Aren’t We Amphibians? – Parade! Parade! | Album Review
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PNWK Records
It took five years of living in New York for me to finally make it to the ever-elusive Trans-Pecos, but one show there was all I needed to understand the venue’s popularity. The 250-cap room is situated on the border of Brooklyn and Queens – technically part of Ridgewood – and sits right next to a Vietnamese restaurant, only a stone’s throw from the Halsey St. stop on the L train. Last year, I ventured from my apartment on a cold November night to catch a now-otherworldly bill of emotional rock bands, including the local rockstars in better living., Japanese act ANORAK!, legendary New Jersey headliner Ogbert the Nerd, and an introduction to the California-based rock outfit Aren’t We Amphibians. As if that lineup wasn’t enough, that gig was the cap to a weekend packed with fantastic shows: I caught Cloud Nothings and Equipment tearing up Baby’s All Right on Friday, then watched saturdays at your place headline Market Hotel the night after. The pure excitement led me to create a playlist called “Last Weekend Changed Me” and, as emo music often does, I was changed.
Aren’t We Amphibians have found a lot of love in the DIY circuit throughout their short tenure as a band, thanks to their infectious energy and reliable output of consistently great music. Formed by vocalist/guitarist Joshua Talbot and brothers Brandon and Tyler Cunningham on drums and bass respectively, the San-Diego trio has put out two EPs and a couple of splits, including one earlier this year with awakebutstillinbed, california cousins, and your arms are my cocoon. Give it a handful of years, and I guarantee this split will be considered a classic entry in a genre with a long lineage of historic four-way splits.
All of this is to say my hopes were quite high when rumors of a 2025 release for Aren’t We Amphibians’ debut full-length started bubbling up, and it finally arrived in the form of Parade! Parade!. The ten-track record sees the group move forward with effective midsong tempo switches and Talbot’s high register belting the most depressing lyrics you can imagine, this time with even more anthemic sing-alongs. Take the opening track, “Rock, Etc.,” which initially paints a portrait of a morbid future as the first lyric lays out, “This time next year, I won’t be still around.” However, the track blossoms into a triumphant declaration of “I’m here right now,” alongside hard-hitting guitars and trumpets, transforming a moment of helplessness into a symbol of hope within four simple words.
Throughout this record, there are multiple instances where Talbot writes lyrics that practically beg to be screamed along to in rooms full of people who are also, for lack of a better term, going through it. Talbot cries out, “I’ve said a thousand times that I never want to be anything but small” in the track “532.” There’s also the incredibly sorrowful cut “The Hallway,” which kicks off with a slower guitar passage before progressing into an explosive guitar pattern alongside the repeated lyric “I think I’d be better off if I never existed at all.” Now that’s what I call emo.
It’s not only the lyricism that feels incredibly raw and heartbreaking: many of the instrumental choices have a sense of constructed impulsivity to them. While they might seem abrupt on first pass, there’s a free-flowing ease between the hallmark time signature switches in the lead single “Dunce Hat,” almost like Aren’t We Amphibians are identifying new paths of communicating what needs to be said in real time. This high level of musicianship makes it easy for the group to pull it off multiple times without ever feeling so far out of left field that the listener gets disoriented. There’s also a personal favorite, “Forgiving Jeff,” which boasts some amazing guitars shifting from throttling to methodical at the drop of a hat, all accompanying the ultra-earnest mantra “Take this to heart,” which I have found myself screaming every time I throw this song on.
Throughout the album, Talbot articulates the pain of feeling stuck while everyone around you seems to be growing up. His ability to shift from singing to passionate cries to flat-out screams, multiple times in the same song, works in tandem with the ever-evolving instrumental passages. A brilliant example of this can be found in “Family on 6,” which erupts into a straight-up screamo passage, accompanied by an explosion of guitars and drums, as Talbot screams “I never learn from my mistakes” at the top of his lungs. It’s easily one of the craziest moments in an already fast-paced record.
What keeps this album glued together, both in terms of sonic and thematic value, is the idea of the parade. The first bits that we hear come from the horns in the opening track, and they make bolder appearances on tracks such as the laid-back “Bookworm,” where the band pairs the brass alongside some acoustic guitar passages. On the flipside, the album’s second single, “This Is Teamwork!,” sees the trumpets placed right before a hardcore-inspired breakdown. It’s always fantastic to see an emo band put together more of these non-traditional instruments into a record, especially when its use becomes a cornerstone of what the project represents.
The real centerpiece of Parade! Parade! comes at the end with the de facto title track “Parade,” cued up by a (shocker) parade-style intro. The song launches into a powerhouse guitar riff, with lyrics that focus on turning everything you have been through into a celebration of the person you are now. The group pulls through with a slower passage as Talbot sings “When the street is empty / after the parade / just take it all in / and feel everything,” extending an invitation to be a human again throughout the suffering.
These parades that Aren’t We Amphibians speak of might not be that far away from you. While one might not catch a line of countless people cheering and screaming to the sound of music in the streets, you can certainly find them in music venues large and small. There’s something about the safety of being surrounded by people who all have the same love of music that brings you back to life after navigating through the hostile environment outside of the venue. At the end of the opening track, a radio broadcast says the words, "Let's talk about rock and roll, let’s talk about concerts, let’s talk about banging your head,” almost like a personal invitation to the celebration. We’re all going through it, so you may as well recognize everything you’ve overcome. If you are ever in doubt, take yourself out to the gig! There’s a chance you could be changed like I was back in November of last year.
The optimism throughout the pain is what keeps Parade! Parade! from being a downtrodden, melancholic emo project and instead cements it with a nuanced mood. There’s hope throughout all of the craziness, no matter what you are going through. There’s a joy that comes with being in the same room as a bunch of strangers who all have the same love of music, and we certainly feel it all once we step outside of those rooms. It’s hard to progress without hope, so why not celebrate all you have accomplished whenever you can?
Samuel Leon (they/he) is a Brooklyn-based performance photographer, playwright, and retired performer. Sam writes plays about music but not musicals. Sam doesn’t like using the internet, but they will if they have to. If you are even remotely close to Brooklyn and want Sam to make you look cool on camera, hit them up on @sleonpics.
