemingly embellished experiences. Except when she sings “I’m standing at the center of the universe\/ screaming at god, I’m not done” in the final track “Give Up the Ghost”, she’s being serious. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003eThe Center of the Universe, an auditory phenomena on a footbridge in downtown Tulsa, Oklahoma. A place where tourists can stand at its center and yell yet not be heard by those standing outside of them. It is an isolating experience for some, where in one space you can say everything or nothing and maybe only god will hear you. Or not. “Give Up the Ghost” is relatively sparse compared to the rest of the record. As it was in the American Hotel in Amsterdam and the bedroom of her childhood, it is just Laura Jane Grace and a guitar, setting her time and memory to melody the hard-edged yet honest way she’s mastered. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:#000000;\"\u003e\u003ci\u003eHole In My Head \u003c\/i\u003eis a record which captures the nuances of humanity and experience in a strangely optimistic manner. The lightness of its influence and the journalistic recollection of experience set against a battered and warm folk-punk delivery from beginning to end makes \u003ci\u003eHole In My Head\u003c\/i\u003e a fun comfort. It is a welcome embrace of life and just the start of a new chapter in Laura Jane Grace’s raucous journey.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eAll songs written \u0026amp; performed by Laura Jane Grace, Total Treble Music BMI \/ Rough Trade Publishing \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eMatt Patton plays bass and sings backing vocals on Hole In My Head, I’m Not A Cop, Birds Talk too, Punk Rock In Basements, Mercenary and Keep Your Wheels Straight\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eLaura Jane Grace proudly uses Ernie Ball strings and plays Yamaha acoustic guitars \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eRecorded by David Beeman at Native Sound in St Louis, Missouri February 2023\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eMixed by Matt Allison at Atlas Studios\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eMastered by Collin Jordan at The Boiler Room\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eCover photo by Dave Decker\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eArtwork by \u003c\/span\u003e\u003ca href=\"https:\/\/www.anniewalter.com\/\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eAnnie Walter\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Opaque Hot Pink)","offer_id":50819005448499,"sku":"PRC-488LP","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":52708167024947,"sku":"PRC-488CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape","offer_id":52708167057715,"sku":"PRC-488TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708167090483,"sku":"PRC-488DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Light Pink w\/ Purple and Blue Splatter) – OUT OF PRINT","offer_id":50819005415731,"sku":"PRC-488LP-EB","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/39aaaf82ad948fb3d4fbb6a274caf1053285e160_2b60bbed9445b6eb223b44080d61c0482b392c15_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1735838860"},{"product_id":"xiu-xiu-13-frank-beltrame-italian-stiletto-with-bison-horn-grips","title":"Xiu Xiu - 13\" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips","description":"\u003cp\u003e“I did not join a rock and roll band to play rock and roll!”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e– Blixa Bargeld, on quitting The Bad Seeds\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“My name is Blixa Bargeld. And I’m here for my COMPUTER!”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e– Also Blixa Bargeld, when picking up said computer from a computer store in Berlin where Xiu Xiu now resides\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThere’s a dance, and on occasion a place to go dancing, where we while away the inevitable in the distinct hopes that we can better embrace what’s left of clocks that only run one way. You see, time is the issue and the issue is all about doing a dance that measures out life, and chance, and smooths the groove into something that can comfortably be swallowed.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eLike \u003ci\u003e13\" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips\u003c\/i\u003e?\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePrecisely like \u003ci\u003e13\" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips\u003c\/i\u003e. Which, on the face of it is the newest record from \u003cstrong\u003eXiu Xiu\u003c\/strong\u003e, but only on the face of it. Underneath that face, the sinews and struggles of a need that seeks to name itself over every record, and every song on every record, ever written by Xiu Xiu of course, but also anyone who ever sought to make a record that’s worth a good goddamned. And this record is precisely that.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThat is: a good goddamned. Nine songs of it, in fact. Nine songs to seal the deal for those who will still listen to all nine songs, in order, because an album is a message that can’t be read piecemeal. Mixed by John Congleton with a band-directed dictum that he should feel free to both “go crazy” and if there was ever any doubt as to what that meant please, by all means “choose iconoclasm.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhich, if your ears are not liars, he has very specifically done. Even if it was not that heavy of a lift to do so since Xiu Xiu has made doing so their raison d’etre for the better part of forever. Formally formalized here under Xiu Xiu’s sense that “the destruction of an original aesthetic notion as a motivation was new for us.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWere it also a marching order for anyone committing to actualizing a musical experience of some significance, it seems we’d all be a lot better off. Or at least feeling a lot better off. Which in the end is the only measurement that matters in the face of lives of weighty import. Or even lightweight frivolity. It’s there and everywhere in-between.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eAnd while it sounds like in a volitional sense something easy to do, doing so song after song on record after record doesn’t always clarify or make things easy. Something driven home on their song “Veneficium,” a word with Latin roots connected to poisoning potions.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Being lost, literally lost, emotionally lost, lost in a smashed psychological dimension beyond your control, being overwhelmed by the weight of one’s insignificance in the face of time, space and death and pointlessly railing against what does not notice let along care about you”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis record though, it must be said, sounds (and feels) like it does care about you. A sense that might mask the randomness of our place in space or more completely, sets it off as the true face of all of our public endeavors.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eBeyond that? Songs like “Common Loon,” “Arp Omni,” and “T.D.F.T.W.” tip the scales toward a dangerous kind of listening experience. One that both takes a lot, but gives more, in almost equal measure.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSomething set off by Xiu Xiu when they say, as they do, that if they want us to feel anything for this record, it would be “unafraid.”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eDamned straight. We’ve had our fill of that shit lately, and if Xiu Xiu’s move to Berlin is any indication – “we wanted to stay ahead of disaster this time” – it is no less important of a thing than anything else we measure life and death with.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSo, \u003ci\u003e13\" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips\u003c\/i\u003e?\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eYes, \u003ci\u003e13\" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips\u003c\/i\u003e. While regret is for children and old people, rest assured that if you’re not one, you’ll be the other. And out of the long laundry list of things on your regret list, you will most definitely not find \u003ci\u003e13\" Frank Beltrame Italian Stiletto with Bison Horn Grips\u003c\/i\u003e. It’s a mitzvah. For what we should be well pleased.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eYou are alive. And, oh yeah, long live Xiu Xiu.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e–Eugene S. Robinson, East Palo Alto, California\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cblockquote\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eProduced by Angela Seo\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eMixed by John Congleton at Animal Rites, Los Angeles\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eRecorded by Jamie Stewart at Nurse, Los Angeles \u0026amp; Krankenschwester, Berlin\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eMastered by Alan Douche at West West Side Music, Cornwall-On-Hudson\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eDesign by Janelle Abad\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eDavid Kendrick - drum set, percussion\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eAngela Seo - synth, organ, sheet metal, vox, percussion, piano, autoharp\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eJamie Stewart - guitar, bass, vox, synth, percussion, bajo quinto, drum machine\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eSoo Cho - violin\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eDavid Kim - violin\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eMin Kim - viola\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eJohn Lee - cello\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color:hsl(0, 75%, 60%);\"\u003eDaniel Park - cello\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n \u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Mint Green)","offer_id":50819003646259,"sku":"PRC-494LP","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":52708159029555,"sku":"PRC-494CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Green)","offer_id":50819003711795,"sku":"PRC-494TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52708159062323,"sku":"PRC-494DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Early Bird Vinyl (Malachite Mix) – SOLD OUT","offer_id":52708681548083,"sku":"PRC-494LP-EB","price":27.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/ee91a82eb4aee8601e7784c1c78e4d33a584f582_00efc34022d699c4de651b41350871795fac4d9a_photo_jpg.jpg?v=1763747481"},{"product_id":"momma-welcome-to-my-blue-sky","title":"Momma - Welcome to My Blue Sky","description":"\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eLike so many coming-of-age stories that leave a long-lasting impact, \u003cstrong\u003eMomma\u003c\/strong\u003e’s new album \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eWelcome to My Blue Sky\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e takes place during a charmed and turbulent summer—a transformative moment in time that co-founders Etta Friedman and Allegra Weingarten sum up as a period of “parallel chaos.” The Brooklyn-based band’s fourth LP, over the course of 12 immaculately composed yet immediately potent songs, documents all the life-altering upheaval the two singer\/songwriter\/guitarists experienced during a whirlwind mid-2022 tour. Equal parts shared memoir, communal outpouring, and riveting emotional travelogue, each track is infused with both unsparing self-awareness and immense sensitivity, and the result is a bold leap forward for one of the most creatively uncompromising and singular voices in indie-rock.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e“This record came from a very formative time for us—there was a lot of change that felt so fun and exciting, but also a lot of instability and heartbreak,” says Weingarten, who met Friedman during their high-school years in L.A. and soon struck up a close musical collaboration. As they dealt with the fallout of that phase of their lives (a moment marked by infidelity, loneliness, heavy drinking, and the start of new romance), the two friends made a pact to wade through the mess together. “In a way it felt like we flipped our entire lives upside-down,” says Friedman. “We needed to lean on each other to cope with everything we were going through, and writing songs together was a big part of working through those feelings and finally putting them to rest.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eWelcome to My Blue Sky\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, produced by their bandmate Aron Kobayashi Ritch,\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003emarks the follow-up to \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eHousehold Name\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e—a 2022 release that earned acclaim from the likes of \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003ePitchfork\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003eNYLON\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003eNME\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, and \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003eRolling Stone\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan\u003e (including landing on Rob Sheffield’s “Top 20 Albums of 2022” list). In creating their most autobiographical and exactingly realized work to date, Friedman and Weingarten wrote most of the album together on acoustic guitars before sharing those songs with Kobayashi Ritch. The multi-instrumentalist\/engineer then guided the band through a highly methodical demoing process aimed at elevating their sound (or, as the band puts it, “setting a new standard for ourselves”) while harnessing the infectious energy they’ve shown in touring with seminal bands like Death Cab For Cutie and Weezer, and performing at major festivals like Coachella. With the help of drummer Preston Fulks, Momma arrived at an album matching the raw urgency of rock with the sticky melodies and taut arrangements of pop—a dynamic born from their deepened commitment to finding the most direct vessel for their emotional expression. “With this album we were less concerned with sounding cool and heavy and rock \u0026amp; roll and much more focused on good, clean songwriting that hopefully inspires people to sing along and mean every word,” Weingarten reveals.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eOne of the first songs completed for \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eWelcome to My Blue Sky\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, “I Want You (Fever)” served as an essential breakthrough in shaping the album’s viscerally charged, inventive, and detailed sound. “I remember us writing that in my bedroom and coming up with a riff for the pre-chorus, and then deciding to sing that part instead of playing it on guitar—which felt so fun and fresh and took the song in a whole new direction,” Friedman recalls. “I Want You (Fever),” with its frenetic textures and hypnotic chorus, soon evolved into a fantastically loopy portrait of forbidden love. “When we were recording that song I felt such an intense joy that I couldn’t stop smiling,” says Weingarten. “It felt completely authentic to Momma, but also like stepping into a whole new era.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eMainly recorded live with the full band at Studio G in Brooklyn, \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eWelcome to My Blue Sky \u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003etakes its title from a gorgeous, sprawling track embodying a far more wistful mood, where Momma’s tender introspection is adorned with bittersweet strings and graceful acoustic-guitar work. “We were on tour and stopped at a gas station and saw a sign that said ‘Welcome to My Blue Sky,’ which hit me as really poetic—although it turned out to be an ad for an oil company,” Weingarten explains. “We got to the venue and wrote that song so quickly, and it ended up being about the experience of going on tour and leaving people behind, and all the unknowns as far as what the future holds for us.” \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eReferring to \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eWelcome to My Blue Sky\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e as “an open letter to those who have come in and out of our lives,” across the album Momma explores the full spectrum of their emotional experience during that summer 2022 tour. On “Ohio All The Time,” the band slips into a lovely nostalgia as they reminisce about a fleeting moment Friedman likens to “living in our own little dream world,” imbuing the track with all the punchy effervescence of early-aughts alt-pop.  “Rodeo” is written from the perspective of their former romantic partners, offering up a heavy-hearted anthem channeling both frustration and longing—a tension perfectly echoed in its pummeling riffs, staccato drum beats, and indelibly sweet vocal delivery. “There was a lot of infidelity that happened on that tour, and we wrote ‘Rodeo’ as a way to process that and own up to how we might have made other people feel,” Friedman points out. Meanwhile, on “Bottle Blonde,” Momma brings moody breakbeats and lush synth loops to an intimate meditation on the complexities of their friendship. “That song is partly us talking to our younger selves and telling them everything’s going to be okay, but it’s also us talking to each other right now,” says Weingarten. “It’s saying that even if our relationship ebbs and flows, we know that we’ll always be each other’s anchors no matter what we go through.”\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eFor the bookends to \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cem\u003eWelcome to My Blue Sky\u003c\/em\u003e\u003cspan\u003e, Momma selected two songs that took them far beyond their comfort zone: the album-opening “Sincerely” (a free-flowing, acoustic-guitar-driven piece conceived as a farewell to their former lives) and fuzzed-out closing track “My Old Street” (a brutally honest look back at their childhoods). “I’m still really nervous for certain people in my life to hear these songs; they all have a level of vulnerability that feels pretty scary,” says Weingarten in reflecting on the latter. But in their dedication to, in Friedman’s words, “learning how to confess the hard things,” Momma hopes to inspire others to make peace with the messiest and most uncomfortable truths of their personal experience—and, in turn, head into the wild unknown of their own blue sky with confidence, curiosity, and self-compassion.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eEtta Friedman - Guitar, vocals, lyrics, additional instrumentation\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAllegra Weingarten - Guitar, vocals, lyrics, additional instrumentation\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAron Kobayashi Ritch - Produced, mixed, head-engineered, co-written, bass, additional instrumentation, sampling\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePreston Fulks - Drums, percussion\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eHayden Ticehurst - Assistant engineer at Studio G\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSebastian Jones - Assistant engineer at Wasatch studios, double bass on Sincerely \u0026amp; Take Me With You, piano on Welcome to My Blue Sky \u0026amp; My Old Street\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDorothy Carlos - Cello on Welcome to My Blue Sky \u0026amp; How to Breathe\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAlbum art photos by Daria Kobayashi Ritch\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAlbum art design \u0026amp; layout by Etta Friedman\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eStyling by Kelly Sachiko Page\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMastered by Matt Colton\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eRecorded at Studio G in Brooklyn \u0026amp; Wasatch Studios in Los Angeles\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Coke Bottle Clear)","offer_id":51012140499251,"sku":"PRC-503LP","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":51012140532019,"sku":"PRC-503CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Blue Tint)","offer_id":51012140564787,"sku":"PRC-503TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":51012140597555,"sku":"PRC-503DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Early Bird Vinyl (Sky Blue Mix) – SOLD OUT","offer_id":51012140630323,"sku":"PRC-503LP-EB","price":25.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/Momma_WTMBS_SQ1Retail.jpg?v=1763439241"},{"product_id":"laura-jane-grace-adventure-club","title":"Laura Jane Grace - Adventure Club","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eBefore the phrase \"Adventure Club\" became the title of \u003cstrong\u003eLaura Jane Grace\u003c\/strong\u003e’s electrifying and affirming new album, it was the name for her gaggle of adventurous friends in Greece. In the summer of 2024, Grace joined an artist residency program in Athens, embedding with Greek punk rockers there while she wrote songs about the sordid trials of her life and world—sobriety, autocracy, identity. By night, this new pickup band, including Grace’s wife and collaborator, Paris Campbell Grace, would often play and record. But by day, they’d explore the ancient and beautiful landscape and the city’s vibrant culture. They dove from beaches nestled in seaside caves into the Aegean and swam with sea turtles. They submitted to tourism, seeing the Parthenon and Epidaurus and breaking into the Panathenaic Stadium to run its track. They became addicted to Freddo espresso, a locals-only iced coffee topped with whipped milk. The lifestyle of this Adventure Club inspired her so much that, by the time she left Greece, she’d unexpectedly finished \u003cem\u003eAdventure Club\u003c\/em\u003e, a new career apogee built from equal parts fun and fury, self-definition and self-deprecation. It is all Grace, continuing to recalibrate what punk rock means for her now. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwo years ago, the Onassis Foundation—launched a half-century earlier, after the shipping titan directed that his fortune be used to promote “aid, progress and development” following his death—invited Grace to Greece. They wanted her to transform “Walls,” a century-old poem of isolation and doubt by Greece’s Constantine P. Cavafy, into a song for a short documentary about inmates learning to express themselves through film while in prison. When she traveled there in early 2024, the filmmaker assembled a pick-up band of local punk rockers (plus Paris) for a string of shows. When the brief tour was done, bad weather delayed her flight home. Waiting for her early-morning exit, she stayed up all night with the ad hoc group and Paris. They recorded a new version of “Walls,” then flew home in a delighted daze. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHad that really just happened? Had she formed a transcontinental quartet, playfully dubbed the Trauma Tropes, with a Greek rhythm section she’d just met? When she returned six months later after earning a full residency with the Onassis Foundation, the answer instantly became clear: Yes. She’d expected to \u003cem\u003emaybe\u003c\/em\u003e write an EP. Instead, she cowrote and cut an entire LP with Paris, bassist Jacopo Fokas, and drummer Orestis Lagadinos, that pickup group called The Trauma Tropes. Grace is happily a solo artist these days, a free agent who has moved among different configurations of musicians since her epochal punk band Against Me! began a break in 2020. The Trauma Tropes are less a new band, per se, than a group of new friends finding one another and inspiration in a surprising but right place and time.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eAdventure Club\u003c\/em\u003e is frequently a record about learning to take up space, about feeling free to be yourself as the bullshit of our ahistoric moment mounts. There is, for instance, the riotous “Wearing Black,” a thundering and hook-bound ode to being the punk or goth amid the rainbows, sparkles, and glitter of a massive Pride Parade. “My pride’s a riot,” she sings during this anthem of self-acceptance. “Not a parade.” There is “I Love to Get High,” a tragicomic blast about enjoying weed so much it no longer works but still trying, anyway. Grace is unapologetic about her choices, howling about dabs, diesel, and her beloved sticky joints as she waits for the next fix to hit. And then there’s “Fuck You Harry Potter,” less a J.K. Rowling diss track than an inspired retelling of the moment when a soused Englishman at a bar near Grace’s St. Louis studio insisted that she reminded him of Eddie Redmayne. She went home and wrote this ripper. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eProtest songs and personal tunes have never been a binary for Grace, and she delivers some of her most profound—and, yes, playful—work ever at that particular intersection here. Written in the Onassis Foundation’s window-walled offices as tourists peered inside the fishtank, “Your God (God’s Dick)” is a hilarious, heretic, and brilliant excoriation of religious devotion, or of using God’s supposed words and one’s belief in them to fuck your fellow citizens. A balancing act among Queen, L7, and Elton Motello, it is an instantly addictive tune, a should-be-hit that feels like a brazen test of the new right’s alleged devotion to free speech. (Grace notably plays the Baglamas here, historically associated with Greek protest music, \u003cem\u003eRebetiko\u003c\/em\u003e.) Like classic power-pop propelled by Oi!’s revolutionary oomph, “Mine Me Mine” similarly lambastes endless capitalist avarice, or how it is used to manufacture suffering for others. And opener “WWIII,” a song Grace has been trying to perfect for years, is a call to solidarity against all these harmful forces, be they financiers or fascists. “I don’t want to die in World War III,” Grace sings, like Bartleby staring into an impending apocalypse with a scowl. “I don’t want to kill for blood money.”   \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut the most prominent thread through \u003cem\u003eAdventure Club\u003c\/em\u003e’s dozen tracks is one of evolution, of letting yourself become something new. In Grace’s case, that is sometimes reckoning with so-called California sobriety. “The hardest part of getting sober\/is pouring yourself out of the bottle,” she sings alongside Paris on “New Years Day” during one of the album’s most poignant moments. It is a theme song for the ever-renewing possibility of always trying again. It’s not unlike “Active Trauma,” really, a stomping number about recognizing that you can never outrun the past (even if, as Grace half-jokes, you actually \u003cem\u003erun\u003c\/em\u003e to attempt just that). You may, however, be able to overpower it, to “burn this house to the fucking ground.” The other side of this evolution is Grace simply giving herself space to have fun, as with the caffeinated hijinks of “Espresso Freddie,” penned alongside bassist Fokas. Isn’t growing up, again and again, the real Adventure Club, anyway?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGrace talks often about her age, about nearing the second half of her 40s after a lifetime as a punk. What does it mean, really, to remain a punk for 44 years? For Grace, it is the same as it’s always been—a resolve to question everything about oneself and the world around you and to allow yourself to evolve within that framework. \u003cem\u003eAdventure Club\u003c\/em\u003e epitomizes that spirit the way that the best of Laura Jane Grace’s music always has. The young punk from Florida may never have imagined making a record in Greece, but it does not change the spirit of the songs that inspired them: to create a place where we’re all burdened by less bullshit, whether it’s our own baggage or the stuff that autocrats, capitalists, and assholes simply want to put on us because they don’t know the thrill of being happy and free themselves. Maybe they need to try writing a rock song, or simply jump into the sea.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eLaura Jane Grace\/ Vocals, Guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eParis Campbell Grace\/ Vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eJacopo \"Jack\" Fokas\/ Bass Guitar, Vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eOrestis Lagadinos\/ Drums, Vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional backing vocals by Chiristina Blioumpa \u0026amp; Georgia Kollyra\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eRecorded at Villa Giusseppe, Piraeus, Greece\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eEngineered and Mixed by Jackopo Fokas\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional Engineering by Konstantinos Ragiadakos \u0026amp; Marios Adamopoulos \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eProduced by Laura Jane Grace, Jacopho Fokas \u0026amp; the Onassis Foundation\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eExecutive Producer \/ Christos Sarris\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMastered by Jason Livermore at the Blasting Room\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eArtwork by Bassment Rats\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAll songs written by Laura Jane Grace, Total Treble Music BMI, Rough Trade Publishing\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\"Wearing Black\" \u0026amp; \"I Love To Get High\" Written By Laura Jane Grace \u0026amp; Paris Campbell Grace\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\"Espresso Freddie\" written by Laura Jane Grace \u0026amp; Jacopo Fokas\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\"Poison In Me\" written by Laura Jane Grace \u0026amp; Jacocopo Fokas\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\"Walls\" Is Original Music by Laura Jane Grace featuring an English adaptation and expansion by Laura Jane Grace of the poem \"Walls\" by CP Cavafy\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Hot Pink)","offer_id":51268420796723,"sku":"PRC-507LP","price":20.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":51268420829491,"sku":"PRC-507CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape (Purple Tint)","offer_id":51268420862259,"sku":"PRC-507TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":51268420895027,"sku":"PRC-507DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Early Bird Vinyl (Black, Purple, Blue Fusion) – SOLD OUT","offer_id":51268420763955,"sku":"PRC-507LP-EB","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/LJG_AdventureClub_RetailSQ1.jpg?v=1764947051"},{"product_id":"anamanaguchi-anyway","title":"Anamanaguchi - Anyway","description":"\u003cp\u003eLast summer, after living across the country from each other for several years, the four members of \u003cstrong\u003eAnamanaguchi\u003c\/strong\u003e decided to try something new. Their label Polyvinyl had rescued the famed American Football house from potential destruction, so the band took the opportunity to move in and write together. Over the course of a month, Anamanaguchi – pioneers of hyper-melodic 8-bit rock, whose extraordinary ascent has led them to topping charts with a virtual pop star – flipped their typically meticulous digital process on its head. The result is \u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e. Written in the converted living room-turned-practice space, Anamanaguchi walked away with the most personal record of their career. And it's a rock record for the ages.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“Crazy sounds come from normal-looking houses,“ notes singer\/songwriter\/guitarist Peter Berkman. “We made the decision to be physically in the same room for nearly every step, writing everything as a group instead of editing and tweaking files over the internet.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe band brought these demos to Grammy-winning rock producer Dave Fridmann (The Flaming Lips, MGMT, Sleater-Kinney), whose old school approach drove the point home. Once again staying under the same roof – this time at the Fridmann family’s cozy Tarbox Road Studios in western New York – they recorded \u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e straight to tape, uniting around live instruments and lyrics sung by everybody in the band. Fridmann encouraged live tracking and spontaneous performances, which were shaped by Luke Silas’ propulsive drumming. The album’s analog sound comes in part from their search for vintage gear, including an extremely rare set of Marshall guitar cabinet speakers from the late-1960s – previously used on recordings by Jimi Hendrix, Van Halen, Nirvana, and Weezer – that give Berkman and co-guitarist\/vocalist Ary Warnaar their distinct sound. “Every detail came from this need to do it right the first time,” Berkman notes about this significant shift for such consummate tinkerers. Adds bassist\/vocalist James DeVito, “This time there was no undo button, no alternate versions. The decisions had to be made before, not after.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAt first, Anamanaguchi aimed to explore rage as the record's main theme, reflecting the various frustrations of the world. But quickly they found themselves distracted by having fun together, and \u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e instead captures a band creatively and personally energized: the experience of four best friends reviving their connection in a disconnected world. As Anamanaguchi has always been an instrumental band, the decision to sing suddenly confronted them with the question of what the band’s voice would ultimately be. They explore this newfound power in every song, making it their most emotionally resonant work yet. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"The overarching theme of \u003cem\u003e[USA]\u003c\/em\u003e was about a voice forming and learning how to speak–a kind of artificial one. \u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e is the next step – it’s about discovering the band’s voice,” Berkman explains. “There’s a now-or-never feeling to it, a kind of ‘why not.’ Loss is a part of life, no one is immune to it. There’s that Phil Ochs song ‘When I’m Gone:’ ‘you won’t find me singin’ on this song when I’m gone, my pen won’t pour a lyric line when I’m gone, so I guess I’ll have to do it while I’m here.’ We’re making the most of our lives and what we love doing which happens to be writing, playing, and singing music all together.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e has moments of anger, love, humor, paranoia, and sadness – but the band’s sense of light-heartedness shines through. On “Rage (Kitchen Sink),” the band confront loneliness and boredom, two epidemics of the digital age that seem to be humanity’s only common bond. The anthemic, fuzzed-out “Magnet” is about the surreal attraction that’s possible between two people – a feeling echoed by the combination of such a heavy track with delicate lyrics. The power-pop ballad “Darcie” finds inspiration in small gestures from a local unsung hero, who brightens their lives and allows unforeseen amounts of fun to happen. Taut and dynamic, “Buckwild” is a rock sing-along that serves as the album’s genesis story: a band making an effort to do something new, while accepting the risks that may bring. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFormed in New York in the mid-2000s, Anamanaguchi made their name with emotionally-charged turbo-electric experiments in chiptune. Known for programming their early music on Nintendo cartridges you can actually play, their accomplishments include scoring \u003cem\u003eScott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game\u003c\/em\u003e and launching one of music’s most successful crowdfunded projects to this day with their Kickstarter for their debut album \u003cem\u003eEndless Fantasy\u003c\/em\u003e. The band’s reputation for innovation grew worldwide, leading them to develop and release their own experimental video game (\u003cem\u003eCapsule Silence XXIV\u003c\/em\u003e), as well as to officially collaborate and perform with the virtual pop star Hatsune Miku on her hologram tour (their collaborative hit “Miku” is not just her biggest English language song to date, it’s also recently a prominent music fixture of Epic Games’ global smash hit \u003cem\u003eFortnite\u003c\/em\u003e). They even launched a pizza into space. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003e[USA]\u003c\/em\u003e, Anamanaguchi’s critically-acclaimed second album and debut for Polyvinyl, anticipated a crucial cultural shift in moving from escapist, nostalgic fantasy to a more introspective exploration of digital identity. Described by\u003cem\u003e Pitchfork\u003c\/em\u003e as the band’s “most emotionally grounded record,” \u003cem\u003e[USA]\u003c\/em\u003e laid the foundation for the openness and honesty that defines \u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e. Where \u003cem\u003e[USA]\u003c\/em\u003e made sense of life online, their third album \u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e ventures into the world outside the front door.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAnamanaguchi’s greatest strength isn’t their devotion to doing things differently, or their ability to translate net-life into emotionally resonant tunes – though they are incredible at both. It’s the way their actual, enduring friendships have allowed them to evolve together. “We’ve always stretched the limits of what counts as ‘being a band’,” says Warnaar, “but \u003cem\u003eAnyway\u003c\/em\u003e honors that special glue that’s kept us together all along.” \u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAll songs written by Anamanaguchi\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eSome lyrics by Josh Knapp\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003ePeter Berkman - Guitar, vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAry Warnaar - Guitar, vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eJames DeVito - Bass, vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eLuke Silas - Drums, vocals\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eProduced, Recorded and Mixed by Dave Fridmann at Tarbox Road Studios, Cassadaga, N.Y. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional Production by Anamanaguchi.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional Editing by Geoffrey Mutchnick\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAssistant Engineering by Michael Fridmann.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eVocal Engineering by Casey Di Iorio\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMastered by Chris Gehringer at Sterling Sound, Edgewater, NJ.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eRecorded June 2024 at Tarbox Road Studios, Cassadaga, NY, and August 2024 at Valve Studios, Dallas, TX.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eArt Direction: Simon Whybray\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eDesign: Supermodel\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003ePhotography: Anna Longworth\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Red w\/ Black, White, Yellow Splatter)","offer_id":51462339232051,"sku":"PRC-508LP-EB","price":32.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Black-in-Red)","offer_id":51463056785715,"sku":"PRC-508LP","price":30.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD (Red Jewel Case)","offer_id":52746482975027,"sku":"PRC-508CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD (Clear Jewel Case)","offer_id":51463056851251,"sku":"PRC-508CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape","offer_id":51463056884019,"sku":"PRC-508TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":51462339264819,"sku":"PRC-508DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/Anamanaguchi_Anyway_SQ1.jpg?v=1754626837"},{"product_id":"jay-som-belong","title":"Jay Som - Belong","description":"\u003cp\u003eWhere, you are almost certainly asking, has \u003cstrong\u003eJay Som \u003c\/strong\u003ebeen? \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSix years ago, in 2019, Melina Duterte released \u003cem\u003eAnak Ko\u003c\/em\u003e, the expansive sophomore album from the project that had quickly grown far beyond its so-called bedroom pop origins into something resembling an actual band. Duterte still wrote and produced that Jay Som record, but her friends now surrounded her, playing parts of their own. But when a shuttered touring industry scrapped Jay Som’s ambitious 2020 plans, Duterte realized she had long needed a reset from the road after several years of constant pivots between touring and writing, anyway. She decided to splurge on herself and her lifelong interest in recording, funneling her government stimulus check into a piece of dream gear she’d repeatedly seen advertised—a vintage Neve console. She committed herself to manuals and online tutorials, peppering experienced friends with questions about becoming more than her own home-recording engineer. Five years later, she’s got a rich résumé of album credits, guest spots alongside the likes of Troye Sivan and beabadoobee, the centerpiece of the \u003cem\u003eI Saw the TV Glow\u003c\/em\u003e soundtrack, and a Grammy for her work on \u003cem\u003eThe Record\u003c\/em\u003e by boygenius, the band she subsequently joined as a touring member. Yes, Jay Som itself has been on a bit of a break; Duterte, however, has perhaps been busier than ever.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen Duterte reckoned the time had come to revisit Jay Som, she did not pretend to be hidebound by the project’s past. Instead, she let the half-decade of life she’d lived and work she’d done since releasing \u003cem\u003eAnak Ko\u003c\/em\u003e filter not only into her songs but also her process. The new friends she’d actually had time to make in Los Angeles now that she was off the road—especially Joao Gonzalez (of Soft Glas) and Mal Hauser (a collaborator to Mk.gee and Illuminati Hotties)—became key partners, as Duterte opened her music to others like never before. But she also opened up her music to herself and her memories, writing songs that revisited the sounds of her youth with the benefit of her experiences as a musician, producer, and performer. She was neither shy about her influences nor limited about where they might lead her. And so no previous Jay Som album sounds quite like the new \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e, a gripping 11-song set about self-definition and, well, belonging, that floats between supercharged power-pop hits and hazy ballads, between electronic curiosities and lighters-up anthems. It is a map of the first 31 years of Duterte’s life, all leading to the present that is \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“When you try something for the first time, you’re always going to hold some type of fear, but I had to come to terms with the fact that I had to let go of some control,” she explains. “This record is essentially still me, but a lot of choices were made by friends who helped me, because I trusted them.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eDuterte grew up with rock radio outside of San Francisco, memorizing the hits of early ’00s pop-punk and emo as a teen. Though she was 400 miles north along the California coast, The O.C. soundtracks—Imogen Heap, Bloc Party, Death Cab for Cutie, and so on—became major touchstones, too. You immediately hear the collision of it all in “Float,” the first song Duterte wrote for \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e. She was experimenting with the vocal synths that still frame the intro when a melody spilled out, inspiring the riff that soon slashes between those sampled synths and the buoyant beat. A top-down radio wonder, its massive chorus—“Float, don’t fight\/I’m not the same”—documents the toggle between pressing into the unknown and trying the unexpected or staying still and doing what you have always done in a push to stay safe and sane. Fittingly, that is Jimmy Eat World’s Jim Adkins, one of those childhood heroes, offering background vocals; that’s a first for a Jay Som album, as Duterte pulls past and future toward an explosive present. Duterte grins unabashedly at her adolescent impulses, too, during “Casino Stars,” a lusty bit of acoustic emo about betting everything on love and trusting that this time you leave a winner. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“I turned 30 while I was making this record. There is a portion of your 20s about being cool and hip and who can come up with the craziest ideas,” says Duterte, who also began her longest relationship ever while recording \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e. (The new couple even adopted a dog.) “But as I’ve gotten older, I am more nostalgic about the music I experienced and want to relive that—by being inspired by that music.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThose aren’t, of course, the only references she brandishes. Where “D.H.” bops like a prime piece of garage-rock smeared with the stain of, say, Sonic Youth, “Appointments” is a beautiful waltz between the sad-eyed wonder of Elliott Smith and the twilit glow of Phoebe Bridgers. Despite those kinships, it is a deeply personal reflection on rejection, acceptance, and imposter syndrome, or the realization that, even as we allegedly become good at something, we’re still capable of flaws and fears. “Missed your appointment\/Your head on my lap,” she sings softly over chiming guitars as the second verse begins. “Changed your phone background\/Smiling again.” It’s about finding a way to make it through these hangups, about enduring. In a way, all of \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e’s songs carry that implicit message—if you can’t embrace the sounds of your heroes to sort through your own mess, what are you doing, anyway?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e, though, isn’t just Duterte’s record. Many of these songs emerged from relationships rooted in friendship first, collaboration second. Duterte and Gonzalez, for instance, became true pals only after she stopped touring so hard. When he brought her a sample early in the writing process, telling her it reminded him of Jay Som, she immediately agreed, the stuttering rhythm inspiring the melody that became “What You Need.” They built the song together, eventually moving beyond a beat borrowed from “Young Folks” to something that is as springy yet sad as the lyrics, a tight-rope walk between adoration and annoyance. Addictive on first listen, it’s a subtle wonder of production, too, its layers of drums and curdled synths serving as a platform for the bright guitars that bend through it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThough Duterte has never been one for special guests on Jay Som’s intimate records, Hayley Williams had insisted on singing together at some point since the band opened for Paramore in 2018. So Duterte and Steph Marziano—another new friend who has written with Bartees Strange and Cassandra Jenkins and who began working and hanging with Duterte after Williams introduced them—went to Nashville to try a song together. Williams’ soft harmonies on the arcing “Past Lives” reinforce its forlorn sense of drifting in and out of doldrums, of finding momentum only to watch it fade. It is a powerhouse of a tune, its downshifted midsection landing like a fistfight with oneself. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAnd while Duterte’s production credits have mounted spectacularly since 2020, she knows enough to know she might not always know best. As she neared the end of \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e, she went to Philadelphia’s Headroom Studios, where producer Kyle Pulley told her that, simply as a Jay Som fan, he wanted to hear more of her. This became her first time working with another producer on Jay Som, yet another sign of her opening the band to others’ ideas. You can detect that insight and burgeoning conviction from the very first notes she sings on opener “Cards On The Table,” a brilliant piece of electronic pop where her warped voice cascades over tessellated drum machines and synths. (By the way, that’s Lexi Vega, of Mini Trees, offering harmonies; again, she, Williams, and Adkins are Jay Som’s first-ever guest vocalists, representing Duterte’s push to try new things with people she trusts.) The track is a pronouncement of renewed intentions for Jay Som, running from those first notes through the underwater experimentation of “Meander” and to the wall of noise and field recordings that end the finale, “Want It All.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThough “Want It All” is the capstone for \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e, it is also the thesis, the moment where Duterte makes the push and pull she feels in her life and career right now abundantly clear. For the better part of six years, she mostly checked out of Jay Som, cultivating and tending to the other side of her artistry. Now that she has returned to the band itself, she wonders where she belongs within an indie rock ecosystem, or how much of the rest of her life and work she is willing to give up to live up to that role. This is why she named these songs \u003cem\u003eBelong\u003c\/em\u003e, after all, as she tries to figure out where she fits into the wider world as an artist, producer, and person. “Do you really want to go? Will you hate what you will find?” she sings near the start of that title track, built on a seesaw of repetition. Duterte doesn’t know the answer yet, how she balances being an acclaimed and in-demand producer with being a proper bandleader, too. She just knows that Jay Som is back, invigorated by more ideas, experiences, and inputs than it’s ever enjoyed before.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAll songs written, composed, and performed by Melina Duterte, Joao Gonzalez, Mal Hauser, Steph Marziano, and Madden Klass\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eProduced by Melina Duterte, Joao Gonzalez, Kyle Pulley, Mal Hauser, and Steph Marziano\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eRecorded at EMA Studios in Los Angeles CA, Headroom Studios in Philadelphia PA, and Klass Drums in Los Angeles CA\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eEngineered by Melina Duterte, Kyle Pulley, Steph Marziano, and Johanna Baumann\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAssistant Engineering by Theo Cobb, Meredith Glover, Eli Glovas-Kurtz\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMixed by Melina Duterte and Kyle Pulley\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMastered by Ruairi O'Flaherty at Nomograph Mastering\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eArt design \u0026amp; layout by Sab Mai\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Early Bird Vinyl (Lavender Sky Swirl)","offer_id":51759889285427,"sku":"PRC-517LP-EB","price":26.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Indigo \u0026 Cerulean Splatter)","offer_id":52813074628915,"sku":"PRC-9717LP-SPTFY","price":27.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (White)","offer_id":51759889318195,"sku":"PRC-517LP","price":24.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":51759889350963,"sku":"PRC-517CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape","offer_id":51759889383731,"sku":"PRC-517TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":51759889416499,"sku":"PRC-517DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/JaySom_Belong_SQ1wlogo_b7e2992e-9a3d-4b63-9df0-fc31bb2db2b7.jpg?v=1760070591"},{"product_id":"xiu-xiu-xiu-mutha-fuckin-xiu-vol-1","title":"Xiu Xiu - Xiu Mutha Fuckin' Xiu: Vol. 1","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe most exciting and terrifying parts of dreams (or nightmares) are the ones we recognize. Familiar fragments collide and reassemble into something strange. Things we thought we knew are turned upside down or ripped apart and sewn together backwards. That unnerving thrill — the shiver of recognition followed by disorientation — is at the core of \u003cem\u003eXiu Mutha Fuckin' Xiu: Vol. 1\u003c\/em\u003e, the latest collection of covers from prolific music provocateurs \u003cstrong\u003eXiu Xiu\u003c\/strong\u003e. Jamie Stewart, Angela Seo and David Kendrick warp and distort classics spanning decades and genres — from 1950s rock n’ roll to new wave, Robyn to Throbbing Gristle.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eXiu Xiu are no strangers to interpretation. Since the group’s inception in 2002, they’ve regularly paid homage to artists they revere — from New Order’s “Ceremony” (featured on \u003cem\u003eChapel Of Chimes\u003c\/em\u003e EP) to David Bowie and Queen’s “Under Pressure” (for 2008’s \u003cem\u003eWomen As Lovers\u003c\/em\u003e).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThey’ve done tribute albums — 2013’s \u003cem\u003eNina\u003c\/em\u003e, honoring Nina Simone, and 2016’s \u003cem\u003eXiu Xiu Plays the Music of Twin Peaks\u003c\/em\u003e — cementing their reputation for considered reimaginings. Across twelve tracks, \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eXiu Mutha Fuckin' Xiu: Vol. 1\u003c\/em\u003e compiles a heady selection of monthly covers the band began releasing in 2020 through their subscription series via Bandcamp, expanding their bewildering universe to commune with artists throughout time. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor Xiu Xiu, covers aren’t about improvement, but reverence. “We never approach them thinking ‘how can we improve these’ but really ‘what can we learn from these,’” Stewart says of the process. Xiu Xiu explores the music that’s moved them, as if each artist were a singular creative deity. The result is “a small honorific offering to the muse that created us.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSome covers are a shadowed vision of the original, zooming in on the song’s pronounced aura. The Runaways’ “Cherry Bomb” bratty defiance funneled through industrial pulses and slithering percussion — a ticking time bomb of acidic distortion and rebellion. Their version of Talking Heads’ “Psycho Killer” is reborn with howling ‘60s organs, flute spirals, and swirls of reverbed vocals. It feels older than the original, as if Question Mark \u0026amp; The Mysterians or 13th Floor Elevators have been drawn into the conversation. Other reworkings with Robyn’s “Dancing On My Own,” or GloRilla’s “Lick Or Sum” unearth new understandings of contemporary hits. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eCertain songs provided unexpected obstacles. “In Dreams” tested the limits of Stewart's vocal prowess; Coil’s “Triple Sun” allowed them the opportunity to study a band that listeners are constantly linking them to; Stewart was moved to tears while recording Daniel Johnston’s “Some Things Last a Long Time”— “If there ever were a sincere and wounded voice in the world it is his.” On \u003cem\u003eXMFX\u003c\/em\u003e, Xiu Xiu reshapes echoes of pop history into séances, lucid dreams, and sonic rituals — breathing new life into music’s past through a years-long, sustainable practice.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003col\u003e\n\u003cli\u003ePsycho Killer [Talking Heads]\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWarm Leatherette [The Normal]\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eI Put a Spell on You [Screamin’ Jay Hawkins]\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eHamburger Lady [Throbbing Gristle]\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIn Dreams [Roy Orbison]\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSex Dwarf [Soft Cell]\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eDancing on My Own [Robyn]\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSPQR [This Heat]\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eLick or Sum [Glo Rilla]\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSome Things Last a Long Time [Daniel Johnston]\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTriple Sun [Coil]\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eCherry Bomb [The Runaways]\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ol\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMusic played by \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eTim Berne - alto saxophone \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMary Halverson - guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eDavid Kendrick - drum set\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eTony Malaby - tenor saxophone\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eFabrizio Modonese Palumbo - viola, vox\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAngela Seo - vox, backing vox, synths, percussion\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eChes Smith - drum set\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eJamie Stewart - vox, guitar, drum machine, synths, organ, bass, piano\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eHouda Zakeri - backing vox\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eRecorded in Los Angeles at Nurse and Berlin at Krankenschwester\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMastered by Alan Douches in Hudson Valley at West Westside \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eDesign by Janelle Abad\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eThis record would not be possible without the past \u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u0026amp; present mind bogglingly generous XMFX subscribers.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Vinyl (Red Ripple Vinyl)","offer_id":52765353869619,"sku":"PRC-520LP","price":22.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":52765353902387,"sku":"PRC-520CD","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape","offer_id":52765353935155,"sku":"PRC-520TAPE","price":12.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Digital","offer_id":52765353967923,"sku":"PRC-520DIGITAL","price":10.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0881\/7655\/8387\/files\/XiuXiu_XMFX_RetailISQ1.jpg?v=1770762062"},{"product_id":"american-football-american-football-lp4","title":"American Football - American Football (LP4)","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe quietest voices don’t just endure — sometimes they deepen.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor a band once defined by understatement, \u003cstrong\u003eAmerican Football\u003c\/strong\u003e has become something increasingly rare: one whose stature has grown less by nostalgia than through patience, self-interrogation and the long view. Since reuniting in 2014 after a decade-plus dormancy, American Football hasn’t simply returned to its past. It has moved forward in parallel with its audience, writing music that reflects the disorientation, compromise, grief and hard-won perspective of middle age.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIts fourth self-titled album \u003cem\u003e(LP4)\u003c\/em\u003e is the clearest and most satisfying expression of that evolution yet. It’s simultaneously the band’s darkest and most playful, its most complex and — paradoxically — its most generous. Throughout, \u003cem\u003eLP4\u003c\/em\u003e stares matter-of-factly at despair while refusing the comforts of melodrama or easy resolution.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIndeed, on “Patron Saint of Pale,” frontman Mike Kinsella proposes playing Rock Paper Scissors with his soon-to-be ex-wife as a way to avoid signing their divorce papers. And on the gripping, eight-minute “Bad Moons,” he jokes about actually being two little kids disguised in a trench coat rather than a flesh-and-blood 40-something dad of two teens, before the reality of the situation can no longer be avoided: “I lost my mind in the dark \/ I told all my lies in the dark \/ I poured my drinks in the dark \/ I explored new kinks in the dark,” he sings, his voice seemingly cracking at times under the cold, hard truths.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“That's the one where I was like, ‘Oh, fuck. My mom's gonna listen to this.’ But I’m proud of it,” Kinsella says. “I think only a grown person would think those things or say those things, and I'm a grown man.” “Those are not funny lyrics,” drummer Steve Lamos adds, “but there’s a weird ‘fuck it’ to the whole thing that I love.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat restless desire to grow and evolve has guided American Football since its return. The band’s 1999 self-titled debut became a touchstone almost accidentally — a record whose elliptical lyrics and interlocking guitar lines sneakily rewired Midwestern emo and post-rock alike. During the 2014 tour, the quartet was surprised to find itself playing larger rooms than it ever had the first time around. “It felt like stumbling into being a mid-level band without having earned it,” guitarist Steve Holmes says of those first shows back.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut over time, American Football leapfrogged existing as a mere reunion act and instead became a vibrant, ongoing concern. \u003cem\u003eLP2\u003c\/em\u003e (2016) and \u003cem\u003eLP3\u003c\/em\u003e (2019) documented that transition — the former cautious and connective, the latter expansive, exploratory and welcoming of new voices such as Paramore’s Hayley Williams and Slowdive’s Rachel Goswell. \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eLP4\u003c\/em\u003e completes this arc with one astonishing song after another.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“The charm of the first record is that it could have only been made by kids,” Holmes says. “This record could only have been made by adults. There's a swagger that comes with the confidence of having done this for a long time, and there’s gravitas to Mike's lyrics. There's still breakup and heartbreak in there, but it’s much more real.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eLP4\u003c\/em\u003e was initially born out of an interruption. After touring \u003cem\u003eLP3\u003c\/em\u003e in 2019,  the band planned a break. The pandemic stretched that pause into a three-year hiatus, during which Lamos, by day a college English professor in Colorado, stepped away for personal and professional reasons. Attempts to write remotely faltered. “It was not easy to do on Zoom,” Holmes admits. “And honestly, it wasn’t clicking.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the meantime, Kinsella and his cousin Nate channeled some of that material into an album for their synth-y side project, LIES, sharpening their shared language in the process and beginning the relationship with Sonny DiPerri, who they enlisted to mix. When Lamos returned and the band reconvened in earnest, something shifted. “It felt much more like a band again,” Lamos says. “There was a certain organic piece to this one that harkened back to what I associate with the first record.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Kinsellas then suggested recording \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eLP4\u003c\/em\u003e in Stinson Beach, Ca., with DiPerri (My Bloody Valentine, Trent Reznor), whose presence proved crucial. “Sonny was a great, calming influence,” Holmes says. “Thanks to his energy and approach, it was easy for me to do what I felt like I needed to do,” Lamos explains. “For me personally as a player, this is maybe the best representation of what I would want to say on the drums.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAmerican Football also overhauled its process. Nate Kinsella devised an elaborate system of scratch tracks and modular demos, allowing ideas to evolve before the band ever entered the studio, while touring members Cory Bracken and Mike Garzon added the kinds of subtle touches that have made them indispensable onstage. “This record would not exist in the way it does without Nate masterminding a lot of the sonic details,” Holmes says. “He’s our Brian Eno or Jonny Greenwood.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe result is American Football’s most sonically ambitious album: layered, dissonant, occasionally confrontational and always deeply felt. Piano, vibraphone, synths, trumpet and unexpected harmonic and tonal shifts disrupt the band’s famously smooth surfaces but invite new levels of depth and discovery. “The goal was to make the best record we could possibly make and not worry about how we’re going to recreate it live,” Holmes laughs. “That’s somebody else’s problem — which is currently our problem.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat ambition is evident immediately. Expansive opener “Man Overboard” is built around a knotty, almost prog-like drum pattern that Lamos admits he had to later relearn. Lyrically, it sets the tone: resignation without self-pity, isolation rendered in stark maritime imagery. “I was born castaway \/ Lost at sea,” Kinsella sings, before the devastating refrain “Man overboard \/ It’s hopeless” previews what’s to come.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAcross \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eLP4\u003c\/em\u003e, Kinsella’s narratives are unflinchingly heavy. Suicide, shame, divorce, addiction, self-loathing and rebirth all surface, often within the same song. “If you read the lyrics on the page, they can seem grim,” Holmes says. “But there’s hope in them.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThat tension is central to the album’s emotional arc. “It feels like stages of grief to me,” Lamos offers. “Raging against how things work, and then increasing moments of acceptance as the record goes on.” Mike Kinsella doesn’t frame it so explicitly, but acknowledges the weight. “The goal has always been to say something giant and heavy in a very plain way,” he says. “On this record, I keep things a little more vague — and I think that makes it more honest.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSongs like “No Feeling” and “No Soul To Save” flirt openly with annihilation, yet the music beneath them is lush, even inviting. “Bad Moons” stitches together two previously unrelated demos into a towering release Holmes describes as “maybe our most cathartic song ever,” while “Desdemona” threads phased, wordless vocals straight out of Steve Reich’s \u003cem\u003eMusic for 18 Musicians\u003c\/em\u003e through the kinds of classic American Football guitar lines that still make people cry in bedrooms around the globe (“It's incredible,” Mike Kinsella raves about the musical juxtaposition. “That might actually be my favorite part of the record”).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eGuest vocalists further deepen the world of \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eLP4\u003c\/em\u003e. Longtime peer Caithlin De Marrais of Rainer Maria brings history and familiarity to “Blood on My Blood,” Wisp’s Natalie Lu provides the perfect ethereal contrast on the almost poppy “Wake Her Up” and Turnstile’s Brendan Yates contributes a key vocal harmony on “No Feeling” that was recorded the day after the band casually asked if he’d like to stop by DiPerri’s L.A. studio. Says Nate Kinsella, “There’s a shimmery, sort of silver quality to his voice when he sings high and nails those long pitches. It’s so beyond what I expected on that song.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAmerican Football now speaks with rare authority — not because Kinsella has raised his voice, but because he’s earned the weight behind it. \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eLP4\u003c\/em\u003e stands as a document of endurance, friendship, creative trust and the strange grace of growing older without growing static.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e“From the instrumentation to the arrangements to Nate running into a microphone and apologizing and us leaving it on the album, I’m really proud of the decisions we made,” Mike Kinsella says. “We’ve gotten nothing but better at writing songs.  We worked together way better than we ever had before. This album is a leap of faith, musically, but I’m proud of us for being ambitious enough to try something different.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cdiv\u003e\u003c\/div\u003e\n\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAmerican Football is Mike Kinsella, Nate Kinsella, Steve Holmes \u0026amp; Steve Lamos\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAll songs written and performed by American Football\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eProduced by Sonny DiPerri and American Football\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMixed by Sonny DiPerri at Octopus Beak\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional Engineering by Nate Kinsella\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eRecorded at Panoramic House, Shirk Studios, Open House Contemporary and Octopus Beak\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMastered by Stephen Marcussen at Marcussen Mastering\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAssisted by John Baccigaluppi, Jeff Kolhede, Stephen Shirk and Zach Capitti Fenton\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eVibraphone on all songs and additional synthesis on “Man Overboard,” “Blood On My Blood,” “No Feeling,” and \"Bad Moons\" by Cory Bracken\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional production on “Bad Moons” by Nate Kinsella\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional writing on “Blood On My Blood” by Cory Bracken\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eViolin on “Bad Moons” by Ben Russell\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional Vocals on “No Feeling” by Brendan Yates\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAdditional Vocals on “Wake Her Up” by Natalie R. 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In crafting a collage of landscapes and characters (Williams wrote over thirty songs in the process), she skillfully weaves together a timeless love album. Just as the generational richness of Williams’ voice cuts through each track’s darkness or playfulness, so does an unmistakable depth of feeling. Love for friends, for landscape, for relentless touring, for her own ideas and feelings, for life itself, for some elusive lover Williams chases to each of her stops along the road. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSpanning 2024 and 2025, the writing process for \u003cem\u003eSay A Prayer\u003c\/em\u003e is an account of the locations and the characters Williams encountered as she traveled across vast American biomes: “Canyons of New Mexico \/ Factories of Indiana \/ Bunkers of California \/ Harbors of New England calling \/ She ends up in borderlands \/ She ends up in familiar places.” Williams chronicles the changing landscapes of a solo traveller, untethered to anyone or anything other than the experience itself, and bolstered by a vast network of friends and companions.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTracked live at makeshift studio Merry Meadow in Door County, WI with a cast of Chicago music heads including co-producers Seth Engel and Jack Henry, and later painstakingly refined and rerecorded to perfection in Asheville, NC at Alex Farrar’s Drop of Sun studios, \u003cem\u003eSay a Prayer\u003c\/em\u003e’s production mirrors its songwriting process. In addition to Dave Hartley (The War on Drugs) and Seth Kauffman (Angel Olsen), both of whom played on Williams’ 2023 album \u003cem\u003eTomorrow’s Fire\u003c\/em\u003e, Williams enlisted a cast of friends including Dimitri Giannopolous (Horse Jumper of Love), Sofia Jensen (Free Range), Clay Frankel (Twin Peaks), Andy Krull (Red PK), Book not Brooke (Babywave), and even family members Jameson, Jesse, and Nate Williams. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFarrar, a producer known for a prolific indie rock sound (Wednesday, MJ Lenderman), surprised Williams by amplifying the quietest, most delicate aspects of her music. “He was encouraging me to lean into this ethereal, yet grounded, spacious yet textured folk music that’s so true to the early days of Squirrel Flower,” Williams states. “It felt like a breakthrough.” Exemplified by the sparkling acoustic arrangement of 12-string guitars, recorder, and accordion on lead single “Reelin,” Williams envelops herself in a shimmering and timeless sound inspired by legendary wild-women Stevie Nicks, Linda Ronstadt, and Joni Mitchell. Williams herself draws from the independent spirits of her heroes, setting scenes both domestic and cosmic, “Trash on Sunday, boy in the yard”—before letting her love and the road take her where they will: “‘Til bad things call me back again.”\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis energy deepens with “Not Me,” a heartland rock single emerging from a dream Williams had one night in New Mexico, in which the subtleties of her voice demand room to shine. “I’d been listening to Linda Ronstadt so much when I wrote it,” says Williams, “and I think that really came through. I wanted to just sing.” Ringing with the tensions of desire and independence, the heartfelt track follows the pop effortlessness of “Cleveland.” Co-written with Ella’s sibling Nate, a first for the typically solo songwriter, “Cleveland” toys with a classic love story in the context of the unmoored angst held by so many young people: “It’s a love song, but she’s choosing the city over the boy,” says Williams.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eHalfway through the tracklist lies “Highway Woman,” the thematic heart of the album. Somewhere between autobiography and fiction, the song earnestly displays Williams’ commitment to a creative life and to the process of creation itself. “I’m singing about myself, to myself, but also to and about every wild person who lives on the margins, on the wind, on the road, who flirts with immortality through art and restlessness.” Williams navigates a bohemian lifestyle in an era that refuses to accommodate it, and catalogues her life in an attempt to grasp some form of independence and immortality: “She’ll never be yours and yours alone \/ She doesn’t plan on dying.” The recording captures Williams’ voice with newfound clarity; she has never sounded so much like herself. Layers of acoustic guitars draw in and comfort weary listeners as guitarist Andy Krull’s crooning beckons them back out to the road. \u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn many ways, \u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eSay A Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going\u003c\/em\u003e is about itself, about the process of its creation on the road. That isn’t to say that \u003cem\u003eSay a Prayer\u003c\/em\u003e is a travelogue. It’s more of a bittersweet testament to exploration and self-possession, longing and musing. Vividly personal, it’s like a set of abandoned scrapbooks filled with ephemera, harvested from the side of the dusty freeway by some highway woman over her decades, piled up in a banker’s box in a backyard shed, tenuously protected from a desert monsoon. Past experiences lovingly chronicled, the future remains open for Williams as she hopes for a sign to help her know when to get going and when to stay still. “And this life is free \/ ‘You gotta take what you can get’ \/ Not me”.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003eAll songs written by Ella Williams except “Cleveland,” written by Ella Williams \u0026amp; Nate Williams.\u003cbr\u003eVocal harmony on “Highway Woman” co-written by Seth Engel.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eRecorded at Merry Meadow (Door County, WI) and Drop of Sun (Asheville, NC)\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eProduced by Ella Williams, Alex Farrar, Seth Engel \u0026amp; Jack Henry Lickerman\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eEngineered by Alex Farrar, Seth Engel \u0026amp; Jack Henry Lickerman\u003cbr\u003eAssistant Engineer: Lawson Alderson\u003cbr\u003eAdditional Engineering on “Surfing USA”: Eric Kilburn at Wellspring Sound Studio\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMixed by Alex Farrar\u003cbr\u003eMastered by Bob Weston\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eMUSICIANS\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eElla Williams (\u003cem\u003eall tracks\u003c\/em\u003e) — voice, guitar, Fender Rhodes, accordion, recorder, percussion\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAlex Farrar (\u003cem\u003eSay a Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eCleveland\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eHighway Woman\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eReelin\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eSurfing USA\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eWeightless, Untethered\u003c\/em\u003e) — bass, guitar, drums, piano, keys, percussion\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eSeth Engel (\u003cem\u003eSay a Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eHelicopters\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eFoot Thick Ice\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eSick Tooth\u003c\/em\u003e) — bass, drums\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eJack Henry Lickerman (\u003cem\u003eSay a Prayer to the Gods of Getting Going\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eHelicopters\u003c\/em\u003e) — drums\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eAndy Krull (\u003cem\u003eCleveland\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eHelicopters\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eHighway Woman\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eFoot Thick Ice\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eSick Tooth\u003c\/em\u003e) — guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eDave Hartley (\u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eHighway Woman\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eFought a Hornet\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eWeightless, Untethered\u003c\/em\u003e) — bass\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eNate Williams (\u003cem\u003eCleveland\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e) — voice\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eDimitri Giannopoulos (\u003cem\u003eCleveland\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e) — guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eClay Frankel (\u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eReelin\u003c\/em\u003e) — viola, voice\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eSofia Jensen (\u003cem\u003eHelicopters\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eFoot Thick Ice\u003c\/em\u003e) — Fender Rhodes\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eJameson Williams (\u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e) — guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eSeth Kauffman (\u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e) — guitar\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eChris Simmons (\u003cem\u003eNot Me\u003c\/em\u003e) — drums\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eBook Not Brooke (\u003cem\u003eFought a Hornet\u003c\/em\u003e) — cello\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp class=\"isSelectedEnd\"\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003eJesse Williams (\u003cem\u003eWeightless, Untethered\u003c\/em\u003e) — bass\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan style=\"color: rgb(255, 42, 0);\"\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e","brand":"Polyvinyl Records","offers":[{"title":"Early Bird Vinyl (Cloudy Coke Bottle Clear)","offer_id":53495524655411,"sku":"PRC-526LP-EB","price":23.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true},{"title":"Vinyl (Sage 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