Detroit band “Protomartyr” are set to release their seventh album Hotel Usona on September 25th via longtime label “Domino,” and today the band have shared another new track off the album titled “Feed the Sewer,” and it’s a relentless takedown of AI. About the single, lead singer Joe Casey comments “The title comes from a line of dialogue in a Peter Greenaway movie. The sentiment of the song is that artificial intelligence is against humanity. The belief is that people are often willing to destroy the world in exchange for convenience. The lyrics are the usual mish-mash of political fears, personal grievances, literary references, and poop jokes. The music is very loud, like a data center.” The single also has an accompanying music video that features comedian Nate Varrone, who also appeared in the music video for the band’s previous single “Sounds We Cannot Hear.” About the video, director Andrew Theodore Balasia says, “Loneliness in the age of surveillance is the theme we explored for this video. The motel becomes a physical microcosm of data collection, each room a profile, each guest willingly paying to stay in a room that is being monitored by strangers. The banality of what’s being observed becomes its own source of unease, stripping away spectacle until all that remains is the dull, unsettling desire to connect with anything.” You can watch the music video for “Feed the Sewer,” as well as pre-order Hotel Usona below:
Though many of us are still not over the quiet breakup of Punk trio “Control Top,” ex-members Alan Creedon and Alex Lichtenauer have moved on with their new project “Index,” and this project is quite the departure from their previous work with “Control Top.” Incorporating Electronic and Industrial elements, the band’s music packs a more visceral punch, without sacrificing their beautifully noisy style of Hardcore Punk. The band announced in July that their debut album Vis Inertiae will be released on September 25th via “Get Better Records,” and following their last two singles “Cellophane” and “Fractured,” the band have released another ripper of a track titled “Earth.” You can listen to the track, as well as pre-order Vis Inertiae below:
September 4th can’t come soon enough. It’s the day the Oklahoma-based quartet “Chat Pile” drops their third studio album Who Loves The Sun, and judging from the singles we’ve heard off the album thus far, this will be the band’s most compelling work yet. The tracks “PEN I S MALL” and “Deep Blue” are both rippers, but their third and final single “Same Rules” is both a ripper, and a gothic-induced atmospheric track that finds the band sounding their most melodic. Their new album Who Loves The Sun drops September 4th via “The Flenser.”
So much music, so little time to review everything, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been listening. 2026 has been a great year for music so far, and I would like to take this opportunity to spotlight some albums I didn’t get a chance to review.
Genre is Death – Attractive People
Though a myriad of modern Post-Punk bands incorporate elements of No Wave, very few bands fully epitomize the genre that had its heyday in late 70s-early 80s New York like “Genre is Death.” Taking the dissonant nature of No Wave, and combining it with heavily distorted guitars and minimal drum machine, the band’s second full-length album Attractive People is the sign of band that has no interest in being trendy, but has all the interest in bringing an uncompromising sonic experience to the world of modern Post-Punk, all while being melodic enough to hold every listener’s attention instead of pushing them away with abrasiveness.
House music is in late-stage broism. Many of us yearn for something less formulaic, and something with more personality. Though there are some outliers, the EDM-ification of Electronic music continues to reign supreme, which spawns an exhausting number of DJs and producers playing it safe by vomiting out the most commercial sounding music. Leave it to a veteran like Richard Barratt to bring us back to what makes House music so infectious. Most famous for being one half of the duo “Sweet Exorcist,” Barratt knows Electronic music and its various subgenres such as House and Acid Techno inside out, so it’s no surprise that his new album Crooked Stile under his “Crooked Man” moniker is pretty great. This album is refreshing.
Australian band “Pond” describe their 11th studio album Terrestrials as “goths at the pub,” and this is the truest description of the album. Much like what “MGMT” did on their album Little Dark Age, “Pond” departs from “Pink Floyd shit,” and incorporates 80s-driven New Wave, Goth, Post-Punk, and a dash of Glam Rock on Terrestrials, and they nail it!
A celebration of Hip Hop. New school and old school. Inspired by the immediacy of mixtape culture of the 90s and 2000s, IDK has released a mixtape that’s quite possibly the most ambitious and interesting Hip Hop release I’ve heard in years. If there’s a release that can bridge the gap between old heads and new heads, this is it. Blending Boom Bap with modern Pop Rap hooks, and let’s not forget the fantastic breakbeat of the track “Stigma,” IDK is shaping himself to be one of the most interesting rappers today.
Odor Eater – But For Who?
Saying I like 80s-tinged music is like Robert Smith saying he likes eyeshadow, yeah no shit! So it’s no surprise that a band like “Odor Eater” has my attention. The Portland, Oregon-based duo wear their “Devo” and “Depeche Mode” influences on their sleeves, but also channel something distinctly their own on their debut album But For Who? Bands that go this route often sound like a pastiche of the beloved era of teased hair and synthesizers, but “Odor Eater” sounds natural doing it. This music is catchy, fun, political at times, and features some killer clarinet.
New Zealand’s own “Earth Tongue” aren’t afraid to spotlight their “Black Sabbath” worship, but aside from some Doomy and fuzzed-out guitar riffs, the band resides in their own world filled with Dark Fantasy, Horror, Sci-Fi, and just about every nerdy thing you can think of. This music packs a punch, and there’s only two members!
Genesis Owusu – REDSTAR WU & THE WORLDWIDE SCOURGE
Using the term “genre-defying” is a bit of a cliché at this point, but in the case of Australian rapper Genesis Owusu’s music, there isn’t a more appropriate term. Fusing Hip Hop, Punk, Post-Punk Revival, Indie Rock, Funk, and New Wave, REDSTAR WU & THE WORLDWIDE SCOURGE is Owusu’s most eclectic album yet, and God damn it’s his best! It’s a political album that critiques the current state of propaganda, systems of inequality, the rich, and alt-right extremism. This album couldn’t have arrived at a better time.
The Healing Power of Horses – Summer Indoors (or outside wearing black)
Blending Trip Hop, Indie Pop, Industrial, and Experimental with deadpan vocals, UK band “The Healing Power of Horses” sounds like a band out of the “Windmill scene” in Brixton. Though they weren’t part of this scene, they take the PVA-style to the next level and show much promise on their new E.P. Summer Indoors (or outside wearing black). Hopefully there’s a full-length album on the horizon.
“I locked myself in my home studio on the 4th of July and made this song in three hours. Pure Catharsis.” Says Los Angeles-based musician/producer Sun Spoiler about his new single “Reek.” “Sun Spoiler” is the moniker of Andreas Emmanuel, and he has been making music under this name as far back as 2023, crafting an eclectic mix of Pop, Indie Rock, Alternative, Electronic, and 80s-tinged Synth-Pop, but “Reek” is by far his best work and the most locked in he’s sounded. With a runtime of 1:41, the track is infectiously energetic with a raw Punk edge, and if we’re in for more music in this vein, then Sun Spoiler is most certainly an artist to pay attention to.
There was a point in time when “The Strokes” ruled the world. When the band released their debut album Is This It in 2001, it seemed as if the five boys from NYC appeared out of nowhere and were quickly on everyone’s radar whether they liked it or not. Music publications dubbed them the “saviors of rock,” and this prompted record labels to sign just about every Garage Rock-tinged band with “The” in their name. To quote Alex Turner of “Arctic Monkeys,” “I just wanted to be one of The Strokes.” We all wanted to be them. I know I did. I dressed like them, and even grew out my hair, and lucky for me, my hair is naturally curly, so I was walking around thinking I looked like Fabrizio Moretti. Though the band undoubtedly reaped the benefits of their newfound success, the pressure of being the “saviors of rock” inevitably took its toll. The band’s sophomore album Room on Fire also received acclaim, but it seemed as if the band were playing it safe by sticking to the formula that garnered them much success on their debut album, and playing it safe in a fickle music industry can only last so long. Aside from spawning some killer singles, their very bloated third album First Impressions of Earth flopped, and we didn’t hear anything new from the band for six years.
In 2011 the band made their triumphant return with their fourth album Angles. Well, maybe not so triumphant. The album’s reception was split between people who lauded the band’s departure from their early work, incorporating elements of New Wave and Synth Pop, and people who felt the album was disjointed due to the recording process in which singer Julian Casablancas recorded his vocals separate from the band. Their following album Comedown Machine received an even more lukewarm reception, and was the band’s most polarizing work, until now.
The band’s new album Reality Awaits is the new champion of polarization. This album is interesting, off-putting, at times catchy, at times grating, and utterly fascinating for the mere fact that some of the artistic choices made on the album are questionable, mainly Julian Casablancas’ overuse of autotune. Casablancas is no stranger to autotune. He has utilized it in a very creative way with his band “The Voidz,” but on Reality Awaits, it seems as if he’s intentionally trying to obliterate these tracks with the most hard to listen to autotune you’ve ever heard. Is this career suicide? Is this Julian telling us to never ask for a Strokes record again like some people online believe? I would think that myself if the instrumentation wasn’t so damn catchy and the lyrical content wasn’t so damn interesting, because aside from the overuse of autotune, which is unfortunately the only thing most people will take away from this record, there are some cool moments, which makes me believe Julian still has faith in “The Strokes.”
The album opens with “Psycho Shit,” a slow building epic that criticizes the current state of politics, modern warfare, world leaders, and celebrities who fail to use their platform to speak out against injustice, and though lyrically topical, the one thing that overpowers the rest of the song is, AUTOTUNE! When I first listened to this track with my family in the room it sounded so bad that my two year old daughter walked away from the speaker, and she’ll dance to the sounds of our fucking washing machine, but after repeated listens I grew accustomed to the autotune, which is the case for the rest of the album. However, being acclimated to this world where Julian sounds like a drunk “Daft Punk” doesn’t necessarily make this song sound better. Instead, the autotune robs us of a powerful vocal performance that could have complimented the intensity of the instrumentation. The autotune isn’t all bad though. It actually works quite well on the track “Lonely in the Future,” but the problem with this song is the God damn lyrics. This is the most bitter Julian has sounded. He disses artists like The Weeknd, Drake, and Harry Styles for copying his style, and instead of seeing the compliment that people being influenced by him is, he goes down the “I did it first” route, but the most embarrassing moment on this track is without a doubt his jab at music critic Anthony Fantano for simply having an opinion on his latest “Voidz” album. This isn’t the scathing diss Julian might have envisioned in his head. It’s just a sign of insecurity. The track “Going Shopping” becomes a catchy tune the more you listen to it, and is a fun critique of consumer culture. The same can be said for the track “Dine N Dash,” which criticizes our society that consumes resources while destroying the environment in the process, and though these are important topics to tackle, especially seeing as how AI is on its way to destroy us, the lyrical content doesn’t make up for how incredibly boring much of these songs are. The deeper you dive into this album, the more you start to realize the autotune isn’t the problem, the real problem is the drab nature of most of these tracks. This album has some good ideas, but most of these ideas are half-baked and have very little replay value.
Say what you will about the band’s divisive body of work, but you gotta admit that it’s impressive that they still have our attention after all these years. Every album release is an event, and we’re sure as Hell going to listen to anything they release, for better or for worse, and given the direction the band went in on this record, especially following their highly successful album The New Abnormal, it’s clear the band are still uncompromisingly doing whatever the Hell they want.
Being a musician trying to make it in this day and age can be a discouraging process. The internet is so over saturated with countless artists trying to get their music out there that it’s easy for one’s music to slip through the cracks. I can attest to that, I’m a musician with 2 monthly listeners on Spotify. This can be disheartening, but the best thing to do is to just keep going. London musician Eaves Wilder experienced this at a very young age. Following the release of her 2023 E.P. Hookey, she considered quitting music altogether, so she stepped back and waited until she found her voice to begin making music again. Now, after a period of writer’s block and an existential crisis, Wilder has returned with her long-awaited debut album Little Miss Sunshine. This album is a prime example of why you shouldn’t rush creativity, because you can tell there was much time and effort put into it. Being more true to herself and her personal music influences, as opposed to succumbing to the pressure of making a hit, Wilder crafts a perfect amalgamation of guitar-driven Alternative Rock, Power Pop melodies, and lush vocals, and this album uncompromisingly drives us through her vulnerability, but all while maintaining a powerful feminist spirit. The track “Just Say No!” highlights the importance of setting boundaries to protect oneself from being taken advantage of, “Mountain Sized” is a self-reflective track that finds Wilder questioning her role or purpose as she tries to navigate young adulthood, and “Ropeburn” is about cutting off toxic people and re-evaluating personal relationships, which all leads to an introspective experience that can resonate with just about anyone, but if this album has an anthem that perfectly summarizes the entire record, it most certainly would be “Everybody Talks.” I haven’t heard a song that perfectly captures the feeling of wanting everyone to shut the fuck up like this one in a very long time, and in a world where people are constantly spewing out their unprovoked opinions and arguing online, this is an important track to hear. It can also be an anthem for introverts. This song takes me back to that lost feeling I had when I was a young introvert trying to navigate life in a society that favors the extroverted. Themes such as these are what makes good genuine music, and if you have the songwriting ability to back it up like Wilder has, your music will move a lot of people. Little Miss Sunshine is an astonishing debut that will resonate with many.
You can always count on a band like “Furrowed Brow” to drop music that knows no bounds, which separates themselves from any of their contemporaries, even the ones that might welcome them with open arms. Why does this work in their favor? Well, they’re uncompromisingly themselves, less worried about building their “brand,” and more focused on exploring their endless wit and inventiveness comprised of sardonicism and commentary on the absurdity of our species. Their new single “The Endless Shouting Tomorrows” delves further into what makes them so enticing without straying into monotony. In fact, this is by far the most concerned the band have sounded viewing modern living through an isolated lens, but in doing this, the band maintain that element of dark humor that’s oh so delicious to feast on. You can listen to “The Endless Shouting Tomorrows” below:
Following their immensely compelling debut album Pleasure Ride, British-American duo “Ready, Steady, Die!” have released a new single titled “Settle,” and this is their first piece of new music in over a year, with more on the horizon. What made their debut album so captivating was the myriad of emotions displayed over darkly angelic production, and the music never strayed into melodrama. Instead, the sentiment showcased was embedded in realism, self-reflection, and at times, uplifting ardor. It’s no surprise that their new single “Settle” walks down that same path, but in a way that isn’t reminiscent of their previous work. Instead it’s an expansion of the unique sound the duo have honed, with a promise of more surprises to come. Speaking on domestic violence, Ready, Steady, Die! aren’t interested in easing us into unsettling realities such as these, instead, the sentiment is clear, but in a way that can uplift those who go through it, as opposed to succumbing to defeat, and as I’ve said countless times, this is honesty that needs to be heard. You can watch the music video for “Settle” below:
There’s a bone I’ve got to pick with major music publications. For awhile now “Rock” and its countless subgenres have been neglected by your favorite cool and contemporary music blogs and publications, and this stems from the misguided belief that “rock is dead.” Now I’m not here to scream “Rock is not dead!” like a character straight out of a Wayne’s World movie, but the negligence that plagues the modern Rock world is more problematic than you think. Rock is not the zeitgeist, and it hasn’t been for over a decade. In fact, the last movement to reach commercial success other than the short-lived Garage Rock Revival scene of the early 2000s was the Nu-Metal movement, and I’m not even going to mention how embarrassing that is. This is problematic because the countless bands in the Rock world whether it be Post-Punk, Alternative Rock, Garage Rock, Punk Rock, Indie Rock etc. aren’t being pushed to the masses enough, and this failure falls on major streaming platforms and their poorly curated playlists, and most contemporary Rock stations whose heaviest or most cutting edge band they play is “Twenty One Pilots.” This unfortunately leads to less exposure. That isn’t to say Rock bands aren’t thriving in the underground. In fact, this gives countless bands the chance to garner a more devoted fan base, which will weed out the trend-hoppers, and the internet is so vast that you can discover as many bands as you want at anytime. I just would like to see more music publications providing a more in depth analysis when covering Rock bands. This has got me thinking that L.A. based duo “Broken Baby’s” new album Late Stage Optimism would have topped the charts had it been released in the 90s or early 2000s. Not that the album is derivative or overly nostalgic, but there was more of a respectful focus on Rock music in those times. However, don’t misconstrue my old man yells at cloud rant about contemporary Rock music as charity or a ploy to get you to feel sorry for Broken Baby and other bands of their like, because Broken Baby are doing just fine with their explosive, fun, thought-provoking, and infectious music. Their sophomore album Late Stage Optimism is their best work by far, and the perfect example of how to correctly combine attitude driven guitar Rock with Pop sensibilities. The Pop elements come from lead singer Amber Bollinger’s catchy as Hell vocals, and I do mean catchy. She has crafted some of the most sing-along-able choruses I’ve heard in a very long time, but along with those catchy hooks lies her sharp and witty lyrical content. These lyrics refuse to stay in one spot, they tackle important topics but the album never gets too bleak or serious, which may be a reflection on how we awkwardly approach touchy topics or try to exit certain conversations with a nervous laugh, and this might be a complete misinterpretation, but I feel like the frequent sense of humor on this album satirizes the try-hards out there who speak out against injustice but freeze up when confronted with the real deal. A track like “Madonna’s a Dick” has no business being that catchy given the fact that it’s about the unfair treatment women face in the entertainment business where they’re sexualized and faced with double standards, but if you want people to listen, sometimes you have to lure them in with straight-forward catchiness. However that sense of humor and sense of fun are far from performative, because it’s evident that the two have a natural sense of humor. Just listen to the opening track “Get the Piss Up” and you’ll know what I mean. The track is a celebration of those moments when you’re having the time of your life dancing and raging with friends. The catchiest track on the album “Manic Panic” has some clever wordplay that inspires me to write better, not to mention the line “Nada Surf with you” on the closing track “Hand Heat” still blows my mind. These multi-faceted lyrics have prompted me to over-analyze, and the journey has been frustrating and immensely enticing, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. Is the track “Meaniac” about men victimizing themselves and labeling women “mean” when they don’t get what they want? Is the track “Cloud Coverage” about escapism and the many vices we use to bury vulnerability? Am I completely misinterpreting these songs? Am I really being over-analytical? All of these questions arise while the music sounds fully-fleshed out with just two primary members, and this is the result of guitarist and backing vocalist Alex Dezen’s eclectic guitar stylings. This is some of the most unique and utterly infectious guitar work I’ve heard on a record in quite a long time. I believe this album will forever remain timeless. Though it has elements of genres that will remind you of an older era, it still manages to sound modern and features topics that will remain relevant for a very long time, and who can deny the addicting personality this album offers? If there’s an album that can get the masses to pay attention to the Rock world it’s this one, and I feel like this is the step in the right direction, but don’t simply lump Broken Baby in a category, because Broken Baby are Broken Baby, and no one else.
MELT REVIEWS 