It’s a freezing Saturday night and the Somerville Theatre is packed. The smell of popcorn fills the air as people rustle the plastic bags. We settle comfortably in our seats, excitement peppering the room in chatter and the occasional laughter. When the lights go dark and the stage is bathed in red lights, the crowd immediately cheers. Opening with “Comfort,” there is an immediate sense of presence from the lone shadow on stage. Alone with her guitar, Julia Jacklin is shamelessly baring her soul to the audience with no trace of hesitation. Jacklin sings nonchalantly, matter-of-fact, recounting in painful detail her own personal experience with heartbreak to a packed audience. Her voice and that simple melody fills the room, finding its way into every nook and cranny, making your heart clench in its chest.

Julia Jacklin performs at Somerville Theatre. Photo by Chris Triunfo for WRBB.

And yet, despite the tears that we blink away after the opener, she has us laughing in our seats, remarking how she feels like she’s about to do Netflix comedy special. The crowd seems to lean forward when she speaks, the energy between her and them something solid and good. “Cold Calling” continues to breaks up the somber mood, its chords making it impossible not to tap your feet or bob your head along. The sounds coming from the instruments are so good that it’s hard to imagine them as anything but a group of friends jamming just because they love the music. The chemistry is like a tangible thing, moving their bodies to and fro as they play.

And then Jacklin sings “Turn Me Down.” The room goes quiet and the lights fall. She is wailing into the mic and we are held captive as the sound grows and grows, the guitar distorting, following her melody. Even listening back to a recording of her set, I get chills during this song. There is something about Jacklin’s eyes when she sings. She is looking at something beyond us as we sing, eyes glassy blue. Her voice swells, and before our eyes she is cracked open, all the heartbreak on display. The silence after her voice echoes through the room is so powerful that we can only sit there, thinking, “Wow. Ok. Oh my god.”

The band takes a break after this as Jacklin banters playfully with the crowd, lending to an intimate atmosphere. She’s charming and witty, fielding silly questions like “What did you eat for breakfast?” with a juvenile smile and funny quips. When the band comes back for “Good Guy,” the energy gets darker, the slow tempo of the bass only sharpening the brutal honesty of the lyrics. “Don’t Know How To Keep Loving You” follows, the sound rougher than its recording and in that sense, more unnerving. She finishes it off with “Pool Party,” it’s joyful sound deceptively masking its tender lyrics: “My heart is heavy when you’re high, so, for me, why won’t you try?” It’s a beautiful sound. 

Julia Jacklin bares her soul to a packed Somerville crowd

On Thursday April 25, PUP kicked off their Morbid Stuff tour at the Royale, packing it to the brim. Unbridled anticipation crackled in the air as the red lights of the stage created a sea of dark silhouettes.

From the get-go, the energy of this show was unparalleled. As the band opened with “Morbid Stuff” and quickly segueing into “Kids,” the crowd was ravenous and crowd-surfing before PUP’s front-man, Stefan Babcock, even introduced them. Early on, he reminisced about their last show in Boston, “at a bar with 150 people. That was cool but this is pretty cool, too.”

There was something incredible about witnessing the beginning of what is PUP’s biggest tour yet. Babcock shared another memory of writing “Dark Days,” in one of their childhood basements and making a pact to one day play a show outside of Toronto. “That was five fucking years ago,” he said. The crowd itself seemed drunk with exhilaration and copious amounts of alcohol, hoisting themselves up to crowd surf to any song, new or old. They found joy in being jerked and pulled down by security, rounding their way around the barriers victoriously before diving back into the mosh pit.

When describing a PUP show, the one word that comes to mind is catharsis. In yelling, throwing beer cans, throwing your entire body against other bodies as the band screams into their microphones with ferocity. The crowd seemingly knew every word, even as they played songs off their newest album, 

and the red lights flashed against the mass of bodies pushing and shoving. The energy was palpable, with drops of sweat pouring down temples and backs and hands rising and falling with the violent percussion. It was a show so effortlessly dynamic that even at the sidelines of the pit one could feel the pulse of excitement and vivacity emanating from the stage. As PUP closed with two of their most famous songs, “If This Tour Doesn’t Kill You, I Will” and “DVP,” I found myself being suffocated front and center of the mosh pit, staring right up at the band and deciding that if this is how I was going to go, it was worth it.

PUP packs the Royale to the brim

 is a refreshing and awe-inspiring experience, a hypnotic inquisition of conviction and self and love.

On her fourth album release, Weyes Blood’s Natalie Mering has given listeners her most ambitious project yet. Aptly titled, 

 is a grand exploration of faith, littered with confessionals as Mering sings about trusting yourself throughout change. Apart from making appearances on folky tracks like “Grey Area” from Jerry Paper’s 2018 album 

, “Honey” from Drugdealer’s 2019 album 

and her folk-synth EP collaboration with Ariel Pink in 2017, this is Weyes Blood’s first project since 2016’s 

 engulfs you in a heavy, drowsy texture, with Mering’s voice acting as a guiding light. On its cover, Mering floats underwater in a childhood bedroom, symbolic of the unconscious. We are submerged with her, watching as her pale face turns to the window. Most tracks can be described as ballads, starting with the opening track “A Lot’s Gonna Change.” Swelling instrumentals rise and fall as Mering pleads the listener to “Try to leave it all behind / In your lifetime.” In “Something to Believe,” she begs for “something bigger and louder than the voices in me” with the same intensity, not shying away from grand moments but rather calling for them. In “Wild Time,” she searches for meaning in these losses, “Let these changes make you more holy and true / Otherwise, it just made it complicated for nothing.” Mering is clearly reaching for something beyond her grasp but struggles to create a sense of wonder, with many chord progressions unfolding predictably.

“Everyday” brings along a much more chipper sound, a medley of psychedelic pop. It could almost be described as a bop with the chorus’ layered melodies and “ba pa pa’s” like a Beatles song. “Picture Me Better” gives listeners a more classical sound, still filled with lyrics that show Mering’s yearning for significance. A violin accompanies a soft guitar as she sings, “Waiting for something with meaning / To come through soon.”

“Titanic Rising” is one of two instrumental tracks on the album, inducing the listener into a dream state and leading them to “Movies,” one of the album’s strongest tracks. In its music video, Mering’s body floats in a deep, dark pool, the white fabric of her dress tangling in the water. Her voice is soft even as it reaches majestic heights, following the ceaseless arpeggiated chords and warm muffled synthesizers that submerge us in that deep bottomless pool. This track is only rivaled in magnificence by “Andromeda,” her first single, co-produced by Foxygen’s Jonathan Rado. Slide guitars accompany an organ as Mering sings, “Love is calling / It’s time to give to you / Something you can hold onto / I dare you to try.” So rich in desperation, one can’t help but get chills.

The continuous melodies of the tracks echo the likes of Father John Misty, but despite its grandeur, 

 at times falls flat. It presents itself with no mystery, no unexpected twists or turns. From the first track, there is no sense of wonder. There are times when the melody rushes to catch up with the lyrics, bending its form to fit the words. Mering’s voice is astoundingly beautiful, which is how she manages to pull it off– but at times, she uses it as a crutch, making a song forgettable. Nevertheless, the strengths outweigh the weaknesses. 

This is Weyes Blood’s year: ‘Titanic Rising’ Review

The weird charisma of Luke Temple along with Lenker’s genuine and quaint musings added up to a show meant to be experienced in its raw form: two incredibly talented musicians on a stage, no fanfare, no bullshit.

When Adrianne Lenker stepped on stage at The Sinclair, she was instantly bathed in blue lights and greeted eagerly by the crowd. The room was filled to the brim and everyone seemed antsy to hear her sing after a long wait following the opener. Opening for Lenker was Luke Temple, a close friend of hers. He greeted us in a dad cap and plain blue shirt, claiming Boston as his hometown. Playing the guitar as an extension of himself and with his voice following its melodies with precision, it was clear he shared Lenker’s affinity for detailed storytelling through his songs.

Like Temple, Lenker is all about simplicity. She greeted the audience in a quiet tone and asked: “Where are we? Boston? No, Cambridge. Earth…we think?” before launching into “Mary,” from the 2017 Big Thief album 

. If Luke eased us into the sadness, Adrianne left us steeping in it. Eventually, Temple joined her onstage to perform several tracks from their album 

is a collection of songs written both years ago and days before they began recording. Lenker has time and time again expressed how precious it’s been to produce music and tour with Temple; there is no denying that together, they make beautiful music. Even as they played, their guitars raced each other, almost like they were in their own world, two parallel melodies rising and falling together.

A large part of any concert is how the artist interacts with the audience. Sometimes, artists simply introduce the song they’re about to play, share a personal story or a connection to the city they’re playing in. To a packed room, Adrianne Lenker tuned her guitar relentlessly, refusing to settle for something that might sound out of tune. Even when the silence stretched on awkwardly, Lenker tuned on. The crowd was patient, and apart for some back and forth between Temple and a fan, silent. All that time, Lenker plucked at the strings of her guitar, head cocked to the side, tweaking the tuning pegs in tiny increments. When Lenker spoke to the audience, it was peculiar but precious. At one point, she just smiled at the crowd, said “I’m here… hello,” and the crowd cheered. They adored her.

The weird charisma of Luke Temple along with the genuine and Lenker’s genuine and quaint musings added up to a show meant to be experienced in its raw form: two incredibly talented musicians on a stage, no fanfare, no bullshit. However, given the deep impression that 

 leaves on a listener, the concert felt somewhat disconnected from the same intensity of the album. At times, Lenker was magical to watch and we stood transfixed as the sounds of her voice and her guitar washed over us, but it almost felt like she was holding back and suspending us before a steep precipice.

Near the end of the concert, as she tuned her guitar once more, she turned to the audience and said in a sweet voice that she was having an existential crisis. Then, she launched into a monologue that seemed to surprise her as much as it did us: “I just feel, almost as much as there’s all the chaos and destruction, there’s also this thing invisibly connecting us and we see someone hurt and we feel hurt and we see someone alive and we feel alive and we are each other.” The concert may not have evoked the depth of emotion of 

 but in that moment, the connection to Lenker felt palpable and it was a delightful surprise to have shared this incredibly special and unexpected moment with her.

Adrienne Lenker gives The Sinclair a raw, melancholic performance

“This is a song about getting really wasted,” Greg Gonzalez, lead frontman and founder of Cigarettes After Sex told the crowd at Paradise Rock Club before the familiar notes of ‘Affection’ filled the room. For a first time listener, it may be hard to imagine any Cigarettes After Sex song sounding distinct enough to identify from the first bars, and yet the crowd surged forward with recognition, clapping and waving their hands in excitement.

Earlier that night, the band had emerged from behind a haze of white smoke, clad in all black, beer bottles held loosely in their hands. Opening with Truly, their demeanor matched their tempo, unhurried and unbothered. After Gonzalez had finished crooning “I just want to keep on loving you,” the last notes of their REO Speedwagon “Keep On Loving You” cover fading into the dark stage, he muttered a few words of greeting. Whatever those were. bland and nondescript, were immediately swallowed by the ambient noise of the room.

Cigarettes After Sex is not a band that would seek to interact with their audience any more than they’d seek to diversify their sound. Instead, they played song after dreamy song, wrapping us all in a cloud of dry ice and melancholy. This was a show for swayers and couples, with soft blue accents occasionally disrupting the mostly monochromatic lighting scheme. The difference between each song was virtually non-existent, but maybe that’s why we all stood rapt with attention. They’re one of the few bands who get away with the great crime that is a homogenous sound. Even though the subject matter may rarely change from love and sex, with lyrics as simple as “Know you don’t really need to be in love to make love to me” and repetitive chords, every person there didn’t dare look away, but strained forward instead, as if you’d miss something if you didn’t listen closely enough.

Even once they moved on to the most popular songs (‘Opera House,’ ‘Sweet’ and ‘Nothing’s Gonna Hurt You Baby’) there was no change in attitude from the black-clad figures on stage. The crowd continued to gushed along, moving back and forth to the unrelenting, minimalist drum beat. The band closed with ‘Apocalypse,’ whose slow melody somehow managed to echo the deepest heartbreak you’ve felt, with every guitar strum like a agonizing exercise in nostalgia.

Cigarettes After Sex’s discography is sorely limited: an EP was released in 2012 featuring ‘Nothing’s Gonna Hurt You Baby,’ a sultry lullaby that set precedence for their trademark sound and still continues to be their most popular song, followed by a 2017 self-titled album. That adds up to a scant sixteen tracks to their name. Their show won’t blow your socks off, and you’ll never catch a band member doing anything more than swaying on stage and performing with their eyes closed, yet, we all stood that night, transfixed, suspended from reality, and submerged in a romantic trance.

Cigarettes After Sex @ Paradise Rock Club

It’s been five years since the release of ‘Riptide’, the first single from Vance Joy’s debut EP, 

 and one of Joy’s greatest hits, both commercially and critically. With its infectious melody and clever lyrics, it peaked at 30 in Billboard’s’ Top 100 and has more than 500 million listens on Spotify. Since then, Joy released an album in 2014 titled, 

 that received generally positive reviews, with Jaymz Clements from Rolling Stone Australia taking note that “there’s more to Vance Joy than ‘Riptide.’” Things looked good for Joy, but that was before he chose to release a third album, titled 

 opens with ‘Call If You Need Me,’ which shows Joy’s trademark vocal range and guitar strumming. It’s a good song, but not really anything to write home about. ‘Lay It On Me’ comes next, with much of the same but with trumpets in the chorus to add some pizzazz. Again, not bad. They’re fun songs but forgettable, sounding more like second hand Lumineer songs than anything else. And then Joy hits us with his third track, “We’re Going Home,” where he takes a different direction– more boy-band than campy–still with the same dull outcome: a few vocal highlights paired with lyrics only slightly smarter than what an AI would write if you fed it One Direction songs.

The rest of the album follows this pattern: Joy brings in the guitar strumming, the tambourines, a solid and interesting vocal range and pairs them with lyrics that belong in a Hallmark card. ‘I’m With You’ is one of the few that strays from this album’s desire to be the soundtrack to a feel-good coming-of-age film. The chorus hints at some of his old melodies and despite the very basic lyrics, it could be the lack of the tambourine and indie try-hard sound that makes it stand out. But, we go back to the same old sound with ‘Like Gold,’ ‘Alone With Me,’ ‘Crashing Into You,’ etc. You get the picture.

‘Little Boy’ is one of the few tracks that is not about romance, but rather about a father-son relationship, presumably Joy’s with his father. Joy doesn’t particularly stretch himself with the cleverness of his lyrics but unlike his other generalized love songs, the personal story that they reveal allows him to sing “I’ll always be that little boy” without sounding (that) cringy.

One of the aspects that gained Joy critical praise in the past was his clever use of pop culture references, and in ‘Bonnie and Clyde’ Joy attempts to make those once again but falls flat. The song starts off as a very literal description of coming out of the cinema in the morning after watching a movie about Bonnie and Clyde and then: “So we might as well say / What’s on our minds / ‘Cause there’s no waiting, no / When it’s your time to go.” It’s about being honest since you don’t know when everything will end, but then it takes a turn and becomes a song about leaving your sins behind: “Don’t matter where you’ve been / You jump into the water and you’ll come out clean.” Whether this is a song about relationships or life, I couldn’t say but either way, it’s a miss.

Vance Joy is not a one-hit wonder, nor is this album some kind of god-awful campy nightmare. Some of the songs grow on you after a couple listens and at the end of the day, Joy is a talented musician and if his genre is your cup of tea, I don’t see why you’d avoid his music. But it does feel somewhat stagnant, lacking any real depth or emotion. If only the lyrics weren’t so basic, the melodies weren’t so repetitive. If only it seemed like Joy was making any effort to do something different. But as long as Joy remains in his comfort zone, his most popular tracks will continue to be from an album he released years ago.

When I think of this album, I think of ‘Alone With Me,’ one of the slower tracks containing the lyrics “Here I am saying things to you” and “Here we are I’m doing things with you.” Well, here I am Vance Joy, already forgetting this album.

 is like a five-dollar heart-shaped box of chocolates: a nice gift but after the initial excitement wears off, it’s just a box of cheap chocolate you’ll leave on the kitchen table for a week until your roommate throws them away.

Vance Joy releases full-length ‘Nation of Two’

Northeastern student and budding artist Sidney Gish’s second album, 

is all about what comes after the coming-of-age: When you are just a “20 something” and all the allotted life-changing milestones seem have to flown by, but you still have no idea where you’re going or what you’re doing or how to even be.

None of this is so strongly evoked as in ‘Mouth Log,’ one of the darker tracks with lines like, “Just like a hate-watched series, I catalog life dearly, dreary how-tos on half-assed self abuse” and “I’m kinda pissed if this is the real me.” And then in ‘Imposter Syndrome’: “What’s a way to just be competent, every other day I’m wondering, was it a mistake to try and define, what I’m certain’s mad incompetence.” It’s an exuberant exercise in self-deprecation and self-examination.

Opening track ‘Bird Tutorial’ sets an eccentric and instrument-heavy vibe for the rest of the album, as Gish overlays a recording about teaching a parakeet to talk with a campy guitar melody and a tambourine, two sounds that appear relentlessly in the rest of the album. The acoustic tunes make it hard to listen without tapping your feet or bobbing your head, which remains true for all other songs. ‘Good Magicians’ and ‘Where the Sidewalk Ends’ are examples of Gish relying less on the depth of her lyrics and more on her vocal and instrumental range. As a solo artist, she’s put together a sound that is genuinely fresh but at a first listen, the tracks seem to blend together. It’s after several listens that the sounds become more distinguished so in this sense, there is still room for her to experiment with different beats.

Gish’s awkward comedic humor finds its way into her music, specifically in songs like ‘Persephone’ where she mispronounces Persephone in a myriad of ways, but always with a stubborn commitment to her character: “But I’ll mispronounce and mis-accent for infinity, there isn’t much that you could do to stop me.” Or like in her dreamy ‘

’ where she serenades her pet rabbit with plenty of ooo’s.

But beyond the feel-good vibes and the exuberant instrumental arrangement, Gish manages to transmit so much feeling through her lyrics, that are almost always a clever play on words or making unusual references. When reviewing her first album, 

, Gold Flake Paint’s Trevor Elkin put it as songs that “prod at those nerves in your stomach that toughened up over the years, until you feel like you’re back in class, not knowing the answer and everyone is staring at you.” Funny and sad, there is no shying away from any unsatisfactory reality, whether it be isolating yourself from your crush or identifying as 97% hikikomori.

In ‘Rat of the City,’ with her bittersweet tunes and dreamy blending of vocal layers, Gish captures the frustrating, doubt-inducing journey that is finding your individual self among the masses. This sentiment is emphasized on as Gish croons over and over again, “I don’t know who I am, I don’t know what to do but I’m not a lot like you.”

The samples Gish uses throughout the album are seemingly straightforward, but within the context of the album they manage to resonate more deeply like in ‘Sin Triangle,’ “Did you ever want, so much, to make a good impression on someone? What did you do? How accepted was your personality? Did you ever feel alone? Out of place, when you wanted very much to be part of the group? What did you do?” There is something about the simplicity that packs a punch.

What Gish does best though, is putting into words the downright depressing, painfully cringy situations that come with being a young adult, the very real process of figuring out how to be a person and where you fit in in all this mess, without sounding like an overly dramatic thirteen year old. Gish spends much of the album grappling with “these sweet instincts” and their life-ruining tendencies. But if these are the instincts that led to 

Sidney Gish releases full-length ‘No Dogs Allowed’

What started as a home-recording project in 1995 turned into indie-rock band, Destroyer has been busy producing and making music since its inception. In the last twenty or so years, Destroyer has become a big name in the New Romantic genre, perhaps because they strive to change and transform with every release, or as frontman Dan Bejar put it, “to start from scratch every time.” To describe the process of making the new album, 

 with one question: “How could a decrepit-sounding voice sing in a dark, New Romantic world?”

 in its own eccentric way, manages to answer this question, and does it with variety. An album where songs like the brooding, dark and synthetic ‘A Light Travels Down the Catwalk,’ and the upbeat and campy ‘Cover from the Sun’ can coexist neatly is not an easy feat.

The album’s opener, ‘Sky’s Grey,’ starts with a quiet urgency. The juxtaposition between an anxiety-inducing drumbeat and Bejar’s deep voice is almost unsettling, but as the song progresses and you get a guitar and a keyboard, the sound comes together, and the song finds its best form. The first seven times I listened to this song, with Bejar’s voice reverberating about Oliver Twist in my ears like a broken record, I couldn’t wait for it to be over. And then, on the eighth listen, the weirdest thing happened: I stopped and asked myself, “Is it possible I am enjoying this song?”

 is a weird album, in the sense that you have to go into it seeing it as an investment. You have to give the songs a couple listens, and come back to them over time, and somehow, they’ll go from sounding like a bunch of meaningless monotone melodies to unusual and almost mysterious arrangements. The more you learn about each song, the more interesting they become.

Take ‘In The Morning,’ the second song in the album and one of the few tracks that’s on the more upbeat side. At first, it evokes such strong ’80s vibes, I can’t help but imagine this as the soundtrack to a slightly darker 

. Its lyrics are almost cryptic but its theme about an inevitable end is clear: “You wanted it to be good / Yeah you thought that it would be ok / A death star in bloom / Another thought in the incinerator.” It turns out this song is about bands coming to an end. Bejar himself described the song as him saying, “Hey bands, you should embrace this dance with death. Don’t fool yourselves. You will be gone soon.” That’s why it goes, “Bands sing their songs and then disappear 

When it comes to the lyrics, there are two types that are pretty concurrent throughout. On one hand, they point at an unknown fictional character. ‘Sky’s Grey’ paints the scene of someone toiling away in the arts: “Give up acting? Fuck no! / I’m just starting to get the good parts [..] I’ve been working on the Oliver Twist,” and ‘Ivory Coast’ is narrated by “miserable pirates — the down-and-out, sad mercenary,” according to Bejar. On the other hand, there’s the direct lyrics, the ones that are talking to the listener, whether they be advice (“Stay lost / It’s an illusion / Being alone’s an illusion”) or stating a reality (“Sometimes in the world the thing that you love dies / And you cry and you cry and cry / Sometimes in the world you turn your back on it”). This proves Destroyer’s strong ability to craft lyrics that at first seem superficial, but paired with the synthetic sound of 

So will you enjoy this album? Well, do you like New Romantic? Have you been following Destroyer since their earlier albums, at the very least 2015’s 

? If the answer is no, do you have time to give this album several listens? If so, then this could potentially be a genuinely good listening experience. I really believe that this is an album where you have to earn your appreciation for it. The first time I gave it a listen, I couldn’t believe how dull the experience was, mostly because it got so many raving reviews. 

 called Bejar “one of the most evocative songwriters of his generation,” and then 

 called him “the smartest and possibly drunkest guest at the party.” Which makes me think, maybe I was supposed to listen to this album drunk. Regardless, if you stick with it, invest your time and ears, these headlines will make sense, and 

 by Destroyer will be a good time, no alcohol required.

Catalina Berretta