more eaze – valley and structure | Album Review

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Thrill Jockey

In my dreams, I inhabit a world that has become reassuringly familiar over my thirty-odd years of sleep. I often return to the same three landscapes. One is a large room, wood-paneled and crowded, where I often encounter friends, or at least memories of them. The next is a vast mountain landscape, stretching beyond the tree line, sickeningly sheer cliffs dropping into millions of acres of granite. The last is my favorite: a deeply verdant and misty hill region, threaded by a road that never leads me to my destination, no matter how long I sleep. There is strange comfort in these landscapes - relief in the repetition of whatever pattern my unconscious brain is tracing. I feel similarly about music, finding myself consistently drawn to minimalist works. The thrum of the music’s predictability brings me comfort, cocooning my ears with a beautiful structure of rhythms, patterns, and notes. 

Because of this, I expected that valley and structure, the latest release from composer Mari Rubio, would immediately capture my minimalism-loving ears. Mari releases music under the name more eaze, both solo and with a rotating group of musicians behind her. I’ve greatly enjoyed her body of work over the years, watching with admiration as the worlds she spins with each new release build upon themselves in delicate, haunting webs. When I reviewed one of more eaze’s recent albums, sentence structure in the country, I commented on the otherworldly aspect of the music - it felt surreal, even dystopian, merging nature with machines. This effect is certainly also present on valley and structure, but in a distinctly different way. Instead of a darkly alien dystopian atmosphere, I sense vast open spaces, eternal fields of waving golden grass, and mirages that taunt from an indistinct horizon. A cloudless sky screams silently above, empty and infinite and possibly too blue. It’s a different brand of dystopia: everything is so perfect, so clean, so empty, that it cannot be anything but unsettling. The tie between these two albums is clear, not only in name but also in theme: whispers and fragments of sentence structure float through valley and structure like leaves in a breeze. It’s a brilliant concept, further tying more eaze’s worldbuilding into itself in a deeply satisfying way.

The album opens with a track titled “they tried to shove me in the structure,” featuring a deftly plucked guitar line that loops and drives forward incessantly. It’s accompanied by warm string swells that alternate between joy and unease, captured in a continuous dance. As I wander the golden grasses of this album’s landscape, I see the first sign of life in the terrible blue sky above: a hawk and a sparrow whirling in dizzying spirals, fighting over territory. The sparrow is relentless, but the hawk evades her, and their struggle traces a Möbius strip in the sky. A thin layer of strings hum in my ears as I watch them, and I notice the guitar’s arpeggios have started to lead away from the home key. However, the tension eases slightly as the rhythmic playing returns to the familiar notes of the opening chord progression. The hawk, realizing it will not be able to outsmart the persistent sparrow, breaks the loop and disappears into the endless azure ceiling. The sparrow has avoided the structure. Radio feedback crackles in my ears, and I realize I am not alone. 

I look around me and catch a glimpse of something metallic on the wavering horizon. The next track, “what’s wrong with the structure?” begins to play: a solo violin enters, bowing a precise string of notes that resemble a technical exercise. Its eerie quality is heightened as another violin joins, harmonizing in various intervals, and the music begins to melt together as a wind instrument adds to the arrangement. There is a faint clatter of voices and static layered behind the instruments, the piece whirring from one ear to the other until, at last, the guitar joins in. Dreamy whole-tone progressions create a blurry atmosphere - I notice a piano fading in and out, the deep thud of a bass, and even the shimmer of a distant synth organ. The silvery chords match the glint of the structure on the horizon I am walking toward. It flickers like a mirage, but the closer I get, the clearer it comes into focus. 

As I mentioned earlier, I am deeply drawn to minimalism for its sense of familiarity and the comfort I find in repetition. This same hypnotic quality is present throughout valley and structure, especially on track three: “once you say yes to the structure, you never get out.” An intensely rhythmic violin melody opens the track, paired in unison with guitar and bass. As I trudge towards the monolithic silver building on the horizon, I am reminded of an album that drives in a similar way. “Different Trains,” I muse silently. It’s one of minimalist composer Steve Reich’s best works. A moving, captivating, and powerful piece of art, I love its texture and depth. I find more eaze employing her own gifts of textural writing here, the instruments whirling around each other, mirroring their melodies in a method so contrapuntal that it feels damn near Baroque. The building is closer than ever, yet I have never walked so far. Everything comes around to itself in the end - modern music sounds Baroque, and the hawk is conquered by the sparrow.

I notice that the music has not stopped playing. Pleased, for I don’t want the song to end, I note that it’s exactly 20 minutes and two seconds long. 20:02 - a delightful numerical palindrome. Another Möbius strip of sorts. Around the eight-minute mark, “once you say yes to the structure, you never get out” slows, skulking back into the only shadow on this planet: the one cast by the building, its darkness a gash across endless miles of golden wheat. There is no whirling melody now, just sustained strings and the occasional comment from the piano. A low, dull humming fills the air as I find myself at the base of the building. There are no windows and no doors. It is hot even in the shade, hotter than it was under the eternal blue void. So I wait as brass and guitar offer their nervous harmonies. I hear a soft voice humming beneath the strings, though I’ve not noticed any company. The air grows heavier as the seconds pass, and the music plods now, no longer hiding in the shadows, but pulling itself along under the blazing sun. I notice the hawk has returned to the sky, whirling in spirals that draw closer to the ground with each rotation. The music has become frantic, and I find my heart beating in my hand, staining my palm red. On the horizon, the grasses dance with anticipation, and the violins follow in a fierce ostinato. I am weeping without knowing it. My heart is no longer a heart; before my eyes, it becomes the sparrow. And then the building opens with a scream – 

– and swallows me. “i’m in the structure.”

This is my favorite song. A heartwrenching melody, sung by an invisible entity, echoes in my ears as I am borne up, up, up to the top of the building. Major one to minor six chords, I note. It’s the same progression as my favorite song of all time, “Hallelujah” by Leonard Cohen. I am still weeping, tears coursing silently down my face. I do not know why. The violin wounds me, so beautiful that I ache with every note. The sound of waves crashing surround me, filling my ears with pressure as though I were underwater, but I am dry and surrounded by light. I am at the top of the building now, and I still hear the voice singing to me: "I’m content to be the void that collapses time and space / tracing out the melodies, replacing / tones / the faceless friend somehow never alone / blanketed by tastes.” I know these lyrics, for they are the same ones used on “The Producer,” a track from sentence structure in the country. Hearing them on this album, in an ethereal new setting, is like greeting an old friend. I am in the structure, and have only just entered the structure, but maybe I have always been here.

Time bends, and cold air burns my lungs without warning. I am on top of the monolithic building now, and there is no visible way to leave. “how can we get out of the structure” is the final track on valley and structure, and the only means of escape for the listener, and for me. The plucked, near-percussive rhythm at the beginning mirrors my heartbeat as I contemplate my options for escape. I sense that I am not alone: I turn slowly and behold something more than light but less than solid. I am briefly reminded of the Eldil of Perelandra. So this has been the source of the singing, the melodies, the driving life of this strange planet. As the music begins to deepen and build, the ever-present piano weaves through the top and then the bottom of the melody like a bright blue thread. Harmonies begin to melt into dissonance, and as the chill of the thin air cuts through my clothes, I hear the more-than-light being start to sing. The music is disintegrating slowly, beautifully, but the driving rhythm never falters. The light atop the structure is all-consuming, growing with each breath, and a honey-sweet breeze carries the sound of victory. I too am light, more than light, and I watch the structure sink into the golden grasses. Suspended in air, I spiral higher with the hawk and the sparrow. The entire planet vibrates with joyous melody, and I – I am singing too.

Britta Joseph is a musician and artist who, when she isn’t listening to records or deep-diving emo archives on the internet, enjoys writing poetry, reading existential literature, and a good iced matcha. You can find her on Instagram @brittajoes.

wakelee – Under Construction Forever | Album Review

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Wax Bodega

I never have the right words to say. Being a writer comes with the expectation that I should know what to say and that I should have the right words, but for the people who matter most, I seldom do. In his 1982 novella, The Body, Stephen King wrote, “The most important things are the hardest things to say.” This sentiment has stuck with me like gum on the bottom of a shoe, largely because I related so closely to the protagonist, Gordie Lachance, an offbeat kid with an affinity for writing and familial trauma to boot. In the wake of his older brother’s unexpected death, Lachance and his group of misfit buddies set off to find a dead body in the woods, seeking small-town acceptance for locating a missing boy. Throughout the coming-of-age tale, our narrator struggles to put his feelings of isolation, grief, and parental neglect into words. 

As an adolescent, this is largely expected; however, no one prepares you to carry that loss of words into adulthood. Frustratingly, it almost gets harder to say what’s on your mind as feelings, relationships, and life become increasingly complex. Even when it comes to things we feel strongly about, often once we try to put them into words, they fall flat. On their new LP, Under Construction Forever, the Brooklyn-based indie unit wakelee grapple with this perpetual struggle to find the right words in the most difficult circumstances.

wakelee are a group that lean into the nostalgic idiosyncrasies of life. This is evident even in their band name, which comes from a park in New Jersey where twin brothers Alex and David Bulmer grew up playing baseball. Although they eventually became high school benchwarmers, the yearning remained, and they decided to channel their energy into music. After playing in a handful of different bands throughout high school and college, Alex and David enlisted Elliot Shiang on bass after a chance meeting at a party in New York. What emerged was wakelee, a project with an eclectic mix of influences that ebb and flow seamlessly, proving the trio to be anything but a run-of-the-mill emo unit.

Photo by Gabe Drechsler

The group’s 2023 self-titled album features tracks like “Mood Rings” and “Texas” that draw on Pingrove and Macseal, while 2025’s Doghouse EP keeps those same emo foundations but also pulls in influences ranging from The Story So Far to Tyga and Korn. The group flexes this wide range of inspiration throughout that EP, crafting emo/pop-punk bangers like “mildlyinteresting” before switching to the alt-rock vibes of “Gary's Outcome” just a few songs later. Doghouse catapulted the trio from another passing NYC band to one that not only commands but deserves attention.

Under Construction Forever is wakelee’s first release with a label, the band now backed by the eternally tapped-in Wax Bodega. On their sophomore LP, the trio embrace their assorted tastes, resulting in one of the most exciting emo-adjacent releases in quite some time. Brisk album opener “Sundial” clocks in at just under two minutes and finds Bulmer grounding the listener in his reality, “Shaking / all my thoughts turning physical.” The introductory track finds the group dipping into some of their most aggressive material thus far, with the above lyrics screaming in on a red carpet of cymbal crashes and guttural bass lines. The song tackles the difficulties of owning up to your shortcomings at the end of a tenuous relationship as Bulmer sings, “In a different timeline / I’d have it all laid out / I know it’s my fault / I’ve been hanging on to you for so long."

The lead single, “Joyce Kilmer Service Area,” named after a rest stop about halfway between New York and Philly, is a polished pop-punk heater where the co-production from Zach Aumueller and Chris Freeman (Hot Mulligan) shines through. Debuting the first d-beat in a wakelee cut, it’s a song packed with family gripes and fast-tempoed instruments that mirror the lyrics’ palpable frustration. The song depicts a snafu where Bulmer’s unidentified relative seemingly forgot to meet him at the aforementioned service area, and he rebuts: “You’re forever slipping in an absent-minded mode / So I’ll stay home now / There’s little left between us / And I guarantee that you know it hurts me so bad.” Under Construction Forever forwardly mulls over blood-related barriers that tend to harbor lifetimes of pent-up resentments when left untended. 

Being plagued with familial dissonance is an overarching theme in The Body as well, which, if you haven't figured it out yet, also served as the inspiration for the 1986 film Stand by Me. Yes, the same film that features one Davie “Lard Ass” Hogan, who transforms a pie-eating contest into a puke-induced revenge fest. Despite the occasional absurdity of King’s writing, he eclipses it with truth-laden prose that sticks with readers for an eternity. Lachance feels largely invisible to his parents, who are in the depths of grief following the loss of their first-born. Much like the iconic story-turned-film, Under Construction Forever seems, at least in part, to be a cautionary tale about unresolved grief. On the mid-album cut “Box Fan,” Bulmer compares ever-present grief to the constant hum of a box fan, one that never goes away but simply becomes less noticeable over time. “Well, I know this went south / But I can drive there / A subtle distance / That’s always kept us apart,” he musters after the screeching tremolo of the bridge. 

Both “Decision Tree” and “Box Fan” put forth this concept of intentionally placed distance, both physical and hypothetical, that is woven throughout the LP. It’s here where Bulmer recognizes: “I tried to measure all the distance / There were signs I just missed them / Every thought is a misstep.” wakelee’s use of metaphorical gaps between loved ones aligns with the overall theme of an awkward barrier where words fail to adequately penetrate. “Decision Tree” traverses complicated feelings in relationships (familial and romantic alike) in which words could never define the brooding resentment, guilt, and longing that fester. Musically and lyrically, the track finds the band at the top of their game with pensive instrumentation and devastatingly catchy vocals that will bring tears to the eyes of even the most stoic of individuals: “There’s so much left to say, but I can’t get it out.” 

Summoning Worst Part Ever-esque vibes, “See It Now” immediately follows and finds wakelee licking their wounds while attempting to articulate complex feelings. With stripped-down lyrics and instrumentation, this song captures what happens when reality crushes romanticism, as the guilt-fueled song sheds lyrics like, “Should’ve had your back when I swore that I’d be there / I still wear your Crocs around the apartment.” In a vexed attempt to put complicated emotions into words, it confirms that oftentimes our expectations of how things should sound, or how situations should play out, are rarely as embellished as we imagine.

The album’s second single, “Statue,” certainly embodies emo elements, but leans more into alternative rock influences while the lyrics bring the family discourse to a head. Detailing trivial arguments with a forgetful relative, like forgotten passwords and inherited lower back pains, Bulmer sings, “One day we’ll gather to spread your ashes all over the ground / And it’ll be hard not to think about where things went wrong.” A few tracks later, the numbing feeling strung throughout the Aphex Twin-inspired “080808” further captures the convoluted mess of feelings that come with the loss of a loved one.

Under Construction Forever's closing tracks, "Open Ended" and "Glitterbox," tie the album up quaintly, as the band recognize their flaws whilst showing themselves some grace. Bulmer compares his destructive rumination to an oversteeped bag of tea, wonders why water is his number one enemy, and acknowledges that he’s “under construction forever,” before repeating “get used to it.” wakelee wrestles with the troubling realization that we rarely live up to who we expect ourselves to be, our loved ones are often not who we need them to be, and life tends to violently veer off the roads we desperately want to stay on. 

In an interview with SPIN, the band says of the album, “There’s the angle of anger, and ‘you shouldn’t have done this,’ and then there’s the angle of ‘I wish I said more. I wish I listened to you more,’ or realizing that you aren’t that great of a person.” Life is chock-full of what-ifs and should-ofs that we absolutely will dwell on if allowed to. Stephen King's assertion that “The most important things are the hardest things to say” also doubles as a recognition of things left unsaid. As acknowledged throughout this album, there's so much that wakelee (and I) would say if only we could find the right words. 

Brandon Cortez is a coffee, football, and music nerd from Texas. He’s on Twitter @numetalrev.

Able Baker – Able Baker | Album Review

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Self-Released

Don’t you like it when rock music just fucking rocks? I love it when rock music just fucking rocks. That was the only thought in my head while watching Able Baker at Union Pool back in April. The entire time frontman Tim Anderson and his band played, I had the biggest smile on my face and turned to my friend multiple times to mouth “wow.” From the moment they opened with “All The Bars” into the absolutely massive tune “Steeper Stairs,” Able Baker held me in thrall with their perfect hooks and ecstatic guitar solos. 

I was at that show to see Sunshy, whose dreamy LP, I don’t care what comes next, has become one of my main comfort records. Sunshy indeed transported me with their swirls of guitar, but when I left, I was desperate to hear those Able Baker songs again. Now that Able Baker has finally dropped their self-titled LP, I can re-experience those highs and have come to realize how much more there is to the band than just pure ecstasy.  

Tim Anderson has been toiling away crafting songs as Able Baker since 2016’s “Play One on TV.” Anderson hadn’t yet developed the Elliott Smith-esque voice that defines how he sings now—gentle yet disarmingly candid—but you can hear the bones of what makes this batch of songs so exciting. 2021’s Spiral Bound Songs and subsequent singles saw him refine his craft with a close group of collaborators, namely producers Isaac deBroux-Slone and Logan Severson. Together, those two draw out the intimate details in Anderson’s songwriting while making the performances sound absolutely massive. And those performances, delivered by Sunshy members Gwen Giedeman, Jordan Zamansky, and Eric Breden, as well as notable contributions by guitarist Graham Hunt and cellist Chaepter Negro, are perfectly attuned to the songs they serve: loose, limber, and full of summery joy on the ragers, paranoid and ragged on the tracks that seethe.

Of the tracks Able Baker played back at Union Pool, the one that caught its hooks deepest into the folds of my brain was “In Your Town.” Why that one? Because it is a perfect piece of Weezer-y pop rock, the kind that hits you in the chest and reminds you, oh yeah, I have to breathe. The verses ride a bobbing guitar melody that briefly quiets as Anderson sings “something’s always the matter in your town” before the chorus hits you in the gut. As the band crescendos behind Anderson belting out the title, I dare you not to feel alive. 

Anderson is a master of crafting these exhilarating, Photo Album-era Death Cab for Cutie-like dynamics. He’s always subtly tweaking moments to achieve maximum impact. Where the first pre-chorus of “In Your Town” has the band building to Anderson’s repeated assertion, the second attempt gets only one run-through, and a guitar rips into the mix before he can even get out the word “town.” It doesn’t even sound like he gets more than the letter T out. He may, but you won’t hear it in the mix. It is a perfect moment of the music fully embodying the mood of the track. The guitar picks up where words fall short. 

“In Your Town” isn’t the only moment on Able Baker where the band pulls off these moments of perfect rock songcraft. Put the record on shuffle, and whichever song plays will be full of examples. “The Word” rushes through the verses to get to the choruses because what matters is the bridge into the final, wordless chorus. The band stretches out on the bridge, throwing in enough drum fills to last a lesser band's entire discography as the bass line locks into this sublime rhythm that makes me smile every time I hear it. Then when the chorus comes back, it’s somehow even bigger than before. “Secret Admirer” pulls the opposite trick. Anderson is a paranoid mess the whole song, singing “I would die if the secret got out.” The band rockets out of the second chorus with an epic guitar solo and pounding drums accentuating the thrill of being exposed, a section that must be building to something, but then it all collapses; there is no grand conclusion here. It is a moment of hope that gets crushed down. When the main riff comes back right at the end, quieter than it started the song, it is a moment of pure devastation. 

I didn’t get that devastation back in April. Only by running these tracks back have I reveled in how provocative they are. I wasn’t wrong in my initial assessment that “Steeper Stairs” is a massive tune, but now I’m lost in the yearning to reach through the mirror of memory alongside Anderson. It’s as if the recursive dialogue and images of Last Year at Marienbad were boiled into a rock song. 

I would like to retract my prior suggestion to shuffle the record, because Able Baker aren’t just good at structuring song dynamics. Able Baker is a perfectly sequenced record. They slot these softer, gentler songs like the acoustic filmic “Noir” and the hazy “Picture Pose” into the running order to give their distorted pop epics space to breathe. That’s not to say these songs only exist to break up the running order. “Picture Pose” rides a beautiful, dreamy vibe to transcendence as Anderson sings “you’re done with self love / it’s time to self destruct” while “Noir” references the titular film genre over a folky stunner.  

One of the great things about really good rock music is that no matter how hard I try to put into words what Able Baker makes me feel, I’ll never get across what exactly it is like to listen. So if you like really good rock music, the kind that really just fucking rocks, I can’t tell you to go listen to Able Baker enough. Please, go hear what it feels like. 

Lillian Weber is a fake librarian in NYC. She writes about gender, music, and other inane thoughts on her Substack, all my selves aligned. You can follow her on Insta @Lilllianmweber. 

MX LONELY – PERFECT HOUSE | EP Review

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Julia’s War Recordings

In Brooklyn, nestled off the Myrtle-Broadway stop of the M and J trains, lies Market Hotel, one of the borough's most iconic independent music venues. You can often spot its sweaty, condensation-stained windows from blocks away, thanks to the multi-colored strip lights that line each frame. Its history, much like the neighborhood itself, has evolved with the times. Originally a bank in the 1800s and a nightclub in the 1960s, the building found new life in the burgeoning Brooklyn music scene in the late 2000s. After shutting down in 2010 due to unsafe conditions imposed by the NYPD, the community came together to keep the lights on. After a painstaking series of renovations, the building reopened in 2015.

At first glance, one could see the venue as another casualty of New York’s capitalist expansion, shifting from a heralded “vibrant arts space in a dilapidated and slightly dangerous area” into a now memed-to-death poster child for the average Bushwickian transplant’s late night out. However, unlike many of the buildings that house these types of shows (especially the rare mainstays over in the neighboring, ever-sterile Williamsburg), Market Hotel has stayed true to its roots in the DIY scene, with the space just as likely to host a Tumblr dance night as it is to give flowers to a punk show.

This past February, I had the pleasure of watching MX LONELY headline Market Hotel in celebration of their then-just-released sophomore record, ALL MONSTERS. The group brought their friends in Shower Curtain, Bloodsports, and Wiring to round out the evening, bringing together four disparate branches of the New York scene for a well-rounded night of headbanging. 

What impressed me most about MX LONELY’s set, in particular, was how they commanded every inch of the room for a record that had been released maybe a week prior. Vocalist Rae Haas stood on (or hung off) every surface they could, while guitarist/vocalist Jake Harms slammed audiences with shrill, riffy guitar tones. Alongside them, Gabe Garman grooved on bass like his body movements were propelling the sound forward, and Andrew Rapp worked every inch of his arms to match the rhythm on the drums. It’s a triumph to see a band this beloved look so locked-in onstage.

Photo by Samuel Leon

At the beginning of their shows, Haas proclaims, “We’re MX LONELY, and we’ll be your exorcist for the evening.” This exorcism is twofold: a release for audience members desperate to shed the weight of the modern world, and a moment for the members of MX to channel their words as a communicative device. This relationship is clear: no matter what setting the group finds itself in, participants in this ritual-like cleanse give that energy back to the quartet in spades, whether it’s a call-and-response to the lyrics or kicking up a mosh pit at a moment’s notice. The strong NY community makes projects like PERFECT HOUSE feel less like a band rushing to pump something out and more like a love letter to the friends and collaborators that propelled them to these stages.

Where ALL MONSTERS takes a deep and sometimes-harrowing dive into the creation of monsters within the corners of one’s psyche, PERFECT HOUSE feels like the exorcism Haas talks about at the beginning of the live set. While the dark moments remain, the underlying feeling of an explosion begins to shine through, waiting to set the demons ablaze inside the house they live in, much like the blaze captured on the EP’s cover. This release grew out of a resurrection of demos from earlier in the band’s career, carefully layering new songwriting approaches onto the base of their previous work instead of simply recreating old material. Thanks to collaborations with Brooklyn singer-songwriter Caitlin Starr and Wiring guitarist Connor Gibson, along with Garman engineering the tones, the group created a world entirely of their own design. This unique approach of past, present, and future colliding into one project achieves a temporal harmony that invites collaboration without losing the essence of the magic the four members created in the first place.

Take the music video for “March 16th,” a black-and-white series of vignettes that captures dancing punks in matching outfits in an anonymous setting. The song’s universe feels like a communal celebration, highlighting the collaborative efforts that the band champions. From the dancing punks arriving via a casting call the band put out to Kaitlin Starr’s feature and local photographer/media extraordinaire Owen Lehman’s video work, the group assembles an all-star team from their community to make the song richer and more exciting. “March 16th” is also the track most directly linked to ALL MONSTERS, with similar crushing guitars and resonant cymbals found throughout that record. 

One of the more true-to-form callbacks to their former sound palettes, “Bird,” is an acoustic-crafted cut, save for some beautiful underscores of shimmering guitars towards the back end of the track. The song features a great display of Haas and Harms’ vocal dynamics, both shifting into their higher registers to create a memorable chorus. In many ways, “Bird” feels like the EP’s ideas in full form, creating an MX LONELY-type ambiance without feeling set in a specific period of the band’s history.

On the opposite end, “Twenty Seconds” feels like MX LONELY leaning further into their trademark gothic storytelling. Something eerie is at work in the track's sonic construction, with the initially ambiguous lyrics like “Twenty seconds under water / makes me want to stay longer” taking on a darker tone as more sinister guitar passages are added. The lyrics clearly mean something specific to the band, but that meaning is intentionally obscured, letting listeners fill in the blanks with their own horrors and unease. Judging from the clues left behind, the image might not look as pristine as some might believe. 

Finally, “Ex Rae Punk” shines as a well-crafted reinvention, thanks to a poignantly diaristic songwriting style complemented by bombastic execution. The play on words here is quite direct, with a former partner of Haas now referring to them as their “Ex Rae,” but the tragedy of the fallout is the realization that they never really saw Haas at all, hence lyrics such as “See right through you, see right through me.” This song has lived in the world since 2019, with its first iteration appearing on the now-defunct V0ID B0YS project, but it's reimagined here, giving the former acoustic track a newfound sense of purpose and reflection. Time may not heal all wounds, but it certainly gives new perspectives that can’t be seen in the heat of the moment.

MX LONELY is a band that gives themselves space to continuously reinvent their history, with PERFECT HOUSE inviting fans to experience the band’s creative process from the beginning to the present. Even if this is a smaller helping of work than their output earlier in the year, the level of detail and love for their work keeps the EP from being any less important to the story. It’s going to be fascinating to see what the next chapter of the journey is for MX LONELY. Make sure to go hard in the crowd the next time the band is in your town; you never know what demons need an exorcism.

By day, Samuel Leon shares factoids about contemporary art with members of the public. By night, Sam’s either cooking an orzo dish, watching a movie, or capturing New York performances with his camera. You can find his relic of a digital footprint at @sleonpics.

The Tubs – Hard Life | Album Review

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Merge Records

Owen Williams, frontman of Welsh jangle pop band The Tubs, is the crème de la crème of certified lover boys. He's the kind of moody, brooding bad boy you would see in a John Hughes film. We all know the type: long, slicked-back hair, well-dressed, and a penchant to be in their feelings. These are compelling character traits for someone who, in fact, wears his heart on his sleeve in his songs, constantly owning up to his mistakes and recognizing the endless cycles of his deteriorating relationships.

With each passing album, Williams is increasingly transparent with his feelings, willing to accept the blame for his own love life. What makes his writing stand out is his self-deprecation; Williams knows he’s a deeply flawed individual, accepts it, and isn't afraid to take the mick out of himself in his songs. The listener will find serious subject matter on these records, from his mother’s untimely death to picking up the pieces of your life in the aftermath and trying to find your place in the world. Still, the way Williams finds humor in all that life has to offer is gripping to listen to.

While the lyrics contain shades of grief, regret, shame, and disappointment all rolled into one, the music itself has the energy of a pint-chugging Friday night out at the pub. Alongside Williams is a full band of merry men backing him up, putting in full-time shifts at the office, headlined by Taylor Stewart on drums, Dan Lucas on guitar, and Max Warren on bass. Stewart is the rabble-rouser of the bunch; his kinetic drum fills and snare hits keep the tempo fast and energetic. It’s an engaging intermingling of moods, so when their record Cotton Crown came across my desk last year and reminded me of early-to-mid-80s R.E.M., the record was a shoo-in as one of my favorites of the year. As the band began touring America relentlessly, they found new momentum that helped them break into the mainstream, culminating in an article in the distinguished publication The New Yorker. 

That brings us to this year with The Tubs’ third LP, Hard Life; the album is grander in scale, beefing up the guitar bits, drum hits, and everything in between. Where we last left off with Williams on Cotton Crown, he was a man broken, dealing with the tragedy of his mother’s death and lost relationships, seemingly at his wit’s end, trying to put the pieces of his life together. Now on Hard Life, our hero has found some peace from within the catastrophes of life. After working through grief, Williams made it out with building blocks for his journey, ready to assemble himself back again from scratch.

This is not to say Williams didn’t learn some lessons from nights of debauchery along the way. Take the song “Heaven or London,” for example. It's the heaviest song on the record both lyrically and musically, with Williams questioning if there is enough room in heaven. This is him at his lowest point: bar hopping nightly, peering into an empty bottle to numb himself from the pain of losing his mother and cope with societal rejection. Musically, the guitars rev up, becoming more gnarly and vicious the further the song goes along as Williams croons his pain away. The title track, “Hard Life,” is filled with so much dark bar jargon that would make Sam Malone’s stomach turn. It’s a high-energy romp through different characters’ POVs about the hard times that people fall on. Whether someone’s dad dies, your boss is on your back, or you have no heat in your flat, the moral of the story is “Well mate, everybody knows / Yeah it’s a hard life.” 

Despite the dark undertones of Williams’ lyrics, he still keeps his sense of humor, flashing it at a moment’s notice like he’s George Costanza in a Seinfeld episode. “Do Yourself a Favor” drips with sass, sung from the perspective of being at your wit’s end with a lover. The chorus has attitude, and the vocal melodies will levitate in your mind. There’s an energy that persists, from the guitar tones to the synths, that reminds me of New Order, making for the best song on the record. A couple tracks later, “The Way It Goes” offers a love song with a Celtic twist and finds Williams in a Larry David-esque state of agitation at yet another Yank in America telling him they’re sober. On the closer, “As Long as You Leave,” Williams lends an ear to a friend to “whine about their scumbag dad” as long as they promise to leave his place afterward. 

There’s a real, cutting honesty to all of this, whether the band is recounting a specific interpersonal conflict or observing a perplexing societal norm. I see both “If You Don’t Love Me” and “Stoop to Me” as companion pieces that show what real-world relationships and growth look like as we get older. The former finds Williams’ heart in tatters as he pleads for love from a partner. He’s paralyzed by love (or lack thereof), threatening to quit the Tubs or even, god forbid, read someone’s Substack if she doesn’t take him back. The latter is Tubs at their jangliest, with Williams realizing that his love interest won’t take him back, so he learns to turn the page: “But baby if I can’t change your mind / Baby I don’t want to spend my life / Waiting for the day you see / The day you stoop me.”

On “Now and Then,” Williams is at his moody, brooding best, singing about writing lyrics in the dark all because a girl who has a hold on him has spurned his “little Welsh heart.” The croons on the chorus are so melodic and infectious, and it’s a marvel how Williams's silent suffering can lead to pop songs that are simply irresistible. 

On Hard Life, the Tubs have perfected their sound to the nines. How far they can push jangle pop is entirely up to them, because they’re at the forefront. Williams picked up the rubble of his life and came out of the wreckage a mentally stronger man. The Tubs turned the debris of pain into a bleary-eyed, nonstop rager of pop songs that are simply exquisite. 

David is a content mercenary based in Chicago. He’s also a freelance writer specializing in music, movies, and culture. His hidden talents are his mid-range jump shot and the ability to always be able to tell when someone is uncomfortable at a party. You can find him scrolling away on Instagram @davidmwill89, Twitter @Cobretti24, or Medium @davidmwms.