April 2022, Nekrogoblikon, PUP, Windrunner, Chase Petra, chloe moriondo
Nekrogoblikon - The Fundamental Slimes and Humors (Mystery Box)
California’s favorite goblin-based metal band is back with their sixth studio album. Being someone who doesn’t usually enjoy metal full lengths I was pleased to find this is all over the map in terms of heavy music, there are symphonic tracks as well as songs that veer all the way to thrash or hardcore. There is a definite cartoonish influence as well with some Dr. Seuss-esque backing vocals or synth riffs but the apex of that is the track “Going to Die.” In this one we get a number that sounds like a scene in a Disney musical where the whole village comes together in song complete with horns, some clear interaction with the world around the protagonist and even the classic sound of a banana peel slip.
I find myself enjoying the record all the way through for the variety but find the record doesn’t quite stick the landing on “No Such Thing as a Key.” It’s a more doom inspired track with sort of grating vocals and instrumental ideas that aren’t quite interesting enough to carry all the way through the six-minute run time.
PUP - THE UNRAVELING OF PUPTHEBAND (Rise / BMG)
Over the years, I’ve seen a lot of love for Canadian punks PUP and on this album cycle decided it was finally my time to try to get in on the excitement. There’s a lot to love here too! I really enjoy the brutal honesty, especially when taking shots at the music industry, that gives a lot of these songs a comedic element to them. There is also this sense of writing about unconventional things such as treating your home computer or your first guitar as a person who you’re growing apart from without making it sound cheesy or capitalist in nature. There is also this sense, sonically, where everything sounds grand and well produced without ever sacrificing the punk rock nature of the whole thing.
For all my praises though I don’t love the record. That, truly is, the only thing sonically we have going on and by track eight or so starts to make me lose interest and maybe get easily distracted. Which doesn't sound like a good chunk of the record but when you consider this thing is twelve tracks with three interludes it gets to be a good portion of the whole thing getting away from you.
Windrunner - Tan (Famined)
Metalcore band from Hanoi, Vietnam has released their second full-length. I was initially very attracted to this record mainly due to them being from a place that doesn’t really have a thriving scene and wasn’t expecting too much mainly because, as I said above, I’m not someone who's generally very into metal as a whole. What I found, however, was a band that is very talented and skilled at what they do between the grooving bass lines, smooth deliveries and intense breakdowns. I do have my reservations however. A lot of these songs are really dragged out, take the intro track for example that is really exciting as an entrance but at two and a half minutes could definitely stand to be cut short especially when so much of the track is repeating chugs. That and this isn’t a very diverse project, the only change of pace we really get is in “Scarlette,” which features Tom Byrne of Valiant Hearts and Windrunner’s label mates; Galleons. The main change up of the track too is just that it sounds like a Valiant Hearts song.
Chase Petra - 4 o’clock in the afternoon (Wax Bodega)
Long Beach based “quarter life crisis pop rock” band Chase Petra has surprised us with new EP 4 o’clock in the afternoon. This abrupt release follows suite with the three singles leading up to it and based on the strength of those alone this was a sure-thing before I even heard it. What I find fascinating about this band is their ability to make these huge pop rock cuts and present them as if they’re raw acoustic tracks. Of course there is subject matter to match exploring themes of dissociation, navigating family trauma and all-in-all being tired of living. They also make some really interesting use of backing vocals on each and every track.
Then there’s the second single, “Josslyn,” who is her own kind of animal. Things still sound pretty bare with these bass driven verses and raging choruses. The song also takes a step back from looking internally and turns inspirational with a message to be a force to be reckoned with in a world that will take advantage of you;
“People are never as good or as bad as you might imagine so please take a step back,
Love where you can but don’t ever forget that.”
chloe moriondo - puppy luv (Elektra Music)
2021 was a big year for chloe moriondo, releasing a major label debut, which I had my criticisms of but still enjoyed so much that I included it on my top five albums of the entire year. After that she followed it up with a series of singles that actually evolved upon all my issues. The song “not okay” in particular impressed me, in some ways, more than the record itself and was included in my top singles of the year as well. That being said, a follow up in 2022 was a big deal for me and I’m not quite sure if I would say I’m blown away.
Don’t get me wrong; a lot of this EP is an improvement of some of moriondo’s songwriting techniques and just sounds like an extension of the record from last year. I was pretty harsh on some of the lyrics to Blood Bunny and found the ones here to be a mixed bag. For example the song “dead 2 me” is a really interesting look into her first relationship and how it ultimately led to her making music, though saying the word “idiot” as a way to bridge the gap between changing parts is a little weird. On the other hand though “nice pup” is just “Your Dog” by Soccer Mommy but make it look like we didn’t copy from our peers' homework. A hard improvement, however, is this use of voice notes or leftover audio from the recordings of the actual songs that on the full-length felt very staged but here just feel like looks into the making of the music. I also like the inclusion of a Florence + The Machine cover as it reminds me a lot of her YouTube covers and having one on a record feels very full circle. All in all I think this is a neat little project but am ultimately hungry for an expansion on what those year end singles brought to the table as opposed to more of the last album.
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