jeff does have some lyrics that TEND towards the depressing… but he also writes with a good amount of hope on some tracks. most importantly, i think the ska punk version of this album embraces a playfulness and an energy that is a lot of fun.
(answering this was hard bc i realized my taste in music is also overwhelmingly depressing)
Mar 1, 2024
Related Recs
i didn’t quite appreciate this song as much as i do now until seeing it performed as the closer to his live show… such a great encapsulation of the feeling of years of life under very late capitalism weighing on you
how hard can you go,
and for how long can you sustain it?
when the force that fights back
doesn’t ever relax
it’s so relentless,
oh how long can you defend
against a cheat code?
at a furious pace,
with a smile on your face
May 5, 2024
🏢
Particularly, the Peel Session version. I listen to this most days before work, Mark E. Smith was always able to create this bleak atmosphere, pulling all the annoying things from the mundane. All punk seems like a charade in comparison to this, this is the only song that matters sometimes, all that anger.
Dec 29, 2024
⭐
The first single from Winter Boyfriend from the upcoming album set a, frankly, very different note. 'anx/bodies' is an outlier for us, musically and lyrically, but when putting the final touches to the album it was one of the songs that people seemed instinctively to engage with if they weren't broadly invested in our main thing, essentially indie/indie-punk made by a would-be emo band. At the very least it provoked a reaction.
It's a song inspired by a very specific series of events but is not specifically autobiographical. Outside of the world of this song i am much less forward about sex. I enjoy being 'too much' with friends but i really don't want it going anywhere my family might hear it. Repression is fun! I often wonder if that's similar to what actors feel when doing nudity or whatever. It's a case of, "I don't want to know you've seen me experience that?" Anyway, honesty can help in art, but also maybe so too does a little internal repression.
It was written about a memory of going to a university disco, arriving at the club where everyone was looking hot and cool, and i suddenly becoming very aware of my inability to be calm. It is essentially about over-stimulation and amorousness and the confusion of that smashing like a wrecking ball through any semblance of chill i might have had.
The verse bass riff is really old, easily over 10 years old. I wrote it for a different project, a Death From Above 1979 rip-off thing, and my pal Martin played bass, while i sang and drummed. The song was unremarkable but the riff was cool. There was no way i wasn't keeping it. Also, it explains why it's the only song that uses a fuzz bass tone. Yet.
I have no idea when i came up with the guitar riff but it's one of my favourite parts i've written. It's rythmic and a little bit dissonant, but i think the G# implies an E Major chord, making it A minor natural (sorry music theory experts, probably butchering this).
I was also unsure if i could allow myself to write the chorus which used power chords. It always feels too basic. But it worked in the context of the song. I finished it years ago aside from a few lyrical tweaks and the introduction sound (chord played, tremolo arm depressed as it fades out, recorded and reversed). Also when mixing the song my references were very different and included a lot of 00s and 10s music, including bands that have been grandfathered into the whole 'indie-sleaze' thing, and it made me realise the second verse needed, nay demanded!, a cowbell and some percussion (the other percussion is drumming on glass bottles fyi).
I feel like 'anx/bodies', and the song that follows it, 'on our way home', are two sides of the same coin. One uptight, repressed yet explosive, and the other unrelenting, desperate and flailing. You could almost imagine the latter being later in the same night, getting existential when worse-for-wear. More on that one later.
Jun 19, 2024
Top Recs from @sloane_shark
〰️
sincerity is cool, caring is cool, you are all cool
Feb 28, 2024
🏳
the first thing to be said is that this recommendation applies equally to everyone
the next thing to be said is that you have, inevitably, been suffering from a cocktail of depression and anxiety for more than a decade, and this has made you incredibly tired
what you need is to make NYE plans with a good friend you haven't seen in years; she will bring you out to the club and it will be fuckin rad; you'll buy some cute clothes and she'll do your makeup, despite these not being things you really ever do, and you'll forget how much you typically disdain your appearance for one night
next, you're going to have to just read for awhile, books and essays and youtube comments and text messages
after enough reading, you'll have your own thoughts and questions, and you'll inevitably see someone else asking the question "am i trans?"
reading this question will naturally lead to you asking yourself: "am i trans?"
the answer is yes
at this point, you have transitioned into a girl, and everything else is just showing off; decide on a new name; get a therapist and a doctor who are supportive; pump your body full of the hormones it needs; get some cute new clothes and burn your old shit; ask for help picking out and doing your makeup
stop treating your body like a shipping container for your sad brain; transform it into the hot girl your brain already knows you are
Feb 28, 2024
😵
Aug 8, 2024