punk this week: retail simps, smashing times, death valley girls + 14 more
Soup Activists and CLASS kick off album cycles. Melbourne’s the Bolt Ons come on strong with their debut. Punk rules.
Hey, it’s Punk This Week—a column recommending the best new punk and rock'n'roll records. Retail Simps return with another knockout on Total Punk. Soup Activists and CLASS have exciting lead singles from their upcoming albums on Feel It. There’s great new stuff from Smashing Times, Death Valley Girls, the Bolt Ons, and a bunch of other bands.
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Retail Simps: Real Simple [Total Punk]
There’s this quality to a lot of Retail Simps records that historically boils down to “drunk, impish, fun throwback ‘60s rock’n’roll worship.” The Montreal operation—seemingly boiled down on this record to Joe and Obe as the creative center—has always been a party band (ask all of Zach’s too-drunk friends at Gonerfest), and Real Simple doesn’t shy away from their strengths. It’s fair that the focus around this band is their aesthetics, because the new 12” features some of their best layered composition ever—their use of wah-wah, mandolin, wind and brass instruments, and tape fuckery elevate them from “sloppy boys” to “sloppy boys with grand ambitions.”
Compared to that Educated Fools double album, which spread out far beyond single sit comprehension, Real Simple is a great showcase for Simps as lyric writers. Look beyond “Rock Jocks”’ single syllable singalong chorus to find a magnificent diss track about a very specific Dude in Rock who very much exists today. “Daffodil Girl” could easily get glazed over as paisley pop pastiche, but these hollered lyrics about gendered societal expectations are an exceptional and jarring contrast. Real Simple stylistically pivots frequently, but Simps are never far from a slam dunk earworm. They’re the reigning masters of the rumpled jam that somehow remains completely immaculate.
