A couple few years back, a close friend of mine, who resides in the Pacific Northwest and shares many of the same musical tastes and sensibilities that I have, brought an old idea to the table. He suggested we revive and reconfigure a record club of sorts. The idea, at its core, is relatively basic: Each month, we send each other an LP that we think the other would enjoy. Given how our tastes align, chances are better than good that we’d come up with something the other person would not only dig, but hopefully had never heard prior. In November 2015, he (unsurprisingly) managed to nail it when he sent me the second full length, “Suitcase,” from Seattle-based trio Wimps.
Wimps’ particular brand of off-kilter garage punk is refined further still on this month’s release, “Garbage People,” which is their follow-up to that album. Refined might be overstating it, but Rachel Ratner (guitars & lead vocal), Matt Nyce (bass), and Dave Ramm (drums) return with a perfect follow-up of jagged punk and lyrical snark, a style that has become somewhat indicative of their output. Their ability to convey and jab at the mundane but prescient frustrations in everyday life is so ridiculously spot on. The record manages to speak directly to the listener, or at least a listener of my age and relative position in life. I cannot recall an album that has done this as thoroughly and pointedly, again and again, track after track. At the very moment when you question whether they can get to this point any better or more succinctly, they top themselves in an instant. Truly. From track six, “Procrastination,” right up to closer “Insomnia,” I get the sense this record was written just for me. Thankfully, the rest of you can enjoy it as well.
“Garbage People” is available Friday, July 13, via Kill Rock Stars as a digital download (your choice of high quality MP3, FLAC and more), on compact disc, on cassette tape on a chrome-plus with a green shell, and on vinyl in a standard black colorway. Limited edition green vinyl is available, while supplies last, if you buy direct from the label. Super limited edition bundles are available if ordering from the band via their Bandcamp, and include an autographed green LP, a new t-shirt designed by Craig Gleason, and a “Friends with Pony Time” Japan tour CD.
Recommended for fans of classic punk such as The Slits, The Raincoats, X-Ray Spex, The Adverts, or Gang of Four, and moments of the fringe in art punk of bands such as Mclusky or The Coathangers.
— Jon E. Lynch[email protected]
